STOXPOKER NEWS FOR FEBRUARY 2008
New "Mental Game" Coach On Stoxpoker Team

Stoxpoker is the first online training site to add a "Mental Game" coach. We are excited to announce that Jared Tendler will be releasing his first video in the next couple of weeks and will be a regular contributor to Stoxpoker as the newest member of our coaching staff.

Jared's goal is to help you manage tilt and also to jump the mental hurdle you might have in moving to higher games while at the same time more effectively managing the stress of online poker.

Jared conducts seminars around the country on stress management and performance management skills. He has worked one-on-one with Dusty over the past year and is working with other high stakes online players on the proper mental strategies you can employ to improve your game.

Isn't that great or what?

I had a pretty tough month this month. I ran bad, I tilted and I lost more. Yeah… I tilt…

I’ve been reading Pie’s Book (The Poker Mindset - Ian Taylor) and in one of the very first chapters (Chapter 2) he mentions things that your ego will make you do.

1. You might call bets you shouldn’t.
2. You might allow a personal feud to cloud or override your judgment.
3. You are likely to try too hard to get even.
4. You might play in games you can’t beat.
5. You might make plays to impress your opponents.
6. You might not drop down a limit when you should.
7. You could inadvertently give away information to your opponents.
8. You might scare away players who you would rather stay.

I noticed lately that when I am on tilt, I do #1, #2, #3 (big time), #5 and #8. I did not do that in the past. I started tilting sometime this year. I remember blogging about it and I thought I had it under control, but since then, I have reviewed some of my plays. I have to confess that tilt as plagued me for quite some time now…

When I am ahead, I play very solid poker because I don’t do #3. When I get bad beats I try to do #3 big time and this is a big leak in my game right now that I am trying to fix.

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On a side note, Party Poker gave me a 200$ bonus (no reload, pure money) I have to play a bunch of hands to get the 200$ and if I don’t they just take the 200$ back, I get to keep the profits if any. Well, I had 0$ in my account when I took the bonus and now my account is at 776.45$.

I played really good. I had bad beats early on (I dropped 100$ in a AA vs 77 preflop all-in – I had the aces) but I managed to keep my cool and play good solid poker.

I played some more poker. Same result. I am running bad and it’s getting to me. I got a 10$ bonus from CD Poker. They send me this kind of bonus every 2-3 months or so. So I decided to go play there. I had about 35$ including the bonus.

Played some HU 5c/10c, just for the fun. Obviously I was better than my opponents. Got up to 27$ and then this fucking trash talking guy comes and stacks me when on a board . I had for a flopped set. He had . I bet every street and he hits is 2%. And he trash talks to me.

The money at that level does not bother me, but I don’t know… I think I tilted and proceeded to lose all my stack to him and ended the night with only 10$ left in the account.

I don’t really care about the money, but right now, I am mad has hell… Mad at me for playing so poorly and letting a bad player take my money. I am mad because this idiot thinks he is good. I am mad because I tilted at a level that I should consider as play money. I am just mad….

I am down 1 373.47$ this month, got some rakeback that puts that amount to 1 083.33$. I still have a BR of approx 2.6k with an all time won amount of about 16.2k.

I guess I will have to move down a limit and play NL 25 for a while. Until I get my game back. Read some book. Pie’s book (The Poker Mindset: Essential Attitudes for Poker Success) should be a good re-read. Watch some Stox Poker videos. Maybe change game. Seek a coach…

I don’t know. Right now I am pretty bummed out by all of this. Last year was not a good poker year. Not a bad poker year. I made money, but not a lot compared to the previous year. It seems I have not progress at all.

I still haven’t posted my 2007 review and I think I am procrastinating because I am not too proud of the year.

Ok I’m off to bed. Got to sleep this off…

Well, I think I am done over there. Jesus Christ the bad beats. All day long. Dropped 1k since the start of the month.

I know I played some hands badly, but fuck, that compounded with the bad beats. I mean Jesus, I re-raise an early raiser with get called by the BB and the early raiser folds. Flop is . We put it all in on the flop and the fucking BB show . Jesus Christ how can you call a 3-bet with that?????

I know, I know in the long run and bla bla bla, but right now it’s the short run and I am fucking pissed.

Health has got in the way of my poker play the last month.

I feel much better now, and I started playing poker again. I am still playing at Cake, with the bad beats where someone will call a raise and a reraise from the blinds with and will call all the way to the river if he hits bottom pair.

I still have not made my 2007 review and I plan on doing it sometime this year with my 2008 poker goals.

It's been a long time since I've made a bonus hunt. But I am proud to say I just finished the Cake 600$ deposit bonus. It took me about 1 month to complete.

I'm still playing there even though I hate their network connection. But, the tables are so juicy and the 33% rakeback is quite nice.

I am preparing a longer post to review my 2007 year. I'll post that a bit later and also my 2008 goals.

ITH opened Cake Poker as an affiliate and when you sign through them, you get 33% rakeback.

If found the offer tempting, but Cake does not support Poker Tracker, which is a software I rely on when I multi table. I still decided to give it a go and tried Cake Poker for the past month.

The players are awful. Therefore the suckouts are terrible… I found that I had big upswing and big downswing throughout the month. So you must have a solid state of mind when you play there, you will get sucked out a lot. But it’s all about the long run, right?

I thought that not having Poker Tracker and Poker Ace Hud would hinder me a lot, but in fact, it didn’t. I had to take more notes on the players and I had to pay more attention to how the players played, but all in all, I was still able to 4-table without a HUD quite easily.

I doubt I will continue playing at Cake, simply because there software is awfull. Not the software really, but the network connection. I get disconnected regularly for no apparent reason. Sometimes I have 2 tables working properly and I get disconnected on the third one… I estimate that I lost at least 1/2 buy-in in disconnection, which is a high price to pay.

I just can’t play on a site with so many network issues, but I may seek another site that is non PT compatible and that offers a high percentage rakeback.

My game has been off lately. I have had 3 consecutive losing months and I just know I am playing badly.

I joined CardRunners for a while and watched their videos. I was quite satisfied of what they had to offer, but when came time to renew I decided to check other options.

I found Stoxpoker and was quite impressed by the brochette of pros they offer. So, I decided to try them out for a 6 months period. The price was ok too: 69$ starting fees and 20$ each months. If you buy a subscription for 6 months or a year you can get goodies like software and books.

I hope this will help me fix my leaks and get me on the winning side again...

I have downloaded quite a few videos and I plan on studying them shortly.

I posted my frustration on the ITH forum and I got a nice reply from Llanlad. This is what I told him, might as well put it here since I am ok now.

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I am quite ok today. But yesterday I was totally tilted. I almost never tilt, but yesterday man did I tilt. Good thing I stopped playing. I went to bed and I couldn't sleep. I kept thinking about the bad beats. I manage to get asleep at 5am. I wake up at 6:30am .

My online bankroll is about 3k. When Neteller bummed out for Canadians I was a little afraid and I took 5k out of my 10k bankroll. I decided to drop to NL 100 and then to NL 50 because I like to play with an uber bankroll.

Basically, in the past 6 months or so, I lost close to 2k.

I honestly think my game is off. Either I changed, the competition has changed or both. I can't seem to beat the game like I did in the past.

I won't quit. I like poker too much, but I have to find a solution to my problem.

As a side note, I invested 400$ in my initial bankroll and I won a little bit over 16k since I started. So, even if I lose the totality of my BR I will still have made money playing poker.

Losing my entire BR will never happen. One lesson I have learned and that stuck is BR management and I tend to err on the side of caution. I will drop down in levels if my BR shrinks.

Tabarnak de calice de calvaire d'osti de criss.

I FUCKING CAN'T believe this. Fucking idiots every where and they call call call call . And they fucking HIT every time. Every FUCKING time!

I have never seen anything like this.

My Bankroll is below 3k again. I just can't believe what happened today.

I am so fucking frustrated right now that I may just quit playing poker. I don't think I can't beat this game anymore.