Pilgrims Progress

[fandango]

So after reading many of the other members blogs over the years i have decided to have a dabble at my very own..

I can warn all potential readers that im by far probably the worse person to be doing this, as my grammer, punctuation, and spilling/ spelling are utterly dispicable.. as i should of spent more time learning this at school than acting the class plonker! so if you are desperate enough to read please bear this in mind   .

So a little about myself.. Well for those who dont know me my name is Carl Pilgrim, have reached the ripe old age of 41!
I live in Ipswich, and have always been living no further than 15 miles from Colchester where i was born. Have not taken that big step of getting married, but have a wonderful partner of 6 years, who has 3 kids from a previous marriage, and mother to our youngest princess/monster, so as you can guess the home where we live with 4 kids, a puppy  , a parrot, 2 fish and 2 Guinea pigs is a joy   .

I was born with a medical condition called Muscular Dystrophy, this is a muscle wasting disease that progresses as you get older, there are hundreds of different types of MD and mine has the wonderful name of Limb Girdle Muscular Dystrophy type 2i. Was first diagnosed with a strain called Beckers MD way back when i was 12, when it was clear to see that my physical attributes where lagging far behind those of my fellow pupils at school, but after further tests 15 years ago was changed that in fact it was LGMD2i, basically same symptoms different genetics. Doctors didnt really know much about MD 30yrs ago, but with todays science great leaps in understanding the disease have taken place, so prehaps in another 30yrs they could find a cure?.. I never really let my condition effect me if i can help it, i feel blessed that i have a milder form of MD and although i have many challengers ahead of me, i was able to lead a relative "normal" childhood, i feel for the poor kids who are born with the horror of Duchenne MD  . I am fortunate to have a great partner and family who support me day to day, and also very very lucky to have so many great people in the APAT community who i can call true friends, who help me more than they can imagine when i come along to the live events.

So there is a little waffle about me, now for the real reason im writing the blog POKER .

Having MD restricts the things i am able to do vastly, i was a Chef for 15 years but MD got the better and put a stop to it. So i needed to find something to do as my legs arms etc was getting weaker and weaker as time went by,, i played a lot of pool and snooker and spent hours and hours up the local club, where we would play cards alot, one of my mates was talking about playing poker online at a site called Paradise poker.. so went home downloaded the client, three weeks later Pokerstars was downloaded and it took off from there.
In the early days online poker was very very different from today and actually was quite easy to make a decent $ or two, i played 12 hours a day on Paradise mainly $10 SNGs but after building a roll progressed to the $200nl tables, max buy in $200 min $40.. Played with a few players regular who are now rather well known Durrr being one of those. Well i then started playing the MTT on stars and was doing very well if i dont mind saying so myself  . Started satts into their WPT events, and after numerous FTs i managed to win a seat to a WPT shooting stars event in San Jose California $10,000 buy in!! this would be only my second ever live tournament i had ever played! I had played a $20 freezeout at the Imperial Palace the year before on a family holiday to vegas and won it   so i obv thought i was a professional, easy game!.. Well the WPT event didnt go to well lol my utter lack of experience was my down fall, totally out of my depth playing with all the top pros utter carnage, wont go into details but didnt even make first break lol.
Now i had struck up a good online friendship over a few years with a player on Paradise called Divingduck and had met up in San Jose, had learnt alot from him he was a very very good player.
His name was Mark Forrester and lived in Preston, and we played hours and hours together on Paradise and that same year he qualified for the WSOP with Bodog where he had a deep run and cashed for $100k+ in 55th i think it was.
So he kept badgering me to open up a Bodog account for next years WSOP (2006) so i opened up an acc and mainly played their satts, i never had a good bankroll on Bodog after bad management when drawing out large chunks after good wins, so their $250 freezeout satts where out of my price range, the overlays where huge!! always one seat garunteed never reached more than 90 players, needless to say Mark grabbed a seat early on, the pressure was on me to qualify but that meant via a cheap sat, never was able to bink a seat into the Frezeout looked like i had to wait till next year  . But then Bodog put on a one off $27.50 freezeout one seat garunteed tourney, so i hopped in for what i thought would be a impossible task, well 5 hours later i was calling my parents to tell them to book their flights to Vegas   i had beat 400 others to book a place at the WSOPME $10,000 +$2.500 expenses + enough merchandise to sinl the Bismark Ipod, shades hoodies etc etc, amazing package for $27.50.. The trip will stay with me for ever amazing!! 2weeks of Vegas   played well in the ME but busted last level of day when was crippled when flopped nut flush, losing to rivered quad , the sound of chip ruffling in the Rios Amazon room is something to behold!! a definate if you ever get the chance to go play..
Apart from Vegas my only other live poker i play is with the APAT tour, and i can say hand on heart i enjoy it more than any other poker i have ever played!! amazing people and well run perfect in every way. Although next year i may be playing a Genting event after i was lucky to be given the chance after winning it as a added prize... This takes me to what i consider my greatest poker acheivement to date winning the ECOAP  , i wont go into too much detail ( brag ) but i run like ( ok not run lol wheeled) Usain Bolt for a few hours at the end of day two the rest is history, i did a report on the live update thread a few days after if any one wants the report.. Also winning the POTS at same time another bonus as it gets me a ISPT seat next May at Wembly Stadium!! oh and not to mention £7,500 for my troubles. ok enough bragging.. wait maybe one more small brag while im at it, ummm the little honour of competing for ENGLAND A at the up and coming home internationals at Stoke... GET THE FOOK IN THERE MY SON!!! am so humbled and cant put into words how bloody excited i am  .

So if you have made it this far through my attempt at a blog im sure your doctor can prescribe the appropriate medication.. I am not going to be posting daily as to be honest i really dont get out and about that much, will post from time to time about my online/ Brick and mortar experiences, and anything else that you may find remotely interesting  

So here it starts... lets hope i can blog some great news like England crushing the home internationals with a clean sweep of Gold Silver and Bronze, Des buying a round of drinks at an APAT event, Ger shaving off his tash for Movember  or Phil and Stu staying sober..errrr ok

Thanks for reading  

oh did i tell you... i hate Beetroot

[Fatcatstu]

Top blog that Carl, I will be reading on with interest

England will indeed be crushing the Home Nations, of this I have no doubt at all

Keep it up please mate, cant promise to stay sober tho sorry :p

[Santino67]

Pilgrim"s Progress....I like it  

[duke3016]

Ger shaving off his tash for Movember

Was going well until then     I am going to enjoy these words from you ....

[Waz1892]

About time Carl!

One of those blogs that I"m genuinely pleased it has started

[AAroddersAA]

Should be good, lots of poker posts please :-)

Oh and jokes there have to be jokes.

[nosey-p]

Good start Carl

Looking forward to reading this

[Santino67]

Should be good, lots of poker posts please :-)

Oh and jokes there have to be jokes.

Aren"t there enough of these on FB?  

[PHIL_TC]

Wiiii! Look forward to this Carl

or Phil and Stu staying sober..errrr ok

Hang on.. you saying we"ve got a drinking problem up North??  

Look forward to reading more of this.. and seeing you in Stoke mate x

[VBlue]

Interesting background in online poker which I would love to hear more about.  Playing with Tom Dwan online regularly.

Nice results too.  Will follow the blog with interest.

[AceOnTheRiver]

Fantastic OP - looking forward to more

Proud to call you a friend Carl

[fandango]

Thanks for all the encouraging comments guys, it has given me more confidence to prehaps blog more than i first intended to.

Interesting background in online poker which I would love to hear more about.  Playing with Tom Dwan online regularly.

Nice results too.  Will follow the blog with interest.

Thanks VBlue will give a little more insight to the early days of online poker from my perspective..

In "the early days" as i call it, there was few online poker sites available, unlike the hundreds if not thousands there are today.. Paradise poker, Pokerstars, Ultimate Bet, and Full Tilt... and although i had accounts for all of these Paradise was my main stomping ground, and Pokerstars being my other..
Paradise had its so called big names playing there at the the time i recall NSXT2 being the online phenom (Todd Arnold) he was a poker instructor, and Paradise used to "blow some serious smoke up his bottom" he was their ambassador at the time, also Miami John Cernuto was a regular..
PP always endorsed WPT events, and held satts into all their Main events.. Played lots of them myself but only if i satted into them in the first place, although i had a healthy bankroll i never would dream of splashing out $200-1,000 on a single game, the games where pretty soft then and all my 1000s of hours playing i was almost always binking a seat into the daily final, the finals themselves where very well attended and there was usually always 2 seats up for grabs.. and good money for bubble $3-4k .. Although i only ever won seat to the "Shooting stars" tourney at Bay101 San jose, i did bubble a couple of others.. one i remember to this day as it is particulary painful!! :"( :"(.. Was a WPT event final to play at Foxwoods there was 2x $10,000 and $4,300 for third (back then PP bumped all $$ over into bubble), well the long and short of it all was we got down to 3 handed, after my Shooting Stars bink the prevous year i was desperate to win and try again, the $4,3k wasnt even an option!.. well i have now learnt my lesson of never trusting a complete stranger online  :"( :"( ... three handed i was 2nd in chips ,CL was miles ahead pretty much secured a seat after i doubled him up when i was a chipleader my AK v AJ AIPF cruel J on river (funny how even to this day i still visualise that J hitting lol ).. no worries i still had a healthy lead on 3rd place guy  .. then it went tits up guy in third announced he wanted the cash and we could have the 2 seats   happy days we all agreed and he sat out, we went about the business of sharing his blinds for a couple of hands, then the school boy error on my behalf my turn to steal his blind.. instead of min raising i raised all in not thinking that he would do what he would and sit back in and call!!.. WTF It was the dirtiest trick ever, well obv from there on he went on and got 2nd  :"(.. the rail went crazy at the guy saying it was the most awful thing they had ever witnessed etc etc.. then a couple of peeps also said it was my fault for trusting him, you know what they where right i was a stupid mug!!.. Well i couldnt sleep for a couple of nights so gutted!! so i emailed PP and explained what had happened, even sent them the chat log in HH.. their reply was that obv it was out of their control etc etc, obv they where right so not alot i could do.. So a couple of weeks passed and they released the holding tank details for Foxwoods, so i scrolled down to see the list of qualifiers and to my amazement the villain was not on the list??.. and in the rules and regulations there was no cash alternative and you could not transfer the seat?.. So i bombarded customer support with emails asking where the seat had gone or who the seat had gone too?.. they forwarded my request to Lucy who was their live events organiser at the time, we had met the year before at SS.. now this is where it gets fishy IMO, she couldnt give me a straight answer where the seat had gone! basically she explained that the villain was infact an underaged player.. so my argument was if in case that was the fact then i should be bumped up into second place, and the $$ go to 4th place.? Well she said this could not and would not happen as it is stated that seats cant be transfered? WTF!! ok then i said if thats the case what has happened to the $12,000 prize generated by all of the players who had entered the tourney? and again i was fobbed off as to say she wasnt in a position to give that information out, and it was the end of the matter, and as a gesture they would give me a free seat into the next WPT event feeder $215, what a load of tosh, just made me so angry that either stole the $12k or transfered it to one of their online pros ( NSXT2, Turniptruck, or Miami John).. i even started a thread on pck5s i was so sickened.. but at the end of the day i guess it was my own stupid fault..
So as i stated i played the $200nl cash tables back in the day. i remember so many of the names i regulary played with.. Divingduck, Gavarillo, Paul Craven, Billiards, Durrrr, Lardbucket and mine and everyone elses fav Oilman..
Now this guy Oilman was an absolute maniac obv had more money than sense or was using others credit cards!! it is no lie that when he came on the table the min raise was $25!! the guy could drop $1,000 every ten mins.. never have i seen a waiting list climb from 2 or 3 to 30+ in mins.. it was like everyone was sitting on PP waiting for him to sit down, i know that Divingduck and myself over the six months that he played easily took $60,000 from him alone.. it wasnt poker it was robbery!! he would obv bust people all over the place and sit with $1,200 at the table now this might not sound much by todays standards but it was classed as a huge stack back then, thing was it would all end up being given back within an hour or so, it was quite sick to watch, and i did actually feel sorry for the guy even though he furnished my flat it was plain to see he had a problem and we was feeding off him..
At the time we was playing on PP Durrr (from Edison) wasnt a well known player to us just another reg playing the $200nl games, infact i had him as a fish on my player notes (ooops goes to show what i knew) as his style was so loose and he did actually donate alot of the times.. then he seemed to go off the screens on PP? Well a couple of years later Mark (Divingduck) and me was chatting on MSN and he said do you realise that Durrr is making millions on Full Tilt on their PLO games and to check it out, so i would spend hours watching him crush on the tables scooping huge pots that i could not believe where real money!! obv my notes where way out.. i needed to look at my own game!!
So the poker Boom had taken off big time!!  Chris Moneymaker wins the 2003 WSOP, Pokerstars and FT lead the market, and making money online is no pushover in fact it was hard to make anything like i was when i first started..
My game wasnt any good in the boom of online poker.. my style was TIGHT in fact a player commented on my play which still makes me laugh to this day Quote.. " Fandango you play so tight, i bet you could swallow a lump of coal and s**t a diamond!   ) so an adjustment was needed and tried to adjust to the new way that i needed and its true no matter how many millions of hands you have played there is still so much room for improvement, im still needing to constantly change the way i play, still often curse myself the way i played a certain tournament, not so much a single hand but a tournament on a whole... Prehaps i should start reading books? i have never ever read one but hear that people swear by them, sad as it may sound but i do watch hours of poker from the rail, i almost always stay on the rail after busting and watch especially APAT games and take mental notes aswell as enjoy the banter..

I would love to hear feedback from my other fellow players also, please if there is an obvious flaw in my own game PM me and explain what you see, constructive criticism is always welcome, i think i need help when im at the awkward stack range of 12-15 BBs i think i tend to tighten up too much instead of trying to build and my bet sizing off All in is wrong relative to situation etc should i be sizing 4x 3x to show strength, then what to do when i whiff the flop etc. etc.

Well so much for the small blog hmmm getting carried away with waffle lol..

But if there is any thing anyone would like to ask either poker/non poker related i will endeavour to bore you with an answer..


Quick joke today.. As on FB..

" My wife"s face is so bloody rough... her glasses have been boarded up!"

[fandango]

So another eventful APAT promotion finished its first of five legs last night .. Bunch of fives was brilliant really enjoyed all aspects of the games played. My results by my own standards where rather disappointing, I like to think I have an above average standard on a couple of the variants especially the PLO Omaha and Omaha hi/lo but one bad beat in the PLO and one cooler/ bad play in the hi/lo kinda ruined my chances of a strong finish.
Andrew and Johnny crushed the league and deserved the top two places, John Murray played very well all week as he normally does and was in with a fighting chance if the other two slipped up.. Looking forward to playing more of these, dunno if I can commit to every week, Emma might go nuts lol so will have to test the waters  .
Just under three weeks to Stoke.. can"t wait my last live poker game was Nottingham ECOAP where happy memories will always be with me. Been busy on EBay since the call up purchased a few apt patriotic merchandise pieces to bring along with me.. oh and Emma has purchased me " lucky" England boxer shorts, I won"t spoil you all by modelling them, but be rest assured they will be worn on the day.
Tommorow brings another league game for us all, last week the whole of EOE seemed like the bad beats where smacking us all in the face, hate to harp on about them as we all forget the beats we dish out ourselves, but last week was just carnage!! Wayne owned me   :"( he did nothing wrong I had position on him from the start he ran his Kings into my Aces only problem was I was drawing dead on turn when he hit four to the flush on the turn with Diamonds, then another hand his A9 beat my AJ on an A high flop with the 9 on river. Then Bill shoved his short stack UTG AIPF with 77 i wake up with JJ in the BB safe flop and turn then the obligatory 7 on river, Bill went on to finish 4th last week, so was quite a great comeback. EOE need a good second half of the season and I"m sure we can be up with a chance of a strong finish, we have a very good strong committed squad so I"m sure a good run is on the cards..

Not going to mention Portugal much but jealouse the end.

[fandango]

So another great week of enjoying the Bunch of Fives series, although I missed the five card draw to the late reg glitch.
Never had any kind of chance after a terrible week where variance and bad play put that to rest.. Two worthy winners as always congrats to Paul and Tony, the final table will be a hard fought affair and if I"m not lucky enough to qualify I will def enjoy watching it...

Having by my standards a somewhat meagre attempt of playing much poker this month, just playing the APAT games and the odd Micro millions and SNG on stars.. Not enjoying online poker as much at the moment, have had no real deep runs etc, not playing to my full potential!! .. This is because the last month or so I can only think about trip to Stoke, I need a live poker fix! Looking forward to catching up with all the regular faces and having a good laugh.. Will also be nice to catch up with Anne (Nellie) who is Michelles mum, who I havent seen at a live event for a couple of seasons.. Always been such a nice person to chat with at the tables, and also a very tough accomplished player..  So was chuffed when she said she was travelling up with Mich on the Friday to rail, and probably play the ME on Saturday..

With my recent success at the ECOAP I treated myself to a new Samsung smart TV, I have yet to use the 3D feature it has.
So I purchased the Prometheus DVD today as Lovefilm does not have it on their rentals for some reason..gonna sit with Emma and watch it tonight with our funky looking glasses on lol.. have heard mixed reviews about the film so I guess I shouldn"t get to excited, but all the trailers I have seen make it look pretty awesome..
Also with the DVD I got a code for a digital copy that you download to PC, then you can view on PC/tablet etc..
If anyone wants the code number and link to website they are welcome to it, as I won"t be using it myself. First come first served   , just reply on this thread if you want it and I will PM you the details..

Good luck to any APATers  playing Micro millions etc, good luck to all EOE players this weekend may we have some run good please poker gods!! Special luck to pokerpops of to St Kitts next week bink the win please ..

Edit... If anyone needs a new washing machine I believe our good friend Ger may have a spare kicking around  

[duke3016]

Edit... If anyone needs a new washing machine I believe our good friend Ger may have a spare kicking around  

sigh