It's always a bumpy ride, but sometimes the wild bumpy rides are a lot of fun.

or not...
Spoiler

It's always a bumpy ride, but sometimes the wild bumpy rides are a lot of fun.

or not...


Pre-Flop: (0.03, 6 players) Hero is BTN Q♥: Q♣:
UTG calls $0.02, 2 folds, Hero raises to $0.08, SB goes all-in $1.98, 1 fold, UTG goes all-in $0.45, Hero calls $1.90
Flop: J♠: 4♠: 9♣: ($4.45, 3 players), 2 all-in
Turn: 7♥: ($4.45, 3), 2 all-in
River: 8♣: ($4.45, 3), 2 all-in
Final Pot: $4.45
Hero shows a pair of Queens
Q♥: Q♣:
SB shows a straight, Seven to Jack
T♦: T♠:
UTG shows a pair of Nines
Q♦: 9♦:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pre-Flop: (0.03, 5 players) Hero is UTG A♦: A♣:
Hero raises to $0.05, CO raises to $0.18, 2 folds, BB raises to $0.31, Hero goes all-in $2.03, CO folds, BB calls $1.72
Flop: J♦: 9♦: Q♥: ($4.25, 2 players), 1 all-in
Turn: 3♥: ($4.25, 2), 1 all-in
River: 4♦: ($4.25, 2), 1 all-in
Final Pot: $4.25
BB shows three of a kind, Jacks
J♥: J♠:
Hero shows a pair of Aces
A♦: A♣:
Originally posted by Fredjen
Hi
Following! From where are you in Belgium?
Bachten de kupe
Thats the area that is closed in by the north sea, french border and the river 'Ijzer' in the Far West of Flanders
Running some buyins below EV. It's not easy no to whine about it ![]()
But this video this morning made me feel better about it
Originally posted by H0witzer
Thx VP. This is some brilliant shizzle![]()
np — there is an entire channel of this stuff.
I don't know if there's any new content though.
New approach for my bankroll challenge. I deposited some extra money to be rolled for 10NL. I don't have the stomach to play 2NL.
Howitzers 1K challenge
Update week 4
Start + Goal: From $220 to $1K
Hands played this week: 6.698 hands
Stakes: 10NL
Week result: $5,81
Current bankroll:$225,43
That yellow line ![]()

I got an interesting mail today from Sky Matsuhashi. I once opted in to get some free PDF and now i get a lot of mails to persuade me to enter his pokerschool ![]()
Today: Calling in the BB with T7s
The other day, I called in the BB versus a cutoff 3bb open-raise with T7s... and got into a world of hurt. I tagged the hand for review and I’m going to share my preflop findings with you.
First off, many players call with “pretty” hands like this in hopes of flopping 2 pair, a straight or a flush. But, Flopzilla Pro shows us it only hits these incredibly strong hands less than 5% of the time (almost 1 out of every 20 flops):
What about hitting top pair or better? That’s more frequent at 13.6% of the time (around 1 out of every 8):
Given this, what will you do on most flops? You’ll check-fold around 86% of the time unless you want to stick around with weaker pairs. Is that worth giving your opponent Bread & Butter by calling 2bb’s to defend with T7s? No way, Jose.
But, some of you may be thinking, “Hey, I could flop a straight or flush draw also! Isn’t that worth something?”
It might be. A hand like T7s hits the best draws, the open-ended straight draw or flush draw, about 15% of the time:
So, when you hit one of these draws, you might be able to stay in. But here’s the rub: Most cbettors won’t give you the right price to check-call on a draw.
A flopped flush draw only has 9 outs to hit on the turn. Using the x2 rule to estimate the chances of hitting a flush on the turn, it’s only 18%. If the pot is $3 and your opponent only bets 1/3 pot at $1, you’re still overpaying for your draw. Calling $1 to win the total pot of $5 means you need to hit 20% of the time [$1/$5]. You’re only hitting 18%... not good enough.Most of your opponents cbet ½ pot or greater, right? So, they’re almost never giving you the right price to call with your draw.
Now, you might also say, “With my draw, I can get aggressive and check-raise bluff.”
Sure, you could get aggressive. However, are you willing to?
Most players aren’t willing to get aggressive with their draws. They’d prefer to “minimize the risk” and make overpriced calls or just fold.Lesson:
If you’re not willing to get aggressive when you flop good draws with hands like T7s, and you’re just relying on hitting a strong hand on the flop or check-calling with draws, these “pretty” hands are NOT profitable to call with.2 Calling Tips:
1) Before calling preflop, recite the flop situation you’ll be in. “By calling here in the BB, I’m handing my opponent Bread & Butter. I’ll be out of position on the flop against an aggressive cbettor with a tough-to-play T7s.” If it sounds like a losing situation, just fold.
2) Before calling preflop, remember that your call voluntarily puts you into a pot against a specific player. Look at his HUD stats and consider what you know about him. Are there any post-flop weaknesses you can exploit? What’s the best way to win the hand if you don’t hit a strong pair or draw?
1 Action Step:
Before defending either blind in your next play session, recite the flop situation you’re voluntarily about to enter. Sounds profitable? Make the call. Sounds like a tough spot? Just fold. Use those chips you would’ve called with to instead raise when you’re in late position.
That is a real eye-opener!
Thanks for posting that.
I wonder if Equilab can do a similar analysis?
Another interesting email from Sky. We all know we have to target the fish. But some data to support the concept behind it never hurts.
The key idea behind targeting fish for lifelong profits is to play tighter ranges than they do.
In the example range versus range analysis below, you open-raise in the cutoff with the 20% range on the left. Your fishy opponent defends his BB with the 30% on the right:
You have about 55.5% equity, and he only has 44.5%. What does this mean?You have an 11% preflop equity edge! That means that over millions of random flops, you’ll win 11% of the time more often than they will (assuming you have good post-flop skills).
Let’s look at these two ranges in another way: how they interact with random flops. This will give you better understanding of why the tighter open-raising range has such an equity edge.
Check out the group output pie chart for the 20% open-raising range:
The 20% range above hits the average flop with:
Top pair or better 27% of the time (rounded).
Weaker pairs 24% of the time.
Open-ended straight draws or flush draws 5.4% of the time.
Ace-high or no made hand 43% of the time.
Contrast this with the 30% caller’s range:
This fishy 30% calling range hits the average flop with:
Top pair or better 21% of the time (rounded).
Weaker pairs 21% of the time.
Open-ended straight draws or flush draws 5.3% of the time.
Ace-high or no made hand 53% of the time.
Our tighter open-raising range hits the best hands way more often, solid draws more often and completely whiffs the flop less often. That’s where our 11% equity edge comes from.
Lesson: Play tighter ranges than your fishy opponents do. You’ll hit random flops harder than they do, and your huge equity edge is a disadvantage they’ll have a hard time overcoming.
Originally posted by H0witzer
You have an 11% preflop equity edge! That means that over millions of random flops, you’ll win 11% of the time more often than they will (assuming you have good post-flop skills).
At PokerStars I've played 10 million hands.
Rather few of them NLHE though.
Have you seen the poker variance calculator?
Head to https://www.primedope.com/poker-variance-calculator/ and play with the numbers a bit.
It is a real eye-opener and head-shaker and some other random body part mover. As the page opens you see several hundred 100K hand runs for a hypothetical player with a 10BB/100 winrate. How can you lose?
Originally posted by VorpalF2F
Originally posted by H0witzer
You have an 11% preflop equity edge! That means that over millions of random flops, you’ll win 11% of the time more often than they will (assuming you have good post-flop skills).At PokerStars I've played 10 million hands.
Rather few of them NLHE though.
Have you seen the poker variance calculator?
Head to https://www.primedope.com/poker-variance-calculator/ and play with the numbers a bit.
It is a real eye-opener and head-shaker and some other random body part mover. As the page opens you see several hundred 100K hand runs for a hypothetical player with a 10BB/100 winrate. How can you lose?
I ran it for short deck a while ago ... fastest I ever closed a site
. But in general I see to much focus on running compared to EV and not talking about hands/flops/concepts/etc. To be fair I'm also guilty and know it's not easy to post something and say 'I have no clue about this situation, please help me...'
Originally posted by VorpalF2F
Originally posted by H0witzer
You have an 11% preflop equity edge! That means that over millions of random flops, you’ll win 11% of the time more often than they will (assuming you have good post-flop skills).At PokerStars I've played 10 million hands.
Rather few of them NLHE though.
Have you seen the poker variance calculator?
Head to https://www.primedope.com/poker-variance-calculator/ and play with the numbers a bit.
It is a real eye-opener and head-shaker and some other random body part mover. As the page opens you see several hundred 100K hand runs for a hypothetical player with a 10BB/100 winrate. How can you lose?
8-o8-o
I only want happy thoughts I won't look again at the calculator.
Welcome to Pokerstrategy, ![]()
I just finished reading your blog from to top. I wish you good luck.
I'm not going to play for a week and do some studying instead. I purchased Peter Clarke's 'From The Ground Up' course on runitonce 2 weeks ago. I'm half way through at the moment. With the purchase I also have access to all their essential videos on the website for a month. Still have access for 14 days so will make an effort to view as much as possible.
I will regularly update my blog with the study content i have watched.
This evening I did 8 topics from the course 'FTGO' by Peter Clarke
Concepts
Begin to learn and apply advanced poker concepts to improve your strategy.
Introduction to Combos
Bet Sizing Special
Introduction to Blockers
Pyramidal Defense
Preflop Level 2
Taking our preflop play to a more advanced level.
Polar vs Linear 3-betting
Mixed 3-betting
Facing 3-bets - The 50:50 Strategy
4-betting Polar