Way to go... I can't wait to see some future results. Hope the cash games treat you well the rest of summer and beyond. Enjoy.

What RR said. My hand was all in pre.



Thanks to everyone for the run good wishes and support. It was a good run.

Good job T... how was the experience for you?

You have had two very good WSOP tournament runs. Two tournaments, two cashes. My hero !!

Great job!

A main event cash always looks good on the poker resume.

Thanks guys!

Its about time for a WSOP wrap-up. Because of the tourney scores I had a pretty good series results wise. Total I played about 50 hours less than last year's series, which I pretty much expected going in. Played significantly less cash due to playing 70 hours between the Monster Stack and Main Event. Definitely not what I had planned on but the end result is just fine. I got some great tournament experience and really feel I learned a lot in the process.

Despite having a big edge in deep events, there are so many spots in these tournaments that are unfamiliar for cash game players, and I'm really pleased with how I was able to adjust. I talked about some of these spots with RobFarha and also picked the brains of a couple tournament guys I know (once which was on a break after the bubble in the ME lol) which helped a ton.

Also got to sit next to Phil Ivey in the main which was pretty surreal. Its possible I get on TV if any of the hands he played over the couple hours I was there makes the episodes. I'm not in poker for the fame by any means but that would be pretty cool. My claim to fame now is that Phil Ivey asked me for poker advice. After calling a shove from a short stack with 7.5bb getting 2:1 and busting him with A2 vs the shortie's A9, Ivey says "I don't know if thats a call", looks at me and the guy next to me and says "You guys know", then looks directly at me and asks "would you call there?". I was so shocked that all I could really muster was "yea I think I call". Who am I to contradict the actions of Phil Ivey after all?

He had his chips stacked in tens, which is usually indicative of a fish. Some guy asked him why he stacked them in tens and he just said "no reason, felt like it".

He certainly has an aura about him. People stay away from him despite knowing his LAG tendencies. It was astounding how he was able to steal the blinds and get people to play passively against him, allowing him to get to showdown with some marginal holdings. The only major hand he played was where he cold 4 bet from the bb after the CO opened and button 3 bet. He ended up taking it down pre flop and the CO said he folded a big hand. While the guy was tanking the cameras were all over our table. It was pretty wild and I had to hold back my smile for several minutes as the situation seemed so tense and serious that I felt like smiling would be a strange expression to have. I was playing the biggest tournament of my life so far, but at this moment I really stopped to think about what was happening and all I wanted to do was smile. Here I was sitting next to Phil Ivey while some mook tanks and cameras with ESPN guys holding them capture it all.

After the hand Ivey just said "you got very lucky" to the CO, alluding to the fact that if the button hadn't 3 bet in the middle they would have gotten it all in and the guy was way behind.

He bounced as soon as the day ended and had a floor bag and tag his chips. He was probably on his way to play 3k/6k mix at Bellagio or something even more absurd. Here I am taking what is for me a pretty big shot, and this is just small beans for Ivey.

That experience was certainly something I'll remember the rest of my life. I played with Phil Ivey to my left and lived to tell the tale. Luckily I only had 15bb so wasn't in any danger of having to make actual poker decisions against him. I'm actually kind of hoping a shot of that table makes TV because I was too wrapped up in all that was going on and also a bit intimidated to get a picture. Also thought it would be weird because I am a professional poker player also. Obviously I'm not of that caliber but it would be like a rookie asking Peyton Manning for his autograph imo.

On top of the Ivey experience, I was pretty psyched to make the money after going into day 4 with 10bb. Had to hold in a flip with 88 vs AK, which was easily the biggest poker sweat of my life. Win and I'm a huge favorite to cash, lose and I'm out with nothing. Since I was in the 9 seat the dealer's hand/arm blocked my view of the cards as he was revealing the flop, turn and river. I relied on the reaction from my opponent in the 6 seat and other players to let me know how I was doing. After not getting much animation from anyone, I adjusted my seat to see that a board of 5-5-6-5 had me in good shape going into the river. I saw paint flash as the dealer flipped the last card, and as his hand moved away I was able to relax as I saw the Q had fallen.

When the bubble burst a guy at my table starts getting out these plastic champagne glasses and not one, but two bottles of champagne on ice he had brought. He put together the plastic 2-piece glasses, passed them around the table and poured everyone a glass. The whole scenario was hilarious and our table was basically laughing and partying for a few minutes, with everyone else looking around at what was going on.

After the bubble I started doing work, taking down a bunch of pots with timely pre flop shoves. The slow structure allowed me to pick my spots pretty carefully despite being relatively short stacked. Unfortunately I couldn't hold with KK against A9 all in pre flop for a 40bb pot and had to settle for just over a min cash. Certainly not a bad result for my first Main Event.

Even though I didn't play nearly as much cash as I probably should have, I'm nothing but satisfied with my WSOP. I got to go deep in my first 2 WSOP events and learned a ton about tournament poker, which will certainly translate to cash when playing against these tourney guys in what Limon has dubbed the infinite stacks poker tour (AKA cash games). Even though tournament poker is pretty boring most of the time, it was pretty fun to go deep, especially in the Main Event. Other than a pretty miserable couple levels on Day 3, I had more fun that I expected playing these tournaments. I'm also not nearly as bummed as I thought I'd be. I played my best and have no regrets.

I am also fairly exhausted and will be taking some time off here. I have about 3 weeks left in Vegas before a 2.5 week trip back to Wisconsin that I am very excited for. For the next 3 weeks I will probably play very little poker as I have some other things I want to attend to as far as the new house goes and would like to get more involved in the side hustles I've been dabbling in; writing, investing, and looking for small business ideas being the main ones on my mind right now.

After that it looks like I'm gonna take a trip to Florida for the 5k 10 million guarantee thing. I don't plan to play the tournament but will grind cash a bit and hang out in Florida for a month. Plans are not set in stone yet but it looks like its going to happen.

All in all it was a good series but I'm kind of glad its over to be honest. For 6 weeks its been all poker and now I'm ready to dive into some other things and play as much or as little poker as I want. I will also be resuming my mixed game learning that was put on hold and continue watching videos and playing whatever low stakes stuff I can find to get hands in.

Just from writing this post and detailing my plans, I'm more excited for the next 2-3 months both in terms of poker and life stuff than I have for any other period in a long time. Until the last week or so I had been making progress with my health as well and am looking forward to getting back on track with that along with some other personal improvements.

Since table time will be limited for a while my updates will probably be sparse. Thanks to everyone for your support and thanks for reading!

That's nice you'll be grinding cash in Florida for a month! Staying with a friend?

Also glad to hear you're excited for the upcoming months and that you had a good learning experience from playing the two tourneys.

Hope to run into you again at some point.

Nice to see you're in good spirits!

It is a bit weird to think of the ME buyin being like 1 round of blinds for big players. Damn

Improving your "health". Did you mean fitness or have you had a health problem?

Or is it none of our business? :-)

Yea RobFarha and some other Vegas guys going.

Likewise.

Yea in reality the money in the ME means nothing for him, just trying to win bracelets.

Fitness/not being so fat. Poker players are notoriously unhealthy and I try to stay ahead of it. I'm not sure where I am compared to general population, but I'm definitely in the 99th percentile among poker players in terms of eating healthy/exercising.

Very good job ! And nice post ! I enjoy Ivey stories so much haha

I never thought I'd read an 80+ page grinder journal but it's been a part of my daily reading for over a month now. It is a very inspiring piece and I savored reading each post. Good luck with your business ventures and your future grinding. Congrats on implementing proper brm in real life and on purchasing your house. I've never been active in threads but I feel very fortunate to have stumbled across this one. Thanks for chronicling it, man!

glgl

Hey guys, just got back from a trip to my cabin in Northern Wisconsin. I'm back in my hometown now for a while until my trip to Florida. Hadn't planned on writing on here much but I got some inspiration while I was up north and decided to put some thoughts down.

I went up with my brother and a few friends from high school and a golf course we both used to work at. We also met up with some people who have a cabin near ours that we usually see when we're up there. Basically spent the week chilling on the lake, riding wave runners, playing lawn games, campfires, and of course some beer pong at night. It was a great trip, but what inspired this post was some of the conversations with my friends. They are all 1-3 years older than me, but we are basically in the same phase of life of just starting our "careers".

One is a teacher, two are accountants working on their CPA credentials, another works at a bank, and my brother works in marketing at a vacation resort. Listening to these guys talk about their 9-5 routines reminded me how much the paradigm of my life changed when I chose poker as my route. Now there’s nothing wrong with the path any of these guys chose, but hearing them talk made me incredibly happy that I chose something different. The pros and cons of professional poker have been discussed ad nauseam itt and around 2+2, but listening to my friends discuss their lives made me even happier with my decision to escape the 9-5 life.

Since we were all going out to eat and paying for groceries together, at one point early in the trip I brought up credit card roulette in a conversation with 3 of my friends, already knowing it probably wouldn’t happen. Literally everyone was against it. One of the accountants, who actually just bought in to a local CPA firm, was extremely adamant that he would never do that, saying things like “what if you lose a bunch in a row?” My response was pretty much that you just have to pay for a few in a row.

It just so happened I had lost the last few I did in Vegas. The thought of this made them sick. One said it would ruin his day if he lost. I’d probably be the same way if I had chosen a normal job as well, so I don’t blame them whatsoever, it just highlighted how different my paradigm is from all of these guys. They can’t imagine flipping for a $50-$100 dinner bill, something I do at least weekly. When they asked how much I buy in to a poker game for and I responded with “usually $1000”, they about **** their pants.

I had similar realizations at various moments on the trip when they were talking about their budgets. I track my expenses more than nearly all poker players I know and try to keep my expenses low, but these guys have their budgets down to the last dollar. It was crazy listening to them talk about maintaining a minimum balance in their checking account and pinching pennies at the grocery store.

Its not like these guys are broke either. For being in their mid-twenties they make plenty to play ccr and not worry about pinching pennies, but their relationship with money is just so different than people in the gambling world. I am desensitized to it. Losing ccr or having a surprise expense of $20 might stress one of them out whereas I wouldn’t blink an eye.

It’s really just a different mindset. Poker has altered my relationship with money. In my opinion this has been for the better. Quality of life is higher when I’m not worrying about saving 50 cents here or a dollar there. Obviously if it becomes extreme and people just spend, spend, spend it is bad, but imo the general population worries about money too much in spots where the time and energy spent to save a buck simply isn’t worth that time and energy.

There were also some interesting discrepancies when talking about daily lives. Guys were talking about having trouble getting off work for the trip and budgeting their 2 weeks of vacation time for the year. I pretty much just booked a plane ticket for when I wanted to leave and didn’t have to tell anyone. I’m taking a month vacation and then a month “business trip” to Florida just because I want to. Granted they get vacation pay and a consistent income, but to me that freedom is worth sacrificing those perks. Doing what I want, when I want is important to me and if necessary, giving up income to get that luxury is optimal for me. I don’t care about money, I care about freedom. Money is just a means to that end.

There was a discussion about getting weekends off, as all of them previously worked in hospitality or restaurants where they had to work weekends and holidays, but now get those days off. I was asked if I take weekends off. I tried not to laugh and said I pretty much take off whatever days I want.

One of the accountants mentioned that he gets excited when he gets to wear jeans on Friday’s. I had no words. There were many times like this that I could almost not believe what I was hearing but didn’t really say anything since I’d sound like a complete *******. It’s just a different life, a life I very nearly had.

One of the guys was pretty much directly responsible for me becoming a poker player. A classmate of my brother’s in high school, he was the one who suggested having a poker game in the parking lot of a grocery store several of us worked at. The game was moved to my house the next week and became a weekly thing for the next 2-3 years until I left for college. If that doesn’t happen I’d probably be working 80 hours/week in some finance job.

I’d be lying if I said I loved it right away. I actually quit for a few weeks because I lost every time. It just so happens that this guy beat me heads up once because he kept bluffing and I didn’t understand that I couldn’t wait to make a hand heads up in what was a short-stacked sit-n-go format.

So even though I wasn’t hooked right away, that game is what started it all, and without it I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing.

Its mind boggling how easy my path could have been different, and a side effect of this trip was realizing that. Yes, sometimes poker sucks, but hearing my friends talk about the 9-5 lifestyle makes me even happier that I made the decision I did. I know I won’t play poker full time forever, but I’m so glad I did something different. Again, there are lots of advantages to taking the paths my friends took and I don’t disparage any of them for what they chose, but for my personality and temperament, I’m very confident it would make me unhappy.

This isn’t really about poker being the end-all-be-all. Far from it in fact, considering how much I’ve been thinking about alternative income sources. It’s more about the lifestyle it offers. There are other ways to get that lifestyle, but for me right now poker is the best option. As poker becomes less appealing I will look for other things that still allow me the freedom I want, but going after poker helped me to figure out the lifestyle I wanted.

Around the campfire one night, a friend of ours from the other cabin, a teacher in her mid-twenties, was asking “20 questions” type stuff just for fun. It was mostly “would you rather” and other hypothetical-type fun questions. One of her questions was “If you could be doing any other job besides what you’re doing now, what would it be?” I’d never really thought about it that way, but I didn’t really have an answer. Its not always fun and games, but when I really thought about it, I was doing exactly what I wanted to be doing. I’m self-employed and find the best way I can to make the money I need to be happy. Right now that’s mostly poker and a little writing and investing.

Everyone else was pretty quick to come up with something they’d rather do. I thought I’d sound like a douchebag if I said I was living my dream job, so I said football coach because I really would like to volunteer with a program, but I don’t actually want that to be my job.

A lot of this year I’ve been thinking about doing some other things. At times I’ve even considered going back to school and doing the 9-5 thing (for like a minute maybe). Being able to take a step back from Vegas and get a glimpse about what that life would actually look like, I’m more confident than ever that I made the right decision to find an alternative way to produce income. My passion for poker may not be what it once was, but my passion for having a life structured around free time, relaxation, self-improvement and just generally doing what I want rather than around work burns brighter than ever.

Oh man. Awesome post.

Great post.

cya on your business trip

Cushlash,

You show great ability to put the greater concept of "life" and "quality of life" in perspective for your age, it's probably one of the main reasons why you've adjusted well to your chosen profession quite quickly and are succeeding.

I lived similar experiences as your Wisconsin trip that steered me away from the corporate world and into journalism and then screenwriting. It's not about $$ and retirement funds, it's about quality of life, the one and only life you get.

Naturally those out there who had kids early may take safer career paths to ensure health insurance and other benefits that are clutch for raising kids, no problems with that.

However it's great to see you doing what you want to do and have a depth of life perspective to stay grounded through your adventure.

Keep going and GL, dude.

ty sir

Thanks man. haha yep, got some monies for ya.

Thanks, agree completely.

The credit card gambling reminds me a ton of flipping for time. I think lifetime I'm down huge in both of these instances. Still though, I've never given a second thought to losing and enjoy the rush. I guess it comes with the territory.

Good post.

Great post man, couldn't agree more.

Great Post. You are wise beyond your years. As someone who is currently stuck on the 9 to 5 grind I dream of my escape. It will have to come in the form of my growing tax business. I want to work my ass off from Jan to April just in time for summer poker. I long for the time my business income can replace my job. My company is constantly trying to outsource, and i predict I have 4 years (based on outsourcers in other departments ) before they get vendors together who can handle it

I was not as wise as you at your age. I partied hard and was the guy who was an example of what not to do when going to college. I never got my degree. I was a kid who skipped a grade. I was probably too imature to go to college at 17. I still pay for my mistakes. I am glad to see you are doing things right.

Always delivers.

"My passion for having a life structured around free time, relaxation, self-improvement and just generally doing what I want rather than around work burns brighter than ever."

I love that statement - those truly are words to live by !!

Bingo! +1

"I don't care about money, I care about freedom. Money is jus a means to that end" -this. +1 glad you had a nice trip. I'm flyin back to lv from Hawaii tonight (at airport rn). Maybe I'll cya around !

Great post Taylor!