Liberating My Thinking

 

I have made a good start to March 2024 after some inconsistent form. Firstly, I have qualified again for the Sunday Million via the freeroll Power Path route. I will be playing late March or early April and will be thrilled to repeat my cashing performance from last November. I then enjoyed a decent win on 11^th March, my wife’s fiftieth birthday! I came 1^st of 275 in a $3 progressive bounty tournament including a whopping 18 eliminations! The total return of $173. A week later I came second in the same tournament. 2^nd of 270 with a return of $89 including a more modest 6 eliminations. Understandably I am playing this tournament as often as I can, perhaps 5 or 6 times a week. During the victory I made good use of big stack, using controlled aggression. However, in truth, the key factor was good fortune, winning more than my fair share of coin-flips, allowing me to keep wielding my big stack.

I love getting these winning e-mails like this from Pokerstars:

Dear Kartajana,

You finished the tournament in 1st place. Congratulations!
A $2.87 USD award was credited to your Stars Account upon reaching the money, and the remaining $63.24 USD award was credited when you finished the tourney.
You have also received USD 106.53 in Knockout Bounties for this tournament. You won bounties for the following players: slimJD245, wagnerjsilva, AlisRagnar, momola1970, Nr.1_Serg, MWWW18, bk_odnodnevka, thaabest, Luck3y_8, Slim8r, biglolANGEL, MAFIAAZUL338, dyna140, stellalouise, elchapohani, G. Costa12, OOIngo, KOWJAIMAI, Kartajana
Note: As you won the tournament, you also won your own bounty.

I have been focusing on some new thinking recently prompted by the teachings of BlackRain79 – Essentially focusing on good play, maximising returns in my good poker sessions and minimising losses in my bad ones. When I am playing confidently and well I now play for longer and perhaps at higher stakes. When I am a little tired or frustrated and not playing good poker I stop firing up new games and wind down the session or play at lower stakes. It’s not rocket science but it seems to be working even though I am not implementing it consistently. However, the effect is to feel more positive about both winning and in particular losing sessions. OK I lost but it could and should have been worse. This has genuinely been a liberating approach for my poker.

Good Luck

Jason (Kartajana)

Sunday Million Result

 

Remember, remember the fifth of November. This has nothing to do with the gunpowder plot of 1605. No this was the day in 2023 that I played the Sunday Million, the most famous weekly online poker tournament. Over ten thousand players, no doubt including plenty of pros, playing/battling for the $1 million dollar prize pool. Not only did I play, but I played well, enjoyed it and landed my largest haul since my return to poker. What a result!

Rewind a couple of weeks before the tournament, I had absolutely no plans to play it. However, via a series of satellite qualifiers, initially using a free 50 cent entry I built this up to $1.50, then $10, then the $109 required for bigger tournaments. I could have used it for the chance to win entry to some of the Pokerstars regional live tournaments in the UK. I have never played live though so realising that I could use my token to play the Sunday Million and also seeing that the following Sunday worked well for me in terms of timing and family commitments, a plan was made to play. I was also very attracted to the fact the Sunday Million is now a progressive bounty tournament, meaning that even if I didn’t make the final 15% of players to cash I had a chance of winning at least $25 for any player I knocked out.

The early stages of the tournament went well, especially given I am not used to playing so deep, with 50,000 chips initially and thus plenty of room to manoeuvre. Quite soon I hit a significant hand, my Jacks catching another Jack on the flop against Aces. My opponent could not let them go as I pressed my advantage and so I had an early double up and the boost of a $25 knockout. A perfect start for an inexperienced player at this level. It meant I had a lot more chips than most and I had already achieved one of my goals, to turn my entry into real cash. The next few hours I progressed cautiously but confidently in the right moments and managed to build up my stack, keeping above the average and taking out another couple of players. There were only a couple of small setbacks where I tried but failed to take out a couple of short stacked players.

As we closed in on the bubble I did tighten up a little as we neared a massive personal poker objective – to cash in the Sunday Million. In truth I have only played twice before and had never really come close to cashing so I was thrilled at this growing realisation. Not only that I had a competitive stack. More importantly, I was playing well, relaxed and enjoying myself, determined to press on once the bubble burst. Despite the presence of more experienced high level players this is ultimately the same game for all and at times I can play it well. Having played for four or five hours I made the final 1500 or so players and cashed for $87.48. I had a workable stack and had already made a further $193.75 in knockout bonuses. Having already achieved my initial goals and more my new aim now was to push on try to qualify for day two of the tournament. At around 2am UK time the game is paused and the final c150 players return at 6pm Monday to fight for the big cash prizes. At this point I got aces for the first time and was able to achieve a significant double up. I now had around 900,000 chips and was in the top one hundred players!

Unfortunately, that would be my peak position. The blinds were now starting to get much bigger and I had less wiggle room. Soon the game was largely all-in or fold which simplifies things a little but also makes you more dependent on getting good cards. Better, more experienced players than me would not need them and simply pick spots to push or put pressure on others. I survived a bit longer winning a 99 v AJ race but soon after my 77 lost to AQ and I was out in 301^st place (out of 10262), an hour or so too early to make day two. I got a further $129.92 for my finishing position giving me over $400 in total plus a massive boost to my poker confidence. My bankroll is now over $1600 and I will try more concertedly to qualify for the big one again. In the results e-mail Pokerstars send they always say we hope you had fun. Most importantly, I really did. I am looking forward to the next one. 

Take care

Jason (Kartajana)

 

High Lights

 

In the last month or so I have won a couple of multi-table tournaments as my return to poker continues. Both are regular games that I play almost daily. The results were as follows:

1^st of 256 players, $3 buy in. $140 return

1^st of 307 players, $1 buy in. $58 return

Nothing life changing but when you are first out of three hundred or so players at anything it naturally feels good and is a boost to confidence. It is also a boost to my bankroll as my return winnings now surges past $1000. I have also played in a few higher buy in games without making an impact. I will keep pushing forward though in my search for more highlights.

Good luck at the tables.

Jason

Poker Zone

 

A year into my return to poker I finally pushed through the $500 profit level that had eluded me thus far. A fourth place in a $3 tournament featuring 290 players snagged me just short of $50 dollars and that feeling of satisfaction from achieving a medium term goal. The journey over the year has been far from constant progress though and it was only really in the last couple of months that my form has been particularly strong. I have struggled with variance, confidence, fatigue and my ability to reach the zone – that mystical place of optimum poker playing. Lately I have found it quite often with success leading to further success. A good mind set is so important to playing poker well.

In the $3 tournament above one of many key hands demonstrates my improved zone like approach. With the final table now active I was one of the shortest stacks, even though I had just doubled up. I was trying to sneak up the ladder a spot or two but now maybe I could push for more. I was dealt 88 in first position with eight players remaining. Given the stack sizes and blinds an all in shove was a completely legitimate move, perhaps the only and obvious move. Usually aggression pays. However, I now maybe had more time to take a more cautious approach. I folded and what occurred in the hand without me showed I would have been out in eighth place. Something inside me, some weird combination of intuition, math, patience and control told me to fold. This is the zone my friends. Buoyed by this significant fold I was able to progress much further and secure fourth place and a satisfying score. 

The key question, a year on, is what now? More of the same steady progress or do I push on to try to achieve more at slightly higher levels. I can’t devote much more time to poker but I could test myself at the next level up and see if my return is greater. Of course, I have the solid option here of dropping down a level during a bad run. I will progressively give it a go and see where I can take my poker in 2023 and beyond.

Play well and good luck.

Cheers

Jason

Not Raking It In!

 

The definition of the phrase raking it in means to earn a lot of money. Unfortunately this is not what I am doing following my return to poker. Sure I am making some progress (and still playing with other people’s money) but ironically it is partly the Pokerstars fees (the rake) that is holding me back. I can’t seem to hit the $200 level which is my current target and where I feel I could step up confidently to playing $5 games as standard. Over the summer I have re-engaged with my old friend’s variance and tilt. Ultimately re-reading some of Jared Tendler’s work has helped me back on track somewhat. In life and in poker I am a big fan of injecting logic. As such it felt a good point to evaluate my game, to assess what is good and where I can improve. Why do I play and why does it matter so much that I win. Indeed, at times I am trying so hard to win these low stakes games that I forget to enjoy them. A week’s family holiday (me pictured at Zafiro Cala Mesquida, Majorca) facilitated a natural break from my online poker and an honest analysis of my game.

This traditional swot analysis of my game revealed some interesting points. The key one being that just because I am an above average player I can’t just turn up unfocused or tired and expect to win, even low stakes games. I also need to be as focused as possible, constantly gravitating towards the mythical “in the zone” state. I need to remember this is when I am playing well and with confidence not just when I am winning coin flips! I need to work on my game, checking ICM push/calls I am unsure on before and after sessions. Just using feel is not enough and weakens my confidence when things don’t go my way. I need to be clear on my aims, on why I play and have a plan in terms of types the games and levels I play at. I really need to embrace warm up games at lower levels rather than jumping in to tougher action. I also need to spread the timings of my games to balance intensity and restrict the potential impact of internet drop outs. Most difficult of all I need to focus on playing well above all else – if I lose but played well I should be happy! If I play badly but get lucky I should be disappointed in myself! Like I said, most difficult of all. If I can stay focused and make progress my next blog post should feature a roller-coaster style chart heading higher.  

Take care and good luck. 

One Hundred And Eighty

 

Poker is fun, fascinating and frustrating, usually all at the same time! I have been back playing for a couple for months now and generally I am loving it. I certainly look forward to every session. However, performance and profit wise I am not consistently achieving my goals and this very fact is probably impacting on my performance and profit at times. Welcome back to poker Kartajana, 2022 style!

The experience of playing in 2022 is somewhat different from when I played the game between 2005 and 2015. There is very little in the way of friendly conversation or respectful acknowledgements. I have had a total of one such interaction, so long gone are the days of nh (nice hand) and gg (good game). Instead the Pokerstars software allows us to virtually attack/wind up our opponents by the use of throwable virtual objects. At the age of fifty one I am past launching a virtual rocket or fried egg at one of my rivals. Also it is clear that in this ironically mature phase of poker that many of its players, usually the worst ones, are convinced the game is rigged. Despite this, they play. Indeed it would seem a good 20% of the players don’t trust the software. The other 90% think statistics are subject to both error and manipulation! In truth, variance can be very tough at times, but I genuinely do trust the software, in the sense that over infinite time we would all get our fair share of the good and bad luck that inevitably is out there. I have, in addition, researched the performance of a lot of the regulars I now play. Some are good, some are not but I have concluded, especially at this level, none of them are to be avoided at all costs. It is they that should avoid me, he writes confidently!

In terms of my challenge to play $2 sit n gos in April things started well. Then things stagnated to leave me with only small progress. By the end of April I had played 180 of the $2 nine man sit n gos so far this year allowing me to neatly examine my performance from a finishing position point of view. If the game was purely random a player should finish in each place 20 times. I am thus using my skill and managing my luck the best I can to secure the top three spots, paying out 50%, 30% and 20% of the entry fees. The chart makes interesting reading.

My highest finishing positions are the top five spots which is encouraging but I definitely need more first places. I showed my son the chart and he asked an interesting question. Do you not get frustrated when you come ninth, knowing that you are one of the better players? My answer was no, unless I had made a mistake in my decision that saw me exit the game. I explained not being frustrated at losing was a key to my success playing poker. I made maybe a modest $40 playing these games which is way below where I feel I should be. I should maybe play another 180 to prove it, to both myself and anyone else that cares! How to make progress in future is certainly a key thought. How do I turn lower positions into cashes and thirds into wins. Probably I need to be more cautious early and more aggressive late on. Being more patient in my heads up matches could also help.  

My return to poker so far has been very encouraging though. Every session I see players making obvious mistakes. I am making the odd one or two but am hopefully learning from them. I am having fun making an average of $2 per session. So it looks like I am saying good bye to Fortnite for now – Taxi please to the nearest poker game! I ended April with a nice win of $25, first in a forty-five player $2 sit n go. I still enjoy the thrill of a final table so mixing in some of these games helps keep me balanced when I am playing lots of single table games. One familiar poker nemesis has returned though. Internet connection problems still exist all these years later. My connection seems to occasionally reboot at 11pm which has cost me on a couple of occasions now. I have now withdrawn my initial deposit so I am playing with other players money. My profit balance moving into May is $115 and the new month has started well. I am back reading my old poker books which hopefully remain extremely relevant in 2022. If this return to poker is to be worthwhile I need to move my bankroll up much further. I intend to stick at the $2 level for now though, build my confidence and funds to get ready to move up a level or two.  Watch this space.

Cheers

Jason (Kartajana)

 

Challenging Times - Kartajana Poker Is Back For 2022

 

The first challenge was to jump through various Pokerstars hoops, at least twice, to be even allowed to play. It too me six weeks, off and on, just to prove I was me! Even allowing for the significant time gap, the fact that I was using a new laptop and growing security concerns online, this was far from ideal. I nearly lost patience and fell at the first hurdle.

So why am I back playing poker? The main reason is a practical one. My son has moved rooms in our house and as a consequence I cannot play Fortnite on his X-Box when he has gone to bed. I need an alternative diversion. In truth I have been planning to return to poker for a while. The time was right, my initial ID challenge has been completed and I am ready to play. I deposited $25 with the aim of quickly turning that into more. I was fascinated to see if, after many years, I could still play. The answer was yes, it all quickly came back to me and in a good way. It was like meeting an old friend. It was great remembering to be disciplined, both patient and aggressive in the right moments, trying to embrace the devil that is variance but most of all to enjoy playing whilst zig-zagging your way to profit.

So what has changed on Pokerstars since I have been away? Not a lot really, some of the sit n go games are structured differently and there are less players overall but I can still get quick action at my chosen levels. Significantly, there are Brazilians everywhere on Pokerstars. Poker has taken off there in a big way and that is great news as it means new players. New players learning the game at my chosen lower levels means only one thing – poker profits potential. Now at the age of fifty, can I turn this new poker adventure into ongoing profit, making a steady profit each month on my chosen games whilst having fun? Generally I plan to play a regular game say ninety percent of the time but also mix in a few higher level sit n gos plus a few MTTs. In April I am challenging myself to play 100 $2 sit n gos and see what I can achieve. Then, if successful, I will perhaps move up to the $5 level and test the difference.

I have been playing again for a few weeks now prior to my April challenge and am enjoying the action and have made a modest $50 profit playing some low stakes games. The only negative so far has been an upsurge in back pain as I spend extra time now hunched over a laptop. I will report again in early May about my progress.

Take care and be lucky

Jason (Kartajana)

One More Year?

When I first started playing poker in 2005 the initial experience was nothing short of awesome. In my first tentative game with play money I was completely out of my depth and shocked at how quickly hands progressed and decisions had to be made. Soon though I got to grips with this new on-line experience and began to learn about the game of no limit holdem via books, magazines, on TV and on-line. Quite quickly it became apparent that there was money to be made here whilst having fun. Ten years on I have amassed around $27000 based on doing something I enjoy.

In truth over the last five years the games have got tougher, new players are in less abundance and profit potential has been reduced. Since I moved to my current house five years ago I have made $10,000 but I had made that amount in the two years before. Over the last few years I have recorded my progress in this blog, this being my one hundred and forty ninth entry. I intend only to write one more, should the situation arise, entitled "Jackpot". It is a great disappointment that I have not won a sit n go Jackpot and despite the money I have earned through poker I certainly feel I have left some winnings at the table, so to speak. Not that I am giving up hope. No way. In fact the poker I do play next year will be entirely Jackpot focused which can’t do my chances any harm.

By the end of 2016 I plan wind down my poker activity focusing instead on my horse racing blog and the historical material that relates to it. If horse racing is of interest to you please follow the link and take a look. Meanwhile, thanks to everyone who has taken an interest in my blog over the last five years and good luck at the tables for 2016 and beyond. For now my Jackpot quest continues.

Cheers

Jason (Kartajana)



A week or so later I received big news from Betfred Poker:

We are sorry to inform you that iPoker will be fading out the jackpot tournaments from the Poker Lobby as each jackpot is won.

All four Jackpot games:

•  Dirty Dozen
•  Maui
•  Rio
•  Fort Knox

…Can only be won one more time!


In some ways I am fine with this. A natural conclusion to my ten years in Poker. Certainly I am not totally surprised by this news. If anything it will spur me on to try even harder now the clock is ticking. Good luck to all during this final Jackpot period, especially to me. Based on the last ten years I will need it!

Countdown To Christmas

Following a family holiday in Portugal at the end of August I am largely re-focused on poker and my Jackpot goals. I am playing both the Maui (Currently 58000 Euro Jackpot for 5 consecutive wins) and Dirty Dozen (Always 2000 Euros for 4 consecutive wins) versions. This mix helps me fit more games into my busy schedule and gives me a more realistic Jackpot possibility. From September until Christmas I aim to maximise my win percentage in these two games to provide a very special Tomlinson Christmas. In both games I will challenge myself to hit a 15% win rate - tough but attainable. My long terms average rates are 13% and 12%. As a minimum I hope to earn enough to buy a new laptop over the holiday season. I will update my progress as I go along:

MAUI WIN RATE: 14%    (Including sequences of 1-7-1-3-1 and 1-5-1-1-5)

DIRTY DOZEN WIN RATE: 11%    (Including a sequence of 1-8-1-1)

Good Luck

Fantastic Four

I have started the month on a high having managed to bag my fourth Maui Jackpot sit n go consolation prize of the year. Five consecutive games finished in the first two positions wins the prize. At 150 Euros a pop this really is a Fantastic Four. Indeed, this 600 Euros represents around 25% of my year to date profit so these opportunities are not to be taken lightly. It also massively helps cover the additional rake paid for these type of games. I am fighting back from a recent slump and in the main playing well and running good too. Even my consolation claim went well and I was paid out in less than 48 hours,  a new record. All in all this is a confidence boost and an indicator that the main Jackpot for five wins in a row, now standing at 47000 Euros, is genuinely within reach. A realistic dream at least.

Meanwhile I am recording the different ways I am able to double up early in the Maui games. By assessing my success in each category I intend to adapt/improve my early style based on the findings. It really does make a big difference to your winning chance sitting with a double stack from early, but only when the risk associated with getting it is manageable. More on this in a future post if my analysis proves fruitful.

Perspective

One of the hardest things to do in poker is stop a losing run. Bad luck can lead to bad play. Bad play can lead to frustration which itself leads to worse play. Then, even good luck can't help! Okay, so things have not got quite so bad for me of late but I am on a losing run. Good luck has deserted me in my Maui Jackpot games and I am not playing my best poker. It is a while since I have won on consecutive nights and I am getting a little frustrated. The graph below shows good progress over the first eight hundred games this year followed by a shocking run over the next two hundred. Is this really the same player and what the hell is he doing?

More importantly what can I do to turn the tide back in my favour? 

Lots of things for sure:

• Firstly writing this blog should help get some of the frustration out of my system. 
• I also need to get some perspective about how big a problem this really is and why I really play. I am so lucky in many ways even before I log on to play poker and I need to remember what is truly important. For example my kids (pictured above) have started their summer holidays this week with a big focus on fun. 
• Despite this bad run I am still having a winning month anyway in July based on some good form and good fortune on Pokerstars and Full Tilt.
• I play these Jackpot games to give myself a chance at the Jackpot itself, currently running at 45000 Euros. Over the next one thousand games I will get myself in a position to do just that whether I win a $100 or $1000 along the way.
• I mainly need to focus on my game, the way I am playing and a little less on the influence of luck. I will analyse my end game push fold actions a bit more often to promote further understanding and confidence.
• When I am playing well I plan to extend my session. When I am too tired I will not play at all.
• Another way forward is to look at my results in a more positive way (see below). Am I really playing that badly? When you remove the rake from my results during my 'poor' run I am still holding my own against my opponents which is reassuring to some extent.

Time to turn a corner. Signalling left. 

Good luck.

Being Patient Like Alex Fitzgerald

Quite often in poker you come across a tricky situation where you are unsure how to act but perhaps feel obliged to act in a certain way. This regularly occurs in my usual jackpot sit n go games. For example when you are dealt a good pocket pair during the mid to late stages of a sit n go you are ready to get involved. But what happens when there is significant action before you. That pair of nines doesn't look quite so attractive, but it might still be the best hand. I recently read a good related article in the final WPT Poker magazine published last December. In it Poker Pro Alex Fitzgerald responded to a question about such a scenario during a multi table tournament. The player asking the question had felt obligated to get involved in a hand based on his chip position and the cards he held even though he did not feel comfortable doing so. 

The thing that interested me here was that Alex encouraged the player to avoid the obvious and mathematically optimum strategy in this situation. Instead he was encouraged to follow his instinct and wait for a better spot. Based on my related experiences in the world of sit n gos I agree with this advice for two important reasons. You may be giving up a small amount of equity by following this path. However you are avoiding sacrificing all future potentially clear cut opportunities. As Alex concluded "Making a slightly tight fold is much better than putting in all of your chips without a clear idea as to what's going on." There is possibly a more important second reason, for me at least. Being in control and being mistake free is key to my focused A-game. If I make a mistake or take a path I doubted in this kind of scenario and my actions backfire it can affect my play across all the games I am playing. Suddenly my A game becomes my C game and I take on every opportunity to gamble and flip for chips. Patience is still key especially in the middle stages of a sit and go. So dump the pair of nines, follow instinct not obligation, stay in control and wait for a better spot. See you there.

Thanks Alex

Top Twenty

My main focus this year has been on the Maui Jackpot Sit N Gos. My successful journey so far has seen me play around seven hundred games and achieve two top twenty Sharkscope rankings and win three consolation bonuses for 150 Euros. I am currently ranked seventh for the best 100 streak average profit at this level this year and ranked eleventh for the best 500 streak average profit. The former has a good chance to see the year out and become permanent but the latter could be close to call. I am very pleased with my efforts especially as there are an increasing number of regulars playing these games. Overall I am up $1713 year to date and intend to continue my Maui mission playing perhaps another thousand games this year whilst mixing in some other action on Full Tilt and Pokerstars. 

Most recently my form has been somewhat patchy but I ended May on a very high note, a sequence of 12211 leading to a consolation win and a near thing on the 37000 Euro Jackpot. In both second place games I had a chip lead during heads up play but could not quite take them down. I played the final four games simultaneously and having won one must have been at least 25% to win it all when heads up in the other three. A great effort but also massively frustrating. I could recount the hands that would have clinched it for me in these games but I won't. To be fair I had plenty of luck along the way in the five games so I can't get too hung up about the final outcomes. I have to take forward the positives from this. Once again I have got myself into a great situation. When there I was relaxed and playing well despite the huge potential jackpot. I made no mistakes when it really mattered. The key for me now is to get there again soon and hope luck and skill can take me just a little further, finally to Jackpot glory!

Good Luck.

One Dollar

The outcome of my challenge over the lent period was in a sense a failure. I did not hit forty wins in the Maui games I played and I failed to achieve a 15% win rate. I came close but I failed. However in many ways the period was a great success. It was a pretty profitable period, an enjoyable poker experience and a significant period of my life. I managed to amass over $450 profit via the 267 Maui games I played. Exactly $1 profit per game plus 150 Euros for a consolation bonus, plus a little rakeback. I also managed to achieve a Sharkscope ranking for a 100 game hotstreak. I am currently in fourth place and it should last the year out in the top ten. If I can play well over the next month or two I could also add a 500 game streak to my repertoire.

Interestingly, in the initial period of my challenge, when I set the one hundred game performance marker I was off work following an appendix operation. For the most part in this period I was relaxed, well rested and playing my A-Game. My previous response to the solid advice "don't play tired" has always been that if I didn't I would never play. I am always tired in truth, trying to jemmy in far too much each day - squeezing in some leisure time around my work and my family. In this week or two however things were different. I was compounded to rest. You could argue that this was just a coincidence but suddenly my poker skill was elevated, my patience increased, my confidence boosted. Throughout this period I was also not drinking alcohol, which I usually would have been whilst playing poker. Again a positive no doubt. I genuinely wonder what I could achieve in such ongoing circumstances. However, as I write I am back at work, way too tired to be doing this and should be in bed. Nevertheless my quest for more dollars continues.....

Giving Up - Mini Maui Challenge

My wife recently ran a Sunday School session on giving things up for the upcoming lent period and the importance of self discipline. Inspired by Jesus and by her I have resolved to give up some bad habits over the next forty days or so. The aim here is not centred on Christian belief or on a noble desire to better myself though. I am simply intending to win more money playing poker by adjusting my lifestyle. For this period I will no longer go to bed way too late, drink too much or be distracted whilst playing. Instead I will play focused poker, specifically trying to win the jackpot sit n go games I have built my poker existence around. Between 18th February and 5th April I will challenge myself to win forty Maui Jackpot Sit N Go games with an overall win rate of 15%.

None of this will be easy but I certainly play my best when well rested, focused and working to specific aims. For anyone who cares (mainly me) I will update the number of wins and my win percentage as I go along:



Final number of wins: 38 (out of 267 games)

Final win rate: 14.2%  

My recent activity has been hindered by an unexpected surgery (had appendicitis!) causing me to miss a good few days play. It may be few more days before I am fully operational poker wise. On a plus note I am way ahead of schedule in terms of drinking less and sleeping more!

A week later I have been boosted by a consolation win. One hundred and fifty Euros for a sequence of 11221. I am playing well and running good, so good that I have now established a best 100 streak average profit top twenty leader board ranking on Sharkscope. Currently placed seventh, it may not be good enough to last the year on the leader board but it is very encouraging and I am now aiming to develop this into a best 500 streak ranking. 

As I approach the end of my challenge I am struggling for a win. A couple of poor sessions have been followed by a really good one, but with four seconds and no wins. My win rate is down to the magic 15% now which is still really good overall but I am starting to run out of time to hit my target number of wins.

With one session remaining I need two more wins to hit forty in total. I am running just below the 15% win rate mark. Whatever happens it has been a solid, profitable effort with elements of really good play by me. 

No win in my final session so thirty eight Maui wins in total at just over a 14% win rate. A shame not to hit my target having come so close but a really good effort. More reaction and statistics in a few days.


Take care, good luck to you and when it arrives Happy Easter!

Jason (Kartajana)

It's a Trap!

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away Admiral Ackbar uttered the classic "It's a trap!" line as the Rebel Alliance attacked a fully operational Death Star. As a kid I loved these movies and I have enjoyed watching them again with my own kids thirty years later. The joy of setting a trap is not just for those prone to the dark side. In poker one of the greatest feelings comes from executing a successful trap move. When I started playing this involved slow playing a set. These days I trap mainly using my old friends aces and kings. In early position at most stages of a sit n go or tournament I regularly limp with super premium hands. Often faced with a raise I then exploit my confused opponents by re-raising big style. In a mixed start to the year I have had one notable success on Pokerstars which developed out of this trapping with kings and aces strategy:

PokerStars Tournament #1099432314, No Limit Hold'em
Buy-In: $13.78/$1.22 USD 
45 players 
Total Prize Pool: $620.10 USD  

Tournament started 2015/01/04 17:56:20 ET 
Tournament finished 2015/01/04 19:11:50 ET 

  1: Kartajana (United Kingdom), $192.26 (31.004%) 
  2: pipiki (Greece), $133.32 (21.499%) 
  3: Matheeeew (Slovenia), $102.31 (16.498%) 
  4: Leviathan74 (Greece), $77.51 (12.499%) 
  5: DrTee28 (United Kingdom), $55.80 (8.998%) 
  6: wondras3005 (Czech Republic), $37.20 (5.999%) 
  7: cockneyboy19 (United Kingdom), $21.70 (3.499%) 


So if you do come across me at the tables limp, three betting you don't need to be a Jedi to work out what I have. Cheers and may the force be with you in 2015.

2014 Review

2014 was a decent year for me poker wise. An overall profit of around $2300 is nothing to get too excited about but it represents progress and a period when I made money on all the three poker sites I play on. I also made a profit in all the different Jackpot Sit N Go formats. Above is the combined position on Betfred for the year (95% jackpot sit n go games), which overall I am pleased with. I definitely gave myself a chance to win big whilst making a modest profit. Not a bad scenario when you are having fun. Timing wise I am on a bad run, so the year end is helpful in a way.

For 2015 my approach is to start off by concentrating on what I am good at. On Full Tilt I will continue with the Flipout Tournaments, on Betfred the Maui Jackpot Sit N Gos where the jackpot is currently 50,000 Euros and on Pokerstars my old favourite the $7 45 man games. I will work on my sit n go strategy via Nick Wealthall's on-line course which I need to spend further time reviewing.

Ideally I will make twice as much profit in 2015 and make twice as many blog posts which I have neglected a little last year. The two are not mutually exclusive. If I get the chance at a big win again all the better. 

Good luck at the tables in 2015.

Focus On Fish

If you want to progress in sit n gos you need to focus on fish. That was the message from Nick Wealthalls latest marketing campaign for his new online training course Sit N Go Shortcuts. The solid premise being it is easier to win more from poor players than improve against the good ones. Sounds good. Count me in. For me this is a chance to update my game, review my strategy and focus once more on maximising my win rate in the jackpot games. 

A few weeks into the course I am happy with my decision. The material is interesting, useful and sometimes quite amusing. I tend to listen/watch the videos whilst playing which is probably sub-optimal in lots of ways but I am enjoying them and my game is improving. I have definitely already made a couple of adjustments. I am changing the way I deal with a specific tricky spot and have an improved heads up approach. I still though have a long way to go to entrench this material and work through all the action steps. Most of all my general confidence has improved because I am working on my game and enjoying it and as a result my results have progressed.

Recently I have had a couple of near miss sequences on the Jackpot trail. The Maui games saw a sequence of 11151 when playing for 41000 Euros and in the Rio games I played a run of 151111 for 110000 Euros. In both cases I was a coin flip or two away from the big one. Having won four Rios I had a realistic shot at a big pay day, perhaps one in twenty-five to win £100,000! Normally my fifth place in the next game would be a source of great frustration but not following my recent work with Nick and some personalised feedback relating to the jackpot games. I had e-mailed him a very specific question about the adjusting your approach/game once closing in on a jackpot winning sequence. This is part of the deal for the first sixty days after sign up. My response was in short excellent. I consider myself a bit of an expert in this sphere having played around 15,000 jackpot games and I liked/agreed with what he had to say - but it also meant quite a lot to hear another point of view on this specialist area. Without giving it all away there was three key aspects to his advice that I empathised with most:

1.Having won three or four games jackpot games on the bounce you will probably lose the next one - that's just the maths. Very true.
2.Keeping the jackpot situation out of your mind is very important. Agreed.
3.When in the later stages of sequence be absolutely playing your best poker, disciplined, focused and always aggressive. Good stuff.

Cheers Nick.

Flipin Obvious

Earlier this year, following the end of the Daily Double promotion on Full Tilt I was looking for some new action to satisfy my multi table tendencies. I found two options that complied with both my time frame and my bankroll:

1. As a sit n go player who really loves an MTT but hasn't really got the time the new Flipout Tournaments are great. The tournament begins with a shootout round, which features a flip tournament format. In this round, all players go all-in automatically on every hand and one player per table progresses to the next round. The bubble bursts at the end of the first round and all players who reach the second round in a Flipout Tournament will share in the prize pool. They are effectively a sit n go disguised as a MTT - but with an added bonus - random players not the best players make it to the latter stages. My results are as below. A higher than normal win rate with super time efficiency built in.

2. I also identified a knock-out tournament which fitted perfectly into my poker evening. OK so its turbo structure was a bit on the fast side for my patient MTT game and at $24 was a little pricey but surely I could adapt and get stuck in when needed. Or perhaps not! See below. A series of min cashes has done nothing for my overall result. In these tournaments the money is at the final table and I have only made one brief guest appearance finishing ninth. Whilst the graph does ignore probably $200 worth of bounty prizes there can be do denying my poor run playing this game. Certainly whilst luck plays a bigger role in this type of turbo structure I probably played bad as much as ran bad.

Incredibly, given the charts above, this is the same player, playing the same site, the same variant of poker at the same time. I wonder which game I should focus on - Flipin obvious really. I have removed the knock-out game from my options. See you at the flipout tables soon. 

On the sit n go front I have just embarked on a new learning chapter designed to give me the best chance possible to improve my Jackpot game win rate.  More next time. I continue to play the Maui games and this new information should help me maximise my return whilst working on improving my game.

Good Luck.

Five A Day

I am introducing a shift of strategy which I think will be good for me. So far this year I have enjoyed some solid progress and profit. However, my good run in the dirty dozen games has waned of late. I have become a little unfocused and also distracted by other less profitable games. I have also not been enjoying my poker as much. Ultimately I think I am a little unmotivated by the goal of winning a 2000 Euro Jackpot. Sure it is a decent amount of money but great as it would be, it would not really be a big step forward forward in poker or in life. To play at my best I need to be fully motivated so I am shifting back to the Maui games which conveniently has a current jackpot total of 31000 Euros. Enough to help me exceed my overall poker target of $50,000 and also enough to impact on my non poker world. As a family we could do something really significant with that.

In my first five Maui games for a long time I managed a win which gives me some encouragement. So I plan to play five a day to focus me back on the jackpot goal. If it also reminds to eat more fruit and vegetables that can't be a bad thing for my poker either.

Good luck.