In 2004, I was a late-30s white guy with a PhD in electrical engineering, trying to get back in shape so I could play soccer again, with an alcoholic ex-wife who I just divorced and an aspiration to keep doing fun stuff at work while trying to build a successful group. Then I discovered poker like the rest of America. I played hours on end (almost all online) and was moderately successful.

Flash forward 2 years. The UGIGA, or whatever the hell that worthless group of dream crushers is called, had to ruin the party and steal all the online fish. Well, once the dead money morons left the scene, as Darwin predicted, the strong survived. Unlike many around this time I did not came to the realization that I was not one of them. After a several years of break even to slightly losing poker, and an inability to realize that I was better at my job than online poker, Black Friday came and I finally stopped playing online poker.

I am quantph, and this is my blog. If my thread title and introduction are completely unfamiliar to you, then you should immediately go to one of the best 2+2 trip reports-turned-blog ever, mooremoney19’s:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/10...-tl-dr-659480/http:

You will not regret losing several days of your life to reading that. Of course, if you’ve managed to make it all the way to House of Blogs on 2+2, it’s pretty likely that you spend way too much time on 2+2 and are already familiar with AKAD.

A little bit of introduction is in order, so here’s a bit about me:

1) Who or what is a quantph?

Good question, glad you asked. Quantph is the short hand for the quantum physics section of the preprint server for the physics community:
http://arxiv.org/archive/quant-ph

Although my academic degrees all say electrical engineering, my work is really in applied physics (more on this later), and quant-ph is the area in which I publish.

2) How did you come up with the title for your blog?

I’ve been playing with this idea for a while. mooremoney19’s trip report/blog was just an awesome read, and I had to plan to write an extended trip report some day. I had a long-term plan to take off from my job for 6 months and travel around the US playing poker, but that got slightly derailed.

My alternate title was “Pronounced quant-pee-aitch”, along the lines of a Lynard Skynard album. But this seemed more appropriate for this forum.

3) Why did you start this now?

I am a furloughed federal employee, and I have too much time on my hands.


That’s all for right now, I’m off to play in a PLO home game. More about me and poker and other stuff later.

Well, the PLO game never got going, which I guess is okay since I was very tired anyway. Today I played some 30/60 LHE and some 2/5-100 spread limit HE at my local B&M. Had some serious run-good at the 30-60 game, flopped 2 sets in my first orbit, racked up >$1K to the good before the table changed enough for me to think that 2/5 would be easier money. Won a few hundred there, too, and came home early enough to work on this a bit.

A little bit more about me andpoker:

4) Where do you live? How is the poker?

Boulder, Colorado. I moved here for a job in 1996 and have no plans of ever leaving. The nearest casinos are in Black Hawk, about 1 hour drive. Colorado casinos have a maximum bet of $100, so there is no such thing as No Limit Hold ‘em here, it’s all spread limit and limit. For those of you who are unfamiliar, 1/2-100 means that you have $1 small blind, $2 big blind, and can bet or raise between $2 and $100 anytime (a raise must be at least the amount of the previous bet as is typical in NL). 1/2-100 plays very similar to 1/2 NL (I suppose a deep-stacked game would be different but this is atypical in my experience). But 2/5-100 plays much smaller than 2/5 NL. And it’s pointless to play 5/10-100, might as well just play limit.

5) What poker games do you play?

My preferred game is Pot Limit Omaha HiLo. Of all the games I play, I believe this requires the most skill and discipline. In limit O/8, if you flop the nut low you’re never going anywhere, especially in a multiway pot. In PLO/8, you can lose a lot more money playing just a low, with no chance to win the high. Getting quartered in that game can hurt. Unfortunately, the only time I get to play this game is at a Wednesday home game (5/10 PLO or PLO/8, dealer’s choice). At my local B&M, I’m a regular in the 2/5-100 O/8 game that runs on Friday and Saturday nights. I mainly play 2/5-100 hold ‘em at other times, and occasionally play the 30/60 limit game when the line up looks good.
When I go to Vegas, I usually call the Venetian my poker home. I play 2/5 NLHE and limit O/8 if the stakes are interesting (occasionally 8/16, but preferably 15/30 or 30/60).

I also like to mix in some PLO but that must be rough at a casino with a $100 max bet.

Any problem in the 30/60 raising to $120 or is each raise a separate bet?

Yeah the spread limit O/8 game gets a little funny once there's $100 in the pot, essentially you're playing limit at that point. You might think it would change the strategy a lot, but in reality most of the players aren't thinking that hard (OMG! I have the nut flush draw! Must call (to try to win half the pot)). There was a PLO high only that ran for a while at the Isle but I never played it so I can't speak to how it played. I did play a little capped PLO online on FTP so I imagine it would be similar. In any event, I've seen $1500 pots on multiple occasions in the 2/5-100 O/8 game, so it can still play pretty big.

Each raise is a separate bet. So on the turn you can bet $60 and I can raise to $120, you can reraise to $180, etc. I forgot to mention that game plays with a kill to 50/100 as well. And in the spread limit hold 'em games, I can bet $100 and you can raise to $200, and we can keep going if heads up.

Are you one of those crunchy Boulder hipsters? If not, why not?

I'm too old (46) to be a hipster, although I admit to a penchant for PBR on a hot summer day, otherwise I'm a Colorado microbrew kinda guy. Also, I'd rather be playing poker or riding my mountain bike than sitting around the coffee shop, thinking great thoughts and cursing out "The Man".

The teams in the 30 game don't worry you?
I assume as a reg you have learned how to spot and avoid them.

I don't have a ton of hours in that game, but I have figured out who are the good regs and who suck, and when the game is overly reg-infested I play 2/5-100.

But I did encounter an outright attempt at cheating in my Tuesday session. Here's how it went down: I'm in the 2 seat, folds to me and I fold as well, the young Asian (I believe Vietnamese) gal (YAG) to my left, she's a reg and open limps from middle position. Older Asian woman (OAW) on her left calls. These two talk in between hands in either Chinese or Vietnamese, I believe it's the latter but I can't be certain and it's not too relevant. Folds to the blinds who both call. Flop is AAT. Checked to OAW, she bets, small blind calls (FWIW, he is also Asian but I didn't recognize him as a reg) . YAG also calls, and she says something very softly in Vietnamese. No way dealer could hear it and I couldn't understand it.

Now is when it gets ugly. Turn is a blank, checked to OAW who bets, SB calls. YAG now picks her cards up off the table and holds them up to eye-level, so that OAW can see them! I'm fairly sure that I see OAW's eyes dart in that direction before YAG tosses them into the muck. While this is going on, I say something like, "keep those cards down'. Dealer isn't paying enough attention, I tell her what I saw. She tells the YAG to be careful about exposing her hand, the two yell at me that they weren't showing cards, whatever.

I probably should have made the dealer call the floor, but none of the regular floormen were there at the time. The whole situation really bugged me. I know a couple of the regular floors reasonably well and will chat with them this weekend. The bottom line is that I don't think there's a lot that can or could've been done, it's just a he said, she said situation. Next time will be different, I was caught off guard this time since I've not seen that BS before. I put this completely on the YAG, she initiated everything. I would bet that her soft-spoken word would translate as "ten". And, the dealer was also a young Asian gal, these other two talked with her in Vietnamese between hands. I don't believe she was complicit, but I doubt this would've been attempted if a sharper dealer was in the box.

Any thoughts on this situation, and on other team play that goes on in this game, is appreciated.

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I already denied being a hipster, now I'm a hippie?! My long-hair days have long since passed, I did have some cool braids (for you soccer fans, think Baggio braids: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/4...styles/page/10. Now I'm just trying to hang on to what I have left...

Went up to Black hawk on Friday night and spoke to one of the floormen about the collusion I saw the previous Tuesday, he didn’t seem at all surprised when I identified the culprit. He said he’d keep his eyes open, I didn’t really think he’d be able to do anything.

Was crushing the 2/5-100 HE game while waiting for an O/8 seat, then ran my KK into AA. Oh well. The O/8 game wasn’t too good by the time I got a seat in it, and I managed to play it badly for a little while before I decided to have another shot at 30/60 LHE. I had a great table (4th one, a must move) and it wasn’t reg-infested. One guy was totally drunk and tilted, unfortunately he didn’t tilt any of his $2K in my direction before he left. Fortunately, he was replaced by a guy who played almost every hand and called almost every bet/raise. He had to ask the dealer every single street how much he could bet, LOL. I did manage to catch some hands against him. Game was so good, even after I moved to one of the main games, that I ended up playing until 4 AM. Ugh, that’s always bad for me. At least I went home up > $500.

I managed to get up around 9 so I could go to Veloswap, which is a huge bike sale, lots of new and used bikes and parts. My friends who collects vintage bikes met me there and took me shopping for full-suspension 29ers. I ended up getting a sweet deal on a new Giant Anthem X: http://www.giant-bicycles.com/en-us/...specifications It was quite interesting going around with him, I needed to get pedals for this bike, and I would have just picked up any old pair of SPD-compatible pedals for $10, there were lots of these available. However, he insisted on finding me a pair of Shimano pedals that were made in Japan because they are so much higher quality, I would have never known. He also pointed out a couple of former Tour de France stage winners walking around, pretty non-descript in that crowd. Boulder is a bit of a mecca for road bikers, you never know when the guy (or gal) in front of you in the checkout line at the supermarket is a former Olympian or TDF stage winner.

Had a relatively short session at Ameristar on Saturday night because I was so tired, but I crushed the O/8 game for $550. Caught a river 4 on an Q32K double-suited board while holding AA5x to win a big pot, no other hands of note.

Since this is still a new blog, I’ll keep answering questions that I like to know about fellow poker players.

6. How did you get interested in poker?

I first became interested in 2003 but it had nothing to do with Chris Moneymaker. While I was living in my friend’s basement while trying to get my divorce finalized, I got invited to a friendly, low-stakes home game by a co-worker. It was all work colleagues. I think the stakes were $0.10/0.25 with a $20 buy-in. Games were dealer choice, and we played hold ‘em, Stud Hi, Omaha/8, and Omaha Hi (all limit). It was a lot of fun, a good bunch of friends.

But what really got me hooked was reading Positively Fifth Street by James McManus. Before this was a book, it was a long article in Harper’s, and I was a subscriber in December 2000 when that article came out. It was an awesome read, and I had intended to read the book when it came out, but forgot about it until now. Fortunately, the hostess of this home game had a copy and lent it to me. I read it and was hooked. I immediately sent bought a copy of Wilson Turbo Texas Hold ‘Em and played tens of thousands of hands of limit hold ‘em before ever playing online or at a casino. Times sure have changed, hard to believe that was around a decade ago…

Adventures in 30/60 LHE

Greetings readers, thanks for tuning in to the next episode of my blog. I’ve been a bit slow about posting updates since I’m back at work, and catching up from the government shutdown has been pretty time-consuming.

The weather here in Colorado has been spectacular for the past few weekends, and I’ve been getting in some fun rides on the new 29er. This is my first full suspension bike, and it rocks. Hopefully get to ride until Thanksgiving this year.

On to poker news: I’ve been playing a lot of 30/60 LHE the past few weeks, and a little 2/5-100 O/8 and HE. I’m afraid that the O/8 game is already close to dying. I played for a few hours on Friday, and the game was terrible. At least 3 people at the table wouldn’t put money in the pot without at least 3 wheel cards. I ended up playing 30/60 most the night. And Saturday I wouldn’t even sit down the line up looked so bad, the game ran short-handed for a few hours before dying completely. I don’t think it will be going past Xmas.

So I’ve been working on my 30/60 LHE game, the variance and suck-outs are often unbelievable to me. I’m not one to complain about bad luck but I feel like I get run down at that game way more often than is probable. I keep telling myself the same thing I tell my friends that complain about the rundowns, “You want them to chase, you just don’t want them to catch”. I know it’s true but when they river the gutshot in a heads-up pot where you flopped top two, it still frustrates.

I was able to play on Sunday this week since Monday is Veteran’s Day (thanks for your service, vets!) and found that both 30/60 tables were pretty juicy. I ended up with one bad reg, one terrible semi-reg, and one unknown who played about 80% of all hands. Despite losing two huge kill pots (kills to 50/100), I managed to rack up a winner.

Here are the two kill hands (50/100), I think I did okay in both of them.

1) Kill is on, in the SB, I’m in the cutoff with T8. Solid reg raises from UTG+1, 2 calls in front of me, so I call, button (terrible unknown) calls, SB (so-so reg) calls. Flop is 975. 3 checks to me, and I bet my draw, button calls, SB calls, one other caller. Turn is 3, checked to me and I bet again, button folds, SB raises to $200 with $25 behind, mid-position folds, and I raise his last $25 knowing I’m behind. River is 8, he shows 64 for a turned straight. Ugh, 80% flop equity and $375 down the tubes.

2) Killer is bad reg in the cutoff, folded to button (solid reg, we’ve had some run-ins tonight and I’ve somehow managed to win them all) who raises, I call from the SB with pocket 4s, BB calls, killer calls. Flop is 554, this board is nearly perfect. Checked to button who bets, I call, BB folds, cutoff calls. Turn is 2, I lead in case button was just c-betting two overs, cutoff calls, and I think he must have the 5. Then button raises. He must have an overpair, I think, and tank while deciding whether to raise or call. Since cutoff has strong calling tendencies I raise, cutoff folds (!) and button 4 bets (!!). He never has 54 here, and I think if he had an overpair he’d just call. I call, and tell the dealer I’m thinking of a card. The bad beat jackpot qualifier is quads beaten, and $225,000 (they rake $2/hand), 40% to loser, 30% to winner, 30% table share. I’m pondering what new toy I could buy with $90,000 (loser’s share) if the case 4 comes, but alas it’s a Q, and I pay off quad 5s. $650 gone, sigh.

I’ve been putting in more hours at 30/60 since the beginning of October but still playing 2/5 HE when the 30/60 looks bad and/or tough. And I’ve just been crushing the 2/5 during that time, makes me wonder if the 30/60 game will ever be worth it. If I could consistently beat it for 1 BB/hr then sure, but the discussion in mid-stakes limit says 0.5 BB/hr is the new 1 BB/hr, and I can consistently make more than that at 2/5 without any $1500 losses…

Thoughts on 2/5-100 spread limit versus 30/60 LHE welcome.

Hey, found this thread after reading your TR to the WSOP over the summer. I'm only on post 14, but looking forward to keeping up with it due to the LHE nature of it. One hand comment though:

Even though this pot is going to be multiway, I think this call preflop is a bit too loose, unless you for sure get telegraph tells from the players behind you indicating they will all call. It obviously can't be a huge mistake, but a solid regular UTG+1 has your hand crushed always, and it really sucks when he has ABroadway or KQ.

And you are basing your 80% flop equity matching it up with the only hand you saw, there were two other hands that called the flop, so you're lamenting over the 'beat' is wrong, you weren't ahead on the flop, that much is sure. But if it makes you feel better, sure, calculate your equity against 6 high and complain about it.

Also, if you know you are behind, which you are with T high, why raise the last $25? It is going in on the river if you hit 100%. That is burning money. Granted you would have called on the 8 river because the pot is huge, but if the river comes a 4, wouldn't you like to save that $25 and buy a nice dinner?

You may have improved in the last few months, and the play there may be bad enough to make you a winner in the game, but your thinking and play leaves a lot of room for improvement.

Thanks for reading and posting! I feel kinda bad I never finished that TR, it was pretty time consuming to write, and once my buddy came to town I had someone to talk with at breakfast and no time to write.

No doubt I'm behind UTG+1, he has 99+, KQs+ here every time. I agree this call is on the loose side, but I think I'm getting the right price. Worst case is ~3.8:1 and I close the action. Additional info not in the original hand history: button has played ~80% of the hands since I sat down. And SB probably can't pass this up since he has posted the kill. So either 4.8 or 5.3:1 likely. And it certainly does suck when you end up in a flush over flush situation, but your implication here is that being suited could be bad, and I should be playing connected only hands because of the fear of being "overflushed"? I don't think you really mean that

Points well taken, especially the latter, in this particular case I would've lost that $25 anyway because of the 8, but I would've saved almost 0.5 BB if I whiffed. With regards to the former, no doubt I was behind probably every other hand, which makes it frustrating to lose to the one hand I was way ahead of. If A,K, or Q not a heart hits the turn I certainly check back if it gets checked to me. Sorry if that came off whiny.

Well, that's at least part of the reason for writing this blog, to try to improve and write out my mistakes in particular, it helps me to think through the hands when I write them out. Hands that I think I play especially well (get max value or lose the minimum) tend to be not so interesting to discuss.

40/80 Mixed Game

Last night my Wednesday home game decided to play 40/80 mixed game, rather than the usual 5/10 PLO/PLO8 game. The host and one of the other guys want to learn these games so they can play them at the WSOP. A few of the regulars at this game weren’t interested, so we ended up with seven players, which is about right for mixed games.

The mix was: O8, Razz, Stud, Stud/8, Badugi, 2-7 triple draw, Badeucey, and Razzdugi. I’m reasonably comfortable with the first four, having played the latter 3 online a fair amount (but never live in a casino). I’m by no means an expert these stud-dealt games but the lineup here isn’t too daunting. I find Badugi particularly uninteresting and frustrating. 2-7TD and Badeuecey are okay, I have very little experience with either of them and tend to be overly conservative, I think. Razzdugi is straightforward, play good razz and let the badugi take care of itself most of the time, if I have a good 3-card razz hand and a badugi I raise, raise, raise.

Here is 2-7TD hand that I found somewhat confusing, any advice appreciated, this is probably pretty basic. And if anyone has a link to a good beginner/intermediate strategy for 2-7TD/badeucey, I’d appreciate it.

Folded to hero in the cutoff, hand is 3457J. Seems strong enough to raise because I have good position. Do I just toss the J and draw to 3457? I suppose it matters how many callers I get and how many they draw. If I’m heads up, I think I should draw just one and pat any 2, 8, or 9, and try to take it down there. But if there’s 2+ callers then I doubt I can win with a 9, and there’s likely 1 or 2 deuces out already. Thoughts on this hand? I’ll post in Draw and Other Poker if people think this hand is interesting.

Here’s another hand that I wasn’t involved in was also found interesting. The game is stud hi only, and on 6th street V1 is showing 5777, V2 has cards but doesn’t matter, and V3 is showing J88Q . V1 leads out and is called by V2 and V3. On 7th street, V1 leads out, V2 folds and V3 raises. V1 tank-calls. V3 shows 8s full of Js, V1 shows a K-high diamond flush. V1 is probably the best player in this game, and we were discussing this hand during a break. He was lamenting leading out on 7th even though his flush was well-disguised. I told him that this hand reminded me of a hand that Sklansky described in Theory of Poker (I believe this is the right book). I might have the exact details wrong here but the core of the argument remains the same. Game is also stud hi only, and on 7th you’re showing QQQQ. Your opponent is showing 5678 (4 to a straight flush). What do you do? You check! Your opponent is never just calling, if he has a straight flush he raises and if not he folds (or perhaps bluffs). You check, and if he bets, you have to decide if he is capable of bluffing this spot. V1 at my game faced nearly the identical situation. V3 is never raising without a hand that can beat trip 7s, and he almost certainly wouldn’t raise with a straight or flush here because of the high potential that V1 has a full house. So he either has a bigger full house or a straight flush with nearly 100% certainty.

The night went really well from a financial view point. I got hit pretty hard by the deck early and was up ~$2000 after a few hours, some combo of good cards and weak opposition. Gave back half of it as the night went on and I missed all of my draws. Ended the night up ~$1500. Hope these guys want to keep playing this sometimes!

Having never played home games outside of cheap buy-in games with friends who aren't poker players, what is it like playing for that much money in a home game environment? Any concerns people won't pay up? How do they treat new players who get invited by only knowing one of the people?

Almost forgot: got a call earlier this evening from the poker room manager at the Ameristar, an audit showed they shorted my payout by 1 penny! The message said I could just call and decline it. I called and told the guy I wanted it, and I wanted a check for $0.01 He didn't buy it for second

Another Poker Update

I had an excellent 3-day weekend on the felt. I already wrote up the big night on Thursday, and I played both Friday and Saturday as well. Friday started off with a bang as I sat at 2/5-100 HE and got 3 pocket pairs (88,88, and KK) in consecutive hands and raised them all. First one had one limper, I raised to 20 from the hijack, button calls, limper calls, and 3 of us see a flop of 844 2-tone. Limper checks as do I, button bets 50 and I smooth call. Turn is a K, ck/ck. River J and I bet 50, he folds. Sigh. Next hand I open and all fold. Third one there’s one limper, I make it 25, folds to limper, who makes it 120 to go, I make it 220, and he puts another 65 on top and is all in. KK > JJ, and I take my 30/60 seat up ~$300 in half an hour.

Another soft table, and I’m mostly running good. I open KK from UTG in a kill pot, killer folds, fish calls, agro Asian gal (AAG) 3-bets, and I cap, fish calls another 2. Flop is K43r, I bet, fish calls, AAG raises, I call to let fish come along, and he does. Turn 5, and I lead out, fish folds, AAG calls. River A, bet/call, she claims AK but doesn’t show.

Of course, it’s never all good, I had AA cracked twice, once by a flopped set of 9s in a pretty standard hand, once by a LOL-played 87o that limped-called 2 and then check-called 2 on the flop with 2nd pair, caught 2 pair on the turn. Oh well, if bad play was never occasionally rewarded the bad players wouldn’t come back, right? No matter, I still won a lot of good-sized pots and racked up an additional $1800 here in 6 hours of play.

Saturday started with the first half of the Argentina-Belgium game, followed by a spin on some of the local trails with my 29er. I feel fast on that bike, I can only imagine how’d I’d feel 20 years ago when I actually was fast on a bike. A little nap before the awesome Netherlands-Costa Rica game (had to root for the Ticos since they’re a CONCACAF team, even though the Dutch were clearly better), and then on to the Ameristar. All 17 tables were running by the time I got there at 6, and only three 30/60 tables were going, so I played 2/5-100 for an hour before my 30/60 seat was available. I played pretty poorly at the 2/5 game and lost ~$300, most of that from paying off an OMC when he limped-called my raise, called my cbet on a paired board where I flopped top pair, then led out the turn. So bad, he’s OMC, he’s never bluffing there.

And 30/60 started out badly as well, when my flopped nut flush and gutshot draw missed everything and had to call 4 bets on the turn before folding the river. The fish were biting back hard for a while, and I was stuck ~$1500 before making a huge comeback. No particularly noteworthy hands, I got dealt KK about 4 times at the tough main game (2 huge fish and 7 solid if unspectacular players) and it held in some big pots. Also QJs in a multiway pot, flopped flush draw in position in multiway 3-bet pot, turned a Q and rivered a J, got paid by one of the fish. Racked up +~$1K after 5 hours.

3 strong winning 30/60 sessions this weekend, I’m on a bit of a heater now as I have 6 consecutive winning sessions, each one > $1K.

You might want to post that incident in the Regional forums. There's a Colorado Poker thread there where Black Hawk poker is regularly discussed. Other 2+2 Colorado regs may have encountered similar issues, if those two particular ladies make a habit of flashing each other's cards and/or breaking the english-only rules.

Thanks, this was actually on my to-do list for tonight, I am a fairly regular poster in that thread.


In other quantph news, variance caught up to me in my Wednesday home game (5/10 PLO;PLO/8) when my Q-high straight (high only this hand) got all the money in against a T-high straight on a T98 board and he caught running clubs for a flush. C'est la vie.

At least I was able to go back to work today as the federal employee furlough ended with nothing accomplished. I did win $40 betting that 1) the government would shutdown and 2) the over/under on when government employees would return to work, he picked the 15th, I snap-called the over FTW. I am thinking about investing in some single malt whiskey but Ted Cruz seems to have discovered a strain that allows him to live in an alternate reality, I wonder if that strain is available in CO...

Sub

Another Saturday night at the 30/60 LHE game

The O/8 game was running short-handed when I got there, and I was first up for 30/60 LHE with a weak-looking must-move starting lineup, so I took the 30/60. A bunch of good starting hands, some of which held up (QQ in SB with JT9 flop, J turn, Q river, I was good even without the boat), some didn’t (AA UTG < Q8 in BB, gutshot came in on turn). There were at least 3 bad players when I sat down, but they gradually moved into the two main games. I eventually moved to the bad main game, put my name on the table change list as soon as I sat down and I was 6th on the table change list, LOL. I put my name on the 2/5-100 HE list but got my 30/60 table change before that seat became available. Although the uberfish was gone, it was still a good table, and I caught a few hands.

Here’s a hand that I won but I think I played very badly and probably won the bare minimum. I have QQ in the SB. 4 limps in front of me, and I just call. I know nobody is folding here, tons of lost value. BB checks. Flop is J54r, I check, BB bets, middle-position calls, button (decent reg) raises, I 3-bet, BB tank calls, middle-position calls, button 4-bets (cap), all call. Turn is 5, and it’s checked through. Damn, more lost value, I hate playing big pairs out of position. River is 7, I lead, BB calls, other fold. QQ > QJ. But I lost $180 by not leading the turn, and $150 by not raising preflop. That’s 5 BB, which is a lot to lose out on in this game. Still learning how to maximize my big hands while minimizing losses, I think I'm overthinking too many hands.

No other hands of note tonight. The O/8 game was running strong when I left, and the lineup looked weak, but I had a 9 AM trail running session, and I went for a hard ride on the 29er in the morning, so I just racked up +$1375 in 6 hours, a very good session for me. The O/8 game ran strong both nights on the weekend (I didn’t play at all on Friday, I followed on Bravo though) which is great, I was worried that it might be dying already.

Working at 30/60 LHE

I’d like to be posting these updates every week but something always seems to suck away all my time. For the week of Thanksgiving, I traveled to Northern Virginia, to my sister’s house. On Tuesday I took my mom to Hollywood Charles Town, she grinds the slots while I play cards. I’ve been following the fate of this room on Bravo, MarylandLive is just destroying it. Wish ML wasn’t > 1 hr away, I’d love to have that game selection. Couldn’t even get a 2-5 NLHE table going on Tuesday afternoon, I played 1-2 for the first time in a long while. Game was supersoft and I won $67 in a couple of hours, despite losing a big pot with TPGK to a flopped set. Villain in that hand was so tight he didn’t even raise my river value bet, thought I had a bigger set, LOL. My favorite was Old Man Coffee, sat down with $100 and proceeded to make stacks of 5 chips. He was directly to my right. Reasonably aggressive guy is on his right, tells him when he sits down that the game is playing like a 2-5 game, does that mean it’s okay to raise without AA or KK?? Anyway, OMC is ridiculously tight. Aggressive guy (AG) raises two limpers to $10 from the button, OMC raises to $20 from the SB, I fold my rags from BB. Limpers fold, AG calls. I probably fold everything worse than KK to his 3-bet, he’s never doing this with AK or JJ. Flop comes J high rainbow, OMC checks, AG checks back. Turn 4, ck/ck. River 9, ck, AG bets 20, OMC calls and tables QQ, AG shows his A9. Play is just LOL by both of these guys, I guess that's why I can beat 1-2...

Back to Colorado on Friday for some 30/60 LHE adventures. I got back home around 1230 and was at the casino by 3. Played some 2/5-100 HE for an hour or so until my 30/60 seat was available. Poker room was packed the whole time. 30/60 was swingy but my tables were great, lots of limp-calling. I had a couple of runs where I went ice cold for a couple of hours, before going on a massive heater at 3 AM, racked up at 5 AM up another 1K.

Here’s my massive suckout hand:
2-5 100 SLHE

Hero in BB with KQ. Villain is nondescript random guy, no reads, stack size $270, I cover.

Two limps, villain raises to 30, smells like a guy who is scared of JJ, I call, one other call. Flop is QT2, I check, ck, villain bets 100, and Hero c/r to 200, 3rd guy folds, and Villain shoves his last $70 which I of course call.

He rolls over 2 black Aces, FML, drawing to 5 outs. 2 on turn, FML^2, only a Queen saves me now. Q on river. Wow...

My last hand at 2/5-100 before they started a new 30/60 table was really tilting. Villain is a 30/60 semi-reg and I always try to play with him, he’s absolutely atrocious. He’s horrible at 2/5-100 as well. I raise JJ from UTG to $20, 2 callers, Villain calls from BB. Flop is 984r, Villain checks, I check with the intention of checkraising, but neither of the two preflop callers accommodates. Turn is T, Villain donks $25, I raise to $60, 2 folds, Villain calls. River T, Villain tanks, then checks, I check behind. He tables his T6o (great preflop call!). Then he asks the dealer to show my cards. I toss them in the muck but she shows him. Such a douchebag move, I’ve only ever done that like twice ever, when I had a bad history with someone. If this guy wasn’t such a donator I’d have given him **** but whatever, we were moving to the 30/60 game together and I knew I’d have a good chance to win a ****load of $$$ from him later that night and hopefully again in the future. He went on a massive heater early at 30/60 and ran $1000 to ~$5000 before getting must-moved. By the time I got to the main game (with him seated directly to my right) he was down to $2000, and he table-changed about an hour later with his remaining $600, without donating anything to me.

I'll try to write up some of the more interesting hands from the past couple of weekends shortly.

I am a winning 2/5 reg over a large sample. I study poker, work on game away from the table etc... I have family in CO and usually play ameristar 2/5-100 when I am there. Curious your take on the skill required to beat 30/60 vs 2/5-100... I have a limited limit background. What would you recommend buying in with at the 30/60 and just how soft is it?

If you're a winning 2/5 player with a TAG style then I think you can learn to beat 30/60. I typically buy in for $1200 and rebuy if I get down to $700. My strategy with regards to buy in is that I never want to run out of money in a limit game, and that includes kill pots (50/100). 700 is only 7 big bets in a kill hand, I don't think I've ever put more than that into a pot to date, although it's certainly possible.

With regards to relative skill level, I can always find a 2/5 game at Astar in which I'm one of the best 3 players at the table. 30/60 is different. Sometimes the game is full of good regulars, where I don't think I have much, if any, edge. This describes many games during the week, when the game is reg-infested. On Friday and Saturday, I try to get on the third 30/60 game (it's a must move) and I get my name down towards the bottom of that must-move list. This must-move table is usually populated by bad regs/semi-regs, rec players, and a couple of strong regs. Eventually everyone gets moved to one of the two main games, and then it's all about table selection-ya gotta know your villains! I usually keep my name on 2/5-100 and roll it if the 30/60 is good, but it's also good to have a backup plan.

The difference between a good (soft) and bad (supertight) game is night and day. Good games have lots of open limping, even from late position, and lots of multiway pots. Bad games have lots of aggression and few multiway pots. It'll take you all of 1-2 orbits to figure it out.

I guess the other thing to note is that it is possible to lose $1500 at 30/60 by running bad in kill pots and making just a few mistakes. It's almost impossible to lose that much at 2/5-100 unless you go on massive tilt. Finally, I don't know if it's possible to beat the 30/60 game for more than 0.5 BBs/hr (the discussion in the medium stakes limit forum says this is the new 1 BB/hr) since I have all of 100 hrs in this game in the past 2 months. But if that's gonna be my win rate then I'll probably go back to 2/5-100 (either HE or O8) since I know I can beat both of those for more $$$, with lower variance.

PM me next time you're around, I can give you the rundown on the locals if you want to see what its like. It's certainly fun stacking $1000+ pots when it's almost all red chips!