I want to assure you guys that I am working on that video. I've made two so far, one had major audio problems and once my computer crashed while the video was rendering. I am going to try again today, sorry for the delays.

I'd like to apologize to everyone for the lack of updates and videos lately. I was traveling almost constantly throughout December and January and it didn't go very well to say the least. The combination of the live tournaments, staking, and not doing well online all at the same time was hard on me. I didn't want to be coaching and producing videos when I felt like I wasn't on top of my game.

In February I decided I would only grind 5/10 for a month and try to get going back in the right direction. It went very well and I have been back in the 10/20 and 25/50 games now in March which feels good.

Around half of my volume in the last few months has been at PLO. I'm very interested in it and I enjoy playing it. PLO allows you to select more games, and more importantly it helps me play more hands because when I am tired of an NL session I can switch to PLO and it feels like I'm just starting again.

I really want to get my Regulators series going again. I'm sorry that I left you all hanging after episode 1. I will produce a video today and send it in given that all of my hardware works.

Hope you're all doing well.

I always made good grades on my papers in school (when I actually did them). I think it was more the product of other people being terrible writers more than it was me being a good one. I remember anytime I could catch a glimpse of someones paper I'd try to read it over, and it would almost always end in a "what the fuck?" look on my face. Luckily that part of my life is over aside from a slim chance of going to grad school someday and I don't have to worry about those things anymore. I can just write as I see fit. This blog is pretty unorganized as it is and I like it better that way.

The first thing on my mind is a poker rule I have come to understand this past year better than ever before. It's a rule called playing within your roll. Different people have different standards for this and different tolerances for losing money. Everyday that I play now I am pleasantly reminded of my -75k night from October which was a significant downswing for me at the time, not to mention a 1 nights loss. How could that be pleasant to be reminded of your worst session?

It's pleasant because when I play my grind stakes (1k-5k NL) I feel so comfortable with the swings. I feel like I can't be tilted by the daily fluctuations. Many times during my average session I experience 10k-20k fluctuations, and after that 75k experience they just don't bother me anymore. Even though the 75k thing was awful for me, it is something that has to happen for me to grow as a player.

The other night we had eleven 2kNL games running on Full Tilt. I took two 4k coolers and lost a reg stack within about 5 minutes of each other for a 10k loss. I know that Ben from the beginning of the year would've been at least agitated and that he might've quit one of the best sessioning opportunities of the entire year, but I was completely unphased by the situation and actually felt happy when I realized how little I cared about the loss. I think controlled shots are great and I hope to see myself taking another one soon, and I know I will be better prepared for it each time. But I think that I will be moving up a little slower and have tighter roll requirements for myself to better stay within my roll.

Moving on...

Sunday is tournament grind day. Most Sundays for me end in 1 of 2 ways. These are not mutually exclusive. 1 Is me running my angst out on the treadmill. A viable strategy for sure. 2 (and my preferred method) is emo Heroes of Newerth games where I tilt feed and tell Alex he can't pick certain heroes. This last Sunday was finally an exception. As I began to start thinking about what hero I wanted to pick in our first game I won a flip in the 220 person 50r PCA qualifier (2 seats granted). I had some chips now and continued single tabling. A few big hands later I found myself chip leading with 60 people left. The field was soft and I was able to continue running good, coming into the FT with a nice chiplead and eventually winning the seat. Although I made some big satellite ICM mistakes at the end I ran good enough and others made even bigger ICM mistakes and it worked out. So I won my 10k ME seat, 9 days in the hotel (thats like 3k), and 1k spending cash. An awesome result from a 50r and my last tournament of the day, especially a week out from PCA with no living arrangements.

I also want to mention the Regulators series. Vid 1 went over well with everybody and I want to get part 2 out soon, but like most of you I am travelling all over the place for holidays, tournaments etc. The other issue being that I don't have a working Camtasia client for my mac (is it possible to use camtasia on my MAC? help much appreciated.) I am v busy and even heading over to Biloxi for the WPT event there right after I leave PCA, and then snow skiing with my family after that, but I am sure I could find time to get the video done if I can sort my software out and I will be working to get it to you guys.

Well that's all I have for now, if you made it this far I'm impressed.

Take care,

Ben

After a much needed Thanksgiving break I am feeling a lot better about everything. I went home for a whole week and just took it easy, ate a lot of good food, and played a ton of hands on my MacBook which tends to run way hotter than my PC. I played a ton of 7-game and PLO as well as a lot HUNL. I feel like my NL game is back on track and I've always done really well in PLO, although I think that I have almost certainly just run hot there. I requested my HHs from the sites I played on so I can review my PLO play and try to find out since I have no HEM on my Mac. I'm interested to review my 7-game results as well. I feel like I do very well in NL and PLO, that I can hold my own in razz, O8, and stud hi, but that I bleed money in stud8 and LHE. My friend Jimmy (gobboboy) has been teaching me and he's pretty pro at those.

Jimmy is also housing my for my Vegas trip for 5-diamond classic which I am leaving for next week. I'll be playing a 5k, a 1k rebuy, and the 15k main as well as much live cash as I feel up for. I'm looking to sell action on this ~25k package of touranments so if anyone is interested PM me. I'm selling at a 20% mark up.

I owe Leggo a video and it's up on my to-do list to start my Regulators series. I should be getting one out before I leave for Vegas.

Hope you're all doing well,

Ben


edit: bellagio ninjaed their schedule to be 5k, 1k rebuy and 15k

I'm sitting here at my desk 1-tabling the FTOPs 2-day event after another pretty terrible day. 25k below EV and getting yet another 8th place finish in a pretty damn large tournament (Stars 320 morning tourney). Really jaded by everything right now. Ever since my -75k session at 50/100 against CADX2 it seems like I just can't book two wins in a row. I keep getting myself up, trying to go through a positive routine of running and eating healthy before my sessions, and still it feels like every session I play is the same. I would estimate 12 of my last 14 long sessions have gone this way.

I've also come in 10th, 10th, 7th, and 8th in the last 2-3 weeks in tournaments that paid between 40k-90k for first, and like 4-14k for whatever place I ended up getting. I know everyone thinks they run bad in tournaments, but I literally never get to close it out for the big money, I just lose whatever the all-in situation may be, and end up booking another 9th or whatever.

I think the best thing for the moment would be a nice break or vacation but I might have to wait until after Sunday just because it is an FTOPs Sunday. I'm looking forward to going home and seeing my family for Thanksgiving and my mom's birthday. That should be refreshing. When I start feeling better and doing better I'll get back on the video producing. Hope you're all doing better than I am.

Later,

Ben

This month has been the highest variance month of my career. I was up 66K after 13K hands, then down 56K after 34K hands. When I hit the bottom of that ~112K downswing (wow I just realized it was that big) I just set a goal to try to score a positive on the month. To just keep playing and dig out of it. Well now I am sitting here looking at my HEM and I'm somehow +$6341 and 10 cents on the month after 41K hands and it's only October 18th. I'd like to see myself grind hard at 5/10 and 10/20 and some 25/50, but stay off the 40/80 and 50/100 a little longer. The swings of those games are just incredible.

If you guys know depression dog I made a bunch of poker related ones when I was bored. As seen in the MSNL regs thread:











Now for the important part of the post. I decided to do an NL400 6max series that I'm going to start working on this week. It's called Regulators. I'm going to sit in the reggiest of games that I can and try to tangle with them and explain what I am thinking. I also noticed that I tend to say stuff like "umm, like, and uh" repeatedly and I will make sure I stop doing that. Some people requested 5/10, some people requested 1/2, so I decided to go with 2/4. So be on the look out for these.

Take care everybody,

Ben

About half a year ago I made a blog post thinking I was potentially going to have a 6 figure month. Right when I mentioned thinking I could make it I had a downswing and was quickly humbled. I learned my lesson about speaking too soon. I am happy to say I made it in September for the first time ever. Huge thanks to Goggles for everything, especially chilling me out during all of those rough 25/50 sessions.

I have a really, really good 2/4 deep ante video coming out. It is my favorite video I've ever made. I completely butchered the sound on it because thats what I do, but I am going to re-record the audio and try to get it sent in ASAP.

I don't gamble much outside of cards but I have two fantasy football leagues. A 1K MSNL league in which my team is in critical condition but hanging on at 1-2, and then a $300 league with friends in which my team is the stone cold nuts at 3-0. I'd really like to break even between the leagues, I really didn't think I was a fish, but it's becoming painfully obvious that I am. Anyways if anyone offers fantasy coaching hit me up =)


Heres the September HEM shot. I refuse to post a graph at this point in time. If you've ever spoken to me for any period of time, I am the last person you would ever expect to believe in any sort of luck or magic, but I'll be damned if I've ever posted a graph and not been insta doomswitched. And I feel like everyone else I've ever seen post a graph has had the same treatment. It's the only super irrational/illogical thing I believe in.

I just got to Pittsburgh on Wednesday. Goggles' place is really nice. In my first tournament I played I got 9th out of 755 in a 100r on Stars. I didn't really get any money and was kind of bummed, but I am confident that eventually I'll stop getting 10th-20th in big tournaments and start making some real money there.

We picked up Steelers tickets for the season opener next Thursday. Goggles has class all day (he's back in college now), so I'm going to go to campus with him and check out everything and then play a session with our friend Kyle while Luke is in class. After my session he's going to swing by and pick me up and then off to the game. We're on the 50 yard line on the lower deck, and I think pretty close. I'm excited about it because I have never been to an NFL game before.

I think I'm playing really well right now. Being a full time pro has been nice because poker is my only big responsibility. It's also changed the way I behave during my sessions now. Everything seems more real, I'm actually withdrawing this money to pay bills. I've caught myself table selecting 5/10 and even 3/6 a bit when the 10/20 games are meh. I think the bills hanging over my head are making me a better "professional". I struggled throughout August with not playing my best but I think I've turned it around and have put in a ton of hands since I got to Luke's.

I'll be playing almost all of the WCOOPs and logging a ton of hands, I'll still be doing videos and still coaching all of my students while I'm out here. The coaching has also gone really well, a couple of my students have had solid upswings and have sounded really confident in the last few weeks which makes me feel really good.

That's all I've got for now, take care.

Had a really frustrating time trying to play a 25/50 session today. I lost about 40k on the day so far which would change if I cash the FTOPs 2 day event. I guess it's only 7 buy-ins but certainly a lot more than I'm used to losing in a day. I know I was playing too many tables, which is something I keep doing to myself and I don't know why, but I still feel like it was just cash game variance more than anything.

These all are the bulk of my losses. Everyone is 3betting so much that I was putting a lot of emphasis on myself having a balanced 4-betting range. The only one I think is close is the SamH AQ hand and it seemed fine to me because he was 3-betting over 35% during our short HU match.


***** Hand History for Game 31673628936 ***** (Poker Stars)
$5000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, August 15, 06:29:25 ET 2009
Table Adeona (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: Ben86 ( $6198.00 USD )
Seat 2: samh133 ( $7695.00 USD )
Ben86 posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
samh133 posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Ben86 [ Qs Ah ]
Ben86 raises [$125.00 USD]
samh133 raises [$500.00 USD]
Ben86 raises [$1000.00 USD]
samh133 raises [$7145.00 USD]
Ben86 calls [$5048.00 USD]
samh133 wins $1497.00 USD
** Dealing Flop ** [ Qh, 4s, Kh ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 9h ]
** Dealing River ** [ 2c ]
samh133 shows [Ks, Ac ]
Ben86 shows [Qs, Ah ]
samh133 wins $12395.00 USD from main pot


***** Hand History for Game 31672049659 ***** (Poker Stars)
$5000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, August 15, 05:39:38 ET 2009
Table Siarnaq IV (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: nasud 11 ( $10322.00 USD )
Seat 2: RaSZi ( $12287.00 USD )
Seat 3: Domce ( $5062.00 USD )
Seat 4: samh133 ( $10324.00 USD )
Seat 5: Ben86 ( $5722.00 USD )
Seat 6: A. Allemann ( $12586.00 USD )
RaSZi posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
Domce posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Ben86 [ Th Td ]
samh133 folds
Ben86 raises [$150.00 USD]
A. Allemann raises [$500.00 USD]
nasud 11 folds
RaSZi folds
Domce folds
Ben86 raises [$1000.00 USD]
A. Allemann raises [$12086.00 USD]
Ben86 calls [$4572.00 USD]
A. Allemann wins $6864.00 USD
** Dealing Flop ** [ 3s, 9s, 9c ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Jc ]
** Dealing River ** [ Ad ]
Ben86 shows [Th, Td ]
A. Allemann shows [Qh, Qs ]
A. Allemann wins $11516.00 USD from main pot


***** Hand History for Game 31673129197 ***** (Poker Stars)
$5000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, August 15, 06:13:49 ET 2009
Table Adeona (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: Ben86 ( $5973.00 USD )
Seat 2: samh133 ( $8146.00 USD )
Seat 4: Marccus85 ( $5572.00 USD )
Seat 5: katfish21 ( $5075.00 USD )
samh133 posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
Marccus85 posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Ben86 [ Jc Jh ]
katfish21 folds
Ben86 raises [$100.00 USD]
samh133 folds
Marccus85 raises [$375.00 USD]
Ben86 raises [$1000.00 USD]
Marccus85 raises [$5147.00 USD]
Ben86 calls [$4472.00 USD]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 7d, 9d, 7s ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Qh ]
** Dealing River ** [ Kc ]
Marccus85 shows [Kh, Ks ]
Ben86 shows [Jc, Jh ]
Marccus85 wins $11167.00 USD from main pot


***** Hand History for Game 31673110857 ***** (Poker Stars)
$5000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, August 15, 06:13:15 ET 2009
Table Juewa VI (Real Money)
Seat 6 is the button
Seat 1: RaSZi ( $5025.00 USD )
Seat 2: A. Allemann ( $13293.00 USD )
Seat 3: Ben86 ( $5400.00 USD )
Seat 4: ~diQ~ ( $697.00 USD )
Seat 5: Domce ( $11683.00 USD )
Seat 6: NegroVente1 ( $6994.00 USD )
RaSZi posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
A. Allemann posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Ben86 [ Qd Qc ]
Ben86 raises [$150.00 USD]
~diQ~ folds
Domce raises [$550.00 USD]
NegroVente1 folds
RaSZi folds
A. Allemann folds
Ben86 raises [$1050.00 USD]
Domce raises [$11133.00 USD]
Ben86 calls [$4200.00 USD]
Domce wins $6283.00 USD
** Dealing Flop ** [ 5h, 7s, 2h ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 3h ]
** Dealing River ** [ 7h ]
Ben86 shows [Qd, Qc ]
Domce shows [As, Ah ]
Domce wins $10872.00 USD from main pot


***** Hand History for Game 31670939213 ***** (Poker Stars)
$5000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, August 15, 05:06:17 ET 2009
Table Siarnaq IV (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: nasud 11 ( $10721.00 USD )
Seat 2: RaSZi ( $5100.00 USD )
Seat 3: tjbentham ( $4775.00 USD )
Seat 4: samh133 ( $6716.00 USD )
Seat 5: Ben86 ( $5000.00 USD )
Seat 6: A. Allemann ( $13642.00 USD )
RaSZi posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
tjbentham posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Ben86 [ Kc Kd ]
samh133 folds
Ben86 raises [$150.00 USD]
A. Allemann raises [$500.00 USD]
nasud 11 raises [$1400.00 USD]
RaSZi folds
tjbentham folds
Ben86 raises [$4850.00 USD]
A. Allemann folds
nasud 11 calls [$3600.00 USD]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 9d, Tc, 6c ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Ad ]
** Dealing River ** [ 7d ]
Ben86 shows [Kc, Kd ]
nasud 11 shows [Ac, As ]
nasud 11 wins $10572.00 USD from main pot


***** Hand History for Game 31670575017 ***** (Poker Stars)
$5000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, August 15, 04:54:15 ET 2009
Table Siarnaq IV (Real Money)
Seat 4 is the button
Seat 1: nasud 11 ( $10690.00 USD )
Seat 2: RaSZi ( $5000.00 USD )
Seat 3: the_blues57 ( $6072.00 USD )
Seat 4: samh133 ( $6497.00 USD )
Seat 5: Ben86 ( $5000.00 USD )
Seat 6: A. Allemann ( $8522.00 USD )
Ben86 posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
A. Allemann posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Ben86 [ Th Td ]
nasud 11 folds
RaSZi folds
the_blues57 folds
samh133 folds
Ben86 raises [$125.00 USD]
A. Allemann raises [$450.00 USD]
Ben86 raises [$1000.00 USD]
A. Allemann raises [$8022.00 USD]
Ben86 calls [$3850.00 USD]
A. Allemann wins $3522.00 USD
** Dealing Flop ** [ Kh, Jd, 8s ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 5h ]
** Dealing River ** [ Js ]
Ben86 shows [Th, Td ]
A. Allemann shows [Ad, Ac ]
A. Allemann wins $9997.00 USD from main pot

I'm not very good with keeping up with this thing. Overall things are going well. The summer was really long in Vegas and I'm glad to be home. As soon as I got home I got horrible food poisoning and was out of commission for like 3 days. It was truly miserable, now that it's over I am attacking my goal of 70k hands this month. So far I have like a bit over 15k played and am running very well (knock knock).

I have a video coming out, it is me playing 2 tables of heads up nl200 against my friend Kyle Rowe (TheAlphaMale626) I think on both sites. I think it went well. I have also taken on 2 students since I've been home who wanted to remain anonymous and I respect that. I also have two more potential ones in the works. Sometimes I enjoy doing it, sometimes I don't, but I think overall adding the structure to my life is good, I mean just having something to show up for. Also when I am coaching them I feel like it makes me double check my thought processes and think more about why I'm telling something, not allowing my brain to auto pilot.

I'm looking forward to the rest of FTOPs because I enjoy the pain. In September I'm flying out to Pittsburgh to hang with Goggles and win a WCOOPs on his lucky office internets. I'll be looking to release more videos now that I'm home again, so shoot any requests to me through PM. Take care!