I didn't cash in the WCOOP main event, and as I've been saying for some time, I'm quitting tournaments for a while.

I just haven't been having fun playing tournaments lately. Instead, I've been feeling pressure to win, expectations of winning, and failure and disappointment as a result, not the fun, free-wheeling gambler's mentality you need to be successful in tournaments-- the ability to just roll with the punches and get your money in and try to push people out of pots-- and most importantly, not be afraid to lose.

Until I can start playing tournaments like that again, I'm not going to play them for a while. Instead, I'm going to try a steady grind at shorthanded and heads-up cash games. My expenses are low right now because I'm not travelling anywhere (at least not expectedly), so I'm just gonna move down to some lower-stakes games where I can regain my confidence, have fun, and not be afraid to play the way I need to play to win.

Reports from the journey forthcoming.

I've been dealing with some personal stuff this week. I'm in Louisiana right now and probably won't play anything until the main event. When I'm done with all this, I'll have a report of the main event, put up a couple histories from tournaments I thought I played well recently, and finally get around to answering Bond's review of my hand history.

Another cash in today's WCOOP (#9 - the $200 rebuy). I finished like 143 out of 2600 and some. Not especially interesting or worth the time (I played nearly 10 hours to cash for slightly more than 2x what I spent) but it does make me 2-for-2 cashing in WCOOP events so far, and I'm optimistic about that.

You may have seen Bond18 post a review of my hand history from the 50k win. I will be answering those questions soon.

I'll put up the hand histories from the last two WCOOP events soon, too. I think I'm playing well in these tournaments.

On a whim-- well, not quite a whim, but a moment of inspiration-- I decided to jet from Austin City Limits early on Day 3 and play the WCOOP event and the FTP $500. I thought I'd try to run up some chips early on, and if that failed, I'd go back to the festival.

I wouldn't have done it for an ordinary Sunday, and I wouldn't have done it for anything I'd never seen before. But something about how the day was going, and my mentality, said it was the right time. So I went with it.

Oddly enough, I did not run up a stack in the WCOOP; in fact, I donked off a bunch early, and I think actually dropped under 3k at one point. I fought back, though-- and even though I hit an occasional cooler, I fought back again.

Meanwhile, I caught a nice run early on Full Tilt, but all in all it was very wild and swingy, as I would win a big pot then lose some of it back on a cooler or other setup. Anyway, it's not important, because i bluffed off 20k at 170/340/25 with a straight draw vs. top set on the turn.

On Stars, however, I was winning all my races and major showdowns. I won some critical pots at the right time, and the structure afforded me the luxury of patience. With a couple of critical big pots where I eliminated people with AKo > A9s and QQ > AKs, I had jumped up to 625k at 3k/6k/600. I took a hit from there, but I was having a relatively easy time chipping it back with small pots. Then a couple of nice river value bets and I cleared 1 million for the first time, at 5k/10k/1k.

Then I started losing my focus. I made a call in a blind battle that in retrospect I think is poor (I had top pair, but my opponent was exhibiting extreme strength and was an unknown who'd shown nothing but straightforwardness). I chipped back up after losing something like 40% of my stack there. Then I hit a stretch of mediocre cards and my table started reraising me frequently. My spots weren't as good. I was getting my money in behind. Then I finally made a bad shove with AQ over a raise (a few hands after I'd doubled up) and lost to AA to bust in 57th.

I have a bad tendency to bust immediately after getting the double-up that puts me back in contention. It happened last Sunday, too.

Still, 57th is about $6,000, which will help. I'm gonna try to play more of the WCOOP events, but I'm not sure which ones. I need a good night's sleep before I make any decisions like that.

There were a lot of interesting hands and decisions from this one. I may post some of the hands here or on 2+2, or put up a hand history for viewing.

That last post was borne out of a bit of frustration. After venting, I approached my problem more rationally and decided the solution was to grind some cash- like I had planned originally. I have to wait on my desktop before I can do that, but I'm going to be breaking from poker until then.

The WCOOP is around the corner, but I'm going to miss the first few events anyway, because I'll be attending Austin City Limits music festival. Unfortunately, two of the three 6-max events are this weekend. So it goes- it's not as if I can say I have huge expectation in those lately, anyway.

I'll play in a few events, and maybe some lower-stakes cash to stay warm, but once my setup arrives, the grinding begins.

In the meantime, I'm doing some reading to get my mind in the right place. I'm rereading Ace on the River to relearn the attitude and mental makeup of a winning player (clearly my biggest leak, especially during a losing streak- the mind is a powerful and self-replicating thing). I'm also going to get another copy of Professional No Limit Hold 'Em, since I managed to lose mine about a week after I got it. I felt like I was learning from it, and I wasn't finished. Learning usually helps me break out of my funks.

Ok. Off to work on the mental game. Quiet, humble confidence. Faith in abilities as well as the way of things.