Going, Going...Gong!

Some rawkpoker blog readers might notice something a little different for this week's post and its got nothing to do with the look and feel...for those that are very observant - that's right - this blog has come a little earlier in the week than usual! Normally I write my piece on a Sunday afternoon but this weekend I have other plans...I'm visiting my old home town where I was born and bred - Wollongong or as the locals refer to it - The Gong! Yes I'm going back to the Gong.

I'll be travelling with Fi to my home town for a much overdue trip to see the rest of the family and the beautiful beaches. I am really looking forward to it as I haven't visited the old stomping ground since March. It's a reminder for me around how busy my schedule is and how I can get bogged down with IT work and side projects like online poker and of course the world series. I can't wait to get down there and take a break from the faster day to day pace of Sydney.

I'm still getting over this bout of man cold and hopefully I will be OK for our usual run on Saturday morning around the Bay. Of course even if I do run I won't do as well as Fi who finished with a personal best time in last weekend's City to Surf - congrats Fi!

And finally the update on the poker grind this week - not a bad week at all with the trend still steadily continuing upwards.

Here is this week's tournament summary:

Session 1: Played 16, Placed: 2 (7th, 10th), Prizes: $19
Session 2: Played 22, Placed: 3 (1st, 7th, 17th), Prizes: $142 
Session 3: Played 22, Placed: 2 (4th, 6th), Prizes: $54

All in all I managed to squeeze in my projected target of 60 tournaments this week at a 26 buy-in profit despite still being ill and not really playing that well in the last session. I wasn't overly thrilled at a couple of my plays on the two final tables I reached in the final session and I probably cost myself at least a one spot higher finish on each table. There was a small tragedy as well when right on the final table bubble in the first session of the week I watched my QQ UTG shove lose to a very poor T7o call from the big blind when he only just had me covered and we both had 15 big blinds! I do everything right but finish that one in 10th - that's poker!

I am now approximately 30 buy-ins up since the start of the challenge and have enjoyed an upswing of around 110 buy-ins or $277 since my lowest point in the first two weeks. My current PokerStars bankroll performance equates to 223 tournaments at an ROI of around 13.5%. Not a great ROI at this stage for 180-player SnGs but at least I'm not in the red and am starting to show some real consistency with final table finishes.

The overall trend graph is now looking a little better:

On a separate note I have really struggled to get the time to play on the Entraction network account I created recently which is a real shame. Playing during off peak European time means the only format that seems to fill up fast enough is the super turbo 6-max SnGs. The games there seem very soft but high variance and I need a lot more spare time if I am going to make any reasonable profit there on top of my PokerStars session. Hopefully I can get some sort of meaningful volume on there and add those results to this blog as well.