Variance is a bitch

So I've played around 85 games in the past 2 days, and ended up break-even. I should be pissed off, but I reviewed my hands (took a good 4 hours), and apart from a few stupid moves, I seem to get my money in ahead. 85 games breakeven stretches don't seem to be out of the ordinary judging from what I hear from others, so I'm not too worried at the moment.

On the plus side, I don't seem to tilt...at all. I haven't made too many stupid moves based on being angry or going batshit crazy because of a few suck-outs.

The bad things I did note about my play are:

- Getting stubborn with AK/AJ/AQ.
- Trying to bluff lagtards when not hitting hands...it just burns money. I should never bluff them with nothing, and should at least have a tiny piece of the board.
- Sometimes I try to be too tricky, which at the $11 level doesn't seem to work...at all.
- Value bet, value bet, value bet! God damnit I need to stop missing value by trying to faint weakness and checking behind when I have the nuts. Not only that, but I give the dude a chance to hit his outs for free.

Anyway, I'm really only in it to learn, and I don't really have a monetary goal right now...so just gonna continue to analyze my hand histories, and focus on improving. I wanna move up in stakes because I beat the lower levels, not because I have the necessary bankroll. Since I've restarted my challenge again, I've run at 19.6% ROI, including this breakeven stretch...so I can't really complain.

Comedy hand of today:

PokerStars Game #25358531633: Tournament #143696410, $11.00+$0.50 Hold'em No Limit - Match Round I, Level I (10/20) - 2009/02/26 2:51:53 GMT [2009/02/25 21:51:53 ET]
Table '143696410 1' 2-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: Villain (1685 in chips)
Seat 2: Hero (1315 in chips)
Hero: posts small blind 10
Villain: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Hero [8d Ac]
Hero: raises 40 to 60
Villain: calls 40
*** FLOP *** [8h 8c Td]
Villain: bets 20
Hero: raises 70 to 90
Villain: raises 190 to 280
Hero: raises 975 to 1255 and is all-in
Villain: calls 975
*** TURN *** [8h 8c Td] [Js]
*** RIVER *** [8h 8c Td Js] [4h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Villain: shows [Ts Qs] (two pair, Tens and Eights)
Hero: shows [8d Ac] (three of a kind, Eights)
Hero collected 2630 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2630 | Rake 0
Board [8h 8c Td Js 4h]
Seat 1: Villain (big blind) showed [Ts Qs] and lost with two pair, Tens and Eights
Seat 2: Hero (button) (small blind) showed [8d Ac] and won (2630) with three of a kind, Eights

No, top pair isn't always good...especially in a 4bet pot!! I actually put him on the remaining 8 with a weaker kicker...

Anyway, I will probably play a few more 4mans over the next few days. Over my super small sample size of 24 games in 2 days, I achieved an ITM of 50%, which leads to a pretty ridiculous ROI. Not sure why, but I feel really good playing the 2nd game starting with 3000 chips.

PS: I also final tabled the $5 HU tournament again. Ran pretty much card dead on the final table. I lost because I got a bit desperate and tried to bluff a lagtard and he made a few crazy calldowns with med pair on super scary boards, and I never really recovered.