Bumhunting my way to a house. - Bankroll Challenge

Thanks Delrate,

Unfortunately I didn't. Had an idiotic week in terms of mental game and life strategy.

I made ~$800 on Monday and decided to go for the 2nd-level VIP freeroll. This was a mistake. It was impossible to pull that volume, while working, reviewing hands, learning Chinese and maintaining a healthy life. I ran bad and tilted away that and a little more, to finish the week with a $117 loss.

I like to look at my week and ask: If I did this every week, how would my life be? This week, grinding too much, barely studying, neglecting real life, it's not the right path.
These are the patterns I fell into when I was younger and trying to "go pro" - I hope I can reverse course on this now.

Week 4:
15 hours including 4 tournaments, and 2 VIP freerolls
Profit: -$117
Roll: $6292
Goal: $50,000

Hope things will turn around this Week, back on the horse

Thanks, actually I had a dream last night that I was riding my old horse again. Literally.

Maybe it's a sign, synchronicity.

Hey, I had my biggest winning week so far. Unfortunately bitcoin really shat it's pants the last couple of weeks. It's down 40% and all the stakes I play are down with it.

I got lucky by selling a chunk just before the crash, but it still stung. Now I'm debating selling or buying more. Dunno, it adds a-whole-nother level to BRM. It's also killed traffic on my site so... dunno, could be tough times ahead.

I bought gold status here, and watched a great video last week on bluff-catching by w34z3l. I was hoping to read a lot of stuff on preflop play too, but the articles on here are so dated. I guess I'll have to find a video or keep figuring it out myself.

Can anyone recommend a good resource for preflop play (particularly HU)?

I've only got a week and a half left at my English Teaching job! I've been here for a year, a marathon effort for me to work in one place. Teaching has been a huge adjustment for my reserved personality, I think it's been good for me overall. As much as I sometimes hate working (and people), I'm generally happier and healthier when I get out of the house every day.

I might not play a lot over the next couple of weeks. We need to prepare for our wedding and moving out of our apartment (Legally we're already married, but haven't had the ceremony yet).

After the wedding we're going to be travelling around China for a couple of months, I'm really looking forward to that. Planning to read a lot of books, study more about business, improve my Chinese and relax and see the sights.

Anyone here traveled much in China?

This week's results (NZD)

Hours: 9.5 (including a couple of VIP freerolls, which made up a decent chunk of my winnings this week)
Profit: $883
Roll: $7175
Goal: $50,000

Nice to see You’re back in Black. Good luck with the second wedding

Thanks delrate.

Time for Tilt

A lot of players tilt from losing flips or getting sucked out on. That stuff doesn't seem to tilt me much at all. Although I don't love it either.

What really tilts me is folding. The flop comes bad and you have to ch/f, or you cbet then ch/f the turn. I had one of those sessions yesterday. It felt like 3 hours of straight folding. I definitely tilted a bit by the end.

I think it's the uncertainty, villain will very often have nothing too, and I just will never know. I feel like I'm gifting them the pot. I don't know, it's something I need to work on properly and find a way to inject logic.

In the mean time, I've switched up my meditation to focus on cultivating patience. It's really good so far. I feel much better already, after just a couple of sessions.

It's been a few years since I've read a meditation book, but I might try to find one based around patience. I feel like it'd be really +EV.

This is one of my favourite aspects of poker. If your mentality is weak in any way. Poker will rip it open and force you to work on it.

Anyway, I'll post if I find a good one.

Have fun at the tables.

Seems like playing my highest stakes HU vs regs is probably my biggest leak right now. In theory it should be easy to fix though.

I've pretty much finished work, just a couple of half-days to go. I dunno if it was that or my wife's NZ visa getting approved, but I slept so well this week. Very happy days. Long may it continue.

I did lose a little at poker. I'll take it, on balance it was a very good week.

Week 6

Hours: 11.25 (mostly cash games)
Profit: -$163
Roll: $7012
Goal: $50,000

A good Week in life is always good, no matter the pokerresults :-)

Skipped a week updating because of my wedding, which was awesome.

I also didn't really play much. Just 1 brutal session.

Can't really say much about poker, other than that I've been thinking about how the 80/20 rule definitely applies. I think that's why my hourly was so strong before, just playing soft games and tourneys with overlay. But now it's dropped down into the $30s.

My play drops hard after a few hours too. Need to find a way to up my hours without cutting my hourly. Maybe by playing across a couple more sites.

Weeks 7&8

Hours: 4.5
Profit: -$298
Roll: $6714
Goal: $50,000

Congrats with the wedding, awesome news. GL in Real life and at the tables

Late and short update this week, given that it's Xmas.

I've been just playing the odd hand on my phone, which isn't ideal. Tables have been soft af, but I've been running pretty bad.

Week 9

Hours: ~5
Profit: -$415
Roll: $6299
Goal: $50,000

Hey, it's December 31st 2018. Who would've thought I'd be this old. Jesus!

My flight back to NZ is tonight at midnight, my wife's got a really bad cold so we're sitting in the hotel lobby just chillin'. It's been a crazy year in Shanghai, certainly a challenge. Hopefully I've learned something.

I wanna do a New year's resolution post soon, but for now I'll just do my weekly update and leave it at that.

Week 10

Hours: ~5
Profit: $178
Roll: $6477
Goal: $50,000

Nice to have a week in the green

Poker and Resolutions for 2019

Hi everyone.

These are my poker related resolutions for 2019.

- Sleep enough! - Naps when needed, 8 hours a night. I love sleeping but sometimes it takes a back seat.
- Meditate 300 days - Going through The Mind Illuminated, which is a dope book so far
- Complete this challenge by earning $50k
- Consistently work on my game - 2 hours a week
- Play 2 big live mtts.

The last 10 days has been pretty kind to me on the tables. And I started a trial of pokersnowie today, so we'll see how that goes.

Good luck!

Hello,

I have started a new year and things have finally settled down enough for me to update the blog.

This week I got balls deep into pokersnowie, trying to do some tests and training to see how I stack up compared to GTO play.

There's a couple of points I'd like to note:

1. Firstly, It gave me the confidence that I am actually playing a fairly solid game, which is nice. But I do have a few things to work on.
2. I need to work on my bet sizing: This an obviously weak area of my game.
3. It's good to have the ability to approximate GTO strategy, but I don't believe GTO play is what I should be aiming for at all. In fact, I would go as far to say it seems like a lazy way to study and play. I really should be taking notes and exploiting players as much as I possibly can.
4. GTO play seems to give you excuses to do things like calling on the river against fish who never bluff. It's for 12 table grinders, it's not for me.

This weeks results:

It was a slightly annoying week, it seemed like the tables were fishy enough, but I had no choice but to fold a lot of mid-strength hands. It seemed like I missed a lot of flops and couldn't proceed to any big pots. Overall the losses were pretty small, so that's ok, and I'm getting close to unlocking about $250 rakeback, which will be nice.

Week 11 and 12

Hours: 10
Profit: -$35
Roll: $6442
Goal: $50,000

Remember to have fun.

Brad

I played some higher stakes yesterday, questionable BRM, but fishy table.

Here the most difficult hand.
Villain is a reg, who I have played HU. Overall I think he's a bit too loose, especially preflop. I'd only play him HU at lower stakes, because he seems decent post, is really aggressive and often bets pot or over, with both bluffs and for value.

We're 6 handed, I'd let my stack drop to 80bb, because I keep most of my roll off-site and I was running short (as I said questionable BRM).

I'm in CO with K♣:K♦:, Villain is in bb

I open raise to 3bb, only bb calls.

Flop 6.5bb
2♠:A♥:9♦:

bb checks, I check behind

Turn 6.5bb
2♠:A♥:9♦:8♠:
bb bets 6.5bb
I call

River 19.5bb
2♠:A♥:9♦:8♠:K♠:
bb checks
I bet 13bb
bb raises 60bb

What do you think? I always have this fear that I'm getting run over by players like this, but I'm not sure whether it's rational.

can he never thin raise worse here (such as 99, 22)?
i think i end up calling this one, though we also have A:s X:s to bet/continue the river with, of course.

I dunno, I feel that a check raise is a bit thin with sets when the flush completes. Would've expected him to just continue betting with those.

I was thinking a straight out bluff is more likely. My line looks quite weak.

I think it's probably a call.

Edit: Actually rethinking that, bluffs should probably just barrel here.

I dunno, it's a close spot

An up and down week this week, but in the end it was up.

Lined up a really good job too, starting next week. It's a combo of building, landscaping an engineering. I'm hoping it'll be good.

Now one more week of grinding and getting organised before I start.

Week 13

Hours: 9
Profit: $403 (including $250 rakeback)
Roll: $6845
Goal: $50,000

Congrats with the new job and the slighty north going graph

Long time no update.

I've just been really busy, I've been losing the odd time I play too, which has taken my motivation from posting results here.
I will do a full recap one rainy weekend though.

For now, here's a hand.

Playing~200NL villain is a reg who seems to 3b every time I have a bottom of my range hand. I think a decent player.

I'm BU with Q♦:9♦:, villain is in sb.

I minraise and call his 8bb 3b. (bb folds in there)

Flop 16.5bb Q♠:9♠:2♠:

Villain bets 8.5bb, I call.

Turn 33.5bb Q♠:9♠:2♠:2♣:

Villain checks, I bet 22bb, villain shoves 99bb

I tank/call.

Would you play it differently? The call is probably bad right? How many people pull the trigger with A♠:X or something like K♠:Q there? Would you consider ever raising the flop? Could it be a fold pre vs a high frequency 3better? Should I have left the table 2 hands earlier?