I'm bored and will be playing all day, so let's GOOGOGOOGOGOOGOGOOGOGO

Your story?

Stakes? Number of tables? Playing style?

Poker/Life?

Poker: Started playing poker when I was about 19 or so in college (I'm 25 now). Started online on Pacific about 5 years ago or so, played micro stakes limit. Didn't do very well. Moved to FTP in 2004, started with HU SNGs. Poor BR management lead to bustoville many many times, even though I had a pretty big edge in those games. I finally began to have some success when I moved to low stakes 6max, grinded it up playing like 40/35. The imminent downswing crushed me and I had to re-evaluate. In February of 2007 I won FTP's IronMan competition. I won the Gold Freeroll, my good buddy USCPhildo (check out officialpokerrankings.com to see what a beast that kid is) won the Iron. We played HU in the first round of the shootout where my QQ > AK which was an awesome way for us to get it AI since it sort of represented the truth of that match which was that neither really had an edge. I sucked out KQ > AK on a K high flop to go to the next step where you play the pros. Beat Marco Traniello, lost to Paul Sexton on a nasty suckout, and lost to Keith Sexton, but I made 14k or so in that deal. I took out a bunch of money, left 5k on and played 1/2 6m. I went online busto after having a BR of about 22k (I dropped 4k at 1/2). I withdrew my remaining 1100 and took a few months off. In march or April I threw 1100 back on the site, ran it up for a while, found 600 extra in ePassporte and went on to build the BR I have now from that.

Life: Born in Glendale, CA, grew up in Pasadena, moved to Sacramento when I was about 6. I consider Sacramento my home town. I have a 6 year old son who is just about the most awesome thing ever.

GOD LJ, I wanted this in like 6 months when i've delved into HU cash more, but OK, please give like a COMPLETE and in-depth story, what limits you started with, what steps you took to learn, how much you studied / played at each step of your progression, when you decided to go pro, what made the decision, etc, etc.

-Primo

Currently I'm playing 3/6 and 5/10 after a bit of a DS. I'm a winner at 10/20 over a pretty small sample. I've played as high as 25/50 but got owned there. I've played up to 6 tables HU, but I prefer 4.

It's very hard to quantify or typify playstyles HU. I think I have a solid, adaptive game and I like to apply a lot of pressure. I'm usually pretty conscious of my image at the table.

Can you talk a bit about your bankroll management strategies? How much you keep online in relation to your limits at any one time. Also what you do with the money that you cash out, do you spent alot, invest(If so what kind of investments), save, contiunuously build your BR for higher limits, etc.

Also, is there a point or a limit where you feel you can make a great living for yourself and will stop and play almost entirely at or around that limit, or will you always be trying to move up and beat higher games (assuming you can) until you get to the very top?

I went over the basics a few posts above, if there's anything I didn't answer feel free to ask.

When I started on FTP I'd always start off with like 50-100 bucks and play $5 SNGs. If I ran bad I'd sometimes Martingale (NOT recommended). It was just such a boring grind. I played the 10s once I got passed $120, then 20s once I got passed 250. Then I'd go as high as the 50s after 500 with random shots at 100s. You probably notice how that's a pretty bad plan.

Then I started playing 6max. 25NL, then 50nl. I did really well in both. 100nl 6m killed me. After getting owned I started back with full ring, did 25nl, then 50nl, then 100nl. I had a lot of success there just before the IronMan and ended up playing 100nl 6max, where I had some success as well.

As for learning I mostly frequented the forums. I learned a lot of the basics here, if there was something I didn't understand I'd try to make sure I understood it. Pretty soon I learned that I was my own worst enemy when it came to learning. I'd learn the lessons, but not apply them to my game. I kept making the same mistakes over and over. HU was my game naturally, so I was a winner right off the bat when I moved to HU NL cash. I started at the 100 level and was a 7PTBB winner over a pretty decent sample. Then I noticed there was a few spots I was lost and that I was autopiloting a lot. I forced myself to 1 table and think about EVERY decision. I did this for thousands and thousands of hands trying to reinforce discipline. I did stupid stuff around my house like forcing myself to make my bed just to build the discipline I was lacking. All of this lead to some monumental gains in my game.

In November of 2006 I had taken a job with an IT company doing IT staffing. I was promised a lot and was #2 guy in the division. I have a lot of business experience so it was exciting to build a new division for my company. I ended up doing grunt work and making a lot of money for an owner who was a complete ass. I'd never been so needlessly belittled in a work environment. The only reason I stayed was due to the #1 guy in my division (my boss) who was just awesome and very supportive of my poker. In May we made 100k+ in profit for the company. Very early June the owner rewarded his company's best month by cutting commissions. Not to mention I had started to learn that there was a bunch of fraudulent/illegal activity going on. Now my dreams of a 6-figure salary and really getting in there and making a ton of money were pretty much crushed. We had to do a lot more volume to make less money and the owner was putting up barriers for us everywhere. He took away quite a few opportunities for us to make money due to the fact that he paid himself out of a certain team's commissions, so he'd naturally move the juiciest accounts over to that team (which was not our team to be clear). Such a stupid way to pay yourself as a boss but meh.

To relate that to poker, in July of 2007 I had hit my goals I had set for myself. I had a 10k bankroll and was playing very well, so I decided to put in my notice. In hindsight, 10k is nowhere near ideal for a bankroll for a professional poker player. I've been blessed with pretty quick success in that respect, but I really think 30k + money in the bank + proven track record of winning at 400nl (6m or HU) is bare minimum for going pro.

I quickly moved up to 200nl and took some shots at up to 5/10. I ran worse than I ever thought possible and my 22k bankroll was reduced to 9.5k. I was shattered. I learned a lot of good lessons in that run and I learned a lot about myself. I picked up the pieces and quickly came back. I knew I was a solid winner at 1/2 so I said I'd play there unless my bankroll dipped below 8. It got very very close. I rebounded and went on to be a 12.79 PTBB winner over 43k hands and moved up to 2/4 where I've done well, but it's actually my worst stake performance-wise at 8.27 PTBB. From there I went up to 3/6. That has been the softest level by far. I started taking shots at 5/10 when my bankroll was about 70k or so and have been crushing there since. My BR was up to 110k and I started taking shots at 10/20. I've played very very well there and was winning for like 20 PTBB over a smallish sample until last week. A donk just couldn't miss and when he was behind, he outdrew me. Nothing too bad. On the same day I lost 12k at 10/20 I decided to take a shot at 25/50 since I figured I had nothing to lose (this was last week). I got the perfect candidate, but I still lost 2 BIs. I'm happy with how I played and I'm OK with my decisions. I was definitely being more aggressive with my BR and I accepted the risks. In response to that swing I withdrew some cash to build my bank accounts and I am now back to grinding 5/10 and 3/6 for the time being.

Best place to pick up girls?
Best place to pick up girls if youre sober (if applicable)?
What will it take for me to convince you that I could tell you an optimal bluffing frequency in a particular spot against you?
Does it still hurt that I owned you with AJ vs. 43o on T738 or w/e board when I 3bet you called and you raised the flop I called and c/rai the turn at 100nl last summer?

When I hit 2/4 I was a very big proponent of 100 BIs. When I moved up to 5/10 I had 70-some BIs. When I was playing 10/20 I was being a bit more aggressive with 50 BIs.

I keep the vast majority of my BR online as I really don't like the psychological impact of losing a big percentage of it. I'm slowly trying to build wealth on the side. I think I'm done taking out money as I'm going to be making a pretty big run at building my BR for the next few months. I have my son all summer so I will not be able to play as much. I have 2 months to really grind it out and make some cash.

I'm definitely not a baller by any stretch. I just had a great trip to Las Vegas where I lost a good bit of money and I don't really feel good about it. I think I'm done with table games for a while. I'd much rather invest in my and my son's future.

The action kind of sucks on FTP these days, I could see myself comfortably grinding 25/50 and stopping there. Hell, even 10/20 works. But to do that at just HU NL you have to be on multiple sites. I would love to branch out on multiple sites. I think I'll top out at 10/20 for a while and make a run at the higher stakes in the fall.

I'm a bit undecided as to what I want to invest in. I like Gold and know a lot of people who are very knowledgable on the subject. I just have crappy-performing mutual funds at the moment and I'm about to get more aggressive with those.

"Then I noticed there was a few spots I was lost and that I was autopiloting a lot. I forced myself to 1 table and think about EVERY decision. I did this for thousands and thousands of hands trying to reinforce discipline. I did stupid stuff around my house like forcing myself to make my bed just to build the discipline I was lacking. All of this lead to some monumental gains in my game."

couldn't possible hit closer to home with relating to me, great post and thanks for the well thought out reply, I think I will try to add things to my routine to make myself more disciplined, as that is by far my biggest problem

on that same topic (sorry for being the guy asking all the questions, but as long as the channel is open im up for 1 more hour and imma use it ;p), when you play do you have distractions, like how is your discipline in that sense, I find myself constantly on AIM, reading forums while I multi-table, or like watching TV or something of that nature, is this environment the same for you or do you isolate yourself?

Hahhahahahaha

Best place to pick up girls... gooooddd, I'm pretty bad at this. As you know I'm a pretty personable guy. I definitely need "liquid courage" to pick up on girls, so I'd say bars are best, with the internet being second. I'm known as sort of being a vulture as most of my gfs have come from mutual friends. My best friend and I have definitely ran through the same chicks before.

Sober, the best place to pick up chicks is the grocery store.

Hmmm, optimal bluffing frequency... I just don't think there will ever be one vs me in a particular spot. I randomize a lot and I work really hard and not doing the same play in the same spot every time. So I suppose you'd have to convince me that my play isn't as dynamic as I believe it to be.

It was 35o, and yes! I wanted to call soooooooooo bad, IIRC I think I typed in chat "I'm good here like 75% of the time". Right read, wrong play. I wasn't as much of a POW back then, now I think I'd snap call.

AIM gets annoying at times, but I know I bug others on AIM too so it's reciprocal. Like shipurstack, I'm surprised he hasn't head-butted me in the stomach for it....... oh wait.

I minimize distractions as much as possible. Every once in a while I like to play music while I play. My office is pretty isolated. My roomie/best friend runs a recording studio in the house and I can barely hear it.

And we thought it was all Cardrunners, the secret's out!!

=).

Cardrunners truly was key. Stinger, Taylor and CTS's HU videos in particular made me think about a lot of spots. Stinger is just so patient and solid. Taylor seems to always know how to apply the pressure, and CTS is in command of the table and his image at all times.

But yeah, it's sort of trivial but sometimes getting the things out of life that you want requires taking a step back and figuring out if there are fundamental problems. My two fundamental problems are laziness and lack of discipline.

best place to pick up chicks is approximately 1.5 hours driving west of where MJ lives, which is where I live

Indy

Women I have... Money I don't; teach me! start asking life/technical questions, Wells > *

whatwhat was the hardest concept for u to learn regarding hu poker?

It's a concept that I still struggle with, that's understanding different layers of though.

One of my biggest breakthroughs was dumbing it down. With absolutely no disrespect to Stinger, his videos early HU vids showed you that. It sounds like a simple concept, but why get crazy with a bad player? Just play solid. I was trying to outplay the most simple minded opponents and it was burning money.

It's still pretty hard today, it's definitely a skill to find out what level you should be playing your opponent on. There's a great thread in HSNL that Krantz posted vs mastrblastr and it really opened my eyes to just how complex a game can be against a very good player.

The part with the autopilot while playing really apply to me, i really think my a-game crushs nl200, but so often i just play autopilot with my b-game and that really sucks.
And i would really like to say thx for the vids @cr , really helped me a lot.

And a question for you, how strong would you rate nl400+600 accord to nl200?

Yeah, one of the best pieces of poker info I've ever heard was something Schneids said a while ago... the best players don't have the best A-game, they just play their A-game longer.

nl200 = nl400 > nl600.

I have no idea why but really bad players tend to gravitate towards nl600.

Glad to see you're doing this.

How many tables do you play simultaneously at 5-10+? What's your poker setup like? Why have I not been crushing 100NL?

Do you ever get worried that the games will dry up, the fish will disappear, and you'll be forced to find a new profession?

At NL400 and above, do fish actually come and sit with you, or do you find yourself often playing fairly competent players with a slight edge on them?

Can I sit with you for one hand and steal your blind, then leave?

is your plan to end up playing highest possible stakes or are you just satisfied picking of fish at up to 25\50 4L?

- also donkament history, live or otherwise?

QFT

Obviously this ePassporte business alone doesn't cripple online poker, but there's been a chilling trend in the last 18 months. Do you have any alternative (emergency?) career plans? I'm especially curious if having a child affects your decision, many here have minimal obligations and probably aren't too concerned with the medium/long-term outlook.