friday night session

have a big night out tomorrow at a mates wedding party, prince willy wonka is gonna be there, its at raf lincoln where he is getting his wings, so stayed in tonight to play a few hands.

tried to push myself out of my comfort zone and play a bit more aggressively and see a few more flops. had mixed results. i doubled up early on but then really didn't hit any flops or get any draws so leaked chips for the next hour or so. took down one decent pot and then called it a night up about half a buyin or so.

i wanted to try and identify all the areas i need to improve my game, of which there are many, and start taking steps to address these. from tonights analysis i'm going to identify three as follows...

1) i limp too much. i need to foster a more aggressive table image to extract value on my big hands. too often i'll scoop min pots on my big pocket pairs and they don't come along enough to allow this to happen on a regular basis. i also find i get raised out of pots because i limp from an ealry position and can't justify a call and play the flop from the front. this is a major leak in my game that needs to be plugged.

2) i find myself checking too much. checking in places where only a bet will win it for me and therefore giving up too many small pots that i could easily take down. i seem to be continually petrified of big pocket pairs and need to put this out of my mind and play the player and the board rather than assuming i'm always beat. if i can learn to control the pot and keep pots small when i'm nervous then i'll put myself in a better place to see more showdowns on the cheap and win more marginal situations rather than giving up.

3) i need to open up a little more in the right places. sometimes i play so tight even aces aren't good enough! it minimises my losses sure, but it means i have to sit at a table for hours for just the right set of circumstance, with the right cards against the right players to make any decent cash. sure that really is grinding it out but its not positive poker and i leave a lot of money on the table that i could/should be taking with me.

so from now i'm i'm going to really concentrate on fixing these problems. i know i won't like making these plays some of the time but i think if i at least experiment and see how some of these plays work/make a difference then my overall game can only get better.

if anyone reading this knows of any common mistakes players of under a years experience make then please comment. i'd be interested to discuss with you.