Hi all. New (sharper) goals since my restart in poker in january (crf. infra)

Here's the plan:
2013: 500 -> 10k on (maximum) 50 NL
2014: 10k -> 20k on (maximum)100 NL
2015: 20k -> 40k on (maximum)200 NL
2016: 40k -> 60k on (maximum)400 NL
2017: 60k -> 100k on (maximum)600 NL
2018: 100k -> 200k on (maximum)1000 NL
2019: 200k -> 500k on (maximum)2000 NL
2020: 500k -> 1m on (maximum)5000 NL

- This is just a macrostructure/bankroll plan. (I know it's a very tough/irrealistic/utopic plan but one has to have dreams in life... That's the only thing that drives me, having passions/goals and going for it)
- It can go faster, but also slower (/not). Every year I'll try to reach at least this goal.
- I will (try to) never fail in bankroll management. Will only play a stake with at least 100BI in roll.
- This leaves time for social life.
- I'll post my previous posts here since I posted them in the wrong thread.
- Will post only once in a month since I don't won't to be distracted too often.
- The feedback on the forum seems to motivate me a lot, so thank u all before hand! The one who reads this now is x% of my personal mental coach, so a part of my journey is thanks to u!

Graph from 1 jan till now...



°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°° °°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°

This month: may: some thoughts on poker and life:

- Despite my holiday (which was great! The "new collegue" that went with has already become a real good friend, we had equite some fun together..) with school from 1 till 13th of may I managed to get 1k. I played too aggressively in the end, since I'm still discovering new aggro-lines (mainly OOP) and this demands a bit of time to know what works when...

pic from "Montemarcello, Toscany, Italy"



pic from "Corniglia, Toscany, Italy"



- I ran at 12.65bb/100 which is the best win ratio of the year so far. I am very glad with that.




- Start to feel very comfortable at 50 NL, really chilly willy style emotionally. Really pleasant. Hope when I move up to 100 NL (probably in July), I'll settle there quite fast too...
- Best part of may: Told the principle of my school, that starting from September (new school year) I'll go half-time(WOOOO-HOOOOOOOOOOO FINALLYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!(cfr.infra). This makes me sooooooooooooooo happy since I'm all but a typical teacher. (Like to spend time on lots of other topics than just school too(philosophy, psychology, sports, friends, cinema, reading, POKER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
- Will try to play more hands in June, but still have to do lots of correction/exam work for school...
- Knowing that I post my graph here every month seems to motivate me to not go out of line in my game. So thank YOU all for every respons! Really!

__________________________________________________ _____________
I post the previous posts here for the ones who are interested/have time to read. (good luck)

January

Hi all,

Just posting my graph here. Hope the feedback will motivate me to go on. Have stopped playing poker two years ago (had made 10k (in 2 years) and cashed out) since I hadn't got sufficient time space for my job (teacher) and football hobby (3x a week) + girlfriend, friends etc...

But... two years later I really missed the tables and deep inside I know I always wanted to leave the monotone job-thing... Unfortunately not making enough money yet but I hope to be able to play profitably in the 1/2 games one day... (tried it before but I failed (mostly because it's quite hard to combine a full time job with a high level of poker).



About the graph: I made a lot of spewy all-ins preflop . I think that's the main reason why it doesn't go uphill. Hope to change this in february... Also you see that my red line goes down fastly. This is because I started with 13 tables (I have 2 big screens) but after going back to 9 tables the red line (luckily) went up again. So now I play 9 tables on the left with HEM on the right, which seems superb.

So... every first day of the month I'll come here and post my graph... Hope to make 5k some day so I can quit work... The most difficult thing for me is combining poker with a normal life. It easily takes you away to another lonely (since nobody else around me plays it) world (I start to play many hour sessions and in that way other important domains start to fail) imo.. However, there's nothing I'ld like to do more than just grinding instead of doing my day time job... Hope there is more cash to come... (The difficult thing is that my salary is big (1950€) so a lot to give up...

Kind regards, Rikkorov

Hope to see you back at february, 30th

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February

part 2

Hi, as I posted last month, I was gonna try to post my graph and thoughts every month hoping this can motivate me for the month to come...

As I had rebegun playing in january and was very humble, I noticed this month that my biggest enemy - my ego- was already back there. Over 25k hands this month I played 25/21 w 10%3b. This is just a bit too much. There were lots of situations where I shove JJ/QQ against QQ/KK/AA. Apparently my shuv range is still too big, even when I open up. Hope to fix this in march.




When you look at my graph you ccan see three parts:

part 1 (1-13.5k hands) : just playing bad, autoroboting, overestimating myself, taking poker too easy

part 2 : the big jump in the middle: I hate to say this but I was on tilt:s. Opening up a table of 600 NL. Luckily managed to stack the opp off w a better boat...
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part 3 (13.5k till end): I realised I was again falling in old mistakes, so I made some reads. Read some parts of Verneer's new book on bankroll, and certainly reread an ancient treasure (Ryan Fee's bible of how to play 6 max: it's written a long while ago but it gave my thought process the twitch I needed). Autoroboting stopped, my red line started to go up, I was again enjoying every hand and thinking way deeper. I managed to win steadily the last days and hope to continue this way in march.

Balance for the month cash game online: €449 without and €724 with rakeback.

Need to add 2 things:

1.Was 3rd in a tourney for €250



2. Lost €200 in the casino in BXL w AQs<66.

So final balance for feb: €775

The target for march is 1k. Hope to have a graph that's more steady.


Thanks for reading, hope march will go better. Teaching in school is really torturing my brain. Hope next months will prove there's a way out.

Kind regards, Rikke


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March

Hi there, continuing my reports since I feel it motivates me to go on.

March was a very good month:

- I won €2.5k, second best month ever I think.
- I managed to get in 55k hands, which is two times more than january and february. (mainly due to exams in my school => less hours of teaching)
- I ran really well (€560 +EV) which certainly helped me to avoid tilting.
- My game level went well up as I was able to avoid the mistakes I made in January and February (mainly opening and shuving too much). I tightened up my game and paradoxically this permitted me to get my red line up (since I think villains believed my bluffs way more).
- I was humble when I needed to.
- I applied Bankroll Management quite strictly. I will only play a stake now when I have 100 BI to play it. (I put this directive in the program Tilt Breaker, so till end april I can't open tables with a bib blind any higher than €0.5.
- The balance between poker and real life was quite good. Played hard and relaxed "hard" (playing COD, black ops2, playing chess, playing football (finally winning (also +EV since I gain €100/win)), some good parties with friends and collegues, really good bond with my gf...)
- Reading lot of blogs in the meantime, following "gripsed"'s channel on utube, reading verneer etc...
- Girlfriend finally starts to realise that I'm not the guy who will work "normally" forever, and finally seems to start supporting poker(maybe because she starts to see repetitive positive graphs??).
- Raked 556
- Not even close to get tilted, even not when I lose 2 BI. (probably cause I know I've run really well last weeks, so let's not cheer to fastly).
- Glad to have a new BTN tactic working(2x bb on btn which allows me to call three bets IP more, since pot staus relatively small; also this allows me to open like 55% on btn which I like a lot cause I'm very tight UTG (really hate playing OOP))
- Feeling I have departed for the long road, maybe a voyage through life. No time haste, just teaking it easy. This gives me a lot af internal peace, and the hope of liberty, hopefully, one day..


Anyway, thanks for reading, and good luck to you all.

Here some graphs:



************************************************** *******
April

So... posting already now on the 26th instead of at the end of the may, because I won't be playing poker for 2 entire weeks now. From 1 till 12 may I will be in Italy with school (Tuscany) and won't be able to play. Since I'm trying to prepare this voyage mentally I feel like playing right before such a long trip would kill my brain emotionally and socially. Next days I will read some books in Italian (I joined the Italian trip team since I studied roman languages and I speak Italian quite ok) and prepare my absence in school by making some tasks and tests for the pupils I leave behind.

We will visit Siena, Firenze, Pisa, Verona, Cinque Terre (La Spezia) and finally Venezia. On wednesday the 8th the other 2 teachers and the pupils will go back to Belgium and my 2 "best" collegues will come to Italy to join me for 4 days and we will travel by car from Venezia to the west coast to visit Carrara and the neighbourhood villages. One of my collegues sculptures near Carrara (Torano) every year during two weeks, so he's gonna guide us through the environment (my collegue knows lots of Italians there so this should be lots of fun (and wine). So we don't do Tirreno-Adriatico as the cyclists do, but Adriatico-Tirreno (and by car). We'll visit Lucca too, and assist to a Puccini opera in the city. On sunday the 12th we take the plane back from Pisa.

On 1 hand I'm off course happy to do this trip with the pupils, on the other hand I know I'm gonna miss my gf, the tables and the relaxing being home. I know this voyage is quite wonderful, certainly the last days with my two collegues (friends) will be crazy, but the first 8 days will still feel like working since the pupils have to merit points by explaining some monuments and buildings as they study "tourism".

For what poker is concerned, things go very well! I had my 2nd consecutive month where I earned more money than in my own job (€2k). I played well, ran 10 Bi above EV and took +- €2.4k. This really makes me happy since it confirms that I beat 50 NL on a regular basis. Here the graph for april:

Bankroll is at 7.4k now. (Started with 0.5k in january) Will move up when i have 100 BI for 0.5/1, hopefully july.

I ran above EV but I really felt (between 20k and 35k hands) I was "turned" and certainly "rivered" so much. It was really crazy. And when half ur stack is in ur often just pot committed even when u feel ur behind...



As u see my red line goes up and I'm so happy about it. Unfortunately you see that between 20k and 35k hands my blue line drops too :s. I was just playing too aggressively during this period, opening and barreling like a maniac trying to push vilains of top pair and "no nut holdings". Managed to fix this (double and triple barreling less) after 35k hands to finish with a nice steep jump.

This month I finally re-understood i shouldn't touch my preflop ranges too much, and I re-learned much about timing. (when to hit the throttle with AK/AQ/AJ, when to hit the brakes). I feel like in general one talks way too little about timing in books and on forums. Imo sometimes a premium hand is worse than 72o, u should try too feel when...

Here the graph of the separate sessions for this month (some sessions opening way too much => losing):




Mentally my days are quite hard.

Having really wonderful days at home, with gf, with friends and collegues, but the pupils at school still kill my brain since they are so opposite to my calm respectuous nature. It's almost life importance I beat the game and continue to move up.

When I'll be back from the Italy trip I plan to ask the principle to take 12hrs instead of 22hrs (might not seem much but as I said my brain dies when I'm too much at school) at school next year. Whilst doing only 12/22=+-54% of the work I'll earn 70% of money and my happiness barometer will go from 30 to 80 I think. Might also still consider to change jobs since I feel working with youngsters who simply aren't wanting to learn (this not being their fault) is so demoralizing...

Ty for reading and the support.

Hope the Italy trip won't kill my skills and hope to hit the tables hardly when I'll be back.

Grtz, Rikkorov

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Thanks for reading

how can this not have a reply?
gj dude, especially i like ur longterm approach.
Iam thinking bout that too right now, but more like 10years/earn money for a house.
So around 30k a year and id be fine.

gl to you and keep going!

Ty NeoK! Gl to you too. If u'll start a thread, I'll be your first supporter and follower!

I like the long term approach too. Short-term approaches are not significant and don't leave lots of space for other domains in life...

glgl, u crush it!
take shots at nl100 imo

Epic thread Rikke, subbed instantly when I knew it was you !

GL with your journey (albeit a long one!)

Domien

If you crush u can make it before! gl

Ty i3budlight! No, I failed hardly 2 times in the past w bad bankroll management (taking desastrous shots). I really have only 1 fear, that's tilting because of not being able to cope with the big money pots...

Thanks for the support though.

Wow! What a surprise to see u here! I knew u were active at a belgian pokersite (pokerclub?) but didn't know u visit twoplustwo. Anyway, very nice to see you here! Is there a way I can support/follow you too? What stakes are u playing on currently? Bankroll? How is work/life/poker balance?

Greetz and thanks for subbing! Feel free to give feedback if u want...

And indeed, the journey will be long, but it's not about arriving there first but more about enjoying the journey in itsself. And therefore time and space are the clue.

Hmm, maybe. This is just a macrostructure that allows freedom ...

Gonna (try to!) do it the slow and steady way, not ever breaking bankroll rules, and staying involved in social and professional life.

Grtz, Rikkorov

Thread needs update !

Thx for the interest, but as I stated before, I'll only "update" the first of every month!

I can already reveal the poker Gods didn't appreciate my sacrifices this month...

good luck, and next time you tilt just walk away from ur computer, don't open a 3/6 table

keep going... gl

June



Well... I would have liked to continue showing positive things here but unfortunately june was brutal. I'm gonna tell you why, gonna exagerate a bit, but at least it's how I feel about this month... I know that probably I should have played less volume and more quality but I tried to make a promotion on the site... June round-up:
- I lost €620
- Played 50 k hands
- Running €1153 under EV. (23 BI)
- Missing "every flop"
- Getting crushed by the board "all the time"
- Playing too aggro in the beginning, overcompensating and too passive in the end. (watch redline)
- The combination of heat (I poker under a roof) and a bad sleeping pattern made me autoroboting quite much (also trying to make the site promotion, for which I had to play as much days as possible while getting 200VIP points (=1h play)). I was often tired, stressed (exams at school etc), far from ideal.
- Getting QQ /KK /AK and getting beat all the time preflop by KK/AA/AK.
- Missing numerous 3b flops w AK/AQ and opp not folding.
- Playing D/E game because of previous reasons (a long small continuous tilt)
- Lucky to not be at 0.5/1 yet.
- It's a pain in the ass to not have stats anymore at the anonymous tables. I'm a multitabler so this hurts me a lot.

My bad play in june consisted in:
- calling 3bets too much
- squeezing too much and not being believed while barreling
- 4betting too much
- flop aggression is too low
- calling too much with draws on the turn
- bluffing the river too much
- opening connectors way too often
- 3 betting low SC's too much
- floating naked boards too much
- double barreling too much
- cold call too much w a2s-a9s
- ...

Gonna try to fix all this in july...

Biggest losing hand...



All bad news, but the good news is:

2 months of spare time now! Gonna try to play 1hr sessions. (I analysed my game and saw my winrate drops a lot after 1hr play). Also I know human beings are only able to concentrate 100% for 50 minutes. Furthermore I know your brain doesn't work well when being dehydrated. The summer is here so I have to pay attention to drink enough.

This seems a huge month for me, and I don't want to spoil it. I'm gonna try hard and I hope the poker gods will appreciate my sacrifices this month.

Football starts on the 9 th of july so this should relax me a lot too.

Had a wonderful month with my pupils and collegues though in june. This was certainly +EV.

Thanks for reading and for feedback. Good luck to you all.

Rikkorov

Hey Rikkorov, all the best of luck.

I'm from Belgium too, and I think I know Domien ! (I'm in a Skype group with him, DaVitsche, Chickenlal, etc..)

Sick goals nice results in 2013 already ! Keep it up

As I'm currently enjoying my holiday in Side, Turkey, next update will follow the 9th of august, when I'll be back in Belgium where my computer is at.

I can already say July was a good month. Took +-1.4k I think and played 30k hands. More details will follow.

Kind regards, Rikkorov

Just back since my holiday in Turkey, so time for an update.

Things went well again in july after I tightened my preflop range.

Won €1.697 w rakeback.
Won €1.291 wo rakeback
Ran well, €340 above EV.
Overall I won 9k since I started.




I will play on 50NL till I have 110 BI for 100NL, so I have a little buffer to start with.

The 10 days in Turkey were really good to free my mind. Read a lot of random stuff (also some legendary 5stars 2+2 threads I hadn't ever read before(once ended up crying in tears with the thread about the yellow teef man :-D)).

Ready to grind some hours in august.

Cheers, Rikkorov

wp

Almost 1% cleared !

Hey,nice too see u crushing too.I play on prima(unibet) aswell ;D
Gl with ur goals,but i think 110BI for shotting nl100 is very overrolled lol,there are lots of fishes atm there.
Btw how do u manage to play the anon tables now,since HM2 isnt working there any longer?

Lol, yes, but I prefer level 1 almost cleared

Thx for letting me know there are lots of fishies coming. I know it's a little bit overrolled, but I have failed so badly in the past, and I feel it's a conditio sine qua non to be able to play my a-game in bad times.

I play the anon tables without HUD in very abc style. In the beginning when the HUD was eliminated, I noticed that playing a laggy style without HUD (when multitabling) is just not profitable. I was all over the place, unable to read my opps who were fighting back. So now I play very tight and when opps fight back I know much more where I'm at. It's true it's not optimal though, but there are not many "non-anon" tables around, so no much choice.

Thx for the reaction, good luck

No prob.Seems like a good enough strategy to win fishes money$ ,huh?At 50nl 95% of the players are clueless anyways
How many tbls do u play

Nice thread, good luck from a fellow Belgian

Yes, ABC is the nuts at 50 NL. I play 12 tables, tiled.

Thx man, great nickname u have there;-)

Is there still a lot of money to be made on regular tables?
(I only play Zoom)

Well, I only play anonymous tables. I feel like 50 NL is quite easy yes. There are quite a lot sports betters around I think who quickly jump in and spew their cash. The regs are ok, but I can't say they are good. They play in a very predictible way.