I haven't blogged in awhile so I guess I should give an update.

I have still been going strong online, however I have changed my preference a bit as far as what games I am playing. After a couple months of primarily playing MTTs and 45 players sit and gos on Tilt, I have moved over to sit and gos on stars as well.

The original reason is that I found a backer on stars. Even though I have a winning record, it's easier when you don't have to keep a 200 buy in safety net in case you run bad.

I "Run Goot" if you will, and I purchased a 3 month sharkscope subscrition to use their tournament selector. I think the software brought my RIO up slightly, but not enough to make it profitable since my volume is relitively low.

I played 130 sit and gos/satellites for my backer at an average buy in of $17 and showed a profit of $560 over a 2 week period. No, I'm not that good in real life

I also have a backer to play >$13 MTTs on tilt, but that isn't going so well. I went 19 tournies in a row without a cash at one point(4 of those a bubble finish 2 or less from the money). However overall I'm satisfied with my play.

As some of you saw, I decided to go to the Wildhorse Spring Poker Round Up for 4 days last week. I was only able to bring about $1500 for play, which would have been fine for me, but I also partially bankrolled a buddy of mine "Muck it fish" on this site.

We didn't have any success in the MTTs, however we did well in the satellites. We each played 3 single table satellites, he went 3 for 3 and I went 1 for 3. We also both won the Mega satellite, which netted us enough to cover all our MTT buy ins and we pocketed a bit of cash as well.

In the shootout event I drew the same table as Barbara Enright, which was nice because she chatted with the players and told stories the whole time. She was quite aggressive, and in one hand she raised from the cutoff 6 handed and I 3 bet shoved A5s from the big blind. She open mucked pocket 9s, and all I could say was "You give me way too much credit".

I also got knocked out of the omaha event by another 'pro', some 80 year old guy I'd never heard of wearing a cowboy hat. I got to spin their bonus wheel and won a copy of Vince Burgio's book 'pasta, pizza, and poker'(not necessarily in that order). I tried for the next 2 days to find him to try and get it signed, but I never saw him. Oh well.

Even though it sounds bad, the trip was a huge success. We both played quite a bit of cash NLH, mostly 2/5 Blind, and just crushed it. After we counted everything and figured in expences we were +$4700. Needles to say it was great for us because we were expecting to come out like $400-$600 ahead each.

What's also great is before we left I made a stipulation that if I was to bankroll him for the trip and we were successful, it was mandatory that a portion of the profits had to go back into the bankroll for another tournament trip within a few months.

He couldn't wait to go again and booked a trip right away. Him and I, along with another local pro, will be attending the Nevada State Poker Champioship in Reno, NV next week(where I used to live!). After that we may attend the Orleans tourney in vegas and then possibly the WSOP(for side games and satellites, we arent buying into 2k events with a 10k bankroll).

Wish us the best on our trip!

Oh yeah, if you run into 3 professional poker players from somewhere called 'Bend, Oregon', don't be too quick to assume their just a couple of donks from the ass crack of nowhere...

Continued from part 2.

Bankroll was of no importance to me. If I had a buy in for the game I had enough to play. To me I just didn't care if I got broke because I could just go and roll it up again, no problem.

I sat into a $25/$50 blind game ready to play heads up against a player called 'spirit rock'. Later I found out that this was the alias for poker pro Prahlad Friedman*, who has a WSOP bracelet. I bought in for the table max of $5000 and was ready to go.

I don't recall how long the game lasted, but I remember my opponent was by far the most aggressive player I had ever played. He would raise and reraise before the flop and continuation bet almost every hand on the flop and the turn. A couple times I tried playing back with marginal hands, but he would just shove over the top of me and it's hard to call off that much money on a pair of 7s.

After I figured his style out a bit, I reloaded the $2000 I was down and was ready to trap him. Even though I adjusted and was clearly playing more selectively, he didn't slow down one bit. I think he assumed I was a nobody and was going to run me over until I give him a reason not to.

One big pot arose where I saw the flop of QQ8 with Q8 in my hand. I check/called the flop then check/raised the turn. He and I had made a pot of roughly $9000. I eagerly awaited and he showed Q4 which made him drawing completely dead to me!

Well, not completely dead. An 8 would split the pot and that's exactly what the river brought. I continued to get run over until my nest egg was down to a lousy $3500.

Finally we got all in on the flop where I had top pair, kings if I remember correctly, and I called his reraise. He tabled an open ender, 56 or something like that. It filled right away and I was down to nothing but felt.

I remember instantly feeling incredibly sick to my stomache. It took less than 5 seconds for the reality of what I'd just done to set in. I tried to shake it off, but I knew I would never be able to make a run like that again.

I played some more internet poker over the years, but I was never able to fully get back into it after that incident until recently.

In 2007 I moved out to Reno, Nevada with hopes of becoming a poker dealer since I could no longer deal in Oregon due to a change in the law. With $2000 in my pocket I made the drive.

When I arrived in town I couldn't wait to get settled and had to play a session and get it out of my system. I promised myself I wouldn't lose more than $200 until I had secured a job and a place to live. I know I would have stuck with that because I was very serious about the promise when I made it. Especially since what had happened to me online.

I didn't find a place to live for 2 weeks because I was busy crushing the 1/2 NL cash games. I turned my bankroll into $6000 in 2 months playing at that limit and decided there was no point in getting a job until I had to.

I didn't spend much time studying my game away from the tables that year, but I still learned quite a bit, especially about reading players based on their mannerisms and betting patterns. I honestly believe today that I can pick up more information than %99.9 of other players based simply on looking someone over after they make a large bet.

I thumbed through my older books from time to time, but none of the information seemed of any use. I had made the single most fatal error I've ever made in poker. I believed that there wasn't anything else I could learn from the game. I honestly thought I was as good at that time as I would ever get.

After that I quickly grew bored of the game because it was no longer a challenge for me. My boredom lead to poor play and in turn I was broke again before I knew it.

I then made a decision to hop back into my car and return to Oregon and the life I'd left behind. I had reached the peak of my poker career and it wasn't good enough. It was time to give up the game.

Another year had passed in Oregon and I went on driving Knish's truck unable to get the thought of 'How in the world did I screw it up so badly?' out of my head. I was working the worst jobs of my life for people who paid and treated their employees like trash. All I could think about was how easily I could make $15 an hour playing poker if I just gave up on trying to be the best player in the world.

For once I had finally taken the necessary steps. I set goals and guidlines for my play. I got in touch with some other strong players that I had met in Oregon, and we still meet regularly to discuss advanced poker theory. I joined pocketfives and started blogging and keeping myself up to date with the lastest poker knowledge. Most importantly I hold myself accountable for my actions, I can't afford to screw it up again.

After all I've been through, I am ready to play professional level poker for my forseeable future.

I now play both on my own dollar, as a staked player, and I stake other winners as well. I also started doing some coaching to help out novices who are struggling with taking that big step into being a winning player. There are also some plans in the works for instructional videos, but nothing yet.

Thanks for reading and good luck at the tables, CB.

*http://www.pokerlistings.com/spirit-...0-heater-36085

Sidenote: Please rate my blogs!

Continued from Part 1.

After that casino trip, I had boosted my confidence and was really eager to explore poker as a full time hobby. I purchased many more poker books over the years and really started to study my game.

I also frequented a local casino in central Oregon, even though I was not of legal age, I soon got to know all the regulars and made sure to chat it up with the staff whenever possible so I had no problem with not having an I.D.

The crowd at this casino consisted mostly of retired farmers who lived in the area and occasionally some tournists. They played 2-5 spread limit hold 'em where you can bet up to $10 on the end. To this day they still play that game and I've never seen it anywhere else. My best run in that game was a night when the highway patrol closed the only way to leave the casino due to icy roads, and the game played until 4 AM. I was on one hell of a rush and pocketed over $1250 in that game. It was kind of sad because the lesser player kept buying back in when they wanted to quit because they couldn't leave.

At the time I was working as a lifeguard during the day and living with my parents. That provided me with all the extra cash I needed at the time since I had to bills to pay and a steady income. Internet poker had just started to take off, and I was one of the first people to get into it.

I set up my first real money account on Pokerroom.com. At the time there were no tournaments of any kind. As a matter of fact, I think all that was available was fixed limit hold 'em, ranging from 1/2 to 25/50 blinds. I played every level at some point. I was young, stupid, and had more money than I knew what to do with. Why should I care if I lose $500 in 1 hand?

I continued to play locally, but the big games were always online. I moved my business to paradise poker, and then later to Ultimate bet. At the time UB had by far the best software and tournament selection. The only site that was even close was party poker, but I hated their crappy interface so I didn't play them much.

I learned some of the finer points of deep stacked poker the hard way on UB. At the time no limit poker was only played at very high limits everywhere except online or in tournaments, so my experience was inadequate to say the least. I got on a bit of a rush at one point, winning over $12,000 in a month starting at 1/2 NLH and moving all the way to 5/10 NLH. There were some very, very good players playing at those limits since they were some of the biggest available, but that still didn't bother me none. As far as I was concerned I was the best player in the world and I was out to show everyone.

I thought about cashing some money out and buying myself a car or something. I found one I liked, but I needed a few thousand more for it, so I continued on.

In my next few 5/10 NLH sessions I couldn't understand why these idiots bet and raised all the time, but still managed to beat me with their crap cards. I was playing solid poker the way the books had taught me, and they were playing like maniacs... I should be destroying them!

After I lost about $1500, I got upset and decided to find a different game. There were 4 players in a 10/25 NLH game, which was surprising because that game hardly ever got off the ground. I watched in for a few minutes and decided that it wasn't anything I hadn't done before, so I stepped away from the 150 people railing the game and joined the 4 playing it.

It didn't take long for one of the players to ask me who I was. I was confused as to why he would ask me that, and he told me he was just curious who he was playing with because generally only a handful of people sit in that game. I proudly told him I had won a bunch playing that month and I was ready for the big game. He responded with something along the lines of "Ok, good luck".

I played the game for maybe an hour and was down about $500 when a big pot came up which I'll never forget as long as I live. I was in the Big Blind with 47 offsuit. Under the gun raised, the cutoff called, and the small blind called. One thing I still do is play hands like this if I can close out the action in a multi-way pot. I tossed in $60 more to call. Flop came 3,5,6 rainbow. I don't remember if I bet or checked when it got to me, but the 3 of us got all in on the flop and my opponents showed JJ, and AA. To this day I almost never flat with AA for this reason.

The poker gods had unfaily smiled upon me once again and I sang to the tune of a $3700 profit that session.

Man poker was so easy! Doyle was right about all those highroller who don't bother to learn to play properly sitting in big games giving money away. A few days later I was ready to find him, sure enough I found the player "Spirit Rock" sitting all by his lonesome in a 25/50 blind game just waiting for a challenger...

To be Continued in part 3