Online Poker Tournament Rankings

Okay.. So far my November is going really well. At the Hard Rock on Saturday I ended up making the Final table but losing a monster coin flip with 8 people left. So that was pretty disappointing. I will write more about that tournament tonight when I don't have 10 tables up. So expect that tournament summary tonight or tomorrow.

On Sunday I put in another full day of poker and ended up running super hot and taking down the $100 turbo on Pokerstars. Shout out to "Reel_Em_In" who was sweating me on Stars when I took down the tournament. He might have been my good luck charm.

On Monday night I final tabled a $24 tournament with 1800 people on FTP. I was 1/9 going into the final table and I played one huge pot where I bluff shoved the river. I basically made a really advanced play with the nut blocker vs. a basic thinking opponent. Very stupid. I ended up busting 9th in that tournament after I donked off that huge pot. That was very disappointing. Coming into a FT 1/9 you should never get 9th. It was completely my fault and I really butchered the hand. First was 9k in that tournament. It wasn't huge but it would have been another nice win. Oh well.

Yesterday, on Tuesday, I got heads up in the afternoon FTP $163. I had the guy all in twice for his tournament life. A2o vs his JTcc and AQo vs 77. He won both. We started talking a deal. I had about 1mil to his 700k and we ended up chopping it. I am a wuss. The blinds were pretty big but I definitely had an edge over this guy. I cost myself some equity. I guess I am just scared to place 2nd after all that work. I am thinking about adopting the motto "No Chopping!" for the rest of November but I'm not sure yet lol.

So I've had 4 Final Tables in 4 days. Two wins, and two disappointing finishes. I am now on the hunt for a triple crown. I have 4 days to win on another site. I don't even play on other sites really so I just had to get money on them. Hopefully I can accomplish this. It's something I've always wanted to do along with get ranked and some other things. I've never put in the time and volume to do so. I have 4 days to win on another site and I know I will do it. I won't stop until I win another tournament for the triple crown!

I will update the blog later and talk about the Hard Rock tournament that I always either bubble or never win! Some pretty interesting hands there too. I have some good content for the blog this week. So I should have at least 3-4 posts because I will be playing a ton. Good luck to everyone! I will be grinding! NOVEMBER GRIND BABY!!!!

A couple months ago I posted about some blood work that I had done. I had an elevated bilirubin which is a function of my liver. They told me not to drink alcohol for three months and stay away from high cholesterol foods/fried foods. I didn't drastically change my diet. I drank more water and stayed away from soda and tried to eat fast food less frequently. I have never been unhealthy really so I wasn't sure how to tackle that request.

Anyways, this morning I went in to get my liver tested again. I won't know the results of the test for a couple days. Being sober and not having a sip of alcohol in my system for almost three and a half months wasn't so bad. I didn't go out too often but when I did it was boring for the most part. I only enjoyed going to places that played good music since that was all I could vibe to really. Most of my friends would drink and I would just feel left out. On the flip side I feel really healthy and don't mind not drinking one bit. It's funny to be on the sober side of nightlife and see how drunk people act (including myself when I would drink.) I never drank a lot anyways. In college I would drink a couple times a week like any normal college student. Since graduating, I probably would go out once every two weeks.

I'm not sure what will happen with this. They might tell me that my bilirubin levels have gone down to normal levels and I shouldn't drink anymore. They also might say it is still elevated. For the latter I would probably be more worried. I have been in a medical situation where doctors couldn't diagnose what was wrong with me. That was very scary. I ended up having surgery because a doctor thought it COULD fix the problem. The problem went away but it could have just been because of time (one doctor said I might have aggravated something and to take a couple months off from basketball -- I was a sophomore in college and was in the gym everyday so I wasn't going to do that since he didn't even know what was wrong.) I need more information all around. I have done some of my own research on the bilirubin and some elevated levels don't mean much so I will just have to wait and find out what's going on. They did an ultrasound on my liver, gallbladder, and kidneys which they were all normal. I'm not worried. We'll see what they say.

I plan on grinding hard online in November. I am debating if I should try to play all 30 days in November or not. I might go insane if I do that. I need to work on my mental toughness anyways. The fields on Thursday/Friday aren't as good as other days of the week and they don't have as many majors on those days either. I don't know if I will take those days off throughout November. It would probably be better if I didn't and I played every single day. Whatever I decide I am going to stick to it and hopefully I can accomplish whatever goal I set out to do.

My schedule would be: Wake up 9-10, go to the gym, eat lunch, play poker, go to sleep. I would probably start around 1pm or 2pm and play through the whole night. It's tough to sit in front of the computer for afternoon and night sessions but it can be done. I would probably be playing 10-12 hours of poker a day on average. That would be pretty insane over a 30 day period. 300-360 hours of poker in a month. Wow. Haha, maybe I shouldn't be thinking of it like that. I have a couple days to decide what I want to do and then I'm going to attack November. Either way I think it will be good to put that much time into poker and I should be able to fine tune my game and fix some of my leaks. The game is constantly changing and you have to adapt with it.

There is also a $1k Hard Rock tournament this weekend on Saturday. They run it the last Saturday of every month so I will most likely play that instead of play online. Sunday will be November 1st and the first day of the grind. If I do play that Hard Rock tournament I will blog about it and post the interesting hands.

I don't have any plans for Halloween but I might be down for something when it comes around. If I don't get deep in the Hard Rock tournament I might get in the mood to do something. I don't have a costume but I can handle it on a whim.

That's all I have for now. If anyone has any suggestions or advice about playing 360 hours in a month let me know! Just kidding. I probably won't do 30 days straight. Any advice is welcomed though. I'll update tomorrow or this weekend.

These are my articles from PocketFives from my Aruba Main Event. Check them out they should be an interesting read.

Aruba Poker Classic Day 1
 
Aruba Poker Classic Day 2

Aruba Poker Classic Day 3

Update more later...

Hey everyone. Let's see... I got back from Aruba a little over a week ago, last Saturday. On Monday night I went to the Miami Dolphins game with Stu and Rob/Mike Mizrachi. Congrats to Rob Mizrachi for chopping the Aruba Poker Classic $5k Main Event! Although he got 2nd after they chopped I'm pretty sure he made more money than the first place finisher. Let me say that the Miami Dolphins game last week was absolutely awesome. It was definitely one of the best Monday Night Football games I've ever seen. It was back and forth the whole time and the Dolphins pulled out a great victory.

I have played poker a couple days since I have been back. Yesterday was Sunday and I went over to bankrollme87's apartment. He lives pretty close by and I've been invited a couple times to play over there. Nipsman and moneyinbag also showed up and it was a pretty uneventful Sunday. I got deep in a couple tournaments but nothing worked out. After everyone was done playing we played a 4 person SNG and I was the first person out. We were just having some fun and since I never have a hand, I bluffed off all my chips.

I wrote an article about my Aruba Poker Classic $5k Main Event. It was just posted on Pocketfives if anyone wants to check it out. Here's the link. Aruba Poker Classic Article. I also did a Podcast for Pocketfives when I was in Aruba after I finished playing on Day 2 of the Main Event. You can listen to the podcast here.

That's about it for now. I will update within the next couple of days with some substantial information. Look out for parts 2 and 3 of the Aruba Poker Classic Article on Pocketfives.