february results are in

preface
First of all, thanks to Derek for pointing out what I had subconsciously felt but not really been able to explain - that I played every hand of the $11 multi last Thursday exactly... wrong. I could come up with a litany of excuses, but honestly, I just haven't been playing well lately... I'm having all sorts of fun playing out of position and trying to push people off made hands.

So for now, I'm stepping away from the tables and crunching some numbers; that's why I keep little notes to myself on tiny notepads and scribble all over a legal pad every month. There's a computer program that will do this same thing for me, but I don't use it, and as a result, my results may be a bit imprecise. So, for those of you who are interested in playing around with numbers, here are the grind results from February of 2006.

the numbers
February:
PokerStars 6.50 turbos (1 and 2 table results combined)
68 cashes in 162 games, for an ITM of 42%.
$1,367.70 earned on $1,053 invested, ROI of 29%.
15 1st place finishes
30 2nd place finishes
21 3rd place finishes
2 4th place finishes (2-table games only)

YTD results:
PokerStars 6.50 and 16 turbos; PartyPoker 11s; a handful of rebuys and MTTs (results combined):
192 cashes in 516 games, for a 37.2% ITM
$5,813 earned on $5,412, for a 7.1% ROI

the analysis
I found a few of these numbers interesting. Obviously, all my results are tainted by the size of my sample; 162 games isn't really enough to determine trends because of variance, but we can still look at things we like and dislike. I was very pleasantly surprised by my ROI; I suspect it's higher because of some strong finishes in 2-table games, which only take 20 or so minutes longer to play out than a 1-table game. I plan on keeping the 2-table game in my arsenal as I move up through buy-in levels, and they are the most compelling reason for me to hang around Stars and play the 16s and 27s instead of the 22s and 33s on Party.

I was surprised to see I had twice as many 2nd places as 1st, and more 3rds than 1sts as well (I certainly felt like I was writing more 1s than 2s as I was playing, but apparently not.) I am happy that I had more 2nds than 3rds, and that I had more 3rds than 4ths, but I apparently need to work on my late game. My 4th, 5th, and 6th places are pretty much evenly distributed; I don't know if that indicates equally good play or equally terrible play; I would be interested to know what the blinds are when I finish in each spot, because the biggest demon I fight is the rapidly-rising levels (5 min) in the turbo games.

I'm not including my multi-table tournament results from February; I only played a few, and didn't even record some of them, so any attempt to divine results from a sample of 7 that is incomplete would be an exercise in futility. Suffice it to say that I lost in all of them, and it probably reduced my net return by 10 to 15 percent. Obviously, playing multi-table games is a leak that I am fixing every day. ^_^

what's next
Over the last 500 games, my ITM is approximately where it was after about 1000 games last year (~37%). I'm not disappointed, but I'm not excited, either. My ROI is still uncomfortably low, at 7.1%... the actual number is probably even lower when you consider the beating I took at the multis last month. We'll see how it shakes out at the end of 2000 games. I still plan to be four- (six-?) tabling the 16s by summer, and then comfortably in the 27s by fall. My end-of-year goal remains to 4-table the 27s or 60s for a tidy profit by my 25th birthday; I believe it's achievable, but it won't be easy, and I will need a little luck on my side.

oh, btw
I'm sure I'll end up having to adjust this as I move up, but at my level, I raise JJ UTG every time with a big grin on my face. I remain in disbelief at the number of people that will call enormous bets/raises with middle pairs and weak aces. then again, these people are the very definition of 'weekend pussy.'