Poker Dreams Online
Turning $10 into $100 then $1000 and more

I was looking around at some of the poker sites I used to play at yesterday and I noticed that there were a couple sweet offers waiting for me at Party Poker. They are definitely good with rolling out the promotions.

The first offer is for $50 which I need a total of 375 points to clear. This one is released in increments so for every 75 points collected, $12.50 is released into my account. I have until July 9th to get the bonus.

The second offer is for $10 which I need to clear 60 points to collect. This one is a cash offer so I get to use the $10 right away and then if I am able to get the required party points, I get to keep the money. This is the same type of bonus I have received a few times in the past. I have until June 24th to get this bonus but I must first clear the $50 bonus before I can start working on clearing this one.

I figured, why not go for it. My overall bankroll is starting to grow so there is some flexibility with adding a 3rd site back in. So I withdrew a $100 from Full Tilt to load up my Party Poker account. I know it is going to take a lot of work to try and clear the bonuses but it is something a little extra to work for since I currently have no bonus on Full Tilt to clear.

A couple weeks back I was watching the NBC heads up challenge. This is the one where Huckseed got the big prize. (Huckseed was in the same tournament as me once at Full Tilt. Unfortunately I got bumped out before I could play him.)


Anyways… Watching the matches on t.v. gave me the itch to play some more heads up matches. They’re fun, quick and great practice. I have played a few at Full Tilt, including winning a 4 man shooutout tourny once but most of my play is at Cake. So far I have played either $5.25 games or $10.50 games. Always turbo versions. I’m a little too impatient for the regular speed blind raises.


Here is a quick summary of my stats so for:

Well I think it is obvious that I should avoid the higher level game for now as it is currently not kind to my bankroll. Although my latest session today I lost 4 in a row which definitely added to the gloomy stats. My plan for now is to avoid the $10.50 heads up game until I get my Cake bankroll to $400.


On another note, my current preferred game play is to have one $0.25/$0.50 no limit cash game in which I bring the max to the table of $50. At the same time, I will play a $10.80 double up plus a heads up game. This so far is a good combination for me.


I know my posts are a little scarce these days but at least I have been able to keep up with my game play. To date my current bankroll combining Full Tilt and Cake has just exceeded $700. I can’t believe it has already been 6 months. The poker dreams online is still definitely alive!!


Keep them cards coming!!!!

Last night a had a fairly quick session again with one very memorable hand. It was at Cake Poker playing a $0.10/$0.20 table and I was dealt Queens. Well a picture is worth a thousand words so I decided to grab a screen print of the action.

Last night was one of those nights when the stars align. Oh what a night even though it was short. I was playing at Full Tilt and this is now definitely my tournament site. I played a $10 sit-n-go plus a $3.30 knockout turbo tourny with 90 players. The sit-n-go went very well, finishing FIRST!!. That was an additional $45 in my coffer.


Now it was time to focus on the 90 man tourny. Well things were ok but not great and I was in 18 out of 20 when the skies parted and the rally began. Everything seemed to go my way from then on in and I ended up winning the tournament!!! 1st place was worth $74 including the 4 knockouts.


These 2 tournaments alone gave me a new best day record of $104.70!

My Cake Poker bankroll is finally getting to the point where I feel comfortable stepping up my cash game to the next level. Yesterday was my first forray into this new territory. I played tight and did fairly well making about $10 and logging some good rakeback.


Today however was a different story. First 10 minutes were great, up $10 and feeling good. Then I ran into a few slipups and I ended up hovering around a $10-20 loss for the next 3 hours. By this time I was getting tired and thinking about quiting, A big hand came on my lone winning table and I was hopeful to recoup my losses before shutting it down. Well as things tend to go at times, my opponent hit his cards on the river and just like that I was busted out on the table. The next 10 minutes continued to be ugly and I ended up down $75… a new record.

I think I need a day of reflection before dipping my toe into these waters as that undercurrent can be deadly.

I ended up with a very strong finish in March with total winnings of over $100. My rakeback bonus from Cake Poker also broke a record with a total of almost $20. This in spite of a terrible couple of days in the first week where I lost nearly $100. (I got a new record here as well with biggest loss in one day.)


Now that my bankroll has grown to a more comfortable level, I have adjusted my cash game play at Cake. I am now playing 6 tables at once and bringing in half the maximum allowed to the table. This month I have been playing $0.10/$0.20 games and bringing $10 to each table for a total of $60 at a time. My play has been fairly comfortable with this style with the exception of one real bad day. I definitely need to be wary of the very easy temptation to just do a quick reload when I bust out from a table. It is so tempting to just push in again shortly after to try and win it back.


Full Tilt on the other hand is currently the tourny gravy train. I very rarely play there but when I do, my sessions tend to end up fairly well. The 9-man sit-n-go tournament definitely has it’s advantages over the 10 man ones at Cake. The only thing keeping me away from playing more here is the lack of rakeback for my account.


The month of April should be an exciting one. I am hoping to pass the $300 mark at Cake shortly and in turn advancing to the next limit level for cash games.

After my dismal tournament play earlier in the month, today was a great boost. I think the FEEL is back !


Using my time management and multi-tasking skills (can’t help the sarcasm), I played 2 sit-n-gos from Cake and 2 from Full Tilt at the same time.

February seem to come and go in a flash. I was able to get out a total of … zero posts! Wow, not so great for a blog. I guess my stats have to do all the speaking this month.


My gains for the month were not to bad finishing around $50 including rakeback. My dreams of a sharp incline for my bankroll have yet to come to fruition but a slow and steady increase isn’t terrible either. After almost 4 months, it appears that I at least have some control over my profits unlike my stock portfolio (arggghh.. story for another day).


February can be capped as the month of tournaments. I was able to play in 77 tournaments which more than triples the amount I played in any previous month. Once again my tournament of choice is the Cake Poker double up. It’s fast, it’s fun, and is fairly lucrative.

The last day of January is now behind me. I played a couple of tournaments today and ended up for the day.


Due to Party Poker being out of the picture, I played a couple of tournaments at Full Tilt as well. I expanded my tournament play today by signing up for a $2.25 18-man sit-n-go. My play was focused and I was able to make it to the final table sitting in 4th place. Here I stayed until there was 6 players left and the 2 low stacks were to my right and left. The guy on my right for the last few time he was on the button was going all in with about 1300 chips. My stack was around 2500. Then I was dealt Big Slick. Everyone folded to the button and as predicted, button boy went all in again. This time I called. GRRRR, no more easy blinds for you mister. Big blind folded.


And what did he have…. the LADIES !! My AK vs his QQ. Not terrible odds unfortunately the cards didn’t land in my favour. Just like that I was down to 1000 chips.


The very next hand I got A9 unsuited on the button with only 1 mid position caller. LET IT ROLL!! I went all in. Small blind folded and I was called by the mid position monster who was sitting on 4500 chips. He showed KJ. Things looked good until the turn when the Kings brother showed up. No help on the river and boooom. I was out!! Top 4 was getting paid but I wasn’t joining the parade today.


I managed to update the stats on the sidebar today and I noticed that my numbers were a little off. I had an extra $20 in winnings for Cake in December. A little over zealous I guess. Well everything should be in order now. With the second full month done, I am still shy of $200. A little slower than I would have liked but using percentage gain calculations, that works out to 925%. Looking at the percentage definitely helps me to stay positive.


Here’s to February and all the treasures it will bring !!

My quest to gain big dollars from Party Poker bonuses has come to an abrupt halt. The last couple of days have been tough and I have lost all but $0.84. I only cleared about 3% of the bonus. Hmmm…


On a good note though. I managed to break $100 again at Cake Poker!! Wow something nice to finally see during the rocky January poker waters. The month is almost over and it’s time to refocus and get back on track.