2008-08-07 A real grind and a hard read .....

I have to say that I was pretty overwhelmed with this book and the sheer volume of statistical data made it a dry and tedious read. To be honest there a few lessons to take away that helped my play but it would have been able to fit on one page. The best bit of the book (about half) was the scenario's. These are laid out what you are dealt, what everyone else does and what forth street and the river are (or are not) depending on the chapter. So there's like a stack of Pre-Flop / Post-Flop / 4th street and River scenario's. They are down there to apparently test your knowledge and understanding of the material in the first half of the book but maybe I'm being stupid but almost all of the plays they discuss I figured out on my own....however it was nice to know and confidence boosting to see we were in agreement when to raise and when to fold, check etc. etc.

There is one thing that I am becoming more and more aware of. Be prepared to either specialise in your game or READ a lot !!!! Tournament play is different to cash games is different to sit and go's is different to heads up etc etc. Seems obvious now but I am slowly building my own comprehensive rule book for Texas Hold 'em play based on game style and size (6 and 10 tables are hugely different)

Can't really recommend this book fully as it is tedious and like I said, a dry read.