2008

2008 was a massive year for me. I got my new place lined up and I had big ambition, I was playing 1/2 at the time but I set myself a target of making £100 000 for the year. Keep me motivated. I was now under the alias: ImTheGoatian

This is how the year went:

YEAR 2008

JANUARY : PROFIT £5 925 ($1/$2)

FEBRUARY : PROFIT £5 569 ($1/$2)

MARCH : PROFIT £6 658 ($1/$2)

APRIL : PROFIT £13 174 ($2/$4)

MAY : PROFIT £7 769 ($2/$4)

JUNE : LOSS £1 277 ($2/$4)

JULY : PROFIT £12 581 ($2/$4)

AUGUST : PROFIT £25 573 ($2/$4)

SEPTEMBER: PROFIT £3 760 ($2/$4)

OCTOBER : PROFIT £5 252 ($2/$4)

NOVEMBER : PROFIT £23 696 ($2/$4)

DECEMBER : PROFIT £876 ($2/$4)

OTHER INCOME : PROFIT £11 420 ($2/$4)


OVERALL: +£120 117

I calculated this as $236 00 the other day as the exchange rate used to be 2:1 not 1.5:1, its hard to tell the exact $ amount, I think it is less than $236 000 now though, probably closer to $210-$215k. The exchange rate has made it impossible to be exact as I kept these records in £ and the $:£ has swung every month.

I passed my target for the year which was awesome, I did however spend a ridiculous amount of this, over £3-4k per month at least. I have a new Tv/Hifi/PS3/PC/Monitor etc.. to show for it and a lot of good times so although I regret spending so much I've had a great time during the year, and im young so its a good time to burn money. No point making so much money and living in a box room at home!

The other income was a few different things, next year im looking to make at the very minumum £40 000 from stuff other than Poker, this includes being an affiliate, investing, forex trading and a few other ventures. Im about to get stuck into property as well this year, nothing major to start, just getting my beak wet.

To go through 2008 a little:

First few months January/February/march I worked extrememly hard, very long hours and I was rake racing, my winrate went down every month and I struggled to realise why I was starting to win less and less on the tables. I was 16 tableing FR at this point playing a very nitty style. It then hit me after a few words and pointers from Jamsym that I was far far to tight, I knew I was tight, but everyone had improved and everyone had stats on me so I couldnt get away with it anymore. I still made profit though from the tables, even though it wasnt as much as I wanted + rake race and bonuses and I was still making a lot of money.

April: I decided I had enough at FR and wanted to get stuck into 6 max again and play a new style, I completely opened up my game and went from a 8/3/1 style at FR to 19/16/3 at 6 max, still pretty nitty but it was a big jump for me.

I thought why not go straight into 2/4 6 max as I had the roll, this was after a little play at 1/2 6 max with some success. On my 2nd shot I started doing well and had my best month ever whilst playing less than half the number of hands, i had a 5ptbb winrate after my first month at 6 max, and my first month at 2/4. Ship Ship! I always felt I could adapt well in poker, and a few pointers in the right direction was all I needed, raise more from late position and stop being a ridiculous nit!

May continued the same, but I put even less hours in and then in June i got far too lazy and hardly put anytime in and lost at the tables.

I had spent a lot at this time and I had my first ever degen gambling session, losing £8 000 on blackjack, completely out of character for me and felt I needed to get my work ethic back. I cant explain how i suddenly lost so much on blackjack, i never played the game, hardly ever gambled, the problem was I got comfortable with money and lost what i could afford to lose which is stupid.

Anyway onto June and August I was back Rake racing, putting a massive shift in, 15-20 days straight in both months and they were 14hr+ days. Around 200k hands in both months but I got massive results ££ wise. So it was definitely worth it.

I played less over the next two months, still pretty shattered from what Id done previous, it had massively taken it out of my mind. I could hardly play anything.

November came round though and I needed to put a big month in and not get lazy. I planned to do 20 straight days but managed only 13, this was ok though as I had an unbelievable month. By this time I was playing 6 max and in the previous few months at 6 max I had been really spewy, some sessions I was playing 23/20/6, some I was 20/18/4 and some 19/16/3 so i was mixing it up each session, im pretty much sure every reg will have different stats on me. Most of this wasnt even intentional, it was just the frame of mind I was in.

Anyway after 16 tableing for 13 days at an average of 10 000 hands per day I had made something like $25 000 and I decided this was enough, i had bonuses and race money to come too and I was happy to rest up with the money I made. The exchange rate at this point had got fantastic, all the way up to $1.5/£1 so now $23 000 was worth around £17 000 plus after all the hands and hours I had a number of bonuses coming in to make it a £20k+ month for me, and obviously thats pretty awesome.

I had one day where I was down $5000 at the tables and grinded all day until I was in profit, it was a sick day. Also there was a day when I made $8 000, my best day ever, 20 Bi in one session!

Come December, this month im too tired to put a big session together, id rather wait until next year and a new fresh start.

I had a failed shot at 10/20 this month (December), I tried to skip 5/10, then I tried a little 5/10 and again failed. At 10/20 i ran so bad but at 5/10 i played bad, im not in the right frame of mind to take shots at these levels just yet. I feel i can be a winner in these games, but ill wait for now. I dropped $2k at 10/20 and $3k at 5/10 so they weren't big shots. Just having a little go, ill be back next year for a proper shot. Also played a little 2/4 this month, 10-15k hands or so with nothing major to report. Got a few bonuses through again, I played an extra fewk hands to secure a position in the rake race right at the start of the month.

The start and 2007

I thought id start by going through the history of how I started with poker, I know Jamsym is really interested so this is for him especially

Just around the time I was 19 I got into poker after playing 3 card brag with a bunch of my mates, I was always the most enthusiastic about it, I always loved gambling and up until this point had succesfully bet on football for the year. The maths of it came pretty easy to me plus I loved football and Gambling, it was perfect. Poker became even more perfect because there was so much more money to be won!

So I heard about poker from the website I used to tip football bets on, started messing around with play money for about a month, then I did freerolls for a month. My mate Marc was also a degen gambler like me so we both got into it at the same time, and we grinded the absolute poker freerolls mainly, i won a 2000 man tournament and got $15 for my troubles! I lost that the same night obviously.

Anyway after 2 months of learning the game, I fancied myself pretty good at it so I got the courage to deposit my first £10.

I started playing $1 and $2 sit'n'goes built it up a bit and took a 3 BI shot at 5c/10c and never looked back. I played 2-3 tables of this level showing profit every day for about a month, after this I played 10c/20c for a few months whilst playing micro mtts, I remember winning a $1 mtt for $109 which was massive for me at the time!

Then came 5-6 months at 25c/50c after i had over $700 in the account, i felt i was overrolled for this level. I moved up to 5-6 tables all 6 max and discovered my first love- Rakeback.

I was getting 25% rakeback at StanJames and realised how sweet it was to get a lump some straight into my account.

I messed aroung with 25c/50c for a while and got lazy, played the odd mtt here and there as well and had really good results, at this point I was living with a mate of mine Neil in his flat, we had an awesome time and a great summer, I got lazy living here though and it was his place so I decided to move back home for the start of 2007 and convinced my mum to give me a few months playing poker as long as I went to uni in September of the same year.

So this was to be my first year playing "professionally"

And it finished as follows:

YEAR 2007

JANUARY : PROFIT £3058 (Only Mtts)

FEBRUARY : LOSS £120 (Only Mtts)

MARCH : PROFIT £1032 ($0.5/1 NL)

APRIL : PROFIT £640 ($0.5/1 NL)

MAY : PROFIT £1770 ($0.5/1 NL)

JUNE : PROFIT £1645 ($0.5/1 NL)

JULY : PROFIT £165 ($0.5/1 NL)

AUGUST : PROFIT £1713 ($0.5/1 NL)

SEPTEMBER: PROFIT £3460 ($1/2 NL)

OCTOBER : PROFIT £3394 ($1/2 NL)

NOVEMBER : PROFIT £1340 ($1/2 NL)

DECEMBER : PROFIT £7549 ($1/2 NL+ Big tournament win)


OVERALL : PROFIT £25 645

(CASH : £19 840)
(MTTS : £5 120)
(CASINO : £752)

To take you through the year, I started first few months playing 20 small stakes mtts a day non stop for 20+ days. January was awesome then February reminded me about variance and how much it sucks. I played a little at the casino 1/1 games during this time with a mate of mine who plays there for a living (ste) I did relateively ok, but i was mega mega tight.

From March onwards I decided to go back to cash and now I was rolled and brave enough to tackle $0.5/1.

Luckily through my dad I found a deal with a well known pro Malcolm" The Rock" Harwood on his site http://www.rockpokeronline.com/.

I played through this deal on Betfred under the alias: christianu up until December when I moved to a different site which offered a rake race. Suited me perfect as I could put the hours in and by this time I could play 16 tables easily. Just before this I played a big online MTT through my mtt fund as part of my deal with therockonline and got a nice score, im not sure the exact amount but it was around $3-$5k. Awesome for me at the time.

I also moved up to 1/2 towards the end of the year and had good results, Id moved up all the levels now from 5c/10c to 1/2, i wasnt a massive winner but did well enough, I played very very nitty, something like 9/3/1 lol, funny looking back but it was all the rage at the time.

So In December I had my best month at my new site, and felt really excited getting into the new year. 16 tables came 2nd nature to me at this point.

As you can tell I never went to Uni! Never really planned to and my family had finally come to terms with me wanting to play poker and not get a job!

Also I finally got a new apartment to live in for 2008 which was my target at the start of the year, move into my own nice place in town and i managed to achieve it! I moved in with my mate Ste and im still here atm. Its pretty expensive but worth it, the place has a swimming pool/gym/jacqusi, really nice and modern and living in the town center is awesome. Ste moved out, and I lived on my own for a while and just recentley another mate of mine, Brett just moved in. He is starting 09 with poker aspirations himself, im gonna help with what i can.

Anyway that wraps up the start and 07!