We beat her up, crushed her like no tomorrow, stomped her wholeheartedly a few years, yet Old Lady definitely not dead You see folks, she made it thru the 60s grooving :








Punking her old lady ways into the 70s :











Dancing to the (cheesy) 80s New Wave tunes :








Before surviving the grunge-society-is-a-hole-death-trap that was the 90s :








Alright, you folks are familiar with the drift at this point, know that I will crush my way thru this challenge, so vote in the poll accordingly If you have not followed an Old Lady thread prior to this one, the original is a must (especially if the specifics of a small Northern-Canadian-Arctic-Town might interest you) :

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17...09/?highlight=

Alright, on your marks... set... go!!!

Glgl! Love your threads and will definitely be following this one!

um, 100% not in, but voted and glgl

GL Bro, smash it!

Thx bro Man, it has been a torture to watch the Raps crumble underneath the MIGHTY Cavaliers Hopefully Toronto can take a game at home and perhaps offer some sort of resistance



Hummm, ok, thx for the vote then, I guess...



Thx bro


Well, like stated in my introduction post, this challenge will not be underway until May 12, but have nonetheless booked a couple of small wins in the past couple of days, starting with a decent +600$ in 7h online and +600$ in 4h live at Le Casino de Montreal





Up next, the 5.3k Party Millions this weekend, which will mostly be described in my travel thread Will also be back with more specifics about this thread and might post a few interesting HHs taken from tonight's 2-5-10 (straddle) game.


Run good all

A Few Observations on Live Poker

I started playing poker up in the Yukon and was introduced to this game thru the old school way : brick and mortar casinos, yo While I certainly do not expect the games in the urban casinos to come anywhere close to the communital aspect that we have up in the north, let's make this game ****ing fun, can we not Ok, I will not mention anything that the DGAF thread does not already, but pleasssssssse , for ****ing fracking sakes do not be the guy that :

- Dresses like a pro. I mean, how insecure in your poker skills are you that you need to put the hoodie on, speak the "poker dialect" and take time for every decision

- We all know that you essentially suck at this game and will not be around in a few years, but in the meantime, smile, socialize, dress better and ****ing shower.

- Straddle for Pete's sake, especially when the rest of the table is freely doing so. And please, do you really need to show that bluff and belittle the rec player when you got him to fold to your J7o.

- You see that (whale) guy in a suit with the undone tie that shows up at midnight looking tired from a long day's work... He is your customer, your boss and the freaking guy that pays your salary, so smile, talk to him, be polite and try to act half the man that he is


Bah, that is it for now... I just needed to decompress, after a couple of ignorant live pros simply don't "get it"


Run good all

gogogo

State of the (Live) Game

It was good to step into Le Casino de Montreal 20 years later, in a place that had given me my first taste of legal gambling when I had run up my measle College Days pocket money 50$ into 775$ at the 25$ blackjack tables


#BeginnersLuckYo


Hence it was a delight to show up and notice that the majority of the 17 poker tables were occupied on a Wednesday evening (as a measure of comparison, The Riverrock in Vancouver only has a mere 10 tables nowadays).


#PokerNotDeadYo


Of course, The Playground tonight should look like the poker boom all over again, with the Party Millions being in town and all (pics to come).


Thx for tagging along Rick!!!


Hand of the Day


The table has been a 2-5-10 game for a few rounds, which has encouraged some squeezing, especially IP. Villain has been tight-passive, so alarm bells do go off when he squeezes to 70$ OTB after a limper ; I certainly do not love life when I look down at 77, but obviously make the call.

Flop (165$)
AK8

Life is getting worse and worse by the second, but when villain bets half pot, I sigh, swear at all the Poker Gods and beyond, and call the 85$.

Turn (335$)
AK8 Q

After I check, villain continues his aggression by firing half pot again ; something smells fishy here... If we put villain on a nutted range of QQ-AA and AK, he ends up never having a flush... I call the 175$, villain looks genuinely troubled (unless my "Hollywood radar" is off...).

River (685$)
AK8 Q 3

It gets checked down on the river


Run good all

Bahhhh, busted out of the 5.3k Party Millions on the last level of Day 1 Finally got villain where I wanted him, on a platter, up for the taking But poker being poker, you know how it goes : you get the best possible hand preflop, get villain to push all his chips as a 4 to 1 dog, but then the Poker Gods **** you up in the arse AA, no good

Really happy with my play though, performed at an elite level both in this tourney, where I knew when to apply pressure and putting villain's stacks at jeopardy with the appropriate lines and blockers, and also managed to crush souls in the 5-5 game, which rapidly became a 5-5-10 game, and 5-5-10-20-40 game at 5 in the morning





Alright, got a few more days in Montreal with family and friends before landing in Dawson and debuting this challenge


Run good all

Looking good man! Sucks how that Toronto/Cavs series went down ... I didn't expect them to win the series but I did not see a sweep coming. What do you think they are gonna do in the off season?

It will be an interesting couple of months for the Raptor's franchise, indeed... I have never been of the blow-them-up camp, and think that disassembling a very good product from the ground up just to make it better, seems like an unproven and unwise gamble. And besides, basketball is a form of entertainment, there is only 1/30 teams that wins every year, so the question becomes : is it such a shame to offer a product the slides into the top 5-8 range... I think not. I would be happy with a team that potentially gets into the 2nd and 3rd round of the playoffs year after year, and always has a legit 5% chance at the finals, a 2-3% chance at the title... Anyhow, I really hope Ibaka comes back, as does Tucker. Not sure if Lowry will (but would love if he did) and think Patterson is all be gone at this point. Wright, Poeltl and Powell are all ready to contribute significantly next year, which makes some or all of Joseph, Carroll or Valanciunas expendable...

+300$ today in 2h online. Visiting some friends in the next couple of days before flying to the Yukon. I will detail the specs of my challenge in a next post


Run good all

Made a small day trip to Gatineau/Ottawa to visit an old high school buddy who now works for the Ministry of Environment in Ottawa and took advantage of the detour to check out the Casino in Gatineau. The latter is located in a nice hotel, which largely contributes to its general appeal :





yet there was something extremely depressing about this particular Tuesday evening... Perhaps it was the drunken Sen's fans, a bit too inebriated after the game 7 victory... Perhaps it was the uninspiring discussions floating around, where I happened to be one of the youngest at the table... Perhaps it was just the general vibes of finding myself stuck in ****ing Gatineau on a Tuesday evening in a 1-2 game while waiting for a seat for the 2-5 game to open up...





Ok, before we get this challenge going, let's plan things out a little, shall we

- Grinding 50-55h/week. Past summers have shown this number to be the norm for me, yet I might take half a week off this summer for a camping trip (with a pretty lady, yo ). Nonetheless, 55h weeks should be the standard (with some slack to take loosely advantage of the summer).

- Half of this volume will be dedicated to live games - most of which occur on the weekends -, where I average just over 50$/h in the 1-2 game and tournaments. Not much to add here, as this winrate is based on a decent sample size, over the years, in low variance games.

- I will continue grinding 100z and 200z online while taking shots in the next few weeks at 400z. The variance will obviously be bigger than live, but, fwiw, I average (slightly) more online that I do on the live felt (at least since I started grinding 200z 8 months ago...).

- Studying is the area where I usually falter in the summertime, but plan on maintaining 2h/week and upgrading to elite on RIO for 1 month and thus striving for 4-5h of studying weekly.

- Tennis 2-3 times weekly along with some jogging (1-2kms) on non-tennis days and losing 4-6 kgs will be other goals in order to maintain sanity/get out of my head.

That it is about it folks ; challenge starts in 2 days


Run good all

Lofty goal but am of course rooting for ya Dub.
Voted on 50k+ because Gangstas have love for Gangstas!

Hey Matteo, good to see you posting again ; Was wondering about you lately, then saw you posting in your thread this week after a long hiatus Hope all is well...

I definitely set the bar higher with the 50k mark, but, as most of you know, I crushed both previous Dawson challenges by a clip of 5k both times Besides, even if I ran bad live, it would be almost impossible to go underneath the 20k mark (barring a life bad beat that would prevent me to put in the volume... knock on wood) ; where the variance lies, is with online, as we all know that it is possible to hit a long B/E stretch even for big winners... Nonetheless, if I was a betting man - disclaimer : I am -, I would definitely put money on myself to succeed

Taking the airplane to Vancouver then Whitehorse now :

#LongLiveCanadianSummers


Run good all

Day 1

Hopped on the bus, cruised thru the 7h separating the drive Whitehorse-Dawson (after 10h spent in planes/airports yesterday), got off, (got) booked a hotel room for 2 nights (before getting a set-up ready in my future trailer), went for dinner followed by the casino for opening night, yo -100$ in 7h

It usually takes me roughly 2 weeks each year before fully adjusting to the lolive games over here, hence, in order to smoothly acclimate myself once again to this northern/arctic realm, here are a few notes :

- Perhaps it is -EV to straddle every single round, especially given that only 3/10 players participated (not enough to warrant a self-imposed mandatory straddle).

- We go thru this every year, but sure, the post-flop edge you hold in this game might dictate a wider pre opening range, yet do not fall into the habit of opening A7s UTG, for instance...

- This said, a wider range IP might be in order this summer...

- Really love the absolute HIGHLY exploitative lines taken tonight, stuff that I would never fathom of online or in a 2-5/5-10 game :

Hand 1 : bet-bet-shove with KQ (no s) on K and get called with worse

Hand 2 : after an EP raise to 20$ and a call, I 3bet to 70$ 77 and get 1 caller. Flop comes AK5, x-x, I x the K turn, villain fires 75$ ; I call, I x the 3 river-call villain's shoves

- Action will not be good until July, so I will suck it up, content myself with a 35$ hourly in a SLOOOOOWWWW very small game and not complain, neither out loud or ITT Instead, I will focus on the online pokerz, extracurricular activities, studying etc.

That's it for now folks, let's crush this challenge


Challenge : -110.00$

Day 2

Well, that was a biitch slap in the face When it's not the online pokerz that is ****ing me up in the arse (think K10, flop comes KKx, villain shoves 3.5x pot with A10 , it is the live pokerz splitting my skull open -600$ in 6h live, -600$ in 3h onine

Needless to say, but this is not exactly how I wanted to start the challenge Nonetheless, I always seem to run bad when I get back to Dawson which, when combined with the adjustments I must make in order to maximize my EV in this game, is always kind of results damning... A few notes to self :

- Sure, you are trying to extract every last drop of EV you can from this lolive 25 hands per hour game, yet tighten your single-raise range (both with calls and open-raises) in favour of widening up your 3bet-bluff range ; initiative combined with a range-advantage are worth its price of gold in this game

- Continue to exploit with bet sizes and funky lines, thus essentially throwing GTO out the window, yo

- Unless the game is shorthanded or is inclined to do the same, slow down on the straddles buddy

- Sure this game can be upsetting at times, but God is it good to not see any pros (AKA hoodie, ipod anti-social-arrogant-mamafrackers) or jaded poker players, hence remember how lucky you are to be grinding a game you love in this far northern location

Alright, we will be focussing on the online pokerz this week, so lets get out of this downswing, shall we


Challenge : -1282.06$

Day 3

Still getting things organized, like reinstalling my van insurance, purchasing 4 new tires for this (old) lady of mine that needs some care just to not drop dead :





Also staying in a hotel until my trailer is setup :




125$ a night though...


Grinded for 2h today, played tennis, went for dinner, (greatly) stuffed myself, hyped myself with quite the (over)dose of cafeine only to find the casino devoid of action, as expected For the next couple of months, games will be hard to get going, fragile when they do, and still at the constant risk of crashing when put in motion... This said, we do have an NL Omaha game on Thursday, which should entice some gambool-gambool +700$ in 2h online

In order to crush this challenge, we will need to maintain a min hourly of 48$, which should be easily attainable both live and online, barring some absolute run bad... - knock on wood For the record, my most lucrative summer saw me average 44$ an hour, at a time where I grinded small stakes online (50-100z) as oppose to now (100-400z), so it should be smooth sailing ladies and gents, barring a big life interference, like meeting a pretty lady, you know, the kind that would sway me away from this challenge Thx for the vote of confidence in the polls thus far folks


Challenge : -552.88$

Day 4

Swingy day at the office yo : up 2.3k in a few hours, before dropping 1k of it at the tail end of the session +1.3k in 6h

Messaged a few people to try to get a scheduled tournament going tomorrow at the casino ; unfortunately, at this time of the year, one most do all he can to get live games going during the dead middle of the week... Hey, who is complaining, I get to play live in this beautiful, northern land without the obnoxious-hoodie-button-clicking-reg-bots anywhere close in the vicinity (closest casino is 2000kms away ).




Raining like fracking cats and dogs here, so had to cancel today's tennis Tomorrow, dinner with friends then the mentioned MTT which, despite the low 100$ (rebuy) price tag, remains really fun and relatively lucrative (35-50$/h with a 100-150% ROI


Challenge : +50.46$

Hey OP, fellow Montrealer still following you!

GL on the challenge, no doubt you will make it! #summeryukonbeastmode

P.S.: Aren't you up to +750$ with the 1.3k day? You were at -550$ + 1.3k and you wrote +50$... Am I missing something?

Day 5

Bah, like most of yous know, I was on a sunrun heater for most of the winter before getting smacked with some nasty run bad for the past month+ ; this bad variance has inconveniently followed more in the inception of this challenge : -1200$ in 6h

My mental balance is perhaps my strongest suit as far as this game goes, yet I find myself being slightly results oriented since making the latter public anew (transparent down to the last penny ), which also instills me with some level of tilt when on a downswing... Also, not use to the the fatigue that comes with grinding this many hours again... Perhaps I need a little more of this :






Hey Simon, thx for following yet another Old Lady thread bro Did you get to check out/play the Party Millions at the Playground?

Yeah, that 1.3k was overlapping the previous day's results, my rationale being that online was 1 LONNNNNGGGG session since playing live on Saturday Anyhow, the results following the tagged "challenge" at the bottom of the post, are the official ones (using pokercharts), but I will nevertheless make sure to clearly distinguish each day's grind results from now on, given that I know now that someone is keeping me accountable Also, I am still in the hotel, have not set into a routine yet as far as a grinding and blogging schedule goes...

Alright folks, time to go on a upswing


Challenge : -1,174.75$

Day 6

Scientific survey here : how many oversets, overflushes, runner-runner bad beats can a brain take before completely losing it and start flipping over tables, smashing monitors and beating up ladies while brutally snatching their purses away All joking aside, I was not a happy camper when I dropped 500$ in my first hour of play, nor was I celebrating life when I went from chip leader to bubble boy in the tournament yesterday when QQ obviously < J9o after I let villain push all his chips as a 4 to 1 dog -300$ live in 3h, +300$ online in 6h

This weekend is the Gold Show, which attracts a ton of peeps from WhiteHorse and Alaska (mainly miners), so the games should be quite juicy, yo. This will probably be the busiest days until Canada day in July, so lets make the best of this - shall we - and book 2k+ to put us back in the black Also releasing in the vicinity of 6k in RB in the next 2 weeks, so that will greatly help to put us back on track





Challenge : -1132.85$

Nice thread!
opinions on Casino de Montreal and Playground's 1/2 and 2/5 cash games in comparison to other places you've played?

Day 7

Bah, am bummed out : swung down 800$, up 1.3k, down 2k... Woke up this morning after a bad of sleep of what could of only been tilt-induced dreams... Am pretty happy with my game, despite some spewing, but this negative variance is starting to spill into my life... Got to keep the big picture in mind, you know, the macro... I'm out, back tomorrow to challenge the world folks


Challenge : -2326.97$

Gl OP you can do it, have faith

Day 8

Despite being in the midst of a prolong downswing, I am pretty happy to be still gunning - all guns blazing, yo -, embracing variance as it comes This said, my spidey senses are failing me and I find myself with my dick hanging in my hand more often that I want to Not only am I firing all cylinders into the top of villain's ranges, but find myself attacking the wrong spots, bluffing stacks at the wrong time and this, of course, while running largely under EV +500$ live in 7h, +400$ online in 3h

Let the upswing continue tomorrow




Pic taken from a dog musher friend last winter


Challenge : -1446.42$