I have been saving up “Full Tilt Points (FTP)” for a while now and figured I would wait until I could afford the 2000$ bonus in the store. However, this would take me about 3 hours a day for 50 days to clear, and I don’t think I will have the time to do all that, so I settled for the 1000$ one. I will need to earn 25 000 FTP for it to be cleared and today I did about 700 FTP in one hour, so you do the math . As I mentioned, I have 50 days starting today to clear it.

Bonuses are great motivators to grind a bit more which is just what I need to do now . I concluded that it would be great to be in the “poker-zone” the last two weeks before I leave for the Norwegian Championship. And of course, in addition to the 35k hands I will play during the clearing, I will get one thousand american dollars That can’t be bad? Let’s just hope that I’ll win some money playing too…

It will be a hectic couple of weeks, as I have to pick up the pace on my Master Thesis too. Hopefully, I can leave for Riga knowing that I’ll confortably finish it all up before the deadline June 6th, 23:59:59.

Until next time, good luck at the tables and with life in general!

I’ve wanted to play the Norwegian Championship (NM) for a long while now, and I’m thrilled to announce that I will show up to play the main event this year starting April 14th, and hopefully I’ll be the last man standing April 17th .

I will be leaving Norway on Monday, April 11th and stay for a week, so hopefully I will get to meet a lot of cool people, play poker and get home with more money and experiences than I left with . I booked a nice room at Albert Hotel for the entire week, leaving me only minutes away from the casino!

I will be looking to sell about 10-20% of my buy-in for a 10% markup, meaning you’ll pay 1.1€ for 1€ share. I have checked a bit around and found this to be a pretty low fee . So, for 1% you’ll pay 800€*1.1 / 100 = 8.8€. Leave a comment or send me an e-mail if you’re interested

To everyone, buying shares or not, I will be updating as often as I can from Latvia, especially via twitter, so I recommend that you all follow me there.

Until next time, good luck at the tables and with living in the moment!

It’s said that if you have one eye on yesterday, and one eye on tomorrow, you’re going to be cockeyed today. In a world filled with uncertainties and chaos this has never been more true. If today was your last day on earth, what would you do?

Of course, for most of us it is impossible to live everyday as if it was our last. What we can do though, is to stop concentrating that much on past and future events in life and live in the moment. If we talk too much about yesterday, it only means that we haven’t done that much today.

Instead of focusing on how many more hours of sleep you will get Saturday and Sunday, be grateful that you actually woke up and got to see Monday! Not everyone will.
Instead of crying over your ex-girlfriend or boyfriend who broke up with you, take a look around and be amazed by how beautiful people are. Instead of complaining about how worthless and meaningless your job is, think about what you can do TODAY, that will brighten it up. Like I did before college…

…when I used to work in a grocery store which I found extremely boring. For some time I even had a full-time position there. So instead of being grumpy, working slowly, doing just what I had to do, I did more! I talked to the customers and made that little extra effort to make them forget about the last 15 minute hazzle they’ve had stumbling through the shelves. And I smiled, oh yes I smiled. Not because I was told to, but because a smile can change another persons day entirely. That smile, that little moment, made many forget about what a crappy day they’ve had, and what duties that awaited them. I loved it!

I also love animals! I had a little dog for some time and I taught her to sit, to lie, to give a paw, to walk in a leash, you name it. What she thought me was a million times more valuable though. Dogs don’t care about the future, and they sure as hell don’t remember the past. Yelling at a dog 5 minutes after she has pooped in your glove doesn’t mean anything to her. Why? Cause she forgot it over 4 minutes ago. On the other hand, telling her to not poop in your glove in the future will only get you a questioning look (yeah, I know, you can’t talk to dogs, but you get the point). Maybe we should learn something from the animals, except the sanitary part of course ).The past and future are only illusions existing in the present which is what there is, and all there is.

So, you’re having a bad day? Just forget about it, live in the moment and try to be awesome. It may not be that simple in practice, but remember that the only thing you can do is try, the rest is not your business.

As I’ve hinted a few times I’ve been looking to simplify the theme at Deltidspoker and get rid of the whole green, vegas, semi-childish feel.

My good friend Kaan and I came up with some nice ideas for a top banner and the result is pretty good imo. We tried to go for the pokerface, “I’m trowing the chips in the middle”, mysterious feel and I think we succeeded, especially given the raw material we had (me ).

Obviously, this new look has personalized the blog a bit more since I’ve revealed my face or at least partly . I predict that the haters indeed will hate, but who cares anyway

Hopefully this reconstruction can inspire me to put up some more series, like the challenge I had a few weeks back. Maybe some more poker specific material other than “this is my week at full tilt” will see the light of day?

I have a semi-big announcement next week which shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, but still pretty cool for me. Keep watching for that one.

Until next time, good luck at the tables and with life in general

Given what I wrote yesterday, it was pretty awesome when I suddenly felt like playing today. The session lasted for about 45 minutes and I got in 777 hands, netting just over 1.5 buy-ins.

I didn’t have any super-interesting hands, but I’ll post the biggest winning hand for the session, with some extras

Full Tilt Poker, $1/2 No Limit Hold’em Cash Games, 9 Players

Flop:($405) (2 Players)

Turn: ($405) (2 Players)

River: ($405) (2 Players)

After my February downswing I didn’t feel like playing poker at all. When I got home from school, ate my dinner and had nothing to do for the next 5 hours, I really wanted to do something else. You know the feeling?

The really bad thing is that I felt some kind of guilt for not playing, but now I have decided to just ignore it. I think this is crucial if you want to succeed in poker, cause as I state in the title; Not just play poker, enjoy it!!

The good news though is that as soon as you let go of the guilt, you slowly get your urge to play back, or at least I feel that I’m slowly getting there myself. I’ll probably keep away for a few more days so that I don’t fall backwards into guilt-land again

There are many reasons to play poker, but I think a lot of us share that we want to make some extra money to be able to have some more fun in life (not my primary reason, but whatever). So if we don’t have a good time while we play, then some of the point is gone, right? I don’t mean jolly, great, “rolling on floor laughing” fun, but more like the way you feel practicing the guitar, your golf drive or put, your singing, your “whatever you enjoy”.

I’m planning on playing the “Norwegian Championship” in Riga, Latvia in April, so I have to get my poker game back up to pace by then. It’s like being an athlete. You have to be careful with your training so that your form doesn’t drop, and if it does, take a break and get back into shape! That’s what I’m doing, while I try to enjoy every day to the fullest.

Until next time, good luck at the tables and with life!

Pål

There you have it! My first loosing month since, well, I can’t remember. Every month since I started up at Full Tilt Poker has been pretty good, but I guess it was just a matter of time before I had my date with the devil.

But you know what? I’m pretty damn confident that I am just experiencing a series of coolers and bad beats, so I’m not concerned at all! The only downside to it all is that it takes away some of the urge to play. I guess it’s a good thing that the gambler in me takes a step back when I’m loosing, compared to for instance moving up in stakes, but I somehow have to find my rhythm again.

We all know that it’s the long haul that counts and luckily, I have proven to be a pretty consistent winner for some time even though my winrate has taken a hit. I still love the game and spend more time watching videos and reading forums, so it’s not like I’m backing off the poker scene.

I can just hope that I’ll find my form somewhere in March, and hopefully my next monthly report can show a more inspiring graph than the one below!

Until next time, good luck at the tables and with life in general!

Pål