I Won The Poker Battle Last Night

Last night was a good poker night. I set out with a strategy to open six $25NL tables and quit each table as it reached a positive 15 Big Blinds. The reason I chose 15 BB is because I am willing to play poker for 3 hours and I want to make 10BB/100 hands. I average about 50 hands per hour per table. So that means I need to average 5BB per table per hour to be be making 10BB/100 hands. Make sense?

So in my first hour of poker I made at least 15BB per table. On two or three tables I got involved in big pots and won the showdown. One table I left with over $40 and another with over $35. Nice!

After closing all 6 tables I ended up ahead $55. That is 220 BB's in an hour!

My plan was to mainly blind steal. I was careful about blind stealing in early position and only opened pre-flop with limper's in front of me otherwise. I used ACE HUD to determine which players were TAG. If a TAG had HUD numbers of 10/7/2 I was very careful with them.

Once I pre flopped raised I always bet the flop 2/3 pot. I was VERY good about folding to any flop raises and if they called on the Flop I would check/fold the turn/river. I only played the Turn and River with Trips or better and with good reads. The 2 or 3 big pots I won at showdown I won with trips against top two pair and a straight against trips.

Basically I wanted to avoid big pots unless I had a very good hand. TPTK or Top Two Pairs gets me in trouble more often than not.

Being ahead $55 I decided to play some heads up. Turned out not to be such a good idea. But that is 20/20 hindsight vision for you. I started with $5 heads up. I lost 3/4. So I turned to $10 heads up. I lost 2/3. When I finished my cash games my bankroll was at $517 and after those heads up matches I realized I was down to $479. Damn. I decided I would play one more heads up, a $20 match. I wanted to at least get back to $500. As luck had it, I won that match and ended the night at $498.

Overall, I made $38 for the night! Not bad, not bad.

Poker Stars Status

Starting Bankroll: $462
Ending Bankroll: $498
FPP: 1150
June VPP: 750

Tonight me and Lynn (my wife) are meeting some friends for Mongolian BBQ in Rancho Bernardo. Should be fun, but that also means no poker tonight. I might try to sneak in an hour though.

On poker stars each month you can qualify for VIP status. Currently I am at the bottom, which is bronze. If I make another 450 VPP points, I will move up to Silver. I have to earn those points by June 30th. I earn about 45 VPP points every hour when 6 tabling. So 10 hours of poker and I make the level. At silver you earn FPP (Frequent Player Points) 50% faster.

So my two goals for the rest of June is to make Silver VIP and to grow my bankroll to $600.

Then I will have to play enough in July to keep my silver. I can earn the Gold VIP at my current level of $25NL if I 8 table. Perhaps if I can consistently win at 6 tabling, I will move up to 8 tabling. At Gold VIP I earn FPP's 100% faster.

Both Silver and Gold offer daily, weekly, and monthly freerolls. I rarely play freerolls, but I may check out these VIP freerolls. Since you must be a VIP to play them, they may not have a huge playing field.

To make the Platinum VIP I will need to 8 table $50NL 16 hours a week. Platinum is where I want to be. Platinum is the highest monthly achievement.

Now, there are two yearly achievements - Supernova and Elite Supernova. Supernova requires 100,000 VPP points before December 31st. If you achieve that, you keep that status until February. It is possible to earn Supernova anytime in the year.

For example, I earn 100,000 VPP on August 1st 2009. I am a supernova automatically until the end of February 2010. I then have to earn 10,000 VPP's each month keep the status. You can go 1 month earning less than 10,000 VPP's without loosing your status, but if you go two months, then you go back to bronze VIP.

Any ways, I don't foresee earning Supernova this year, since I started so late. But I plan to earn Platinum this year and keep platinum. I should be able to earn Supernova next year (If I am still playing).

The biggest consideration here is Poker Stars doesn't offer rakeback. If I continue winning, I plan to play at Full Tilt Poker more often since I get a 27% rakeback. Playing 6-8 tables at once, 2-3 hours a day, 5-6 days a week @ $100NL, I can make between $340 - $675 per month in rakeback. That is a pretty coin to be earning. I get nothing on Pokerstars. Full Tilt Poker (FTP) has a VIP program too - but not sure what it is. Rakeback and Blind Stealing could easily be 60-70% of my poker earnings.

I am on a limited bankroll, otherwise I would be playing at Full Tilt Poker right now. I plan to move to Full Tilt Poker once my bankroll reaches $4000. The idea is to have two $100NL bankrolls of 20 Buy-Ins (100BB) - one at Pokerstars and one at FTP.

Not sure how I will play these two bankrolls yet, but I figure it is good to have two bankrolls at two of the best US sites.

I do hear the play is better at FTP, so I will have to test the water there to make sure I can beat those tables.