Overdue update

I know it's been a while since my last post and I apologize for that. When I left for Turning Stone I was running bad in MTTs, and it held throughout the trip, and a lot longer. In addition to that I got ripped for about $170 because of an awful ruling by the Floor in the poker room. I really don't feel like making this post that long so I'm not going deep into detail. The trip was not profitable at all. I went 0/4 in mtts. Although I do feel like I got decent grip for live poker, as there are many differences with live and online poker. Overall the trip was fun though, and I'm excited to go to vegas when I turn 21. I haven't booked it yet but will have it done by the end of this week hopefully.

Goals-
Unfortunately I missed all of my goals for the month of May. I have just been running absolutley horrid in MTT's, that I lowered my volume by a lot. To make it a little worse then ir originally was, about a week ago I bubbled a $50 mtt on FTP. I really feel like I am playing my A game as well, but this is just a downswing of variance and just must rough it out for now.

I will not be making any goals this month, besides playing the best that I can with minimal mistakes. This month I just won't be playing as much as usual for a few reasons. One is that I'm going to game 3 or 4 of the NBA finals. I've never been to a championship game in any sport, nor even a playoff game, so it should be a fun experience. GO LAKERS!!!. Another reason is vegas, will be spending 4-5 days there mid-month. The last is that me and my boys are getting our summer house on Friday. Therefore, parties, parties, and more parties, oh and did I mention parties? Should be a pretty fun time, I have some more MTT tables popping up now so I'm going to cut it off here. GL in June, and GL at WSOP everyone

-Pomp

Turning Stone

Going to make this as short as possible, as I am about to leave for Turning Stone for about 4 days to play in the Heartland Poker Tour. Gonna be playing ALOT of live poker this week. Looks like the tournaments I'll be playing in a $150, $300, $300 and $200. Along with a lot of cash games. Mainly using this as a warmup, and to sharpen my live play up for the WSOP. Not that I'm not in it to make money lol.
As for online poker, still running awful in MTTs, just always at wrong end of setup, 3 outers 2 outers non stop, im so due for a big cash, maybe it'll come live. I made a couple of semi-deep runs in low buy ins of scoop events, but couldn't do anything with them. That's it for now as I have to leave for turning stone.
good luck

-Pomp

April Recap/May Goals

Overall I believe April was a below par month for MTT's but it was pretty nice for heads ups, mainly the last 2 weeks in 220s, I did very well. Here's a graph to show how I did the last 14 days just in $220 2 mans....
http://i43.tinypic.com/34q6a1s.jpg

MTT's have been real rough lately, I’ve been consistently getting stacks in mainly the $50 70k, the Nightly 100k, and the Weds 1/4 mil this past Weds, and just running bad. Haven't played as many MTT's this month as March, but in May I plan on playing many more, shouldn't be too hard since school is almost over. Here is my April Goal Review:


+$5000(not including rakeback)

-Thanks to a late surge, I was able to make this goal and a little more. And in addition to that I hit the 90k VPP mark so I collected all $1000 of my stellar rewards, and cashed that out as well.

27,000 VPPS

-Ended the month with roughly 28,400 VPPs.

Talk less in the chat(mainly less "run better" or "Well played sir")

-I feel like I have improved in this area a bit, but not as much as I would have liked, going to try to lessen the talk even more this month.

Play more standard vs. fish, instead of making hero plays.

-Basically the same thing here with this goal, I have played a tad more standard, but there's room for improvement.

Note Taking

I believe I have achieved this goal, especially note taking vs. regular fish in the 110 and 220s.

One thing that I think has helped my heads ups, is the environment that I play in now. I used to play in my room, with my laptop, sitting on my bed, watching TV. Now I sit at the kitchen table, with no TV, and just some music playing. It's more relaxing, and comfortable.

The Heartland Poker Tour is going to be at Turning Stone for the next couple weeks, and I plan on going for at least 1 event as of now, not sure if it's going to be a $300 tournament, or the main event for $1500. I’m basically using Turning stone to improve my live game/warm-up for WSOP. Here are my goals for May:

+6,000(again, not including bonuses)

Discuss more hands played in MTTs, with other MTT regs.

Watch a couple of Bfizz11's videos

Make top 200 TLB for May

Make at least 1 Final Table in the $50 70k



That's it for now.

PS- I turn 21 in about 7 weeks!!!

-Pomp

FT $10 Rebuy, deep runs in Sunday Million

I've been semi lazy/busy lately with updating my blog, so I'm going to try to update more often. About 10 days ago I made the FT in the $10 rebuy, finished 6th for roughly $2400 if I remember correctly. Also, the passed 2 Sundays were very dry for me, besides the Sunday Million in both weeks. 2 Sundays ago I made a deep run and finished 230 something vs a fish who couldn't lay down A7. Then yesterday, I made a deep run again. Was playing real solid, and was a rock. I lost with AKsuit all in preflop vs Q10os, for a pot of about 1.5-6 mil, that would have put me at 3.8mil 30/60k blinds, and in top 5 with about 50 left. Not too much later heres how I go out...
PokerStars Game #43202501307: Tournament #307020010, $200+$15 USD Hold'em No Limit - Level XXIX (40000/80000) - 2010/04/26 0:35:11 ET
Table '307020010 622' 9-max Seat #4 is the button
Seat 1: tmb_bulevar (1851584 in chips)
Seat 2: Zelwi87 (679514 in chips)
Seat 3: Domer (1944960 in chips)
Seat 4: PompYouUp (1567220 in chips)
Seat 5: cwalsh6 (1180324 in chips)
Seat 6: kaju85 (3057954 in chips)
Seat 7: bleu329 (1842880 in chips)
Seat 8: DrEskilstuna (1376891 in chips)
Seat 9: gremlinn (1675848 in chips)
tmb_bulevar: posts the ante 8000
Zelwi87: posts the ante 8000
Domer: posts the ante 8000
PompYouUp: posts the ante 8000
cwalsh6: posts the ante 8000
kaju85: posts the ante 8000
bleu329: posts the ante 8000
DrEskilstuna: posts the ante 8000
gremlinn: posts the ante 8000
cwalsh6: posts small blind 40000
kaju85: posts big blind 80000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to PompYouUp [Kd Qs]
bleu329: folds
DrEskilstuna: folds
gremlinn: folds
tmb_bulevar: folds
Zelwi87: folds
Domer: folds
PompYouUp: raises 94400 to 174400
cwalsh6: folds
kaju85: calls 94400
*** FLOP *** [2d Qh 6d]
kaju85: checks
PompYouUp: bets 205500
kaju85: calls 205500
*** TURN *** [2d Qh 6d] [7h]
kaju85: checks
PompYouUp: bets 341100
kaju85: raises 932400 to 1273500
PompYouUp: calls 838220 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (94180) returned to kaju85
*** RIVER *** [2d Qh 6d 7h] [5h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
kaju85: shows [5s 6s] (two pair, Sixes and Fives)
PompYouUp: shows [Kd Qs] (a pair of Queens)
kaju85 collected 3230440 from pot
beck_AA [observer] said, "good line 56"

really sucks to go out like that, but what can you do. Congratulations to 147_star for winning the milly and shipping 258K. And another congratulations to me being a big moron, and not doing a % swap with him, since we had similar stacks many times during the tournament. And lastly, 42nd was worth $3200. Thank you to everyone who was railing me, appreciate the support.

Other than that, it seems like March and April were opposites. March MTTs were good, and heads up were bad. Now in April, Mtts haven't been overall rough, and Heads ups have been pretty good. Hopefully in May both can be good!! I'm pretty excited for the SCOOP to start soon, I will be playing most of the Hold Em low and medium buy ins, with some Omaha mixed in. One thing that does suck, is that I'm not going to be able to play in the first couple Heads up events on the 4th because of a school final I have. I'm not going to dwell over it though, since there's nothing I can do about it.

One thing that I don't realize how I have forgot to mention, is that my parents finally gave in with work, and they let me quit. Last week I worked 2 last days and now I'm done there!!! I also loaded another $8,000 into my mutual funds, and they have been doing pretty well lately, making consistent money. That's it for now.

good luck

-pomp

Update, Goals for April

Lately I've been more on the heads up grind, and not the MTT grind. For 2-3 weeks, I ran into a large negative variance of heads ups. Which cause me not to be on my A game. Finally things turned around, and as of a few days ago, I've really been in the zone while playing heads ups. Finally starting to profit again in heads ups, and it feels good. It would be nice to maintain the pace I'm currently on.

Last month I finished 67th on the monthly TLB, which was good for a $100 bonus, which is pretty cool. Since then, I've sort of been MTT'ed out, and since then just been taking it slow. One thing that is frustrating, is that I have been running very bad in sunday majors for the last couple months. Just one setup hand after another, and one bad beat after another, hoping to snap out of that soon. For the yearly TLB im curently in 291st, and peaked at 230 something, but like I said before, I have been taking it slow so I've fallen behind a bit.

Last week I reached 250k fpps, so I bought the $4000 bonus asap, and am currently 3505/28000 vpps of the way there. I hop to unlock that sometime during the SCOOP. I have made a few goals for the month of April. I know it's already the 13th but I made these goals at the start of the month, and I have not updated this blog since March, so this is the first time you're seeing my goals. Some of them are fairly standard, but this is my first time making a list of monthly goals, so I will improve.

Goals for April

+$5000(not including rakeback)
-At the beggining of the month felt like this goal would easily be in reach, I'm at school so I dont have my excel spreadsheet, but I think I'm about half way there.

27,000 VPPS
-Trying to gain some ground on my yearly goal of 300K VPPS, and this will also get me my bonus quicker. currently at 11,209 on the month.

Talk less in the chat(mainly less "run better" or "Well played sir")
-It really doesn't do anything to say these things to them, as 95% of them don't even respond.

Play more standard vs. fish, instead of making hero plays.
-not saying I can't make a good read vs a fish here and there, but I think I tend to try to get very tricky vs fish sometimes, in my opinion, you can play so standard vs fish and still be very profitable.

Note Taking
-Take more notes, both in MTTs and HUs They don't necessarily have to be in depth notes on EXACTLY how they play. Even if it's just a hand history showing a unique way they played a certain hand, put it in their notes.

I will check back on these goals at the end ofthe month and see how I did.

Good luck

-Pomp

3rd in $30, 1st in $10 Hyper HU, 6th in $10

Since my last post I've been going deep in a quite a few mtts. Came in 3rd in a $30 mtt out of 850 people, for roughly 2500. Two nights ago, I won the $10 hyper turbo for about 1900. LOL. God, you need to run good to win that tournament, too bad you dont get TLB points for heads up tournaments. Also, 2 nights in a row I've made the final 2 tables of the $10 MTT that starts at 7PM est. The first night, with about 18 left I have about 850k, blinds 5/10k. 2nd to act makes it 30k(560 total stack), 1 caller(chip leader), and I have kings on the button. I think about 3 betting it here to like 100k or something, but I was moved to the table a few hands before this and didn't really have a read on anyone, so I jam for 850k. Guy who opened tanks for a little bit, and ends up calling his other 53bbs with AJ suit, yea LOL, and he hits a flush. A few hands later I'm out due to a race.
Last night I was in the same boat, with having a big stack for quite a bit, I was up to 840k when blinds were just 2/4k. Eventually I was at about 1.4 mil blinds 6/12k, and I called an all in for a total of about 750k with JJ, he had AK. And even though it was just a flip, the way it played out was just brutal. Flop came J 9 2. He doesn't have backdoor flush drawing, so only out is running Q 10, and what do you know it came. I fought back and was able to make the final table, but am upset with myself for the call I made to go out. Blinds 30/60k i have about 1.1 mil, and raise it first to act to roughly 2.5x. BB who has about 1.8 mil if I remember correctly, just jams. I think for a little bit, and he was re jamming shorthand ALOT earlier, so I call but he has AK, and I brick. Even though I have that read on him, I should have folded, because he was the only other solid player at the table, and I could have outplayed everyone. But 6th was good for a little under 1k.

Heads ups still have been a little rough lately, and I'm still trying to find a groove. I played last night after my MTT, and finally had a positive session, even though it was a short session, in a LONG time. As for mtts, my confidence is staying very high, making consistent final tables, and I have been climbing up both the yearly TLB, and monthly TLB for March. I've moved into 258th on the year and I'm only 1300 points back from being on the top 150 list, and I'm also 67th for the month of March. There's almost no way ill fall out of the top 100, so I'll be getting a $100 bonus, which is pretty cool, and I'm only 27k fpps away from starting my $4k bonus. Pretty excited for the NBA playoffs to start in a few weeks, go lakerssssss, and just as excited for baseball to start on sunday.
That's it for now, Good luck.

-pomp

Update

The last 9 days or so I've been really struggling to find a groove. Ever since my $10 mtt win, I've been running extremely awful, and I'm on a huge downswing, and tilt is only responsible for a small portion of it(a lot less than normal on my downswings). Since I don't have class today I'm going to take the day off in heads ups, and just play a bunch of mtts, including A LOT 180 mans, they can really help out with TLB points. Bfizz11 has this bootcamp thing, which is basically like poker school. He holds online classes, with replays available for download at $35, so I'm going to give that a try and see how it goes. He's #1 on Yearly TLB thus far, so who better to learn from, and improve my MTT game even more.

I read a friends blog, and we are kinda in the same boat/have the same thought process on our downswing. I'm trying to stay positive during this downswing. Like bpmst2 said, during a large downswing, confidence in most players drop, and negative thinking comes into play, which will lead you to not play your best game. It is extremely important to always stay in a positive frame of mind. I think the one thing I need to work on in my heads up game(mostly vs fish), is not trying to make so many hero calls, and maybe play more basic since they are so exploitable. For up and coming heads up players, trust me, try to stay positive, because if you don't it can and will lead to massive tilt, and the uneccesary loss of many buy-ins.

I'm currently in 461st on the yearly TLB. I really would love to get on the list that you see on the pokerstars client(top 150), and I don't think it is out of reach. But I'm going to need to do some griding, and have some nice results to get there. Also, I'm at 58k vpps on the year. It's closing in on 1/4 through the year, and to be on pace for 300k vpps, I would need 75k vpps, which I obviously wont be at 1/4 through the year. But you have to take into account that I missed 10 days in January since I was in the Bahamas, so I think I'm on pace, if not very close to on pace for 300k vpps. Also I have 204k fpps, so the 250k fpp bonus is in sight, and I can't wait to get started on that, as I will see it as sort of a bonus for the work I've put in so far in 2010. Also, the swelling in my leg has gone down dramatically. There's almost no black and blue on the front part of my leg, but still some on my calf, and a little on my foot, probably going to take another 4-5 days to completely heal. That's it for now.
good luck

-pomp

1st for $6500, and a ridiculously swollen leg

Last week I injured my leg playing football. It instantly started to swell up and I started to swap heat and ice on it. After a few days it started to get black and blue, and each day it just got progressively worse. It finally reached to a point where I needed to go get it checked out, so I went to urgent care since it was the only place I could get into. It looks alot worse then it actually is. The X-ray came back fine, and he said it was just tissue bleeding or something, lol. So he gave me prescription for anti-inflamatory and instructed to always have light compression on it and heat 4 times a day, and that should help.

As for poker, I've really been struggling in heads up lately, just constantly having run-bad sessions. So it's definitely a good thing I've been doing well in MTT's. I won an $11 mtt on Sunday, with 4100 runners, for $6500. It feels good to finally achieve a win in an mtt. I've won mtts before, but only $3 or $1 buy-ins when I was a very low-stake grinder. I've been making steady cashouts, if you would like to know how much I have made so far this year just ask me. I'm roughly at 53k vpps on the year, and about 185k fpps, so I'm closing in on 1/4 mil fpps for a $4,000 bonus.
That's it for now, good luck

-pomp

Shipping, 3rd in $109 MTT for $8200

Came in 3rd in the $109 Freezeout on Wednesday for $8200 :). Felt really good about the way I played. Came into the final table as the shortstacked with 20+ BBs if I remember correctly, but I stayed patient, and it certainly paid off. I hit a major heater, and in 10 hands I went from shortstack at 110k, to chip leader at 900k. When we got to 3 handed, we were decently deepstacked at 6/12k, as we all had over 650k. It was very tough 3 handed, as one of the other players was agriffrod, and the other I didn't know who he was, but he knew what he was doing. There was a ton of 3 betting and some 4 betting too, and I was holding my ground as well. The hand that basically cost me is as follows: button opened to about 48k at 10/20k, from the small blind I 3 bet with AK to roughly 115k, and agriffrod shoved for 480k total, back to me and I snap called, he had Q10 of clubs. Flop came A 10 9, with 2 clubs, and after the turn I was drawing dead as he hit his flush. If I had won this hand I would have been guaranteed 11.5k I think, and had a 1.5-1 chip lead. After being shortstacked for a little got it all in blind vs blind with AK vs KK and couldn't hit, but 8200 does ship my way :).

Other than that I really haven't played much. I actually just checked my latest mtt stats, and I've only played 17 mtts in the last 8 days, which kind of sucks, but theres nothing I can really do about it. I am on spring break from school until the 22nd so I'll probably be able to get some more volume in.
good luck

-pomp

March

Since i'm playing in a few MTTs at the moment, and I have an essay due tomorrow, I'm going to keep this as short as possible. Made Final Table of the $150(starts at 4EST every day). Came in 7th out of 580 ppl for about $2800, and I'm pretty happy with the way I have been playing lately. Other than that I really have not played much. Been busy doing other things. School, been going to visit Grandma in the hospital. Friday went to AC and stayed overnight. Partied on Saturday night, and worked on Sunday. Currently in 693rd for yearly TLB. If i remember correctly I was in 550th or so, but I haven't played in a single MTT in 4-5 days, so I've dropped a bit, and I'm still making steady final tables for the volume that I play compared to most of the sharks atop the TLB. Spring break starts Friday for me, So I'll prob be able to play a decent amount, and also make up some ground on my VPP grind. That's it for now, good luck

-pomp

Update

Although I'm getting tired of this snow, I cannot complain too much, because on thursday it enabled me to enter some MTTs during the day because school was closed, and I had success. Made the final table of the $10 rebuy with 2700 runners. I came into the FT as chip leader. Just like most final tables play was tight at first, but then since it was a 10 minute level tournament, players started to get knocked out quickly, and one guy hit a heater and took over CL. He was a good player, 3 betting, raising a lot, doing the normal things a big stack should do. With 4 left. I raised on button with 1010, big stack shoved from big blind and I snap called. Hand is as follows:

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to PompYouUp [Ts Th]
Sheriff_20: folds
PompYouUp: raises 172500 to 322500
zmeyga: folds
jackellwood: raises 7356948 to 7679448 and is all-in
PompYouUp: calls 3229370 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (4127578) returned to jackellwood
*** FLOP *** [Kh Qc 7d]
*** TURN *** [Kh Qc 7d] [Ah]
*** RIVER *** [Kh Qc 7d Ah] [4h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
jackellwood: shows [8s As] (a pair of Aces)
PompYouUp: shows [Ts Th] (a pair of Tens)
jackellwood collected 7238740 from pot

:( Unfortunately it couldn't hold for almost 50% of the chips in play. GG me in 4th place. for $5k. Other than that have really done much. Ran pretty bad sunday, didn't play a ton of tournaments, and went 0 for. Quads were hit on me 3 times, maybe 4. Wasn't a fun day.

Going backwards now, I played in a live $150 buy in on Saturday, starting with 56 people. I have some funny stories/hands for you guys. Blinds 300 600, couple limpers and 2 people in blinds, so 2400 in the pot.(one of the limpers is VERY tight, if he shoves all in pre-flop, he has monster, post flop he has good hand). Flop comes A Q 4 with all hearts. Tight player just jams for 10,500. Guy thinks and calls, other 2 fold. Tight player says I have a set and flips over 44, guy that called goes "I have a set too", and flips over 1010, LOL. That's not a set buddy. I didn't misunderstand him, because the other people right around me thought he said the same thing.

Blinds 400/800, I raise to 2400 with AKsuit UTG. Small blind and big blind call. Flop comes 7 5 2 rainbow. Both check I bet 4k, small blind who was donk/aggro (same guy as "set with 1010") min raises to 8k, other guy folds and it comes back around to me. I only have about 10,700 behind, and I was pretty convinced that this guy didn't really have anything, like just overs. Not even a pair because he would prob call with that since he would have odds, based on his history. So I jam for another 10,500 and he snap calls, I say, ahhh I have nothing, he says "I have nothing either and flips over 63os for a gutshot, haha. Turn comes ace and takes away his lives and river brick I double.

Blinds 500/1000, I have about 50k I think, from a 16k starting stack. Couple limpers, I bump it up to 4500 with AQ, small blind calls, everyone else folds. Flop comes Q 8 5, with 2 hearts. Guy open jams for 36k!!! I think for a little bit. This was the same guy that 3rd hand of tournament. Bet a J 8 5 flop, and over-jammed the turn which was a 4 I think. He went to muck his hand and it was accidently flipped, and he had KQ, no draws. So I call even though I only have 4500 invested, and he has just J9 for a gutshot, lol. He bricked and I scoop the pot.

There was this one player, which it seemed like it was his first time playing poker. He was to my left when we were down to final 2 tables. blinds 3/6k, he has 23k total. He limps for 6k, some guy makes it 18k, guy in the blinds calls, limper with 23k JUST CALLS leaves himself with 5k(kinda like a Frank move for those of you who know him, without the same plan on the flop, lol) So anyway, flop comes w.e idr. he checks, guy who raised preflop jams, other guy folds, and guy with 5k left FOLDS!!!! Also i can't remember if it was after he doubled twice or before the hand i just explained, but he was in BB for 6k with 4k behind, and folded to a button raise. Not bad IMO. I ended up min cashing for $500, while jeff owned and won the tournament.

Switching topics, school is still going well, got a 95 on my first accounting exam. Ship. 2 other classes are a breeze so far. Loaded another 6k into my mutual funds, and thats been going up lately. Hopefully it can keep it up, and I can keep final tabling mtts. Hope everyone is off to a strong start this year
Good luck

-pomp

180

Well, it's been a complete 180 since my last post. Everything I lost from my downswing I got back + more. Final Tabling the $50 nightly 70k certainly helped out. I just can't seem t0 finish the job in this tournament. This is the 4th time i've final tabled it since august I think. I've finished 2nd, 4th, 8th, and just the other night, 5th. Kind of cooler hand to get knocked out, 6 handed utg SS shoved for 9 bbs, I rejammed on button for 22 bbs with AKsuit, and small blind picked up kings, pot was for 33% of chips but I couldn't hit, but did ship $3800.

Heads ups have also been a sick turnaround. I'm dealing with tilt a lot better, playing slower and smarter, and not 2 tabling as much, and also have more confidence. I'm also now in the top 1000 for yearly TLB. Also will probably be playing a bunch of mtts the rest of the month as i'm in 379th for February. Another sick turnaround has been my High Yield mutual fund. Since my last post its gone up 14 cents a share I think, i'll probably be buying more shares of that soon. Hopefully this little streak can last a little while. good luck

pomp

When it Rains it Pours

Up until last night, the title basically says it all. Seems like many things are going wrong lately. I have a mutual fund in trowe price, and the market has been doing awful. Over the last 3 weeks, I think it has gone down about a quarter a share. Having about 2400 shares, thats a decent amount of money. As for poker, I haven't been just running bad, i've been running insanely bad. Just non-stop normal running bad stuff in both mtts and hus. I am going to say something, and am going to try to hold my self to this. I will NEVER play the $102 heads up hyper turbo mtt. NEVER. I've lost so much in that tournament, and have never placed.

Yesterday though seemed like a turnaround in heads ups, I think I went 17-10 in 110s and 1-0 in 220s. MTTs have been the same stuff. I had about 24k at 400/800 right before the money in the nightly 100k. And called a guys all in for about 11500 with AA. He had AQos. Flop was bad to start. It came with all spades, and a queen. He had the ace of spades and I obviously had no spade. Turn blank, river spade. Would have had about 45BB stack going into money, racing for a 26k first prize. Gonna stay on the grind though. I also did make a final table in the $10 rebuy a few nights ago out of 2200 people. I only came in 9th though for about 700. Couldn't hit KJ vs A8. I'm in 1237th place on the yearly TLB, and 364th right now for the monthly TLB. I'm also really excited to play in the Sunday 4 Mil, should be an insanely huge field.
good luck

-pomp

Sunday

First I want to start out by saying R.I.P Aunt Catty. She passed away this weekend. Her kidneys were failing and it was just a matter of time. She really was one of the nicest old lady's you would ever meet. Everyone in her family loved her. She lived with her brother, since neither of them ever married anyone. There was a tradition that they had every Christmas Eve. I think it's been going on for 25years or so. Every Christmas eve a majority of her close family would come over and spend the evening. Exchange gifts, have dessert and coffee and catch up with family that we don't see that often. I'm not sure how long this tradition will continue now that she's gone, but I assume we will do it at least one more year in honor of her.

Superbowl sunday was fun. I did a bunch of props on the superbowl and think I came out a little ahead. Also had 100 on the saints so I won that too. My dad and I split a superbowl box that he hit for 200. And Thanks to the interception return for touchdown, and that Saints holding the Colts in the redzone, I won the final score box that I split with my Dad and hi friend, which paid a little under 2k, so i'll be getting about 600 for that.

As for poker, I didn't play as many tournaments as I usually do on Sundays because i wasn't in the mood to 10 table, and I wanted to be able to watch the game. I came in 9th in the $200 HU tourney, which paid about 700, but I made a deal with the guy I lost too, so I got an extra 300 out of it. I also made a very deep run in the $10 Sunday 1/4 Mil. I ended up finishing in 18th out of 33,000 players!! No matter the strength of the field, thats a tough number of people to get through, and it'll be hard to do that again. 18th paid a little under 600 I think, with winner taking 27k. Besides that, haven't really played much besides late last night. I started off playing some 110s and moved to 220s, and went through a short period of time where I 2 tabled 220s. I was making some dumb moves, and getting frustrated because I was running real cold, and losing to players I shouldn't. I regrouped and went back to one table. After starting off 1-3 vs. a fish, I ended up winning 5 in a row, which brought me to about even for the day. I was suprised at how many times he rematched, unfortunately he stopped, because I would have loved to play for hours. I'll probably easily make top 1000 TLB for the month(which earns a ticket to a freeroll), as I stand at 245th right now. I would really like to make top 100 though as I never have, but at least top 200 because that qualifies for an automatic cash prize. Good luck

-pomp

Update

The last 4-5 days have been really rough. I've been going through a bad downswing of variance. I've just been running insanely awful. I have to admit, I have not been playing my A game in heads ups, so I need to get that back on track, but that shouldn't take too long. A couple of my worst hands are these($12 180 mans):

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to PompYouUp [Qd Qh]
tihon7777: folds
Brezi26 is disconnected
Brezi26 has timed out while disconnected
Brezi26: folds
Brezi26 is sitting out
GKrae: folds
T-Macha: folds
lol TRICKED: folds
gena 77: raises 750 to 1000
UHave_3_Outs: folds
PokerKidBd: folds
PompYouUp: raises 2885 to 3885 and is all-in
gena 77: calls 1710 and is all-in
Uncalled bet (1175) returned to PompYouUp
*** FLOP *** [2s 6d Jh]
*** TURN *** [2s 6d Jh] [6c]
*** RIVER *** [2s 6d Jh 6c] [5c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
PompYouUp: shows [Qd Qh] (two pair, Queens and Sixes)
gena 77: shows [3d 4h] (a straight, Deuce to Six)
gena 77 collected 5770 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***

and this one at the final table with 8 left, would have had almost half the chips in play with 7 left:
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to PompYouUp [Ks Kc]
cockaburr: folds
bagnus: folds
Bhzour: folds
PompYouUp: raises 5750 to 9750
L.A. Vale 60: folds
MBaracus82: folds
slystyle12: raises 40438 to 50188 and is all-in
spankmenow: folds
PompYouUp: calls 40438
*** FLOP *** [8d 5s 7s]
*** TURN *** [8d 5s 7s] [7c]
*** RIVER *** [8d 5s 7s 7c] [Ts]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
slystyle12: shows [6h 9d] (a straight, Six to Ten)
PompYouUp: shows [Ks Kc] (two pair, Kings and Sevens)
PompYouUp said, "hahahahahahahaha"
slystyle12 collected 107576 from pot

Like, I can't even complain about him making that move, because im going to win a high percentage of the time. But it's just funny how bad some of these people are. Gonna keep grinding and hopefully this run doesn't last too long.

As for other things, not too excited for the snow we are about to get here in Jersey. Also, school at Stockton College is going okay so far. Pretty much a breeze right now. My intro to research class we have been working on this easy music assignment to date. My Financial Accounting class is very easy so far because it's at least half of the Principles of Accounting class I took last semester at OCC. But I have to take it because I didn't take Principles of Accounting 2 at OCC, and this class is a combination of both. I look really smart in the class because im answering a majority of the questions in class. Also, I was pretty excited to find out, that the top 3 people in the class at the end of the 3 exams, do NOT have to take the final. So now I have some motive to try a little harder. And I'm already at an advantage from what I mentioned before. My Marketing Principles class is a joke, my professor is some 75 year old dude who can barely stand, who just rambles on all period and constantly goes off on tangents. Half the people in the class don't even pay attention. 1 girl reads a novel, 2 girls just talk, 2 are on their phone the whole time, and I do sudokus. Pretty excited to see what the exams are going to be like, lol.

Back to poker, January was a good month, as my cashouts were a little over 6k. I beleive I'm on a decent pace right now for 300k vpps, but I think it's way to early to be doing calculations as to my avg vpp/day and how many I need per day on average. Hope everyone has had a good start to 2010. good luck

-pomp

Final Table Nightly 70k

A couple nights ago I final tabled the nighlty 70k, $50 buy in with 1500+ runners. Was getting a min of 1k, with 1st taking $13.5k. I came into the final table with 35 bbs or so. I was very happy with the way I had played up until this point. If I remember correctly, I was never all in for my tournament life the entire tournament until I was elimanated(and maybe the first hour of the tournament), and I never really won a huge pot being way behind. About 10 minutes into the final table, with 8 people left, I raise it to 2.5x with QQ utg+1, next guy insta jams for over 25 bbs, everyone folds, and I snap call, he has AQ and flopped an ace. I woulda had about 1.1 mil chips(25% of chips in play) and been chip leader. Couple hands later I was real short and got it all in with 22 vs JJ, i flopped a 2, turn jack, lol. :( Decent score of $1700. Other than that haven't really played many mtts, couldn't play any sunday because of work. But next sunday should be fun as i'll be playing a bunch of mtts, and watching the superbowl. Today and tomorrow i'm going to try to qualify for the super tuesday. If I don't, if i can go on a nice run in hu's I might buy in, with having some friends take some action. Today i've played maybe 6 heads up, and I guess you can say I ran pretty bad so I just stopped playing until after I get back from class tonight. Got 3 outered a bunch of times, and hit top pair or better maybe 6 times in couple hundred hands. So I just decided to call it quits. good luck

-pomp

Deep Run in Warmup

The day following where I came in 2nd in the $109 mtt, I made my deepest run in a major. I ended up finishing in 14th for $4,200. I made a shove from the SB for 13 bbs with 44 into a 15 bb stack, and he went into the tank for about a minute before calling with K10 suit, this was also the first time I was all in at this table. In most other tournaments I would say this is a good call, but I don't know about him putting almost his whole stack in with just k10 suit this deep in the warmup, I could be wrong, but that's what I thought. By the way, he flopped a floosh. Played in the milly too, got it all in with 1010 pf to KJos somehow for a 100 bb pot I think an hour or so into the tournament, and he turned a king. Other than that couldn't really get much going on sunday. Since then been running well, netting a little over 2k the past few days, without any big scores in mtts. Along with this, in my next session i'll have earned enough vpps to get my $1500 bonus. I was thinking about treating myself to something cool, but I think i might save more then I usually do for this summer because there's definitely some stuff I want to do. Go skydiving, roadtrip down to ATL to see the Braves play with a friend or 2. And If the Lakers play in the finals(hopefully rematch with Boston and because it's a shorter trip) buy tickets to at least one finals game. One thing I'm trying to work on in my heads up, is berating fish a lot less. #1 I usually only do it when i'm running bad and getting frustrated. #2 It really does absolutley nothing, and I don't know why I do it. I want them to keep doing what their doing, because in the long run I will profit. #3 All it does is give them a rise, and amuse them. Tell them "nh" and pray they accept a rematch. Unfortunately I'm not going to play as many MTTs this weekend as I would like to. Saturday I have to pick up the parents from the airport in the evening, kinda right in the middle of everything, and sunday I have work. Gonna try to do some convincing to my parents to let me quit, as in the long run, I make more in poker, much more. That's it for now. GL

-pomp

Quick update

I usually won't be updating on back to back days, but since I had a decent score figured I would. I had to wake up at 6am to drive my parents to the airport. I got back home at about 9:30 and got in the $100 mtt that started at 9am. I was very pleased with the way I played. I got lucky in a couple spots but never for my whole stack. After a little HU play I took a nice lead, about 690k-180k. Ended up getting it all in with top pair vs 2 pair, not much as I could do about it in my opinion considering i think I disguised my ace pretty well. He then went on a heater and the final hand suckeddd. For some reason it won't let me post it here so, I limped with K9, he 3xd I called, flop came Q J 3, he lead out and I called, turn came 10 for the straight, he bet bigger, I jammed and he called with QJ, river queen bird. oh well, GG me. Ship $4,350. I was happy with the way I played, and maybe my downswing is over. I also donated an additional $200 to Haiti Looking forward to playing in a bunch of sunday tournies tomorrow.

-pomp

Haiti

It's pretty devistating to see what's happening over in Haiti, them being a poor country obviously isn't helping. So far i've donated $50. Hopefully I can escape this bad run i'm on and donate a little more. I'm also going to look through all my clothes and see what I don't need any more and donate some clothes too. I just started school at the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey last week, and it seems okay so far. As for poker i've been running pretty awful in both mtts and hu sngs, more in MTTs though. Just the standard non stop riv 2 outers, coolers etc, hoping this run doesn't last too long. I just bought a new laptop and its pretty sweet. It's an Asus Intel Core with i3 processor or some other. Really needed a new one, as my other one was old/falling apart. I am probably going to try to register for the WBCOOP, but will only be able to play in 1 or 2 because of school. That's it for now, good luck everyone

Bahamas

Although I bricked pretty hard at PCA, the trip was fun. The 1k freezeout, I couldn't really get anything going at was down to 10 bbs at 150/300, and within about 30 minutes I got my stack up to roughly 11,500. I raised it up with AK utg+1 to 2.5x. An aggro donk bumped it up to 3500 in mid position, it came back around to me and and I took about 5 seconds before shoving and he snap called with 99. I would have loved to win this pot to put me at 60-65 bbs at a pretty weak table, but unfortunately I couldn't win the flip. Myself, Jeff, and Tylor were all knocked out within 30 minutes, so we went back to our room took a nap. Later that night we went to the sportsbar, played some beerpong and did a bunch of shots. We headed over to the Atlantis and went to the nightclub Aura. We were there for a bit, we added a Long Island to our system and we were pretty drunk by now. We went over to roulette for a little, i started with $100 bucks ended up some money after a couple spins. Jeff asked me for $100 because he didn't have any cash on him so I gave it to him. He put it all on "17". He said, "if it comes out 17, i'm sprinting." I had to put $5 on 17 also. The spin comes, and what do you know 17 hits, and jeff just books. We were all so stoked. $100 into $3500 in 1 spin. And in addition i had $5 on it for $175. He didn't even bet anymore to push his luck. He had a pretty good reason to bet on 17 if you ask me. Someone asked, why did you bet 17? He goes "Well my favorite numbers are 7 and 13, so i bet 17." Good logic IMO, lol. The next day I don't even remember what we did, I think we just chilled and recouped from the night before. The next day i played in the $1K hu live event. Each round was a best of 3. I wasn't VERY unhappy with the way I had played in the first round, but I could have played better, but I was still fortunate to win 2-1. First match of the next HU, I made a pretty loose check raise shove after 3 betting from the BB with JJ, with a queen flopping. He called with a queen. I turned straight and flush draw outs, and I hit the river and went up 1-0. The 2nd match was kinda even till this hand. At 75/150 i got it all in preflop with KK to 88, and he rivered an 8, it would have put me into round 3 as I had him covered by very little. The rubber match I just couldn't get anything going. I never really hit a hand, and he never gave me credit, calling down with ace high a couple times. Not really sure if he started to become a station or if I had tells. I ended up getting it in on a flip and lost, gg me. The next day was the $650 bounty, and it was GG me in 3 hands. I flopped a set of 9s on a A98 board, I bet, got 1 caller, turn was a 2, ended up getting it all in vs. A2, and river ace, awesome. Not referring to any of the hands I have talked about, but I had expected the players to be a tad better then what I had noticed hey were. For instance in the $200 turbo. blinds a 100 200 I have about 4500, there's 1 limper, I look down at JJ, bump it up to 750, this kid in he small blind, who literally had not played 1 hand in about an hour, bumps it up to 2500, leaves himself with about 2300. I can never fold here with 18 bbs behind in a TURBO so I put the rest of my stack in and he calls, he has a strong hand known as KQ, lol. I lose gg me. I mean after not playing 1 hand in hour, KQ is apparently the nuts. I could list so many other hands but it's pointless. But I'm glad I was able to get some live experience under my belt, especially before the WSOP. Overall the trip was great and we had a lot of fun. I will definitely be going back next year. All pictures from the trip are up on facebook if you're interested. Tomorrow I'll be back to the online poker grind. lets do this.

P.S. My posts will almost never be this long again.

-pomp

Bahamas

Bahamas is pretty good so far aside from the weather. It's either been windy or cloudy just about every day except 1. We went swimming with the dolphins which was awesome, a lot better then what I did in Punta Cana years ago. Also went on the water slides at the Atlantis and they were pretty cool. We've taken a ton of pictures and i'm sure they will be up on facebook soon. The girls leave 2morrow afternoon and that's when a majority of our poker starts. Myself, jeff, and tylor are playing in the $1k freezeout 2morrow. Hopefully we can ship. I played the $200 turbo Monday night but bricked. Also played a couple $120 SNG's, lost the first, and won the next for $500. Pretty soft sngs IMO. I'll try to post updates each night from here on out, but not sure if i'll be able to do that. GL me tomorrow

-pomp

Good start to 2010

Off to a pretty good start. Finished 3rd in the $25+2.50 freeze out for roughly $3500. Good start to both a nice profit, and my quest for Yearly top 100 TLB(Tournament Leaderboard). I had my hand history e-mailed to me and i reviewed the hands and overall was pretty satisfied with the way I played. Believe it or not, during the course of the tournament, I was NEVER at risk for my tournament life, until we were 6-7 handed at the final table. I have 2 prop bets with this kid beaver032. First bet is $200 on who profits more in MTT's and SNG's(using sharkscope) in 2010. The next is, I have $100 that he will NOT profit $100k in SNG's and MTT(sharkscope also) 2010. Other than that I really haven't played much the last few days with new years and getting ready for Bahamas. I can't wait and I"m leaving in a few hours. I'll update as much as possible while i'm there. Good luck

-Pomp