Question: What are sustainable win rates for live 1/2, 2/5, 5/10? Also, what sample sizes are sufficient to determine a rough win rate?

Background:
Former online semi-pro that beat mostly 200NL with some 400NL and occasional shots at 3/6 and 5/10. Used the money to pay for tuition/room and board for a few years. Online poker went bye bye and I got away from it and spent my time partying way too much and got a "real job". Stopped partying so much and started to focus on live poker on the weekends. Built from nothing and absolutely crushed 1/2 and quickly moved up to 2/5. Current win rate is $135/hour over 100 hours of play at 2/5.

Live players, even the 2/5 regs are absolutely terrible compared to online. However, this win rate can't be sustainable, can it? I think this equates to like 100/bb 100 which is insane.

My question is:
How sustainable is this win rate?
What is an average win rate for someone absolutely crushing 2/5?
Also, what is a good # of hours to have a reliable win rate?
(Obviously you will never get the hundreds of thousands of hands you get online to somewhat accurately determine this, but you have to determine a rough win rate at some hours mark I would think)
How hot am I running?

Your win rate is not sustainable.

Most people agree that 10-12bb / hour is about the most that someone can sustain full time.

If you are in a super sick game, and you only play a few days a week it can be higher.

wow, something wise by tommy angelo. better said by Negreanu though imo.

You are running ridiculously hot and that winrate is not even remotely sustainable.

Ive been using PJ for a while on iPhone. Its a good app but that thing that pisses me off is the developer RARELY releases updates.. When he does it is only stability fixes/bugs etc.

I would really like to have more graph options.. e.g. bar graphs for hours played per month, money won per month. The report feature is nice for stakes played but would prefer to see a more visual representation (graphs).

Thanks for the reply. I play weekends only. Usually Friday for about 10-12 hours and Saturday for 10-12 hours. The games are always sick (I play in a small town not in Las Vegas and the players are terrible.

Given this, what do you think is sustainable? 12-15bb/hour at a terrible game on the weekends only? Or is even that running hot?

Prob not unless you are best in room and don't tilt much. Def doable for stretches but there will be some soul crushing times too. How you react to that obv v important.

But generally the wr you quote is more likely at 1/2 than 2/5 or 5/10.

I wouldn't worry about specific theoretical wr. Just put the time in and track your results

I'm easily the best in the poker room in the town I play in. I've seen some decent players but no one that I think is better than me. 2/5 is the biggest game they run. I pretty much never tilt live. The live **** doesn't bother me all that much for some reason.

I'll keep tracking. Hoping to have a reasonably reliable WR at 200 hours and have something pretty accurate at 500 hours.

200 hours isn't reasonably reliable. I've had 200hr stretch at 15bb/hr and a 200hr losing stretch. And I've only been playing live since October

Hate to be another bubble-burster, especially when you're playing 20-25 hours/week, but think more like 1k hours for a reasonably reliable WR, and 2k+ for anything fairly accurate imo.

Obviously the higher your WR and the lower your variance, the smaller the sample you need, but 200 hours is laughable. Even in soft games, do you think 5k hands is going to be an accurate representation of your win-rate? Keep playing, track your results, and watch how much jumping around your win-rate does. That should inform you just as much if not more than listening to us imo.

200 hours is a joke. I've been through 500 hour break even stretches and I crush $5 blind level games.

I'm an online player that's been grinding full time since December, beating 50NL for a mediocre WR and shot taking at 100NL. I've also played a little bit of live poker (12 sessions, average 8 hours per session) at an underground raked game and the action is super juicy, and I've made a tidy profit.

The game runs 5-6 times a week, and an old schoolmate of mine is one of the hosts (he also stakes me). It is usually a deep stacked game, most players will have about 200bb stacks, and it is not uncommon for there to be a couple of 400-500bb stacks at the table. Towards the end of sessions there can be several stacks of over 500bb. The level of play is SOOPER bad, like I've seen a 4 way all in on 3 6 8 flop and nobody has a set, deepest stacks are 600bb deep and one has an OESD and one has a K high FD, the other 2 players were shorter (around 150bb) and one had TPBK and the other had TP+FD. I pretty much haven't come across anybody that's more than a level 1 thinker/hand reader, and the even regs are people that couldn't beat online and "the bad beats are ridiculous, so I prefer playing live."

The question I have is, would it be more profitable for me to just transition to playing full time at this live game and scooping the $? I pretty much have no idea about what winrates look like live, even less so in such a deep stacked game. It probably plays more like a 2/5 game, as a function of stack sizes and people generally raising to ridiculous sizes preflop 7-12bb PFR is very standard. Rake is 5% capped at $50.

Oh, and finally, what kind of BR should I set aside to battle at this game to have low risk of ruin? I'm thinking of buying in 150bb until I get more comfortable playing deep stacked, then I probably buy in 200bb and top up everytime my stack drops below 150bb.

Any advice you guys can give to this OL kid would be appreciated.

hey guys,

I have been playing online for a long time with good results (so far this year 5.5ev bb at 50nl over 500K hands), and I decided to play live in london for the next couple of months. I have very little experience and I have a couple of questions to my fellow london grinders ( or anyone that knows about this). How good are the games in casinos generally at the 1-3 ? What casino is the best for what reasons? The only time I played live in london was for 2 hours at the vic at 1-2 and thought that the table was pretty soft? What hourly do you think is attainable for a player with good knowledge but litle to no live experience yet? And finally what bankroll would you suggest to play 1-3 and 2-5?

Looking forward to what you guys have to say; cheers !

I'm just starting to build a bankroll. I have $700 a month I can put towards it. I'm thinking of taking $400 to the casino to play 1/2 and since I just want to have a 2BI stop loss I'll only be going every time I have $400. Any money I win I'll be putting towards a growing bankroll along with sticking $700 a month into the bankroll. My ultimate goal is to have a sustainable bankroll to be frequent player in the 2/5 game but that is a long way away. I'll only be available to play on Friday and Saturdays so I will be limited. Does anyone see a flaw in doing it this way?

No, this is fine if you have a job

Thank You Duke

I concur with your SN

Player admits to beating 200 and 400nl online (and then put his money towards education), and everyone respond with comments about hours/running hot/skill level/etc.

I don't know if I'm more confused about the questions being asked that searching the forum would turn up (which I would expect a true 200nl+ beater to be able to do, so ?) or the responses given the info if believed.

Yes, you are running hot. If you're being factual with your history then achieving a higher winrate then the "norm"/standard should not be a problem in my opinion, particularly if you are the best player in the room.

if that isn't a typo and the rake is uncapped at 50, then the game isn't beatable. Doesn't matter how good you are, all your winnings will go to rake eventually.

However in the short run you may be able to do well at a game like this.

If that is a typo, and the rake is capped at 5, then just as everyone says, a 10-15bb/hr winrate should be doable. I would personally say a 15-20k bankroll would be sufficient to not go busto

Many people seemed quick to want to rain on your parade, but I'll just say "inconclusive" at this time. If you were really a big winner online at 100NL/200NL, then if you can adjust to all the live poker variables (mostly being patient while you go card dead hours upon hours), there's no reason you shouldn't crush live 1/2 and 2/5. Ideally you'd move up to 5/10 or higher, but if 2/5 is the highest it goes, that's all you can do.

Probably the bigger factor for all of us trying to maintain a winrate is how long a particular group of fish stays in the game. Not all card rooms are created equally. Some have more fish than others and some have bigger whales than others. If you consistently have a big edge over your villains, that translates to a big winrate if you play enough hands.

What programs are ya'll using to track live results?

O.o

I've been away for a few years doing the whole "get a real job/career thing" after graduation but I used to beat 200NL online at like 6bb/100 if I recall correctly (would have to find my old DBs somewhere) with a good amount of 400NL and 3/6 and 5/10 shots.

Pretty much stopped playing prior to black friday due to wayyy too much partying. Black Friday effectively killed it for me. Partied way too damn much on the weekends after graduation with just about 0 poker for several years. Now I've stopped partying and started putting my weekend time into live poker for the past few months. I'm constantly shocked at just how bad live poker players are. I think the players in my town are definitely worse than avg, but I've made a few vegas trips and besides the few kids that do it for a living, most of the tables at 2/5 in Vegas are pretty bad too. My winrate in Vegas was about 100/hour over a much smaller sample (not as high as my town but not way lower either).

Where I play, I play 2/5 with a 1.5k max, so I can play deep all the time, which is awesome (live players are terrible at adjusting). 2/5 live IMO is equivalent to about what 25NL (.10/.25) online used to be and 1/2 is like playing 5 or 10NL online, maybe even play money lol. Also, just about no one adjusts for short handed. So when it gets short handed, I loveeeeee it and just absolutely slaughter the game.

I forget my forum password/email because I haven't logged into 2+2 in years, hence the new account. I'm not sure why you think I would make this up. I've just been logging time in, time out, hours and profit on my phone and putting it into excel to get accurate info. I know there are apps out there that are much better at this. What is the preferred app that everyone here uses to track sessions? Anything close to PT or HEM? (obv you won't have as much details or a huge hand DB)

I made this post right after I crossed the 100 hour mark to see what sustainable win rates really are. I'm constantly shocked at just how bad live players are and obviously how insane high my winrate is compared to anything I used to play online. My hourly is significantly higher than my 9-5 but I clearly have a small sample. However, I don't feel like you need a 5 million hand sample to get a rough winrate live like you do online. The variance in the live game is just insane low, especially in the town I play in and deep-stacked. To give you an idea, I have never had a losing session at 2/5 (granted I've played my way out of a few with some long hours) and only 1 losing session back at 1/2.

Like I said, I used to beat 200NL regularly with some 400NL and higher shots. I'm easily the best player in the town I play in and I play only on weekends. I haven't seen anyone that could even beat 100NL online IMO. The only negative is they only spread 2/5 on the weekends (which is the only time I have time to play anyway) and no or super rare 5/10. So if I ever wanted to move up, I would probably have to move to another town or take frequent flights to Vegas or something.

Also, I don't mind any of the raining on my parade stuff. I really just want to know what sort of win rate is actually sustainable. I feel like I am and will continue to crush the game, just looking for a somewhat accurate/reasonable/possible winrate for someone in my situation. 135/hour is like 27bb/hour and everyone is telling me 10-12 is the most someone can crush the game for. Is this accurate or can someone in my situation beat it for more like 15-20bb/hour?

You bring up a great point about live variance just being so much lower than online so the hand requirements to attain a rough idea of winrate is definitely much lower. Hope you keep up the run good and keep crushing.

Thanks for taking the time to respond.
The max rake for a pot is $50, yes. So the game is unbeatable in the long run by any standard? I thought the $50 pretty much just means there is no cap on rake but seeing as the stacks are usually very deep i didnt know what to make of it