The Dean can be contacted at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk for all poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

Someone asked me about blackjack today for the first time in ages and wanted some info on the game. Not an awful lot that I could tell them within the confines of a personal message on a forum.

But there is far more connections with blackjack and poker than meet the eye. Firstly both of them require adequate game selection. Not all BJ games play the same and differences in penetration, dealer speed, rules and the overall knowledge base of the casino impact on how much you can make an hour and how long your playing life will be.

The variance in BJ has been likened to limit holdem, personally I never felt the wrath of BJ as I had a backer when I played. I didnt really have a bad run in gambling until I played online poker. Online poker is so much better than BJ although playing BJ still has a fantastic lure for me even now.

I think its the prospect of going against the casinos which always did it for me big time. I just loved the thought of walking out of the door without them even knowing……and for all those who think that they can spot a counter……you have obviously spotted the amateurs in the past.

I defy anyone to spot a real pro even if they are single tabling. I also defy anyone to spot a well organised team as well and especially if they are using a floating system of big hitters.

I would like to play BJ again but purely as a novelty and nothing more. The technical side of the game is easily learnable but its the psychological side that seperates the real men from the boys and the pros from the amateurs. But then again doesnt that apply to poker as well?

Regards and take care

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean can be contacted at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk for all poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

Played some heads up sessions last night at NL200 and NL400 and came close to having a disasterous session. I bluffed all-in three times, was called by a better hand and outdrew on all three occasions. I didnt deserve that amount of luck. I had 10-3 on a 9-7-4 board and was up against J-J…..turn was a 3 and river was a 10.

Then I get all in with 9-6 on a 8-5-2 board and am up against top set in 8-8…..turn is a 7 filling my straight and a king on the river gave me the pot. Third hand and I have 5-2 and bet, get raised and then shove on a Q-7-6 board and get shown A-Q…..turn is a four and river is a three giving me a straight. These werent even by the same player.

So much luck that its almost embarrassing. Although I really think that a change of site is in order as my aggressive play seems to be getting called more. Must be getting tracked from somewhere. Still I have made over $4000 in the past two months on this site so cannot complain.

I am still battling on with The Vulture and am about $170 ahead this month after 9 hours of play but I have had immense bad luck and this has been mixed in with some bad play as well. I need to start to implement the work that I have been doing recently with regards the mental side of the game as my concentration has definitely been lacking lately.

I am still nowhere near maximising this system and that is starting to niggle me a little bit. I think I have perfected it now but the only bloody thing holding it back is me……aaaarrrrrgggghhhhhhh!!!!!!

See you soon

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

The Vulture is going through one of its toughest periods so far and I am barely ahead over the past two weeks of play. I am only $100 ahead so far this month although I have had alot of situations where my big hand is underneath an even bigger hand.

This is all normal of course, and it really is about time that this system went through a pretty bad run. Although you can hardly call being $100 ahead after 6 hours this month bad….but it sure as hell feels that way.

I have been having some close looks at how the players on Cake Poker have been playing post flop and it appears that I still may be making errors post flop based on how I think that they play certain hands. Over the past week or so, something has shifted not just in my mindset but in my method of operation. It doesnt feel right and I cannot put my finger on it……chances are its just a bad run but after twenty years in the gambling industry and a large chunk of that playing poker then I tend to know when something is not quite right.

I know that I could have solved these problems had I had access to my Poker Office 5 software but that obviously isnt an option on Cake Poker as they dont allow tracking software.

I know that I will solve these problems as I am killing these games 95% of the time, I just need to alter how I play certain hands……I will do it……never fear.

See you soon

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

The past two sessions have been two of the most satisfying sessions to date that I have played with The Vulture. Only won $16 and $10 but that wasnt the point……I now think that The Vulture is very close……where have I heard that before.

I think that I have finally sorted out a couple of technical flaws that I had with it that would have certainly impacted on how I multi-tabled 6-8 tables. This needed sorting and it was leading to me misplaying certain types of hands in the same situations…..an obvious repeating pattern.

It eventually dawned on me after reading Gambling Theory by Mason Malmuth what I was doing wrong. Now I plan to see how this goes for the rest of the month and I may even expand the number of tables that I am playing a full month ahead of schedule as I planned to move to 5 tables and increase this by 1 table per month upto 8 by the end of the year starting 1st Sep.

But this may have been a bad move as technical imperfections were obviously holding me back……still might be talking too soon but it feels a lot better than it did on the 1st of the month……three days is an awful long time in my world.

I am $141 ahead this month so far despite chronic bad luck. Lost a big $100 pot yesterday on the river after flopping top set against top pair and my opponent back doors a flush….uuugggghhhhh. Still I am far better mentally now with this than I was three days ago and I might actually be where I have been trying to get to……EL DORADO with The Vulture.

Now its time to see if I cant start to hit $40-$50 an hour by the end of the year……see you soon.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

I got an e-mail from a girl last week who asked me what I thought about the future of poker and especially online poker. Well for one it has survived the UIGEA in 2006 which I predicted that it would if you read my earlier posts. That bill looks like being overturned now under Barack Obama. With more countries now accepting online poker as being legal and with vast numbers of younger people taking an interest in the game every single year then the numbers of people coming to poker every year should be steady.

The boom was never going to keep up, booms never do……the arrival of internet poker, under the table cameras and poker being on TV kind of happened very close to each other at about 1999 and that was the reason why poker took off. I wonder just how big poker would be if the poker that people were seeing on their TV couldnt be “replicated” on their very own computer.

Poker is not going away, this is simply because people want to play the game just the same as people want to gamble. Denying them the right to do this would only serve to drive it underground and that is what we dont want. Poker is here to stay, sure…….it may go through stages where numbers may drop at the WSOP or the amount of poker on television may fall but the game is now big enough to ride that.

So poker is going nowhere and will be here for as long as it is legal to play it. Like I said on here in 2006, it will take more than some bill to drive poker back to where it was in the nineties…..its grown far too big for that.

See you soon.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

Because I am using The Vulture on Cake Poker then I obviously cannot use tracking software as that network does not allow it. This means that The Vulture is taking longer to complete than what it normally would. I have had to rework a few things as there were a few things that didnt feel right.

I know that this may feel strange based on how well it has done but I can tend to feel when something is wrong…..its just experience. I have barely made any money now for about a week. Still ahead but only by about one buy-in or so.

I have made even more refinements over the past 24 hours involving big pairs. I was definitely giving too much action with these and I have had a glut of them beaten lately which has obviously been the reason why I am treading water lately and it aint variance either.

I am making money easily enough and then handing it back by misplaying big pairs……its funny but yet I didnt do this playing 25-50. Could be that I have not fully adjusted with these hands after playing so much heads up and six max at higher levels and not to mention years of limit play……thats enough to mess with anyones head.

Had a day off from playing today to reflect on a few things and I think that I will come back stronger. What my plan is……I will play as usual until the end of August and then look to increase tables and try to get The Vulture earning $50/hour by the year end at NL50.

Enjoying the work though……solving problems is fun….but only when you find the answers. Take care and see you soon.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

Played a total of 10,700+ hands last month with The Vulture and made $822 playing NL50 on Cake Poker. This worked out to a very powerful 7.61 ptbb/100 which was an increase on the previous two months but then again I expected that it would be.

I have obviously been tweaking the system and when I said a couple of months ago that I was close to completion…..well I was wrong. This may be one of those things that needs constant attention…..like a car or a woman

For me the holy grail will be reaching 10 ptbb/100 and I think that is possible but I need to do two things. Firstly I need to focus better and I think that I will achieve a better attitude this month…..fingers crossed. Also I need to adjust my play around the blinds and it needs to be a tad more sophisticated than what it is.

So I will be testing this during July, played a session this morning and won $23. I also want to test this at different times of the day as well and I intend on playing more evening sessions this month and I intend to log the differences playing at different times of day. So July will see even more testing and changes and will just have to wait and see what this does to the bb/100 rate.

Played two sessions of Heads up yesterday and got very lucky, first hand I get AA vs QQ and win 100bb, next hand (different player I get JJ and hit a flop of A-J-5 and they have AK. Poker sure is easy when you get cards and flops like that. Won over $1000 so a great end to the month and not having to sweat the 25-50 is proving great for my stress levels as well as mindset.

Not sure that playing HU is helping me to play The Vulture but there you go. Been using Poker Office 5 recently to help me with the Heads up games and this has proved yet another valuable tool for me and has defo helped me to beat these games by selecting opponents better.

Looking forward to a very productive second half of the year…..see you soon.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

PLANNING ON HEADING TO THE WSOP? CHECK OUT CAKE POKER’S WSOP ONLINE QUALIFIERS.

I cant really compare earn rates from different months as I have been chopping and changing the system. But I was on 2+2 today looking at a thread that discussed earn rates for NL50 and it appears that mine is up there with the best of them. I am only counting since April 1st as this was when The Vuture was approaching completion. Unfortunately this means that the sample size will only be about 35,000 hands during that period but thats still significant if a long way from being conclusive.

Apparenty 10ptbb/100 or above is an absolutely crushing rate at this level and I am confident that I can do this next month or the month after. I have made tremendous strides over this past 7 days and especially over the past 48 hours. These further improvements have strengthened the system and if I can improve my own mental state then I really think that 10ptbb/100 or 20bb/100 which ever you prefer to use can be achieved.

Really looking forward to the next couple of months…..now its back to watching Murray vs Wawrinka in the Tennis……take care and see you soon.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

PLANNING ON HEADING TO THE WSOP? CHECK OUT CAKE POKER’S WSOP ONLINE QUALIFIERS.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

Played a short session with The Vulture this morning winning $6 or so. Amazingly I havent had a losing session since the 11th June and have now recorded 25 consecutive winning sessions and the win rate is approaching 90% for this month. Most of those sessions have been tiny wins of between $10 and $30 as the sessions are only short so I am seeing lots of smaller wins rather than say playing for several hours and seeing wins of $100+.

But I ran a big bluff today which cost me nearly $20 but there are obvious weaknesses with my mindset and I am still playing on certain occasions as if its the 25-50 game. I bluff raised to $17 when I should have folded to their pre-flop 3-bet after I raised from the button with 10-7s and was 3-bet by the BB to $5.50.

Flop came 8-8-3 and they led out for just over half the pot, I raised and they shoved……money down the pan. This is not excactly a lack of concentration…..or maybe it is. I think that I am still having to come to terms with playing so low and it hasnt fully left me.

I am still spewing too much money but to still get $28/hour this month and 25 consecutive winning sessions is great. If I could just stop this spewing then I could hit $35/hour if this $28/hour over 4 tables is accurate. If it is then I could train myself to carry this system effectively this time to six tables and then The Vulture could hit the $50/hour mark.

I need to sort a few things out though before that time comes. My ultimate goal is to take this into NL100 and try to hit the $100/hour mark. That is still obviously some way off but if that could be achieved then that would equate to $16,000/month playing full-time.

I have decided to carry on with The Vulture for a few more months yet, I really owe it to myself and millions of others to really see how far I can take this thing. It has come a long way since the 1st December, imagine where it will be this time next year……who knows.

The more that I think about this the more it excites me, I could end up earning more money a month on average with this playing NL50 and NL100 than I did playing at the 25-50 level, that would be crazy and would just underline that I made the correct decision to drop playing at that level.

Played a few sessions of HUNLHE over the past few days and won just over $500. I am really starting to enjoy my poker far more now and it is a lot less stress when you are playing NL50 and working on a serious project than incurring the variance of a NL5000 game.

Happy days……see you soon.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

The Dean is now taking enquiries from all interested parties regarding my new Poker Pro System “The Vulture” and also my forthcoming six max system “The Jackal”, anyone who is interested in these should contact me at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk to register their interest. The Dean can also be contacted at this address for all other poker, gambling and coaching related matters.

I have titled this blog entry under the old “$1000/month challenge”……this was the category that I gave to blogs about The Vulture when it first came out. My original goal was to make $1000/month playing NL50. Looking back at my old posts now and that figure seems laughable.

Despite the fact that I havent made $1000/month since the first month in December, the hourly rate is such now that all I basically have to do is put the hours in. At $28.70/hour since the 1st June, this would equate to $4592/month if played for 40 hours a week as a full-time job.

Like I said in my previous posts, I have been practicing my concentration levels and if I can make $25+/hour this month whilst having several bad tilty sessions then I am hoping for more next month. If I can peak out at say $30/hour with better concentration and then try to slowly increase tables one at a time then I could be hitting $50/hour with this by the end of the year.

I certainly think that this is a possibility and now I am totally fixated with just how far I can push The Vulture to its maximum combat ceiling (to quote an aerial term). If $50/hour is possible then this equates to $8000/month as a full-time working job and for NL50 with low variance…….well I wouldnt say its a miracle because that is a word too widely used but incredible would be a far better word.

There are many regs at NL200-NL600 not pulling down that kind of money. I am still making mistakes though, yesterday for instance I lost $20 in a pot that really should have been less than half that amount. These little things niggle me but they are just another step on the road to reaching the optimal Vulture performance…….how high can The Vulture soar…….watch this space.

PLAY ONLINE POKER THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE PLAYED AT CAKE POKER; THE SITE THAT HAS ONE OF THE BEST RAKE DEALS ON THE NET AND THE SITE THAT DOES NOT ALLOW TRACKING SOFTWARE.

PLANNING ON HEADING TO THE WSOP? CHECK OUT CAKE POKER’S WSOP ONLINE QUALIFIERS.