Bad Beat Bob

I've had a bad run of luck this week. As far as I know I have been doing all the right things, playing the right hands, not going too loose or anything like that. Trouble is, four or five times now I've lost big pots when someone drew a straight or sometimes three of a kind on the river.

I know this happens to everyone and it evens out in the end, but it doesn't make it any easier to deal with when it's your turn to cop the bad beats, and even worse is when they come in a sequence. It's demoralising. You do everything right, someone else does everything wrong, and they walk away with the pot.

I've managed to keep my emotions in check so haven't gone on tilt or anything like that. However, it does get harder to control yourself so a couple of times I have had to get up and walk away to avoid doing anything silly.

I've looked on youtube to see some other bad beats just to remind myself that I'm not the only one who suffers. Seems as well that various poker rooms offer a bad beat jackpot, so if you lose undeservedly you get entered in to win a big jackpot like this guy:



I'm not sure if the poker room I was playing at does this. I was at Betfair Poker last time it happened so I need to check the details of their Betfair poker promotions to see if they have any bad beat rakeback, jackpot of anything else to make you feel a bit better after getting a kick in the nuts! Let's hope so.

Anyway, I'm having the weekend off now and I'll be back to it next week hopefully with some better luck. Yeah I know, there's no such thing as luck, it's all probability. Well in that case, let's hope for some better probability next week!

Back In Business!

Hi all. Well I came back from my vacation and found that my account here was suspended, so the long-ish post I wrote earlier on today had now been lost. Ho-hum, such is life. At least I'm back now.

Anyway I had a great vacation, first I walked the Appalachian Trail which was an AWESOME way to unwind, get some exercise and blow out some of the cobwebs. Then I headed over to San Diego for just over a week of fishing and chilling out on the beach. Some great bars around there too especially Ocean Beach. I will be back for sure.

This is something I think everyone who works online should do, whether it's as a poker player like me or whatever you do. Now and again you just need to down tools, I mean like drop everything, and just go away and forget it all for a while. It's great to refocus the mind and remember there are more important and interesting things out there than your computer screen. It's easy to get isolated if you don't do this once in a while.

So I'm refreshed, recharged, and back in business to make a few more bucks from the poker tables. Not done anything major so far, just a few cash games for modest gains, nothing spectacular. I'll ease myself back in and then start to increase my game time and stake size.

After all, I need to save up for my next vacation....

Straight choice - Betfair or Titan poker

Ok I've had a good look round and I found Betfair poker are offering a bonus of max $2500 and Titan Poker max $2000. You'd say maybe go for Betfair because it's more, but Titan is 200% of your deposit which is more as a percentage than Betfair, so we'll have to see on that.

I won't open both at the same time because I won't be able to spread my time between the two so as to play enough to earn the full bonus at both. Maybe I will do Titan first and then when I've nailed that bonus down I can still go for a Betfair poker account afterwards and get their bonus as well.

This week#s job - Finding a poker room with the best poker bonus

I'm thinking at this stage that I've done enough reading up, research, practice etc and it's time to actually get my feet wet and play some actual poker. Yes I might get my fingers burned at first but surely the only way to learn is by doing. Anyway that's the plan.

So where to play? I'm not sure if any of the poker rooms are particularly shark free, or if any are better for newcomers than others. I do know that full tilt and poker stars are out for a start, I'm not getting involved there and risking having my account frozen before I've even begun.

So what's left? Well, lots more choices actually. I'm thinking that the best way to choose might be to just go with whoever offers the biggest or best poker bonus. That way I've got a chance of increasing my chip stack straight away from the start, which should hopefully compensate for anything I lose while learning. And if I win when I'm learning, well - so much the better right?

So I'm going to look at some of the poker bonus websites and make a decision on who to join. I'll be back in a day or so to update you on my progress.

Full Tilt Poker being sued by WSOP player?

OK, so I was looking around for the best poker room to join (which is gonna be a long job but that's another story) and came across this news story on CNN.

Apparently, "Phil Ivey says he won't compete in the 2011 World Series of Poker in protest of the event sponsor, Full Tilt."

But Full Tilt don't seem to be taking this lying down, their response being:  ""Contrary to his sanctimonious public statements, Phil Ivey's meritless lawsuit is about helping just one player -- himself." Blimey! This one could run on for a while.

If you want to read the full story, here it is on CNN

I'll be back to update on my progress soon.

Online Poker: The Journey Begins....

Guess I'd better start with a quick intro. My name's Kevin Bergsson and the purpose of this blog is to record my thoughts in a journey which I'm hoping to make in the world of online poker. I know a couple of people who play online poker professionally - i.e. its their #1 source of income. And basically, I want in!!!

Now I class myself as a fish because I've never played online before, but I do have some experience of the game from playing socially in the real world so I'm not a complete novice. But you have to accept that playing online and playing in real life are totally different, you need different skills and mindset to succeed.

So anyway, that's me and that's what I want to achieve. Hope to hear from any of you who are in the same boat, and hope you find the journey interesting. This time next year, it could be time to quit the day job. Certainly hope so!