Hi everyone!  After my excursion to the PCA at the beginning of January it was time to head back to Costa Rica and back to work.  We’ve had a student since the 21st of January and I feel he is going to produce some very good results.

I’ve been pleased with my schedule lately (although I would like to wake up slightly earlier.)  I get up around noon, surf, coach, and then grind until around 2am or so.  After our student leaves I plan on grinding more.  Last night was a good night.  I took down the $109 turbo for around $9k.  I think I was well due for a 1st place finish in an mtt being that I have had 4-5 final tables this month.  Another nice score was finishing 2nd in a $5 turbo for $3800 and two nights ago I final tabled the $501r 1a but finished 6th for about $1500.

The mtt sngs have also beein going my way.  I haven’t really played that many this year beacuse I’ve got into the habit of grinding mtts along with my sngs.  Normally when I get deep in an mtt I wind down my games so I can focus.  I’ve been making a lot of deep runs and also have a student so the amount of volume hasn’t been at its max.  Anyway I’ve made $5,673 at sngs thus far and $11,205 at mtts.  Making a total of $16,877 profit for the year so far.  I don’t plan on slowing down either.  Pura Vida!

Hello everyone. As you may know I ventured out to the Bahamas from Jan 4th-12th for the PCA main event. It was a good experience even though I busted on day 2. I went into the tournament on day 1a with the upmost confidence. My table was alright, with only about 4 players who seemed to know what they were doing and the rest kinda meh. The guy to my right seemed like a good cash player, raising a lot of pots and 3 betting pretty wide which caused me to have to alter my game in certain spots against him. My first big hand (for a little over 60k in chips after a 30k starting stack) was against this older woman with a lot of bling. She opened from utg+1 and i have pocket 9’s from middle position so I flat call. The guy to my direct left also calls and the rest fold. The flop was 9 of diamonds and two random under cards, one of those also being a diamond. Actions on her and she checks. With two diamonds on the board and two players in the pot I elected to bet out about 2/3 the pot. The third player reraises and the old lady insta calls. This is kind of weird for me. I could just flat call but a diamond could put me in a really weird spot. Also the guy who re-raised was a very tight player so I assumed he had a hand. I actually put him on a lower set. So I tank for a bit and shove my stack in there. This also could look like I have top pair with a good kicker or an over-card flush draw as well. The re-raiser tanks for a bit and folds and old lady snap calls. She flips over AJ of diamonds. I had to sweat that a little but thankfully she didn’t hit and I was chip leader at my table for the rest of the day chipping up to about 64kish.

The next day was day 1b so I had the day off to explore and just kind of relax. That night I met up with j0hndayt0n, athanasios9, tmoney and his girl, bfizz11, and a few others that I cant remember I believe dcj123. We went out and got dinner (I won the flip for that btw ) and got some drinks. It was pretty cool meeting the guys that I grind with on the regular. Also we were all still in the tournament which was pretty awesome.

I felt good going into day 2 even after having drinks the night before. I had an above average stack which was about 55k or so. I kind of floated along for a while, only getting involved in a few pots before losing some chips with 10’s against AQ. The blinds we’re 400/800 and it was folded to me on the button with my 10’s. I had around 50k in chips so I raise and the big stack big blind (who has over 100k chips) 3 bets me. This is a weird spot because he had been playing pretty tight. I really consider a 4 bet and after a while of thinking I decide to flat. 10’s is a pretty strong hand in this situation and I like flatting in position against this player. The flop is AQA and he checks. I check behind. There’s no reason to bet here I think because he’s hardly ever going to call with a worse hand and if he’s got a lower pocket pair he may try to bluff a future street. The turn is a random low card and it goes check check and the river is also random. Because he checks both the flop and turn I feel that I am ahead. He could have something like a lower pp or KJs K10s J10s something of that nature a lot of the time. He bets out on the river and I call. He flips over AQ. If he would have bet earlier streets I think i could have got away from it pretty easily but the fact it was checked all the way down is the reason I called. I think with an ace or queen he bets the turn most of the time. O well It didn’t cripple me so I wasn’t really worried about it. I fluctuate a little and pick up AA from the bb. I 3 bet a raiser and he flatted and called my continuation bet on the flop. Folded to my bet on the turn. This bumped my up to a little over 45k which was a nice little pot.

Eventually I make it to 800/1600 blinds with a 200 ante. A lot of chips in that pot fellas. I have around 40k chips from middle position and bump it up to 3800. The aggro euro guy to my left re raises to around 11k and its folded back to me. I’m not too worried about this because he had been raise-folding a lot and even 3 bet folded once or twice. Either way I’m getting it in in this spot against mostly any player so I shove. He kinda sighs and calls with QQ so I’m like ok lets flip. Flop comes AJ9 rainbow so I mentally fist pump but show no expression physically being that there are 2 more cards. Turn is a J. River is Q and there goes my tournament life for about 90k chips. This just goes to show how brutal poker can be at certain times. I know in essence I only lost a flip (a $30k in equity flip) but the ace gave me so much hope only to be crushed by the poker gods themselves. I took the walk of shame back to my room and relaxed for a bit. I then went and bout myself a $60 buffet which was extremely good.

A few days later my girlfriend came which I had been looking forward to. The thing about the Bahamas besides it not being that awesome, was that the weather really sucked that week. They had their record breaking low which was like 50 something degrees and it was very windy. Most of the time I wore a hoodie. It was kind of a bummer that we didn’t get to experience much of the outdoor stuff. We did go swimming in the ocean one of the days which was nice because the water was clear blue and also warmer than the air. We saw the aquarium which was awesome and also went into town for a day which was meh. We had a few nice dinners and went to the club a couple times which was pretty fun. It was her first time in a club so she got to wile out a bit

Overall if your thinking about going to the Bahamas I think you should reconsider and come to Costa Rica. There wasn’t much natural beauty there and most of it is pretty run down. The premises around Atlantis made me feel more like I was in a theme park and less like a tropical paradise. The whole time I was thinking about how much I already miss Costa Rica and can’t wait to get back. The best part about being in the Bahamas was having my girlfriend, otherwise I probably would have left early.

So now I am back in Richmond and I’ve been playing a couple hours every day. I’ve been doing alright just frustrated I’ve made a few deep runs and no big cashes. Starting this year I plan to play my normal stake mtt sngs and I’ve really started including low buy in mtts to my sessions. $2.20 turbos, $8.80’s, $5.50’s etc along with my normal $11-$55 mtts. I think that throwing these lower games in will be great overall because several of them have very nice top prizes (5k-13k) and the players are pretty bad the whole time, even final tables. It’s pretty cool because I’ll be grinding and randomly see I’m starting to get deep in something with a big stack. I’m not really sure what I expect to make this year but I’m working towards having over a 100k year. It’s good to set a goal but it’s hard because you never know where life may take you. You could have a nice cash for 20k+ and decide you want to take a break and actually enjoy the money that you’ve made. I love poker but I also love life and find it hard to sit in front of a computer screen for weeks or months on end sometimes. I’m excited for this new year, our future students, and our new website. I think the future is bright for spacegravypoker and cant wait to get out there in a few days. Pura Vida!