ddrstel--

Thanks, but no congratulations yet. I'm down to $850 and considering stopping and setting my alarm early. 13 hours and I was a little fried to begin with.

--Nate

flop for 150? then martingale if loss?

Meh, I'm down to $780.

I'm going to finish these last 7 SNGs and then evaluate. I've never played a session like this before and I'm zapped.

But thanks, snagglepuss, for the best month of posting since FoxwoodsFiend's November. You've been on fire.

--Nate

Nate:

It seems to me that the difficulty of determining the best strategy for the early game (<$10 BR), while daunting, is perhaps dwarfed by figuring out the best strategy for the final hours, especially once the clock gives you less than the length of certain tournaments.

What I'm saying, i guess, is that I have no idea how to approach the endgame given a time remaining T and a bankroll X. Any thoughts you'd like to share about what strategy you would take to maximize your chance of making it given a diminishing T, say the 3 hour mark, and then the 1 hour mark, first assuming you have the ~$800 roll, and then maybe thinking about the hypothetical $400 or $200 roll?

good luck. I think you'll make it.

matt

So do pending trnys entered before the end of the final day still count? Could you enter a trny at the last minute and have it count when finished?

Matt -

I've been thinking about that general question and don't have a complete answer. Right now I visualize my endgame bankroll as an N-tiered entity, where N is (roughly) the number of sets of tournaments I can play.

A bankroll is within "N-order martingale distance" of 1000 if I can take N HU matches and get to 1000 by winning any one of them. The idea, I think, is to structure my play to maximize EV(max such N), without sacrificing too much $EV en route. Unless, of course, P(1000 by grinding) > (1 - 1/2^n) where n is something like EV(max such N).

All this is very hand-wave-ish, and these sorts of questions are so extensively studied that I should know them better (having been a math major, for those who don't know me), but anyway that's how I'm thinking.

--Nate

Matt --

A better plan would have been to take fewer bad beats today.

$832.36 right now. I need sleep. 21 hours 38 minutes to go. (And I need to have the $1k by 7 PM, not be en route to having it.)

--Nate

By the way, I should have just said:

I'm trying to maximize the number of coinflips I'll be able to take at the end so that I only need to win one of them. Obviously it'd be better to be going for 1 of 3 instead of 1 of 2. But if I focus too much on those critical values (530, 800, etc.) then I might lower my chance of hitting 1000 by normal grinding too much. So I have to find a balance. I'm pretty sure it will be correct to begin an N-step martingale with N hours left if my bankroll allows it.

--Nate

EDIT: Going to sleep now. I figure I've got roughly 10 hours of playing left.

Pardon my ignorance, but what's a martingale?

From the context of the conversation I'm guessing it's playing a bunch of HU matches in a row - escalating the buy-in if you lose.

Anyone?

GL again Nate. I'll be checking in tomorrow from work -- while I should be working, but screw it.

You are correct.

Gogogo Nate, well, get some sleep then gogogo, the finish line is in sight.

Sick that you're actually going to make it. I've been silently rooting.

Exactly what limits are you playing right now? Sit'n'gos, cash games, 45 man MTTS, ect - you play at PStars right?

Google & Wiki are your friends for this one - some interesting articles and calculators.

Originally a Blackjack theory - basically if you start with a small bet, and double it every time you lose, eventually you'll win and come out ahead. What it doesn't consider is the fact that Casinos have maximum bets / maximum payouts, which means that when you hit a dry spell, you're gonna tap out and lose a bundle.

Nate - been sweating today - you'd better polish that luckbox... It seems to be rusty so far this morning... GOGOGO!

***NOTE: THIS POST WAS COMPOSED AT 7 AM EST***

plusEVdog --

I'm playing 45-man SNGs, mostly.

thunk --

Thanks for rooting. Hope you didn't jinx me right there.

All --

***13 HOURS TO GO***

I think I misquoted the time remaining at some point. The bet ends at 8 EST, not 7. This is confirmed by finding the first hand history of this challenge:

Hope I run well today.

--Nate

All --

Knock on wood, but I have $917 and have good stacks in two 6x45's.

Earlier today, when I started off with a decent set of SNGs and broke 900, I switched to $6 of various forms to prevent a big downswing.

Wish me luck --

--Nate

Good luck! It's going to be amazing when you win

5$ into $1000 +300 original bet +200 another side bet.

that's awesome!

This is a pretty exciting thread, go nate!

All --

$959.26 and alive in three SNGs, including a FT.

Playing for third,

--Nate

Nate,

Great thread, impressive, etc. Good luck.

Danza -

Thanks. Maybe you can help me with some of the $.02/$.04 limit hands I botched.

--Nate

This is BBV - if we talk about limit they're gonna post that monkey pic.

All --

There's running good and there's running bad and there's running weird. The last two days, I have had ridiculously many of my any-two SB open-pushes snap-called by big pocket pairs.

In other news -- fifth in that SNG. $983 and counting.

--Nate

As you have time to kill, I'd suggest a new goal - end with $1000.00 exactly.

I'm thinking $1.20 / 45's to get close, then $5 NL (or similar) to creep up to the number.

That just goofy?

All --

Playing a $20 PLO8 HU SNG for the win. Tournament #40952002.

--Nate

been following all the way through, it's been emotional, very best of luck Nate. My dads trying to build a roll atm and pointed him in the direction of this thread to save me time explaining how he should start, so thanks for saving 3 weeks of my life