After completing my £0-£2k HUDless challenge in 380 hours (see link below), I need a few more goals to keep my game and brain sharp! So here goes...

Challenge goals:

1. Reach £10k bankroll goal playing a mix of NLH/PLO
2. Step up to NL100 online when reaching £3k + play NL200 live
3. Step up PLO stakes when reaching *250 buyins
4. Play a session of NL500 live once £10k goal reached

**250 buy-ins is absurdly over-cautious even for PLO, but I have barely played any PLO so will be fumbling around in the dark for a while.

Thread and graph from my last challenge...

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...85/?highlight=



^^ I'll be continuing to use this graph for the challenge as it's too pretty to start afresh

Wish me luck, gogogo!

Scouted out the rake situation for PLO games and looks like Unibet is a slam-dunk for PLO4 + PLO10. GGpoker also looks surprisingly cheap at 5% + £0.15 cap (am I missing something here? Do they rake Preflop or have a jackpot drop or something?)

My plan is to put in at least 5 hours of PLO study on RIO before jumping into the PLO minnow pool. I'm sure I read years ago that PLO was aka 'The Texas walk' because it sent all the Holdem players back walking back broke to Texas So I'm going in somewhat prepared.

GG rakes 3bets flop or not. Also they take fees to the badbeatjackpot and splash pots. Total rake is something like 10bb/100 in nl so I think in plo it's even more. GLGL.

Congratulations on completing the challenge and starting a new one!

I think the £9900 line will be overcome without problems

Good luck!

In!

Hours: 385
Profit: £2015.58

Well, I've dumped around 9 buyins at the PLO tables this week, luckily those buyins were $4 so NLH winnings made up for it. Watched a couple of RIO tutorial videos but I think I need to start with a strong preflop strategy. I'm opening wayyy too wide and seem to be calling a ton dominated because I feel so priced in.

Just having fun atm and feeling out the player pool tendencies so expecting to lose a bit at the start.

I look forward to following this challenge! GL.

Hours: 387
Profit: £2102.58

NLH is still my friend at least, had some good games this week made up of fish and uber-nits. Ran into the spot below with QQ UTG, fish in MP was min3betting around 60% of his hands and VILLAIN in the BB has been nitting-it-up for weeks.

Do mega-nits ever turn up with JJ, TT in this spot?...






Feel good hand against the same 2 guys later in the session...

I think in the first hand SB didn't have AA or KK, because in the second hand they 3bet KK non-allin. My guess is they had AK.

As CuteRaven said, 4bet shoves are often AK.

I have found 12 similar situations out of 150k+ hands at 50NL PS:
8 - AKo
3 - JJ
1 - QQ
Strangely enough no AKs and I'm more surprised by this than by not seeing any AA/KK

Thanks for the input on the QQ vs 4Bjam hand, it does look like mb scared JJ, AK that doesn't want to play oop vs 2 LAG players.

My other reasoning for the fold was that the nit might be max-exploiting the mega-spewy player in the middle by jamming AA, KK knowing he's likely calling off with any half-decent Ax or pocket-pair. Seen this quite regularly at very low stakes before as there are a lot more gamblers in the pool, but at NL50 I might be jumping at shadows.

Research nl25-50 pool


Indeed, we will see AK quite often.

In addition, AA is less common than KK.
This is likely because opponents are trying to play more tricky with pocket aces, especially with a fish in the spot.

Hours: 390
Profit: £2114.03

Haemorrhaging money at $4 PLO tables this week, I'm finding some great bluff spots but every strong value hand is just getting so dominated. Feels imperative to have a tight pre-flop range and only start barrelling with nuts with nut-draws. Not sure this is for me, but will try one more week.

Off to the casino tomorrow to play some 1/2, wish me luck!

Reached the tipping point (again) of my journey with Poker where leaving the game to pursue other goals feels like the correct play. I can't thank Tommy Angelo enough for this concept as without it I wouldn't have my current job in IT.

The last few years playing online has saved my mental health and gave me some purpose, dreams, excitement and goals while seriously ill (unable to even walk much) and in multiple covid lockdowns, but my health has improved a lot since then and so have my options.

My 2+2 challenges were always designed with the end-goal of playing live at some level as this still has quite a bright future imo, but I have come to some realisations recently that just doesn't make this an attractive prospect for me any more:

1. Location - In the UK, casinos are always hours away and in run-down areas, so relocating isn't a decent option.
2. Health - much as I love poker, it does seem to stress my heart out, even more so when playing live.
3. Atmosphere - There's a lot of misery, arguing and slamming tables. Mostly I'm blissfully ignorant of this online but don't think I'll be able to shake this image every time I win a big pot online and it certainly isn't fun experiencing it live.
4. Time - I spend maybe 10+ hours a week playing poker, what could I do for my career and personal life if I spent 520 hours a year devoted to learning or doing another activity? (Studying, training, reading)
5. Marriage - Mostly I'm play quietly online but my wife must be sick of my occasional complaining/expletives. I can't get away from this because poker is a very emotional game.

I'm really happy to have been able to grind out £2k from zero and bring my game up to the point where I'm still likely beating NL50 games, the challenge has been a great learning experience and the chatting with you guys about hands has been insightful.

Thanks 2+2ers and best of luck with all your goals!

In any case, I think your poker journey was successful and is a motivating example for players who start their way in poker from zero.
It was interesting to watch your challenge.

I hope you will have even greater success in your new activity.
Best of Luck and see you next time!

Feels slightly embarrassing posting this so soon after listing good reasons to stop, but I've decided to resume the challenge for a few reasons:

- Mainly health still isn't as great as I'd hoped, so not able to hit the gym or put the hours of study in in the evenings unfortunately

- Although I'm now reading more, spending hours pushing myself after 8 hours of work wasn't happening. Tbh this month I've found myself just working my way through all the Resident Evils, so not been that productive

- No longer aiming to play live for now, will just enjoy bankroll building online

- Going to work on my swearing at home (usually occurs after 6th suckout in a row), maybe I'll keep a post-it on my laptop to remind me its about the challenge, fun, always improving + making the correct decision.

- Lastly, holy f*** I've missed online poker :*)

So I'm recommencing the challenge forthwith (but starting from zero again as I'm a sadist), balls to that bingo game PLO, long live NLH and long-live King Charles III, HAP-HAP-HUZZAH!





Hours: 3
Profit: £5.07

3 hours in and we're already on the board after binking GGPoker's free Saturday $1 Spin + Gold for $5. Freeroll-grinding is brutal so glad to hit this early on.

Initial plan is to grind out $1 + $2 SNG's (on another site without eye-wateringly high rake, sod depositing on GGPoker) until we have enough buy-ins for NL4 cash games. Pretty confident we'll be crushing up to NL10 so will use an aggressive 10-buyin bankroll management strategy and up this to a more prudent 30 buy-ins once we get to NL25.

Wish me luck! (again)

Welcome back and best of luck!

Hours: 15
Profit: £16.60

Heatered through the $1 SNGs (maxed at £22) then proceeded to have my ass handed to me at $2 SNGs tonight.

90% of players at these stakes are not ICM-aware, so starting tight, opening solid starting range and letting them make horrible coin-flip jams in the later stages is where the profit is. Not that fun but its a pretty easy way to grind out a mini-bankroll.

Thanks Sly, hoping I can beat my previous time for the £2k mark. Agg bankroll mgt should speed things up!

Hours: 16.5
Profit: £12.6

1.5 hour session and didn't win a single all-in, a number of them were 90% faves. Remarkable! Still managed to cash 2nd prize in a few to dampen the coolers.

Hours: 23.5
Profit: £34.35

Alright now we're cookin'! Had a week of losing nearly all my all-ins but finally getting a few wins in a row.

Hopefully be hitting the cash games by next weekend. In my previous challenge I built half my roll on CoinPoker as the rake was very competitive, not so much these days unfortunately, and when factoring in wallet/crypto/bank fees it works out a bit more expensive.

https://www.primedope.com/online-pok...ke-calculator/

Hours: 26
Profit: £38.74

Hit the NL4 cash games, ahh I'm home!

Good luck and it's nice to have you back

Thanks mate, glad to be having fun at the tables again

Hours: 28
Profit: £43.87

10 buy-in bankroll management is interesting. Was beaten down to £10 at one point , then heatered it back up!

Best hand (I 4B pre, got it all in on the turn):



Worst hand (all-in on flop):

Hours: 37.5
Profit: £61.62

NL4 grind is going great, nice mix of regs, nits and donks to keep things competitive, fun and profitable

Kind of shocked to recognise names from last year still multi-tabling the lowest stake. Wonder if sites would benefit from having a 10k max hands for winners at the lowest stake offered. Sitting at NL4 for years grinding out 20bb/100 seems like something that should be curbed by sites imo.

Lovely thing about NL4 is there is very little pushback from players so variance is pretty low if you're aggressive enough to put players out of their comfort zone.