UB: SNG Challeng Gets Wacked. Okay, Maybe Just Muffled.

So it has been some time since I gave any updates on my UB Challenge. Well that is because there really hasn't been any action to speak of. On 1/17 I did play a six game session that did not go well and cost me about $10 which is okay considering $33 was at stack. My session of six tables was at the same time where as I usually only four table. When this session ended I decided it was best to quit for the day.

I resumed play the following day but this time on PStars. Bad results that we will not speak of.

I had renewed my Deuces Cracked subscription a couple of days before so I decided it best that I take a break and watch videos. Also I had started reading The Godfather of Poker which I highly recommend. It is a great and easy read. Doyle Brunson has some outrageous stories that are so wild and crazy, you could not make this stuff up.

I took a stab at Full Tilt's latest craze. Rush Poker. It is fun, fast and can be very tilting but also satisfying. Still though I feel as though my game is in a rut. Until 1/21 I am feeling good and confident in my game. This night is the January event of the RPL. I take it down with confidence. My game is back.

Thanks to Pokerstars and this blog I was able to be in their World Bloggers Championship of Online Poker which is a tournament for bloggers and runs multiple tournaments over multiple days. Since I was already on Stars, I decided to play some MTSNGs. While I managed to mincash (a ticket to a SCOOP event), I also managed to cash in two of four other tourneys for an ROI of 134%. The following day, while I did not cash in the WBCOOP#2, I did manage another two out of three cashes for an ROI of 166%.

Today after I played in the WBCOOP#3 and four other MTSNGs I thought I would go back to UB and pick up where I left off 12 days ago. I felt good about my MTSNGs so I thought what better place to start. How wrong could I have been... Nobody was playing. While I have been typing this post I have not seen a single 18, 27, 45 or 90 man even get players (other than 1 90 man that went from 8 to 10 registered players). So then I went back to the 9 man tables and they are slow to fill up. At this rate I don't know what to do. I may try to see if any fill up in the 9 man and go from there. Maybe 730pm is just too early for action on UB.

Forecast of reaching the $500 bankroll by Feb. 1. not so good. But I do feel that my break was needed and had I not taken the break it could have been more costly to my bankroll and goals. We will press forward and continue the goal into Feb.

February has a lot of poker action to come. RPL on Feb. 11th which will be interesting with a $20 buyin and a $20 single rebuy and $20 add on. Plus we have a crew going to Indiana's Horseshoe for some tournament action. We're hoping for a good month. 


Days Remaining:....................... 4
Bankroll:................................ $302
Need:.................................... $198

UB: SNG Challenge Hits Upswing, While My Pstars Takes Downswing

This week was a bit of a roller coaster. My play on the 10th was a bit of a downer with only two cashes out of eight games played. I seem to have rough weekends lately. But with the play starting on Monday I was able to find my zone and start getting positive results for the four days I played during the week. Thursday gave a big boost to the UB bankroll. Donna was gone and I was feeling good, so I loaded up 4 11$ STTs. I finished 1st in two for $45 each. And as a bonus I cleared part of my deposit bonus and got a little rakeback for an additional $10. I stopped play when D got home early from class rather than load up more.

Friday I was exhausted so no play but Saturday I decided to see what was going on at Pstars... BAD IDEA. I added a 90man to the 4table mix and played too tight I think. The seven STTs I played resulted in only one second place finish. I then donked off another 10.50 @ a HU table. While it sucks that I dropped approx 40$ on Stars BR, it's not part of the UB Challenge. This was just a bad run so I will move on.

UPDATE: So I guess it's my fault knowing it was Donk Day on Stars that it would probably be Donk day on UB as well... I dropped 55$ to find out that the fish were hitting everything (even though it might take floating to the river to get it they were committed with there flopped nothing and calling 3/4 to pot size bets. I have never seen so many fish be the CL... bygones.

Days Remaining:....................... 16
Bankroll:................................ $368 $313
Need:.................................... $132$187

UB SNG Challenge to resume today

After a few days off from online poker due to a busy week of video shoots etc. I plan to use today to get back on track and in the swing of things. I did manage only two SNGs on Saturday before our home game Main Event, but because Holdem Manager was not working properly I opted not to play any more until I could get that issue resolved. After my QQ was flushed on the river in the ME, I managed to get my HEM back online.
I will start the day as follows:

Days Remaining:....................... 22
Bankroll:................................ $293
Need:.................................... $207

UB: SNG Challenge

As I noted a few weeks ago I am starting 2010 with a personal goal/challenge to turn $100 on UB into $500 by the end of January. I started off strong in my early days of UB but then between 12/22 and 12/28 (only played 30 SNGs) I dropped down from $293 to as low as $234. I attribute this to variance but it still did not come easy. I took a slight break and ran reports on my play to see what I was doing wrong and managed to find a few leaks. Also I think I got a bit cocky on UB thinking I could not lose.

I started things back up on Jan 1 with $253 and have had four short sessions totaling 18 SNGs over 2 days with positive returns each session to manage to finish Sunday with $315. With the holidays and being sick I did not get in as much poker as I would have liked over New Years weekend but... oh well. I will probably not get too much play in this week either since I will be on location for a photo shoot in Chicago for three days and then the RPL Main Event on Sat. That will just make reaching the goal more of a challenge.

Days Remaining:....................... 28
Bankroll:................................ $315
Need:.................................... $185

Hot Turns to Cold, at Least For Today

I played nine SNGs tonight and managed to mincash once, bubble once and the other eight times were not good. I probably should not have been playing tonight. It didn't exactly feel right before I started but I pressed on anyway (especially since D was not home). I managed to drop 8 buyins for the evening. I attribute this to my mood and of course variance. I like to think this is my hot streak with a minor correction. I decided to stop while it was going downhill and not donk off another 8-10 buyins. I am still up a significant amount but just wanted to move past the $300 mark as I work to reach $500 before the end of January.

My overall ROI for UB is 60.1% over 46 games with my bankroll at $252.

A Short Snow Session

I got back from Pigeon Forge Sunday morning to find lots of snow and no cable or internet. Around 4PM I got both the cable and the internet back.

Around 10PM, I decided to play a quick session of four to six tables before going to bed after a full weekend. I managed to do well on two of the four for most of the session and then on one of them I got to around 10BB and ran AA into QJo, all in preflop... and of course he hits two jacks for the win and bust me eighth. oh well. Instead of opening another table I decided just to play my three remaining tables and call it a night. On the second table I managed to get in the money and run into a bad run of cards only to bust out third to a better pair. I'm gonna need more than that cash to keep climbing to break $500 in January for my UB bankroll. On the remaining two tables I am sitting comfortable on one and very bad on the other which was on the bubble. I finished the third table in first fairly easily especially HU. The last table was four handed for some time and the blinds were climbing. With the blinds at 150/300 I was down to just over 900 in chips and managed to stay alive and then take a calculated move and regain a comfortable stack. When I got HU I had a 5:1 chip lead and took it soon into the HU play.

My overall ROI for UB is 94.6% over 37 games with my bankroll at $292.

After Four Days of UB

I made a $100 deposit on UB on Dec 13th. I have since played approx 33 nine man $5 SNGs and have turned a pretty profit ($160 profit) along with maintaining a beautiful ROI (88.4%). Here is my graph so far.

and here is my graph for SNGs between PStars (mostly $3 SNGs and UB $5 SNGs combined for approx 375 SNGs. While I was turning profit on Stars it was a serious grind as I would go up then would drop down some due to the usual variance. The players on Stars are just so many and seemingly much better than those on UB. (totals approx $250 profit and 45% ROI)

I contribute my steady climb to a number of things which include playing multiple tables at a time (4-6). Holdem Manager software to track my hands and those of my opponents and the book Sit'n Go Strategy .

I am going to probably take the weekend off since it is my anniversary and then hit the tables hard again next week. I would like to grow my UB bankroll to $500 by the end of January.