Hopefully this poster can help and motivate you on a daily basis!
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Just a quick update regarding 2 things.
1st
Just finished 2 hour studying session with fellow reg. It was absolutely brutal and awesome. We looked into won and lost hands past 2 days, talked about frequencies and tendencies. Towards the very end we discussed our goals for this year and overall and was very happy to find out that we have almost identical goals and thinking process. It is absolute win win match and I couldn't have picked a better person to continue studying CG with. In the end we said that however moves up faster doesn't neglect other person with working on the game and all the rest.
So you may all see two of us reaching NL200 as a joint project and one very successful story in future. I am certainly expecting that to happen and so is my friend and fellow reg.
2nd
6 days left including today for initial challenge. I need 50 hours of Online CG grind to complete the goal (100 out of 150 hours completed!). Regularly I would do 5 hours a day so 30 instead of 50 hours and cut it short 20 hours.
I have doubt if I should neglect live grind, lower it to accomplish online CG grind goal set!
The problem is that yesterday there was a game and I expect that there will be CG every night due to big MTT coming up on Thursday (200 players expected in the hotel etc) so I can also materialize on playing live 5+ hours in following days.
I can't hit my live goal, already talked about that, but by playing 8+ hours per day online CG I can complete my Online CG goal which for me is way more important!
So looking at everything and analyzing it, I think what might happen today (since its 3pm already) is that I will grind 7 hours CG (until 11 with brakes) then go for live CG 3-4 hours and in following days try to do 9 hours of Online vs like 2-3 hours of live CG.
The reason for this is obviously my long term plan with CG (online can make more vs live here obviously) + super low sample live where variance and card distribution/setups can be brutal (example last night!).
I am mentally preparing myself, going for lunch now and to try to play Online CG 7+ hours. If I manage to do this for 5-6 days I am sure that rest of the February spent this way will bring amazing results and possible switch to NL100.
Believe I can do it all, follow the updates and hope for the best as my energy and willpower/grit is there and I won't give up!!!
Enjoy the remaining of your week !
Originally posted by Ramble
Wow - Great posters, especially last one!
Glad you found them useful my friend! They are quite inspiring to me at least 
Gevgelija 30 Day Challenge
Day 25 (10th February)
Ate healthy and drank tons of water
Working on the game 2 hours with fellow reg
Grinded online CG 5.5 hours
Worked out
Very active day again.
Lost 3-4 hours waiting live for CG and to be honest that really upset me. They called me up to come down claiming that there will be game. I went down and there was no game, I waited over 2 hours and then they left like nothing happened. To make things worse, at the point when they called me I only had 2.5 hours of grind because the night before I went to bed at 5am and woke up 11am worked on the game with fellow reg 2 hours so time for grinding was super limited and they took it away from me. So that really upset me because I am all up for full filling my obligations here but I don't nor will allow somebody to screw up my time management just for the sake of whatever.
I am considering to go back home on Monday 16th when 30 days will expire. Today I will make the final decision and talk with friend and poker manager when he arrives. I feel that live CG is dead during the week, nothing will change in extra 2 weeks and I might just get extra upset if I get another call like last night. Also I feel it is not fair for me to stay here and have all the stuff for free when there is nothing CG related going on. Before coming here I was expecting 6 out of 7 days to grind live 5 hours. That is impossible and not sustainable where there is no players during the week. Only way that would ever work is if 4 more regs came to live to hotel with me here and then we started 5 handed each day expecting 1-2 players to join us during the week. Of course this is also -EV, huge one, playing 4 out of 6 opponents regs on live CG where you play like 120 hands in 5 hours. Just a huge waste of time when I consider how much of that fraction I could be using to fix all my leaks in CG online which is far more profitable long term anyways.
So yeah, I am very close to making the decision of going back on Monday. If I do that, will have to make travel arrangements tonight already as well which should not be a problem.
Finally I want my friend and poker manager not to get any problem here from his partners. I am here for 1 month and there was game mostly on weekend. Why am I staying in the hotel every day when there is no game during the weekdays (at best 4 times a week!!!). So I want to save him any future trouble with his partners as well.
I wouldn't mind coming back to the hotel because of all the great conditions (free food, amazing rooms and service, pool sauna gym etc) but I would come back only if there was minimum 2 more regs here with me or that by some miracle more people started coming in during the week (which takes time and it is highly unlikely that it will happen).
Online CG was brutal. 5.5 hours of grind -13 buy ins. Tons of setups but also old leaks keep popping up.
Today I made a list of 6 leaks that I feel are repeating in my game. As you can guess, that is a lot of leaks for somebody who wants to move up to NL100+ by the end of this year.
Important thing is that I am aware that these leaks exist and am working on correcting them.
Good news : I am working on and on some days I am in more control then others. The days that I control I am cruising, days that I don't (maybe tired or mentally pressured or impatient in some spots/rushed).
Bad news: I have financial pressure to provide certain amount per month which definitely affects my mindset since January. Also I feel that I could be working way more on my game then just 1-2 hours a day. I feel that would be the most +EV for me at current stage in order to reach my goals sooner.
Solution - Plan
Leave home on Monday 16th of February.
Continue coaching 10-11 + studying with fellow reg 1-2 hours per day.
Grind CG minimum 2-3 hours until 3pm or so.
*Dedicate minimum 1 more hour per day on reviewing the session(s) played with key hands and spots*
In the afternoon and evening either continue grinding CG (with improved win rate) or play 4-5 hours of 20 tabling SNGs (for printing money purposes obviously)
End result should be similar to the one in Gevgelija just instead of unknown hours for live CG I will use those times even more efficiently for studying and additional online grind.
Finally all this might result into 2 hours studying, 7-8 hours daily grinding with this intense time management and fanatic focus and approach. Very much look forward to it and want to have minimum 2 months of 200 hours grind.
Things accomplished so far in the challenge:
Working out 13/30
Studied 26.5/30 hours
Coaching 12/30 sessions
Online CG grind 105.5/150 hours
Live CG grind 68/130 hours (waited tons of extra hours to start the games!!!)
Ate 3 healthy meals + 2l minimum of water 26/30 days
Robin Sharma's book "The Leader Who Had No Tittle" 0/90 pages
Drop 5kgs
CG coaching 4.5 hours
2015 Challenge
Things completed so far in the challenge:
31.5/300 Study hours
25/300 Coaching sessions
146/1500 Grinding hours
24/150 Work out
85.5 hours Live Poker (tons of additional hours lost in waiting for games to start!)
Here is the plan for today (11th of February):
Woke up, ate healthy breakfast + drank tons of water and worked with fellow reg 1.5 hours
2 hours of online CG grind done already
Plan to go for lunch now and resume my online grind minimum 3 more hours
Evening time it depends - if they invite me I have to go down, if they don't I will stay in study/review + grind more hours
Overall I can't (never use and hate using word can't!!!) hit online CG goal simply because I don't have 100% control on my time management when they can call me up anywhere from 6pm up to go down and play CG. If this wasn't the case I am 100% positive that I could easily hit remaining hours in 5 days (44.5 hours 5 days 9 hours each day easy game if there was no live CG).
Quick update about today (in 10 minutes day is ending anyways!)
Woke up, ate healthy breakfast + drank tons of water and worked with fellow reg 1.5 hours
2 hours of online CG grind done already
Went to lunch and then went to look for my 2 friends who were playing final satelite 110 euro for 550 euro ticket (20% ITM minimum).
Ended up buying in myself with the idea to cash out the ticket. 23 people were ITM, 24th got from casino 300 euros.
I was absolute chip leader (200k stack from 880k stack total on tournament, 7k starting stacks with 1 re-entry allowed).
By the time we reached bubble I told organizers, dealers and other players that I want 500 euros so that we can finish it right away. What they all did (23 players) was they chipped in 10 euros each for 230 euro total + casinos prize for 24th place 300 euro, I ended up cashing in 530 euro as absolute CL.
This was the whole idea when I decided to play it today after all with such a huge ITM.
I can talk specifics about this satelite with 80-90 people in but I will just say that I saw tons of terrible plays and can maybe name 2-3 good plays in 7 hours of grinding. Had decent card distribution (strong Ax) in the very 1st blinds (140bbs deep) and lost post flop 6/7 hands because there were always multi ways under boards where people had straights/flushes/sets/overpairs.
Very happy with my play through out the whole satelite. Had one fantastic hand 3 way post flop on 10c4c3d where SB checks, BB bets 2k, I call CO 2k, SB c/r 4.4k , BB fold I call, turn is Js, opponent checks and I shove all in 12k in pot of over 16k. SB tanked for long and folded. I shoved 5h5d and took the hand.
From that point on I was dominating like a boss whole tournament so very happy how I did obviously.
Final note about MTT. I don't want to play it tomorrow. There will be over 200 people playing it, it will last 2 days, ITM will be 20 or so people, prizes will be great for top 3 as you all know. I simply don't want to invest 550 euros into 100-200k gtd tourney despite the fact that I feel I have huge edge over general field (even regs that play it have huge post flop leaks and have pour pre flop ranges).
What people forget about MTTs is when you are playing 9-10 max you can't really pull off wider plays in general. You can't open up range like crazy because you are mostly OOP and people/gen pop/fishes and bad regs will flat and play a lot. This means post flop vs 3-4 players usually in early levels, later levels 3 handed post flop. I described my 55 hand post flop 3 handed which eventually got me back to average stack and I was able to dominate after that BVB, post flop IP, OOP doing fantastic plays etc. But overall, I do not feel that playing live MTTs is +EV even when qualifying like I did tonight. I grinded 7 hours to make 420 euros profit (110 buy in). Variance was still huge despite 80-90 players and weak field/opponents. The fact is that you are playing live MTT, turbo structure, after you get to 3rd level you are already short stacked and from that point on there is no post flop, you have to get it in and hope for the best. Tomorrow there will be 200+ players and how many of them will have their stacks lost by the time they reach 4th level? Pure lottery and card distribution from that point on.
The only type of MTT that I would ever consider playing live is with huge starting stack (very deep stacks, for pre and post flop ownage) + very slow structure and time (like 45-60 minute blinds increase or so). I can see myself actually playing this MTT and enjoying it because I would get into tons of post flop spots, profitably value bet or bluff/bluff catch opponents and just create some sort of history start some leveling wars on table. This is what makes poker fun for me live not folding 2 hours then shoving then folding another 2 hours and shoving again. This is not poker or at least I choose not to recognize such type of poker as the one I prefer which has tons of art in it. Any monkey can learn shoving, calling , 3/4 bet, r/calling ranges in MTT and just sit and wait for hand. But post flop they don't know even PTSR (Pot to stack ratio) or pot odds. Just very bad plays today overall from whole table.
At one point I was thinking "Is this really worth it? Grinding this live satelite to earn 420 euro and to suffer playing it? Watching people take too much time to look at hands, decide what to do pre flop, take forever post flop, see retarded plays?"
I really felt like it is complete waste of time and I still do despite the fact that I owned whole table and busted like 7-8 players or so both pre and post flop. So yeah, I see myself playing MTTs live only if this criteria is meet: 1) I travel with my brother and best friend and we decide to play it all together for fun 2) MTT has brutally awesome structure for me to play deep 3) I have tons of extra money to spare and no pressure with making any form of steady living so that I can just play and don't care in the end at all whatever happens.
A bit of MTT rant but I had to guys. I really think all of you out there that play it are special kind of brand. I know I couldn't do it unless above terms are meet and even then doing something for hours and loosing as favorite when deep hurts like hell (my Prague story is enough - so close with AA vs KK and yet so far - that guy later took down the tourney and 15k with "my chips" lol)
I wish you all the best of luck with MTTs and try not to be staked and forever in loss like most people are now days (very few actually have their own bankroll to grind them anywhere).
As far as remaining of the day/night goes it is 12:12 already and I am in the room planing to grind CG minimum 2 hours more. If possible I will do 3 hours.
Another important thing that happened after I finished the MTT satelite.
I let my friend and poker manager that I am leaving on Monday 16th of February back home. I have also messaged my dad about it and will call him now (as soon as I finish this blog update).
My friend asked me if everything was ok, do I feel like going for the sake of going and whats up etc. Told him everything that I wrote in the latest update and he really appreciated my honesty and openness. I told him that I want to leave the door open and come here again for longer period of time. Perhaps next time 2-3-4 months. Maybe not in this year but definitely I plan to come. The best time will be when I don't have this financial pressure for 40k this year, 20k for morgage, rest for life expenses. Once this is sorted out and I am owning online ZOOM like a boss, I can come here and keep grinding online CG on my laptop again and be totally detached to when there will be live game, how long I will play it, will it affect my time management and my goals greatly/challange etc. Until that happens I feel that my best and most +EV is returning home, studying additional 1 hour per day (reviewing more hands and watching super great videos + taking notes) and to keep up this high grind pace (go for 200 hours in March for starters and then extend it to future months if that becomes strong reality). I feel this way I will reach 40k+ this year far easier then if I stay here. Sad that I will go back to extent that conditions are really awesome here but I came here to play CG 6/7 times a day live and at best it is there 3-4 days per week and not even every week. This is a problem and also the fact that I never know when game will happen and am waiting for a call which can totally mess up my initial time management (like last night). This is why going home this won't happen as I have full control over my time management and will aim to keep it brutal like so far.
Thank you for finding time and hopefully reading the whole update.
Expect the update about today briefly after I finish online grind (2-3 more hours). Also on Monday before I go home I will make a review of the whole Gevgelija Challenge, pros and cons if you will so stay alert for that one also.
All the best to good people out there not meaning harm to anyone or anybody and thanks for following my blog and giving me the energy back to keep writing all these updates daily.
Enjoy the rest of your week and have a great night!
Gevgelija 30 Day Challenge
Day 26 (11th February)
Ate healthy+ drank tons of water
Worked with fellow reg 1.5 hours
Online CG grind 4 hours
Live MTT satellite grind 7 hours
Made all the arrangements for Monday return to Nis
Was playing close to my A game past 2 hours online. I had very ugly rivers in 3-4 bet pots and I would say ideally I could have made 2 more folds on river tonight and saved 1 buy in. Will analyze it all in depth tomorrow.
Overall played very close to my CG A game with post flop excellent sizing and thin value betting.
Through out the session my idea was to let the clock run out and really think through all my decisions. This resulted in better play but instead of 700 hands per hour 3 tabling, I got 650 hands per hour. I will aim to continue with this idea and I definitely feel I made tons of +EV decisions in difficult spots when letting the timer go down all the way while analyzing every possible combo + thinking in frequency and tendency.
Things accomplished so far in the challenge:
Working out 13/30
Studied 28/30 hours
Coaching 12/30 sessions
Online CG grind 109.5/150 hours
Live CG grind 75/130 hours (waited tons of extra hours to start the games!!!)
Ate 3 healthy meals + 2l minimum of water 27/30 days
Robin Sharma's book "The Leader Who Had No Tittle" 0/90 pages
Drop 5kgs
CG coaching 4.5 hours
2015 Challenge
Things completed so far in the challenge:
33/300 Study hours
25/300 Coaching sessions
150/1500 Grinding hours
24/150 Work out
92.5 hours Live Poker (tons of additional hours lost in waiting for games to start!)
Here is the plan for today (12th of February):
Wake up, eat healthy breakfast and drink tons of water 9-10am
Coaching session 10-11am
Working on the game with fellow reg 11-1pm (dependent on regs schedule also)
1st session 1-3pm
Healthy lunch 3-3:30pm
Work out and shower 3:30-4pm
2nd session 4-6pm
Short brake 6-6:15 or 20
3rd session 6:20-7:20pm
Healthy dinner
Rest of the night NL200 live CG
some great quality posts as always from ivicailiev here - quite shocked initially tbh that you have made a switch to cash games (I have just caught up with this year's posts), but on reflection it seems sensible given the SnG climate just now with spins etc, and it seems to be going well for you, so fair play! (I also noticed arron wilson advising someone elsewhere to learn new formats, and even successful husng regs like him are now diversifying into CGs and other formats - no good for me tho' as I really don't enjoy grinding online cash - live CGs are ok now and again for a change imo, and mtts too swingy/long hours to grind out regular profits (for me, anyway - I'm gettin on in years) 
- totally agree abt the live mtts btw - most of them are a total joke re crapshoot structures, and very little opportunity for skill plays
- would be interested to hear your opinions on the husng world nowadays, btw, as this is the format I have been looking at concentrating on in 2015, and you seem to be very well-informed generally, on the online-scene
All the Best, from a long-time (in the background) follower btw!
Originally posted by sherriffatman
some great quality posts as always from ivicailiev here - quite shocked initially tbh that you have made a switch to cash games (I have just caught up with this year's posts), but on reflection it seems sensible given the SnG climate just now with spins etc, and it seems to be going well for you, so fair play! (I also noticed arron wilson advising someone elsewhere to learn new formats, and even successful husng regs like him are now diversifying into CGs and other formats - no good for me tho' as I really don't enjoy grinding online cash - live CGs are ok now and again for a change imo, and mtts too swingy/long hours to grind out regular profits (for me, anyway - I'm gettin on in years)
- totally agree abt the live mtts btw - most of them are a total joke re crapshoot structures, and very little opportunity for skill plays
- would be interested to hear your opinions on the husng world nowadays, btw, as this is the format I have been looking at concentrating on in 2015, and you seem to be very well-informed generally, on the online-sceneAll the Best, from a long-time (in the background) follower btw!
Welcome Sheriff
I am always glad to see new people on the blog especially when their 1st post is right down to point with excellent observations.
Will try to tackle all the things you mentioned in the post above.
I haven't yet switched full time to CG, I am still in the test drive phase. Initial idea was to reach 3 tabling on NL50 with high enough of a win rate to make a permanent switch. My win rate is not yet determined as most of the leaks are due to my mental leak (wrote about that in the blog - it is still difficult to cope with it and I do fight it daily) + there tends to be biggest problem in 2 areas projection bias and reverse hand reading. Funny thing is that I feel I would do way better on NL100 as opponents have better ranges pre and post flop + their c/c c/r bluff catch value bet ranges are wider. Most of videos and studying that I did came from higher limit videos. Also for a lot of things my thinking process is very much in place but tendencies on NL50 and things that players show with on showdown sometimes really makes me laugh super hard. It seems like mission impossible when they show with 2-8 combos that beat me from which like 4-6 of them should not even get to river
What I can tell you about my CG adventure so far is super positive things. Having studied CG since mid December and grinding it lighter then, right now 2 months later I feel like I have improved close to 6+ months of my improvement in 2014! Yes it is that fast and crazy. I am surprising myself daily how much my thinking process, hand reading and all the other things are very much clicking. When I started studying 2 and a half months ago I was just SNG reg who was testing the waters. Now I feel very much in control and enjoy playing the CG (especially ZOOM) a tons!
Future or times ahead seem to be very bright for me in this format. I am really encouraged when I just think about how much I still have to learn and improve as a player. Just thinking of this makes me super happy and motivated. Just watching awesome video, taking notes, learning new concept and implementing it making it a part of existing game plan is huge for me.
My decision with CG vs SNG will happen in near future. I feel that reverting back to SNGs is easy and safe money but dead end street improvement wise (no challenge whatsoever). Staying on CG however offers higher hourly, tons of hard work and challenges and it makes me feel like a little kid entering Disneyland for the 1st time. CG is really inspiring me and it was always from the very beginning my goal to "get" thinking process that those awesome guys have. After playing SNGs for 2 and a half years, I saw tons of leaks in range construction both pre and post flop while just watching at decent NL50 video on range construction I already saw how much time I have "wasted" with SNGs. Sure I made money, making a living from it, coached over 50 people during that time but personally I have reached a point where money is not #1 thing. What matters the most to me is becoming the best I can be as a poker player and right now the best path for that seems to be the CG vs any other format really (maybe HU would be my 2nd choice!).
So there you go, I hope that answers your 1st part of the post regarding switch. I do hope to stay on CG and switch permanently because it inspires me to move forward and am super driven to go for NL200 ZOOM but with super solid knowledge/thinking process/ranges/hand reading/you name it.
I agree with you about live CG and MTTs part. I like playing live but after staying in hotel for almost 4 weeks, I can say that not every live CG scenario is ideal. I like having people who are positive, talk at the table, have fun, start some stories, get to know each other. Live poker or poker after all is social game and should be treated as such! What I don't like is sometimes you have table with people who swear at dealers, tilt like monkeys or are just not saying a single word for whole night. Where is the fun in that, sitting 5+ hours and acting like you can't speak ?
MTTs I already wrote about, no need to repeat. There are really fantastic live MTTs and I think it would be very +EV to play them vs huge recreational field. On the other hand if you have extra money to spare it is somewhat like buying a lottery ticket, you buy in and hope for the best with card distribution when you need to double up. Sometimes this happens 10+ times during tourney that you need to survive all in PF so it definitely brings tons of gamble elements into it that makes it fun for all to play.
Final point about HUSNGS.
I feel that this is very profitable format and if you are still choosing one this would be the most +EV one to get into in my opinion.
Consider following couple of things when it comes to it:
- Format with least variance and highest edge (as you play 1vs1 your skill directly affects tons of outcomes)
- Biggest winners online (and live recently) are HUSNG players
- By learning to play this format you can later switch to any format. The fact is that by learning pre flop and post flop strategy + how to adjust to various opponent types, tendencies, board run outs, you actually become super proficient to play any other format. Think about it, regular SNGs you would own people BVB, HU and early game post flop. MTTs ownage in early blind levels and if its deep hopefully it lasts longer! CG you play tons of HU pots + multi ways and you can apply knowledge from the HU easily to own. Finally SPINS which people are getting addicted to nowdays, tons of HU regs are adding them because they have huge edge over fish in HU and expect therefore higher ITM long term and hoping to bink as well some high multiplier.
So yeah, overall I love HU and in 2014 1 month studying HU hypers helped me increase my 1st vs 2nd places by 2-3% which long term equals a lot of $!!!
If I would start again from beginning I would either choose HU or CG. Traffic wise these games exist on any network/site with even bigger rakeback % so you don't have to worry about finding games (like SNG players do).
If you are still thinking about it, just go for it and for motivation check Gordons videos/series/courses + all the blogs with success and uprising stories.
2 words for you: Daniel Cates !
Really appreciate you following the blog (even in the background) and coming out from shadows and contributing with such a quality post.
All the best to you as well and hope to see and read you more in the future
Gevgelija 30 Day Challenge
Day 27 (12th February)
Ate healthy and drank tons of water
Worked on the game 4 hours
Grinded online CG 1 hour
Grinded live CG 3 hours
Meet new people today and made new friends
Scheduled couple of coaching sessions for the weekend
Had problems with room switching due to MTT starting today
Today was really brutal. Mentally I got very thrown off by the fact that I had to pack and move into room with 2 friends from my town. So from staying alone in the room so far now I will stay 3 more days with 2 of my friends. At 1st I was very upset as I am very emotional and when I feel that I am treated unfairly I feel the need to say it right away. I moved from the room, packed all the stuff, and decided to go to lunch to think it over. Spoke to my brother (he is always voice of reason in such spots for me as I would let my heart and emotions make the decision not rational thinking when I am hurt) and decided to stay until Monday with such conditions.
You can just imagine that this took me 3-4 hours easily with moving, packing, deciding what to do, should I go back tomorrow morning or wait for Monday etc. In the end I decided to stay and I will be returning back on Monday as initially planed.
Remaining days I will have trouble running my full time management as I will be studying, grinding and watching videos in hotel bar with headphones instead of staying in the room alone on the speakers in my bed. It will just be different but when life gives you lemons make a lemonade Will do my best to hang with 2 of my friends, today we already had a lot of fun talking and laughing. Hopefully remaining 3 days will go well as well
Meet new people, most of which came for CG or MTT. 2 guys from Slovenia who grind NL100-NL600 online. They used to grind couple of years ago NL1000+ but now they say the games are tougher and they had to drop out.
I think I easily spent 2 and a half hours with these guys talking about poker and life as poker players. One of the guys lived in Thailand for 3 months and after talking to me for 1 hour he said that I must move there as he feels that is the perfect place for me. Community with great players, support, improvement, excellent and affordable conditions Asian girls !!! So I felt like he already knew me for long time, he gave me diagnosis within 1 hour, how awesome was that?
We talked a lot about poker strategy (I told them about the site and whats happening here!!!) and we really had awesome discussions for pre flop game plan which stopped by the time we reached to flop. Once I started asking them and starting to list some c/c c/r c/f bet ranges on flop they just went crazy and told me that I should switch to HU like today. They claimed that thinking process displayed in 1 hour should easily beat NL200+ online (which they crush). We talked about sites, rb, opponents and tendencies, hourly, future and past, poker in their lives, what/who brought them here etc
In the end I decided to study some more but we exchanged facebook and skype + I gave them some HU videos for studying which they seemed thrilled about.
Really look forward talking more to them while here remaining 3 days as I felt like I had somebody that understands things I am talking about and can respond and give fantastic feedback + start new topics.
This is close to feeling super connected with my friend and reg that I am currently working on the CG for past 6 days or so. It just feels amazing when I meet such people, it makes me keep my faith that there are still good people out there in this world, with good intentions that mean no harm to others, that are not scumbags and people without integrity.
Really enjoyed meeting and spending 2-3 hours with them today. Don't regret a single minute despite the fact that I missed on grinding live today. This might be one of those poker friendships that will last for very long time if not for life!
Studied 4 hours. 1 hour and 45 minutes with fellow reg from which half of the session was hand analysis from day before (3-4 bet pots, lost hands, hh review with tendencies) and rest was live sweat. Remaining time studying I spent watching 2 videos, taking notes, rewinding parts, pausing and getting all the important aspects/topics/theory memorized.
Just want to say to anyone out there that is following this blog: If you are friends or by any chance Phil Galfond himself, you just got another huge fan and follower. I already knew that PG was/is brutal but today the 1 hour wide I watched in 1 and a half hour with all the notes taking rewinding and reviewing.
PG is just brutal and what is funny is the everything he explained in the video was not new to me but I rather followed it 100% and knew what was about to follow and say in a lot of spots. I really felt great watching the video and predicting his plays on further streets. Just brutal guy and again if anybody knows him that follows the blog or if by some miracle Phil Galfond is following this blog, I want to connect with him and pick his brains out - would go that far to move wherever in the world and get coaching/staking from him to reach nosebleeds and become true crusher.
Needless to say, felt great to do 4 hours of studying today. If I had no financial pressure of any sort, would love to have days like today and just socialize with great people, grind less but study like a boss and improve a tons! Reality is different, money needs to be made every month therefore study to grind ratio has to be very different. Hope my financial reality will be resolved in 2015 and in 2016 I can finally have 100% total control over my time management regarding grind vs study ratio and life balance! Until then, fanatical year ahead of me, make sure to follow March as I will go for 200 hours grind in it minimum!
Things accomplished so far in the challenge:
Working out 13/30
Studied 32/30 hours
Coaching 12/30 sessions
Online CG grind 110.5/150 hours
Live CG grind 78/130 hours (waited tons of extra hours to start the games!!!)
Ate 3 healthy meals + 2l minimum of water 28/30 days
Robin Sharma's book "The Leader Who Had No Tittle" 0/90 pages
Drop 5kgs
CG coaching 4.5 hours
2015 Challenge
Things completed so far in the challenge:
37/300 Study hours
25/300 Coaching sessions
151/1500 Grinding hours
24/150 Work out
95.5 hours Live Poker (tons of additional hours lost in waiting for games to start!)
Here is the plan for today (13th of February)
Wake up and eat healthy + drink tons of water
Work on the game with fellow reg 1 hour minimum (CREV analysis)
Grind online 5 hours
Eat healthy lunch and dinner in between grinding
Go for some swimming and sauna (to say farewell to it
In the evening decide about live CG (grind 5+ hours or grind 3 hours and study 2 more hours!)
thanks very much ivicailiev! - some very pertinent points in there about husngs and poker in general - Cheers!
- I don't wanna hijack your blog or anything, and I'm full of flu just now ( 
), so will keep it brief - but just from what you have said there, I think you are probably already way ahead of a lot of CG 'regs' @ NL100 and below, tbh!
And with the solid work/study ethic, and especially the new connections you have made, I foresee only great success for you in this game - best of luck with the pursuit of coaching/mentoring from PG btw!
cheers!
Originally posted by sherriffatman
thanks very much ivicailiev! - some very pertinent points in there about husngs and poker in general - Cheers!
- I don't wanna hijack your blog or anything, and I'm full of flu just now (
And with the solid work/study ethic, and especially the new connections you have made, I foresee only great success for you in this game - best of luck with the pursuit of coaching/mentoring from PG btw!
cheers!
You welcome Sherriff!
I hope you get better with flu and all - health should always be the 1st priority ( I tend to go against it and don't like resting but you need to do it!)
Glad you found response useful, hopefully some other people interested in similar matters will find it interesting as well.
As far as your praise goes, thank you very much that is very kind of you. However I feel that I am very far from where I want to be and even when I get there I will set a new destination I am not interested that much what other NL100 regs are like despite the fact that I need to get reads on them and tendencies (differences between NL100 vs NL50 zoom). All that matters in my head is learning to adjust properly, to stop with projection bias as it costs me tons of money on NL50, improve and fix all my current leaks and then I will be ready to move up full time. Until that happens I will stay on NL50, study and grind hard, work on my projection bias, pay attention to reverse hand reading and regs that know and exploit it. NL100 is just another number or level that requires better level of play. Who knows, maybe I will have 5bb+/100 on NL100 3 tabling once I do switch? Why not - gotta have goals right? ♦
If anybody got to Phil Galfond so far, please put in a good word and connect me with him.
I plan to continue working with fellow reg as it is super +EV and win win situation. So even if I connected and got coaching/staking form PG I wouldn't forget about my reg friend, in fact I would suggest PG to hire him as well. Feel that could be like super successful story, imagine top pro taking 2 players coaching them for 6-12 months and they both becoming NL500+ ZOOM players with great win rates?
PG make your move :sfishg::sfishy:
Hope you feel better and look forward seeing you more on blog
Gevgelija 30 Day Challenge
Day 28 (13th February)
Ate healthy and drank tons of water
Worked with fellow reg on the game 4 hours! ! !
Grinded online CG 6 hours
*Took a shot at NL100 ZOOM!*
Hanged out with my friends I meet yesterday from Slovenia for 2 hours
Overall very productive day.
Was initially planing to grind live today but saw that there will be same live Greek music like 2 nights ago and I said no way! 2 days ago they performed in casino it was super load (my stomach was turning and I arrived after satellite just for 5 minutes to talk to poker manager). Tonight they performed again and I just choose most +EV play which was to stay in, grind 6 hours and study 2 more hours with fellow reg. Very happy I did it as today felt one of the most productive poker days when it comes to improvement.
2 hours in the morning we studied 1 post flop hand in CREV. We covered every possible street + pre flop action. We changed sizing on different streets. We changed opponents calling range on river. We changed different rivers. After all if it took the final conclusion analyzing what is most +EV play on what type of river. It was a 3 bet pot so it was somewhat easier to analyze (as ranges are tighter in 3 bet pots) but it today session was probably most +EV for both of us. We seemed to really enjoy it and it came like a perfect icing on the cake after doing Phil Galfond's video the night before with all the note taking and applying concepts.
After 2 hour studying session, I hanged with Slovenian friends for 2 hours where 1st hour we talked, 2nd they watched me play ZOOM. Through out the session I was 3 tabling and discussing every single spot with all the ranges brake down which resulted into time outs in 3-4 spots that I feel I could have made money in. Overall I crushed the session, without perfect card distribution and had around 10bb/100. Slovenian friends seemed very thrilled and excited, in 3 bet pots they seemed very impressed with all the range brake downs. Many times they told me "Awesome, I would never barrel on that turn now I understand why you did it". So overall it was awesome.
Rest of the day ate great food and drink tons of water + grinded in the room remaining hours.
After 5 hours of grinding I invited fellow reg to review all the terrible spots that I had in my last session. Was up whole day and then from 4 buy ins + ended up in 8 buy ins loss!!! So I felt like one of these things happen : 1) It is weekend and recreational players are gambling and owning my soul with shopping 2) I was running into top of the ranges when getting called 3) I kept expecting people to fold rivers and not bluff catch retarded and super light (both regs and unknowns) when the board run out was super draw heavy
We reviewed hands 1 hour and 15 minutes (about 14-15 of them) and divided them in 3 main categories : Bad beats/bad calls from opponents = 7 2)Bad plays/spew = 8 3)In between = 1
What we discovered was that main problem were my expectations and not adjusting accordingly. In basic terms Projection Bias leak. Expecting regs to fold rivers with bad 2 pairs when there is full houses , flushes and straights for example (then you see reg bluff catching with any 2 pairs which long term is super -EV play of course). So me not adjusting to NL50 expecting with my thinking process that they MUST fold those bad bluff catches when I have capped ranges more geared and heavily towards value was the main leak and problem.
As you see I listed number of hands in each area that we put. There is about 30 more lost hands that we will go through to rank them in different areas.
Hands that fall under spew could easily be treated as bad beats if I played on higher stakes! This is what my friend fellow reg kept saying today through the most of the session. "Yes but I expect them to call you down light rivers because they are bad" or things like that. And I kept saying "Why would they call xx on xxxxx , that is such a money burning play, I don't get how bad they have to be to make such a bad call ?"
Overall it was super fun session and I took great things from it that I can brake in 2 areas:
1) Stop with projection bias leak (expecting people to have same or similar thinking process like me)
2) Adjust immediately in 3-4 bet pots vs bad regs who call down light and vs gen population in general by (for time being) jamming way more for value then bluff frequency to be way more times ahead!
3) Be patient with my thinking process, improve leaks and re use it again on higher stakes where it would be more appropriate vs better players. For time being force myself to adjust vs worse players and decrease bluff shoves (with equity) and just own them with value shoves.
Finally remaining 40 minutes or so of session, I decided to take a shot at NL100 2 tabling!
It was very fun as by the end my win rate was brutal (graphs to follow). Saw about 10 players or so from NL50 there as well that I already have hands on. Immediately saw light raise and call 3 bet shove of mine turn to river (with 2 pairs, not even top 2 bvb where there was stronger 2 pairs, sets and of course straights!!!). So it felt awesome after 5-10 minutes to double up 100$ stack BVB after taking a shot on NL100.
Felt awesome that my friend and fellow reg was sweating the session as we discussed and laughed through out the grind about certain plays and tendencies.
So yes, NL100 shot went well but I am in no ways fooling myself that I belong there yet! Need to fix all the leaks I mentioned above, force and restrict myself in some spots in 3-4 bet pots vs bad players and once I stop having projection bias leak I can easily move full time to NL100 and before it take shots of course for the sake of further inspiration and motivation.
Here are the 2 graphs from today
1st session with 2 Slovenian friends live sweating me:
NL100 1st time ever
Things accomplished so far in the challenge:
Working out 13/30
Studied 36/30 hours
Coaching 12/30 sessions
Online CG grind 116.5/150 hours
Live CG grind 78/130 hours (waited tons of extra hours to start the games!!!)
Ate 3 healthy meals + 2l minimum of water 28/30 days
Robin Sharma's book "The Leader Who Had No Tittle" 0/90 pages
Drop 5kgs
CG coaching 4.5 hours
2015 Challenge
Things completed so far in the challenge:
41/300 Study hours
25/300 Coaching sessions
157/1500 Grinding hours
24/150 Work out
95.5 hours Live Poker (tons of additional hours lost in waiting for games to start!)
Here is the plan for today (14th of February) :
Wake up and eat healthy breakfast + drink tons of water
Coaching session 10-11 am
Working with fellow reg 11-12 or so (maybe starting 11:30 etc)
Get haircut and shaving (look like caveman past 2-3 days with beard growing super fast!)
Grind 1st online session until lunch 2 hours
Eat healthy lunch (3-3:30pm)
Coaching session 4-5pm
Grind 2nd online session 1.5 hours
Eat healthy dinner
Grind 3rd online session 1.5 hours
If there will be live CG with right conditions (no crazy loud greek music) then go for grind of 5 hours or so
If not,stay in, review all the hands from the day, take notes and go for another video study before bed
*Drink tons of water through out the day, especially during grinding!*
Really excited to be following your journey into the cash games and glad that you are sharing some of your struggles. Great posts this month!
Originally posted by Ramble
Really excited to be following your journey into the cash games and glad that you are sharing some of your struggles. Great posts this month!
Thank you my friend! It shows that I am human after all and have leaks + make mistakes like all the others. There is always hope for all the players out there 
Gevgelija 30 Day Challenge
Day 29 (14th February)
Ate healthy and drank tons of water
Coached 2 sessions
Worked on the game 2 hours with fellow reg (live sweats 1 hour each)
Grinded online CG 2 hours
Played 3 hours live MTT bounty 100+110 euro 
Went for haircut and shaving 
Watched Banshee latest episode
Overall productive day.
Playing MTT effected my time management hugely but I just had to go for it as it was capped to 100 players and each bounty was worth 100 euro. Field was insanely soft and stacks were 10k 25-50 starting blinds with 30 minute blind levels.
In theory all sounds awesome but in actual live play tons of bad beats. Went from 10k to 16.5k in post flop ownage. Than from Greek aggro reg to my right lost 2 hands that brought me down from 17k to like 7 or 8k. 1st hand I opened 9s8s 3 of them called flop Qs8h10s I c bet he calls from bb while rest fold. Turn 3s, he now leads out I call IP, River is a blank and he bets out I snap and he shows As6s for nut flush. 2nd hand vs same guy he opens EP+1 I call with AQo, flop is AJ7r, he bets I call, turn x he bet/call , river x bet/call. I tell him before making a call you must be super lucky to have here JJ (3 combos) AJ (6 combos) or AA (1 combo) , and he shoves AJ. Was considering after seeing tons of showdown from him weaker Ax and that's why I went for bluff catch there.
I busted out vs same fishy reg who opened MP+1 and I jammed with 9 M or so, Ks10s, he was like OK CALL and turned K9o.
Flop QJ8r, turn x , river 10. GG for r/calling 14-15bbs with K9o LOL
Studying with fellow reg was watching him grind 1 hour and him watching me do the same. Very fun times and lots of interesting spots.
Was mixing NL100 (1 table) with NL50 (2 tables) and there were some brutal spots for bluff catch. I may post 2 hands at some point. I then played 1 more hour on my own and I wasn't happy how I tackled some spots especially that I lost with TPTK in 4 bet pot when opponent had KK (was blocking A obviously).
Coaching went great. I worked with Darko and Kornel, both very hard working guys. I expect great things from both of them if they maintain strong focus at the tables and continue with their time management approach.
Things accomplished so far in the challenge:
Working out 13/30
Studied 38/30 hours
Coaching 14/30 sessions
Online CG grind 118.5/150 hours
Live CG grind 81/130 hours (waited tons of extra hours to start the games!!!)
Ate 3 healthy meals + 2l minimum of water 29/30 days
Robin Sharma's book "The Leader Who Had No Tittle" 0/90 pages
Drop 5kgs
CG coaching 4.5 hours
2015 Challenge
Things completed so far in the challenge:
43/300 Study hours
27/300 Coaching sessions
159/1500 Grinding hours
24/150 Work out
98.5 hours Live Poker (tons of additional hours lost in waiting for games to start!)
Here is the plan for today (15th of February):
Woke up and ate healthy + drank tons of water
About to coach 1 session
Work on the game with fellow reg 1 hour minimum
Grind online CG 1st session until lunch (1.5 hours or 2)
Healthy lunch and short brake
Grind online CG 2nd session (2 hours)
Short brake
Grind online CG 3rd session (1.5 hours)
Healthy dinner
Play live CG 3-4 hours depending on focus, energy and what games/tables are running.
1st Session (2 hours 3 tabling)
Super close to absolute A game playing. Could be up by 1 more buy in but lost from flop to river in 4 bet pot with AA vs KK on low flush board (opponent binked K on turn).
Very satisfied of course. Things are definitely clicking and leaks will hopefully appear with far less frequency.
Also made some brutal (exploitative) folds just because tendency on NL50 is that they will have it way more frequently. Then also made some brutal calls which I may post here in the blog just for kicks.
Overall excellent start of the day and final day of the challenge (coached 1.5 and working with reg 1 hour + grind 2 hours). About to eat healthy lunch and go for 2nd session.
Enjoy remaining of your weekend!
Gevgelija 30 Day Challenge
Day 30 (15th February)
Ate healthy and drank tons of water
Coached 1 session (1.5 hours)
Worked on the game 3 hours with fellow reg (3x1 hour)
Grinded online CG 7 hours
Talked to my family about tomorrow's travel plans
Very productive day
Coaching went great. I am very looking forward to Jernej's achievements in 2015. Mark my words, his work ethic is brutal and has huge potential to become a beast of a player. I sincerely hope he will reach SN and own the limits as well!
Working with fellow reg was focusing on live sweat sessions. 1st one was in the morning, 2nd and 3rd until recently. Would say that with 1st session played my absolute best or close to my best game; 2nd session was OKish but I had a play that I was definitely not too pleased with on NL100!; 3rd session was very bad, made lots of mistakes (when I say lots I mean like 5-6-7 which costs a tons in CG!!!) and I will review those hands for sure.
One thing is certain and that is that I have to keep working hard and do whatever it takes to remove those leaks. I am super hooked on CG and improving as poker player going with that path so I don't plan to give up on ZOOM.
What I might do in February is take some "days off" from grinding to get new tracker going (HM2), install new HUD (more advanced) and go through database analysis of mine + mark all the regs and their plays. This might take me about 1 week or so but it has to be done not only for myself but for someone else who might play those limits (ex. my brother, best friend if they ever decide to switch to CG!).
With this approach in mind I also plan to continue working with my friend and fellow reg with huge focus on new videos (have about 5 of them that I have to go through and take notes + review constantly and some even re-watch again!) and on post flop analysis in CREV. I feel that doing this for next 3 months every day 3 hours a day with fellow reg would give brutal results. I am positive that we would both be ready for NL100 easily and expect very strong win rates. So if that is what it takes to get there, I am willing to go through it!
Wanted to grind some LIVE CG tonight but there was waiting list of 3 people and they didn't want to open new table so I just went back to room to grind some more online (after fantastic dinner).
Challenge is officially finished and here is how it went:
Working out 13/30
Studied 41/30 hours
Coaching 15.5/30 sessions
Online CG grind 125.5/150 hours
Live CG grind 81/130 hours (waited tons of extra hours to start the games!!!)
Ate 3 healthy meals + 2l minimum of water 30/30 days
Robin Sharma's book "The Leader Who Had No Tittle" 0/90 pages
Drop 5kgs
*** CG coaching 4.5 hours **
Will do challenge review from home tomorrow or day after with pros and cons.
Overall I am very satisfied how everything went here and I do plan to come back again in future if I feel I am getting distracted or can't accomplish my tasks back home in Nis. This year is all about working super hard but also super smart which means eliminating any sort of distractions that can take away the focus from important goals. Don't mind watching favorite tv show or going for coffee with best friend (back home) but if minimum 2 hours of studying is not done + 1 hour of coaching and minimum 5 hours of grinding then it is pointless to stay home. So I am keeping my options open and I do plan to come back here and the return date is out there in the open for the next 1+ month(s) (future challenge).
2015 Challenge
Things completed so far in the challenge:
46/300 Study hours
28.5/300 Coaching sessions
166/1500 Grinding hours
24/150 Work out
98.5 hours Live Poker (tons of additional hours lost in waiting for games to start!)
Here is the plan for today (16th of February):
Eat healthy breakfast and drink tons of water
Do 30-45 minute HH review with fellow reg before leaving home
Leave to Nis
Spend afternoon with my brother and best friend (perhaps go for lunch if I arrive at decent time),
Consider going for coffee at my favorite coffee place (grind there 1 hour)
In the evening go to Jazz guitar duo gig to say hi to my friend and student Vladimir + perform some tunes with them
Get back home at some decent time, hit bed around 2am or so and get ready + set plan for remaining of the month
P.S. Hoping to get some grind tomorrow from home like minimum 2 hours but it would be more +EV to review hands, watch new videos take notes and start installing + transfer hands into HM2 with new advanced HUD!
Your problem at current limits in CG (reverse hand reading) and using it at best possible way - enjoy ♦
"Think the same way im thinking Barry, fold that hand" 