As I’ve talked about I’ve recorded every hand of my ecoop win on a hand replayer, and the videos will be released today. I hope you’ll enjoy them, I would like to remind you that I don’t have the experience of a cardrunners pro in speaking in front of a microphone so go easy on me :). I think the video shows how good solid poker wins in tournaments, I don’t get tricky in many spots and mostly just play ABC-poker waiting for good starting hands.

I did not follow my own advice to stay at the lower omaha limits (what a surprise :D). I couldn’t resist the juicy games that were running, and had two big days at PLO1000, first one I won about 4000$ and the second one like 7000$, and I have this unbeatable feeling again. Even though I was down like from earlier sessions 8000$, I’m now up on the green again in PLO1000 which is really nice. I also feel like I have an edge in these games even though I’ve only been playing PL omaha for like 2 months now. My strong background in no-limit texas hold’em is definitely helping me, as so many of the concepts stay the same in these hold’em big bet games.

I will be starting my military service tomorrow, which kind of sucks when I have this upswing going on. When I get settled there and get my new laptop I’ll try to play a few hours every day, and update my blog with more hand discussion.

I’ve had a sick rush these past 4 days. i just quit my session, and am up 18k euros within 4 days. Mostly playing nl1000, some nl2000 and nl4000 mixed in. I’ve been running good and making some awesome plays, I really feel like I’ve been playing my A-game the whole time.

Pot-limit omaha is just such a sick game, it’s so funny that everytime I have a winning session I feel like I’m beating the games completely, but when I run bad I feel like I have no shot in the games. For now on ipoker I’m sure I beat the plo200 and plo400 games, pretty sure I beat the plo600 games, but when it comes to plo1000, I’ve been running really bad. I’m also not sure if these very loose aggressive regulars there are just taking away too many pots from me without showdown. I have the same feeling as I had in my early nl100 full ring days, I just hated bluffing, I wished there wasn’t an option to bluff. But as my style evolved, and I loosened up preflop, I just had garbage too often, and had to rely on bluffing a lot more. I’m trying to get the same thing going in pot-limit omaha but I feel it just takes experience to find these good bluffing spots and double/triple barrels.

I played my biggest PLO pot so far:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2831630

It is kind of an interesting hand, I decided to reraise the hand to exactly 100$, as I would do with my whole reraising range, as the shortstacker behind me had a stack of 200$ so if he went all-in, and the other players called I could come over the top with a pot-sized committing reraise. Anyways that didn’t happen and we see a flop. I have a wide 3betting range in position so it’s not like my opponents can automatically put me on AAxx, especially when the flop comes with an A, it makes it less likely for me to have. They both check to me and I pot it on this pretty drawy board, I get called and the turn is not the best card as it puts out the broadway (A-high straight). He checks again and it’s kind of a tough spot as I expect to get checkraised by the straight alot of the time, but with the additional outs from my flush draw, I’m not even that bad of an underdog against the nuts at the moment so I decide to just bet/call. It’s kind of a cooler and he ran into probably the worst possible hand, and was drawing very slim.

I’m gonna try to get in some sessions before my military service starts, which is next monday. For the first few weeks then I won’t be able to play, but after that I should be able to put in a few hours every day. Just need to get myself a laptop!

Phew I had a sick texas hold’em session today. Haven’t had such sick beats in a while. It is just fun how nuts some people go when they can’t handle my loose aggressive style. Everything started great, I opened some nl1000€ tables and was up something like 1k when this hand comes up. A fish opens from early position to 20 with about 700 behind. 2 callers to me, I’m in the bb and look at KK, I reraise to 120, the fish raises to 687 or something like that, I thought he went all-in, everyone else folds to me and I call. Flop comes K93r and I notice he has like 45 left so I put him all-in. He calls and flips over AQ offsuit, and I’m like thanks for the money donk. The turn is a T and the river is a J, and it takes me a while to realise what happened when the pot is dragged towards him. This was only the start.

Other hand, I open 88 in late position, the small blind calls, everyone else folds. The flop comes 865 with a flush draw, I bet close to pot and he calls, turn is an offsuit Q, we get our 100bb stacks in the middle and he flips over Q7 for top pair and an open-ended straight draw, the river is a 9 and I’m NOT happy.

Then the last but the most annoying one. I play HU nl1k€ against a player I percieve as weak. We have about 1500 euro stacks, he limps, I raise it up to 40 with 22, he reraises to 100, I put him on AA/KK and call for set value, the flop is a beautful 237 with a FD. I check, he bets like 180, I reraise to 600, he goes all-in and I snapcall. He shows KK and the turn is…………. a K, river blanks out and he takes the 3k pot. Felt pretty sick.

A bit after this I notice a big Italian fish sitting down in a nl4000€ table, and I’m joining really fast before the seats get taken. Like the third hand in the fish opens to 120 from the button, small blind folds and I reraise him to 400 in the big blind with KJo. He calls and the flop is KJ3 rainbow, I feel this is my payday. I contination bet 600, he calls. The turn is a 4, and the pot about 2000, he has like 2600 left, so I decide to just make a smallish bet of 900 (I can easily get the rest of the money in on the river, and there aren’t really many draws I’m worried about) , he ships it in and I call so fast I almost break my mouse. He shows AJ offsuit and I’m like cmon god don’t do this to me, luckily the river is a blank and I’m now even for the day, this game is just so sick. I grind some more and end up like 2000 euros and feel it’s good to quit for today.

I’m finally home again, after being away for a week in Bulgaria, Sunny Beach, and a few days in Malta. It was awesome to get thoughts off poker for a while and just relax.

It is funny to think about with what kind of money people really play in lets say nl2000. I mean when you play you just see it as numbers on your screen, but only when I went travelling did I realise how much I’m really playing with. A one week trip to bulgaria for me and my friend - 1/2 buyin. Blowjob - 2 big blinds. A juicy steak at a nice restaurant - less than one small blind.

So in Bulgaria I felt really rich, but that feeling dissappeared very fast when I arrived to Malta. I was there to for a birthday party of an pokersite owner who had spent 30 thousand euros on his birthday. The finest nightclubs, most expensive shampagne etc. And it felt like everyone I talked to had made millions with something that had to do with online poker. Anyways it was hell of a party and really opened my eyes to how rich some people really are, and how rich people party :).

I’ve decided to make a videoseries of my ECOOP win, where I will use a hand replayer to show every hand I played. Hopefully I have time to make the first one before my military service starts. Also I’m gonna try to get some hands in now, it’s been too long since the last time I played (almost 2 weeks!).

As I said I’ve been working on my PL omaha game, it is funny how much variance there is in the game. I had a sick 32 hand start at my first PLO600 table I joined

It was quite funny, I’m gonna post the big hands:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2738058 this one was quite funny

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2738067 guess I could’ve reraised peflop

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2738071 no one ever believes you have aces when you reraise preflop nowadays

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2738094

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2738101 my blocker play worked for once :), I think I’m too reckless when doing these and should not be bluffing with them as much.

After that everything went really bad, and my shots to PLO1000 have been going really bad, I’m down 8 buyins in 1600 hands, running like 5 buyins under expectation but I will keep some break before trying there again.

But now I’m off to Sunny Beach for a week. It’s going to be fun and can’t remember the last time I’ve been a week without poker.

I arrived at the casino 15 minutes before the 3000 euro main event was going to start. I catched up with a few friends and saw some finnish celebrities, and the tourney started. My starting table seemed pretty tough, like 4 of the people there knew each other and all seemed to have been playing poker for some time. There wasn’t much happening, but I tried to play as many pots as long as we were deepstacked as I feel I have a big edge at this point of the tournament coming from a cash game background. I just couldn’t hit the flop and had a failed J4s squeeze attempt, but I managed to grind some chips to keep my stack somewhat healthy.

The first bigger hand comes up when I got about 26k in chips (starting stack 20k), blinds were at 150/300 if I remb correctly, I look down at AA under the gun and make it 1000 to go, I have been pretty aggressive so I was expecting to get action, one guy calls before his turn, and luckily for me another guy before him reraises to 3000, the caller then folds leaving 1k extra dead money in the pot, a few people fold to this Swede who raises it up to 8k, it gets folded to me and I have to admit I’m quite happy with the action :D. Now I’m trying to figure out what would be the best move, I think calling just screams aces at this point so I just shove it all-in, the first reraisor folds and its down to the Swede, he is getting pretty good odds and thinks for some time and ends up folding saying he had AK. I show the aces and tell him nice laydown.

After 4 hours of play there is a dinner break, and after that I get moved to another table. Here the cards start to go my way, at the beginning I open tons of hands because of the antes, and because I still have a solid image. Second hand at the table I open A3o from the hijack, everyone folds to Ilari Sahamies in the small blind who calls with only like 15 big blinds behind. The flop comes QTT, he checks, I ask him how much he has behind and realise I can’t really cbet here because of the stacksizes, I check behind. Turn is an ace, he checks, I check. The river is a blank, he checks and I bet 3/4 pot. He goes into the tank, at some point I jokingly say K-high is no good as I have seen some sick hero calls by him at the full tilt highstakes tables :D, he says he has KQ and after some deliberation folds.

I start slowing down after stealing many pots, knowing no-one will give me any credit. This is when I start picking up hands, Teresa Nousiainen, a finnish pro poker player opens, everyone folds to me in the SB and I look down at AK and reraise, she thinks for some time and folds. Just a few hands later she openlimps UTG, everyone folds to me on the button, I look down at JJ and raise, blinds fold. It’s up to her and after a while she reraises 3x my raise which is kind of scary and is like 1/3-1/4 of her whole stack. Limp reraise from UTG usually is a big hand, especially at live 10handed tables, but in this hand I have to take into consideration my the game flow and my crazy table image. I ask her if she has aces and decide to put her all-in. She doesnt instacall which I’m very happy with, Ilari points out “No aces” which I find quite amusing. She ends up folding and my stack keeps growing.

Everything is going really great, and I have the perfect position at the table with two nits on my left. I have opened the 2 last hands and look down at 33, everyone folds to me in middle position and I’m not quite sure if I want to open it or just fold, but I end up opening it to 1100 with the blinds at 200-400, and a generous 50 ante. This woman to my left who I’m not sure has played a single hand reraises my to 2500 with a stack of like 26k. Everyone folds to me and in my opinion its an easy call at least for set value for 1400 more, the board comes down K53 rainbow and I probably have an erection. I check, she bets 3k, I raise to 8k pretty quickly trying to make it look bluffy. She calls pretty fast, and the turn is a 2, I put her all-in, she tanks and asks me how I’m getting so much good hands, and says we probably have the same hand. I just stay quiet knowing she will call, which she finally does and shows AK. I’m like no 4, cmon that would be sick, and the river is a ten.

I also make a pretty big bluff, the blinds at 300-600, a guy who has been opening pretty liberally, opens from middle position to 1.5k with 40k+ behind, everyone folds to me on the button with AdTd which I decide to call with, the blinds fold and the flop comes Qd6d6x. He bets 3k, I call. Turn is Jx, he bets 6k, I call. The river is a Qx and he checks, which brings up the everlasting question to bluff or not to bluff. I decide to do it and slowly count out 17k in chips which is push towards the middle. This guy literally tanks for like 5 minutes, before he finally folds, I turn over my hand and Ilari shouts out “I would have instacalled, cmon you could see it on his face”.

At this point I’m at up to like 70k in chips and am probably one of the chipleaders, I’m very confident in taking down the tournament. Ilari and a guy besides him is talking about a highstakes hand against CTS. Here I found the hand: http://www.pokerhand.org/?2698813 , I join the conversation saying something like “yeah it would have been the biggest pot of online poker had you called”, the other guy adds yeah, but it was a good bluff by him. Ilari says nah, it was a pretty terrible bluff, I can’t believe I didn’t call him, I was tired or something, wasnt playing good. He also adds and says afterwards he tilted and put 130k in preflop with jacks in Pot-limit Omaha, which is pretty funny, I can’t believe a guy playing on that level can make such tilt plays, btw if someone has this hand saved please pm it to me :P.

Anyways this is when everything starts to go *****. With the blinds at something like 400-800, everyone folds to the SB who opens with about a 20k stack behind, I look down at AQs and put him all-in, with my image I know I’m getting called by alot worse, he snapcalls with 99, and manages to win the flip of an over 40k pot. A little bit after this it’s probably the first bigger mistake of the tourney that I make, I look down at AQo from early position and open to 2k with the blinds at 400-800. Teresa reraises to 6k, with like a bit over 20k behind, it gets folded to me. Now I don’t think calling is an option here oop, I either put her all-in or fold. I think I could have gotten away from this as I overestimated my laggy image, I had been pretty quiet for a while now, and knew she wasnt doing this light. Anyway I end up putting her all-in and she calls with AKo which holds up. A few hands later I open 99, a shortstack with like 11k shoves so I kind of have to call, he has TT, and I lose. I cant believe how fast my stack has shrunken down. When the day is over I have 34k, with the average stack being somewhere at 65k, so I’m gonna need to get lucky the next day.

The second day I get a new table. The blinds start at 1200-2400 with a 200 ante, so I’m in push or fold mode now. It’s funny how live poker players do not understand the math behind shorstack pushing. This one hand comes up with everyone folding to me in the SB, I look down at 73o, the BB only has like 5 big blinds behind so with the antes I’m expecting to get called a ton of the time, most players would understand to pretty much call with any two cards from the big blind here, but I have hopes of having at least some folding equity so I think its a +ev shove. I shove and bb says its really close, but ends up folding A6s faceup, I’m like say whaaatt.

Everyone is just giving way to much credit to my shoves and I’m basically shoving any two cards from SB and button, and almost the same from the CO when it’s folded to me. I manage to build up my stack to like 44k before the hand I’m out on. A bit before this guy with glasses gets moved to our table, 2 to the left from me. Everyone folds to me on the button, blinds still at 1200/2400 I look down at KQs, the SB is too short I dont have to worry about him, but the BB who just arrived has me covered. I think about just openshoving but it would be quite an overbet so I end up opening to 6k. SB folds and the BB shoves pretty fast. Here his looks really come into play, he is a young guy with glasses, looks like an online player who I would expect to be restealing really light here. Also I’m getting sick good odds because of the antes so I end up calling, he turns over 88 and I lose the coinflip and am out. I’m pretty dissapointed but I guess you can’t win them all… What still surprises me is how bad some of the live “pros” play, I saw a well known finnish pro, I’m not gonna say his name but he openlimped UTG with like 10bbs, I thought to myself like omg aces, someone raises behind him, everyone folds to him and he folds?? Well stuff like that just gives me confidence the no-limit hold’em games will stay beatable for years to come.

oh and btw found the JJ hand: http://www.pokerhand.org/?2698800

So I played the 3000€ BI main event of Midnight sun, and the mixed 1000€ event. I’m gonna write a report of them tomorrow, today I’m just gonna talk a little about online cash games that have been going great. I haven’t had alot of time to play online the past week but the little I’ve played has been going great. The day before yesterday I played like half an hour and managed to stack off a guy with a flush over flush in nl2k€. Yesterday I was down almost 2k from the nl1k games until one a regular(not a very good one imo) sits down at the nl2k€ table I’m waiting at. He goes ahead and donks off 3 buyins to me so I book a nice win for the day.

Some interesting hands, we are like 2800€ deep, I open 2h9h, he calls. Flop comes Kxx with 2 hearts, I continuation bet, he calls. The turn is a pretty jack of hearts, I have no reason to slow down so I bet again, he calls. River is a blank and the pot is like 700, I bet 500 into him, and now he ships in the rest and I’m a bit like wtf, I have to call almost 2k to win 5.6k, so I’m getting descent odds and I don’t think many players get away from this hand, so I call and he shoves K9o, top pair that he turned into a bluff :).

A bit later, he has about 1.8k, he opens to 60, I look down at 3s4s and reraise to 200, he calls. The board is KdQdQx, I cbet half pot 200 into 400, I really like the bet size with both when I hit the flop and as a bluff. I’m giving my bluff good odds, but unfortunately he calls, the turn is a blank offsuit 7, I decide to make an interesting second barrel, I bet 320 Into 800, which in his mind sets up a perfect sized river shove, he thinks for a while and folds. I show him the bluff and he seems to get a little bit tilted.

The final hand, 2K effective stacks, I really feel him tilting so I’m happy to look down at AQo, he opens to 60, I 3bet to 200, he 4bets to 520, because of the game flow and momentum I’m really happy to just get it in so I think for a while and shove, he snapcalls with AJo, my hand holds up and he instaleaves the table :).

Tomorrow I’m gonna write about my Midnight Sun tournaments which didnt go that well, cya and gl at the tables.

Hey guys, I am an 18-year-old (very soon 19) poker player from Finland. I’ve been playing for a little bit over a year now seriously, and my progress has been very fast. I started out by getting third place in a freeroll for 10 dollars, grinded it up to 300$ playing limit hold’em after which I switched over to no-limit and haven’t looked back since. I quickly climbed up in the stakes from nl10 to nl200 multitabling like 8 tables of full ring, not really thinking much about the game, mostly just playing my hands for value, and extracting money from players who played too loose.

 At this point I noticed that the full ring games were pretty dry from nl400 up, and that most of the fish could be found in the shorthanded games. I did the transition but things didn’t go very well. I was playing a way too tight style, and even tho I stacked fishes left and right my roll didn’t grow and I had an almost breakeven month. I couldn’t understand what I was doing
wrong, I clearly saw the fish playing worse hands and that I’m supposed to win from them, I blamed it all on variance, until I finally started to think more about the game, read more different poker strategy forums and subscribed for a video coaching site. A big turning point in my career was the “aha” moment I had watching one of CTS(Cole South) videos, I saw him opening stuff like 29s on the button and J8s in the cutoff and I was like wtf. I started experimenting with a looser style and was very successful. I realised I had been leaking a lot of money to the other regulars who were stealing my blinds.

My progression continued up to nl1k and nl2k tables which I’m currently grinding out. The past month I have been working on my pot-limit omaha game and haven’t played much texas hold’em. I’m working really hard on my PLO game atm and trying to move up in stakes as fast as possible. I will be talking poker here and writing up interesting hands and possibly making some videos of me playing. Feel free to comment my blog and give feedback!