Katja was playing some $100/200 on PokerStars yesterday. "Some" means about 1600 hands, both 6-max and full ring within a 12 hours session (single tabling only). We did this after a really good run at $30/60 where she made some serious money. We spend the whole time together, talking about hands an decisions. This is a fun and good way to improve your game! We agreed on 95% of all decisions and found out (the hard way as usual) that our turn and river plays for that limit are way to tight (read: weak). We got our money in preflop and on the flop with the best hand about 80% of the time (which is very good I guess) but we somehow failed to give our hands the right protection on the later streets. We definitly don't do enough re-raising there. Our main observation was that almost nobody there gives up any pair. Ever. Pocket 22 on a JQK flop? CALL! (or even raise) - 68 with a 6-7-J board and two bets to call? 100% call. D-o-n-t f-o-l-d a-n-y p-a-i-r. Another note was that we don't get enough action on our big hands. Looks like playing textbook-stlye ABC poker is not enough in those limits, the players are way to good in determining the hand strength based on action patterns. Although there have been defintily enough donkeys playing conclusion is we got to mix it up some more. Looks like this is more difficult than expected when still in this "play solid poker" big-buyin tournament mode after the WSOP. Even I (lol) was clueless and I really know how to play reckless [yes, I am clueless, read below]

There was actually a point early in the goings where we have been up like 7k, holding AA on a 3-8-K-6 rainbow board. Katja has been betting out, getting raised, reraised and he capped so four bets going into the pot on the turn. When the river brought another 8 Katja only check-called to get shown a 78o hand by some donk. From that point on we lost 50 BB in 30 minutes with 4 more major hands lost on the river to 4 or less outers. Yikes. When the table broke we changed to the 6-max table and played there another 5 hours, almost getting even again. Back to full ring. Table breaks (table chat reads like 'this table is way to tight, let's move to 25-50 NL' etc.). Back and forth, up and down. Although they were taking our money overall nobody really seemed to like playing vs. Katja. Guess having a tight image hurts further. Funny sidenote: one guy told the story that he deposited $1000 two days ago, got on winning streak right away and after being up more than $40,000 his account got blocked by PokerStars to run a detailed security check on him. Wow. He was required to send in some ID's and papers and was then allowed to play again. When we last played with him he ran his $4,000 to more then $20,000 in a 3-hour session so he must be up more than 50k by now - in two days that is! Some small portion of this is our money too, lol.

Much better news from Casino Bregenz tournament "Bodensee Poker Championship". Our poker buddy Bedros Kupelian won the €300+R event for a €27,390 payout. Well done, CONGRATULATIONS. You're the man.

Most amazing is I know Bedros for over 10 years now and played thousands of hours with him in all kinds of cashgames and tournaments. And I still have no idea how he is doing it. No idea. Just look at his winnings - and that's not all, by far. Even when slandering with other about him, nobody has any idea except the usual - fearless player, very experienced, great reads, big laydowns etc. Note all attributes like "patient", "tight" or "consistant" are missing here - for a reason. He is none of those. He is patient only in waiting for the tournament to start, tight only when leaving the casino after blowing some serious money on the slot machines and consitant only in his high placements. Gamewise he should not have any chance at all, still he rulez. Hmmmmm. Now he could be on a ten year long lucky poker tournament streak or doing something out of my reach. Hmmmmmmmmmmm. Let me quickly re-read the above from the $100/200 game. Is there some correlation? Should there be some? Is solid, "responsible" and meaningful poker style, well, out-of-style? As I think about it while I write these lines here there may be some truth to it - did not I myself had my best results years before when money was no concern, I played for fun (and I am not talking about the fun resulting from profits) and earned my nickname, "50outs" because nobody ever had any idea which of those cards had hit me?

I should really give this mode a new chance. Again.