Heater: OFF

Well, I finally hit a brick wall. I knew it would come, but at least it came swiftly and mercilessly. I wasn't even teased for a while, I just couldn't make a hand.

First off, though, the freeroll at Riverside.

We showed up, along with about 35 other freerollers. The chips are only 1k, which is really awful considering the blinds are 50/10 and double every 15 minutes. One can give a $10 tip to the dealers for another 1k. Also, having certain high hands or cracked aces in live play adds 500 to the mix. There is no cap on the amount of "extra" 500's one can earn during the week, so live play is definitely encouraged. Glenn said someone at his table had four top ups (2000 extra chips).

The payout structure is $500/250/125/75/50 and there is usually a deal made, due to the horrendous blinds by that time. In addition, the top five earn points for the quarterly freeroll, which is the one where they give away the car plus 5k.

So we are going to be spending a lot of time at RS. The promos are just too good to beat, even if I feel some things are rigged there. I have heard rumors before that The Don has to add about 5k per week to the BBJ rake for all of these extra promotions (he takes it from the rake, obviously, but that isn't the point). I do believe this, as the promos are so frequent and good that it would seem that the poker room is almost losing money every day.

Okay, so back to the freeroll. I was cruising along, uber shortstacked, until we were down to 11. Glenn had been out for a while, and was playing cash games. We were six handed and I got AQ, figured it to be the best thing going, and went all-in. Little did I know that behind me, there were the following hands: TT, 99, 88, 86s. The guy with 86s was in the big blind and caught both a straight and flush draw, so that is why he stayed in. No one really had any chips, so three of us were busted out on the same hand when the tens held up. One would think that I could catch an ace or queen, since no high cards were dead, but the final board was 7744x, all small cards. Go figure.

I started out doing well in cash games, zooming up to $40 before the freeroll, and then things went to hell.

I misplayed my first big hand at the 4/8 kill table. I had tens, raised, bet the flop against a lone opponent who still had chips (another newbie went all-in). He check-raised me, but I didn't put him on a hand. The flop was QQx and I put him on air. He seemed like he was trying to do the, "I have a queen, get out of my pot," routine. I followed my instincts. Both the turn and river were bet, but things just got worse. The turn was an ace, the river a jack. I figured that he probably didn't have much to start, but had made his hand somewhere along the way. He certainly kept betting into a dry sidepot (by the river a substantial sidepot). Somehow I let false logic get into my head, and figured that 1) even if he had nothing to start, he'd made something that beat tens, 2) he wouldn't keep betting into a starting dry sidepot if he truly had nothing.

My mistakes in the hand were many. Misplayed on every street save pre-flop. I wouldn't even call one more bet on the river (oy). Of course he turned over air. I couldn't go with my instincts, I had to try to come up with some convoluted logic to fold on the river. Oy vey. I is retarded.

The very next hand I had kings. I hoped and prayed the table would think I was steaming due to the tens hand, but only got one caller. I flopped quads and that was my high water mark for the night. I won the high hand bonus of $50, and a miniscule pot (around $20, ugh), and things swiftly went downhill.

For two hours, every pat hand was outdrawn on the turn, river or both (runner-runner). Every drawing hand, no matter the outs, never made it. I never once made a straight or flush, although I flopped about a billion draws. I remember one hand that had so many outs I couldn't even calculate them before action was on me. I was in the big blind with T8o and flopped top two. I actually had about 16 outs to win the hand (I didn't know I was drawing so live until it was over). But of course I didn't hit. Some yahoo with something like 73s, in middle position, who called a PFR with that, got the flush.

And that is how it went, all night, every hand. Usually the beats weren't "bad," because I wasn't getting premium hands busted (made flush busted by RR straight flush, poor Glenn). They were mostly just very excellent draws. Flop is a four flush for me, backdoor straight flush, gutshot straight, top pair, etc (all in one hand, I might add, lol).

So I managed to lose $200, even with the $50 bonus. Ah, well. Tonight is another night.

Last night:

$40 ($2-6 spread HE)
-$10 (Net Tournament Winnings)
-$200 (4/8 kill HE)
=-170 Net winnings for Wednesday, August 16, 2006

(Total saved for new car pre-August 15 $2500. Current total $2450)

Felicia :)