Canada: Week 1

Week one is in the books. I set a goal to play 6500 VPPs a day and fell just short earning about 41,000 . I ended up winning about 14K with bonuses/milestone credits and am very happy with that especially considering I'm down 2 big bets after 22K hands.

I was very rusty the first couple days, making a lot of mistakes. I also started out 6 tabling which was a big mistake. The pace was way too fast and I kept losing track of the action. I've cut down to 4-5 tables now and sometimes 6 when I'm thinking clearly. It's a ton of poker in terms of time, it's taking me about 9 hours a day of playing to hit 6500 VPPs. I don't know if I'll be able to keep up the pace but I'm going to try.

The games themselves have been sporadic. Sometimes they'll be four or five tables going at 30-60+ and other times they'll be several hours with nothing running. Lobby watching has become even more valuable with the higher limits games since they run less frequently now and fill up so quick. In terms of skill, the games seem about the same. It's generally five regulars with one recreational player, with the occasional table with two recreational players. The lower limit games (5-10 and 10-20) run most of the day but there are even periods where those are dead. I've struggled at the lower limits, partly because I don't pay as much attention to them, partly because I'm not familiar with the players, and partly because many of the players are so difficult to read. I have a lot easier time understanding the regs at higher limits and feel like I'm able to exploit them better.

I haven't made any withdrawals yet and that's my main concern right now. It's still unclear how the Canadian banks will feel about US players receiving money from poker sites. More on that to follow..

Here's what the month has looked like so far: