Bonus Whoring

Hi folks, my Titan first deposit bonus has now expired. So I think now is an omptimal time to consolidate my bonus/rakeback for the month and then cash out on Titan. Redeposit on another ipoker skin and bonus farm some more. This should give me a big edge as the reg's will still be in my database but I will be an unknown vs them. I would expect this to positively effect my winrate for some time. As well as the added advantage of a 200% bonus that is equivalent to 22% bonus back. This is just too good to pass up.

So as of next month I shall be choosing between Poker770 and Winner as my skin of choice.

Sadly next month I will miss out on 2 weeks of play due to my charity bike ride (see my other blog for details or visit http://www.justgiving.com/kyle-foulds)

I will be going from lands end to john o groats (bottom of UK to top) this is about 960 miles so this may take some time on a push bike. Hence lack of play time.

The + side is I will be taking my laptop and watching training videos most nights so my game should be improving by the mile. I will also stock up on podcasts for whilst I am cycling wheeeee.

Onto poker. This month I have had a bit of an upswing which is nice. Moved upto 20NL and I have consolidated my roll there so now I can stick around. Hoping to be playing 50NL by August. This is achievable so long as I stay focussed on playing less Xbox and more Poker after work :P

Over the last 25k hands I have been managing 4.7bb/100 which is pretty good. This has been exclusively at 20NL. I have been running surprisingly close to EV as well, only 0.5 stacks below. Which made me uber happy compared to my 24 stacks below at 10NL.

So anyway, long story short I have been playing good. Running alright, and hovering up all the monies.

So not posted any hands for a while, and thought this one was pretty interesting.

This particular hand highlights turning a made hand into a bluff vs a specific opponent when you can assign them a narrow range and have a good idea of how they play vs a specific line.

In this hand villain is 10/8/3.9 with 8% PFR from EP flop cbet of 64% and turn cbet of 60%
Goes to showdown 24% and wins at showdown 62% so he is a good tag. I have 2k hands and have played a lot with him this session. Seen him fold what I believe were overpairs on more than 1 occasion this session. So Effective stacks are 100bbs.


IPoker, $0.10/$0.20 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 8 Players
LeggoPoker.com Hand History Converter

CO: $6.48
BTN: $36.88
Hero (SB): $19.80
BB: $22.24
UTG: $12.33
UTG+1: $43.72
MP1: $19.80
MP2: $46.55

Pre-Flop: Ad Jd dealt to Hero (SB)
UTG folds, UTG+1 raises to $0.80, 3 folds, BTN calls $0.80, Hero calls $0.70, BB folds

Flop: ($2.60) Jc Ts 6h (3 Players)
Hero checks, UTG+1 bets $2, BTN folds, Hero raises to $5, UTG+1 calls $3

Turn: ($12.60) 5d (2 Players)
Hero bets $5.50, UTG+1 folds


This is not a great flop for him to barrel multi way as my perceived range in BB contains lots of PPs and SC's. I assume Villain has a HuD as he is playing 9 tables. My current preflop stats for this session are 16/12/5.8. As we are going multi way to the flop AJs can flop well multiway and it's fairly easy to get away from if I don't flop huge. However in this case once the BTN folds I believe I can turn my hand into a bluff fairly easily and vs this kind of reg can easily get him off an overpair. If we consider his C-betting range OTF. It largely contains AA KK QQ and AK perhaps AQs. When he flats a weight his range heavily towards overpairs.

Given that we are clearly repping TT/JJ here 5d is a great barreling card for us. I beileve this is because if he was peeling with AKs/AQs it completes the rainbow so he can't have picked up any backdoor FDs and thus can't have improved his equity. My plan was obv fold to a shove or if called shut down OTR unimproved.

I do however think that I should of sized the flop a bit larger. $7.50 would be optimal I belive as this would allow for an almost pot sized shove OTT and I believe this would of maximized my fold equity. Its worth noting that this is not a play I would EVER make unless I am 100% sure this is a reg capable of folding overpairs. Given his nitty EP opening range and that he is barreling the flop into someone he will hopefully see as a competent reg then his range is generally pretty strong here. This is not a move I would make if the flop had come say Kx Tx 4x or Qd Jd 7 as it is more probably I am doing it with a draw and given my play style he can quite possibly come back over the top or just call down with his overpair. Given how dry this board was coupled with Villains play style I believe it makes turning this made hand into a bluff a viable option.

Here endeth the wall of text. However I hope we can see from this how turning made hands into bluff to fold out the strong part of a villains range can be uber profitable so long as you are targeting the correct opponent.