I am back!

Well, I doubt many people even remember this. When I went back home on Jun 23 last year, I thought I would take a few weeks, maybe 2 month hiatus while I find out where to go next. Well, that didn't work out well now, did it?

Anyways, now I am back on the road and ready to document it, mainly for myself but also for your entertainment (hopefully).

Just to get you up to speed:

- Went back home, found out that except for my closest friend group, people had mostly moved on.

- Travel bans happened left, right and center and I found myself stuck. Quarantine on top of that for like 7 months in Germany starting in the fall.

- Got severely, horribly depressed in winter. Did a "how to gain 25 kilograms" speed run. Basically didn't play any poker.

- Decided at the end of March that being depressed is stupid and stopped. But I was still bored, so I decided to grind PLO Rush'n'Cash for the whole of April (PLO is by far my worst game and that had to change). Lost 12kg back.

Made $8112 as a result:



- Burned myself out doing that, spent May trying to organize/bribe someone to get me a vaccine. Succeeded at the end.

- Decided to stay for my sisters wedding and my birthday, had a suuuuper illegal party with 15 people ( ) aaaand

now I'm in Corfu, Greece. Didn't plan to come here but my mom and her husband booked something so I thought I could join them.

I hit the actual jackpot: They are in an all-inclusive hotel down the street where I leech from and at the end I go back to my quiet little appartment to grind a bit.



Sorry, no poker yet, but I am planning to change that! Here is the plan:

After this holiday, I will go on a live poker bender. I can't decide where I wanna go yet, Bratislava, Rozvadov, Prague or maybe Budapest are the main options. The goal will be to a) become better at live poker, because I know I suck - most players just suck even more. And b) to make money to then, in October, go to Las Vegas to play WSOP.

I never wanted to play WSOP before, but man I am hyped for it now. I think it is gonna be absolutely massive + now that it is in the fall it fits my plans much better. I am already rolled for it, but everything I make now, I will consider freerolling then.


Let's have a great rest of the year and get back to positivity. Cheers!

We went to Paleokastritsa monastery yesterday. Paleokastritsa is, as our very nice taxi driver told us, usually overrun by cruiseship visitors (up to 30000 a day) - so we were kind of lucky to get there when things were quiet.

Some impressions:



I also played some poker. Right now, $1/$2 5PLO on Nat8 is my game of choice and we ended up +$178.

I love that Nat8 introduced 5PLO to their site. It is ridiculously swingy, especially since people can (and do) straddle from every position to any size. But it is also very juicy and it invites short burst sessions, which is exactly what I have time and energy for right now.

Have a great thursday everybody.

nice update and glad to have you back 8g!

One of my favourite blogs in this site. Glad u back sir!

Thanks guys. Good to see you back.

Played a small session yesterday that didn't go too well, lost $706 on Nat8 despite the games being amazing, we had two 5-player allins preflop and unfortunately lost both of them.

Won 6mbtc (~$200) at Black Jack on Nitro though (I have a promotion there that makes it ever so slightly +EV, don't judge me). I have to say, it's fun to look back at this blog and see that 16 mbtc used to be $65.


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Yesterday, we went on a boat tour around Corfu that included a BBQ on a beach in a empty bay and a small trip through Cassiopi. For 35€ pP you get a 7 hour trip and Antonius ( Link ) was super friendly.



Onboard, I met a very nice girl from Rosenheim, Stephanie, who was solo vacationing at 19 years old. She said she will do solo travel again and she definitely had the right mindset for it, very open and genuine. It is very nice to see that people are back "on the road" and that there are even some new faces. Plus I really missed these random, chance encounters a lot, so that made me happy.


Oh, one more recommendation I have to share is Alexandros Tavenra in Dassia! Great authentic Greek food, I had a spinach salad with Gyros. 9.5/10! Prawns were amazing too, according to my mom.



That's all I got for today. Hope you have a great weekend!

Im going to greece. You know if a return fligh is needed? Im from EU country too

Nice, where are you going?

No, there is freedom in the EU, if you wanted to, you could just decide to live here. I didn't have a return flight when I came here.

Since then, I have booked one flight, this one:



Yes, you read that right. $6. Six bucks. SIX! At this point, you just book it just in case. In fact, Nis in Serbia would be a pretty good destination as I was planning to go to Exit Festival in Novi Sad in the north of Serbia on the 8th of July. It is supposed to be the first big festival post-corona with 40.000 people and David Guetta and Paul Kalkbrenner headlining the event.

I am yet to finalize the plans and not sure if I wanna do it, as it sounds like quite an adventure and very draining. We'll see, I decide tomorrow.
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I played 26 hands of poker today.




Thank you, come again!

+$678. We call this EFFICIENT!


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We went to Corfu town. Impressions:




I promise there will be more poker in the near future, this is still a poker blog, okay? Nah but seriously, right now I'm just hard-chilling and enjoying my life.

See you later!

I am going to Athens for a week, then i will see where i go next, prob will stay at least for 2 months.


****, that bargain is nice! How did you get it?
Whatever you do, have fun sir!

Nice. I meant "freedom of movement" ofcourse, haha.

As for the flight, if you use SkyScanner, you can either go destination: "everywhere" and see where to go cheaply OR pick a destination and search for the whole month to find the cheapest prices. I use a combination of both to find good flights and also inspiration where I want to go next.


Looks like this. Only works if you have no restrictions on when and where to go, but in that case it is incredibly easy to find reasonable prices. For example, from Belgrade to Saudi Arabia is $60 right now.

For me, I have decided to actually go to Serbia, travel from Nis near Kosovo to Novi Sad and attend the Exit Festival (I paid the tickets with bitcoin!). Gonna be quite an adventure!

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Poker was relatively uneventful. Played for an hour, ended up $142 + $100 rakeback. Only big hand here:



I have to say though, games at GG have been exceptionally good in the early mornings lately. They recently took the #1 spot from Stars and I couldn't be happier that they did. **** Stars!


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Today I'm going to get a PCR test and then to Ipsos to do my laundry. Surprisingly, during most of my travels, getting my clothes clean has been one of the most consistent problems I have faced. Most places I stay at (not big hotel chains) don't have laundry service, laundrymats are surprisingly rare and I am not skilled enough to clean them in the sink. Does anyone have any tips for that?

I have to admit, I am a little bit anxious going to Serbia next. Along with Cambodia, probably my most exotic country I have been so far and I am way less prepared/don't know what to expect at all. Gonna have to rely on my main motto that everything will fall into its place in the end.



No pics today, we just chilled and will probably continue to do so for the remainder of the stay. Have a great start into the week everybody!

Nice, thanks for the tip, enyoy Serbia, I heard decent things about the capital. Will take the helm myself in Greece in a few days!

Regarding to your laundry question, i have been in airnbs while travelling without washing machines and i just clean it on the sink by hand. Use shampoo, not soap. Works well enough for me

Good morning friends!

I am in Serbia now, travelling alone again for the first time in over a year and it f*cks with my head a little bit.

I said goodbye to my mom two days ago after a great BBQ at my apartments and then yesterday, took the plane to Nis. There were 8 people total on this flight, in a narrow-body 737. If all of them paid $6 like me, good luck RyanAir for covering these costs.



Then, given his reaction, vastly overpaid a taxi driver that didn't speak a single word of English - I paid 4€ - to get me to the bus station. Plan was to have to get a ticket, get breakfast and then go but the next bus left in 3 minutes. No food for poor 8g.

Anyways, it turns out I might just be the only tourist in the whole of Serbia. No one here speaks a lick of English - or any other language than Serbian for that matter. I am usually a confident guy, I don't mind striking up conversations with strangers at all but it gets so much harder when there is this big of a language barrier.

The bus took us through Belgrade, which is an exceptionally ugly city. Jesus Christ. Maybe I didn't see any good parts, but we completely traversed it and there weren't any redeeming qualities to be honest. There was a lot of construction going on, maybe they are trying to change it. They really should.


(Best pic I was able to get in Belgrade.. Danube (Donau) river)

Finally arrived in Novi Sad, which seems considerably nicer, and decided a 30 minute walk with backpack and laptop bag wouldn't be THAT bad. You'd want to see the city, right?
WRONG! Terrible decision, it has a blazing 40°C here. It is incredibly, unbearably, in-your-face hot. Greece was chilly compared to this. I arrived completely drenched in sweat and panting. The receptionist laughed at me and told me there's a bus line from the city center directly to their door steps. Welp, who knew!

On the plus side though, the hotel is pretty nice, all things considered. It is a sports hotel, they have a soccer field and tennis courts (the whole of Serbia seems to be HUGE into tennis, anyone know why?) that kids actually played on in this heat! And also a pool. Room is pretty clean, internet is good-ish. All in all, I had worse in Eastern Europe and I am pleasantly surprised.

Spent the rest of the day in the room and played my first longer session in a while.
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We ended up +$661 after quite a battle, lots of deep stacks built up on some tables, which is unusual for GG where players come and go pretty frequently usually.


When I have some more time, I want to write a love letter to 5 card pot limit omaha. In my opinion, it is THE perfect variant of poker, essentially flawless in its conception. I love it, and so should you.

For those of you who prefer live poker, after this stint in Serbia I will go to Hungary to check out the Duna Poker Centre in Budapest, Hungary! That should be fun, they play for Forint, 500 of them are like 1,40€ so you can go all in for 100.000!!! And apparently they're playing Dealer's Choice over there, too.

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I'll go find some breakfast now, today the Exit Festival starts and I hope I can find some tourists there. Not gonna lie, felt kinda lonely and drained yesterday. But I guess it's just the adjustment.


See you later.

#1 ranked tennis player in the world and one of the absolute GOAT's is Serbian

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novak_Djokovic

Aha! I asked and apparently, he played here when he was very young. That's kinda cool!

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Last two sessions were a -$729. Games looked like this:




and I ran pretty badly in the all-ins. No big deal. In fact, here is one factor that I believe is super important if you want to endure as a "pro" in poker (not that I am one): It is suuuper important that you feel just as satisfied with a session where you lose way less than you should have when you run bad, as you feel when you have a big winning session. In fact, I generally feel better when I run really bad but end up with only -50bb or whatever where others would have lost 400bb+, because those sessions usually have more interesting hands and you can be more creative in finding bluffs and interesting lines than if you just smash every board.

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Now to the more important part: EXIT 2.0 FESTIVAL

Day 1 is in the banks and man, was it amazing. The "fortress", as they call it, is actually a mid-sized town, there are 16 stages running every genre you can think of, the sound is better than anything I have ever experienced before and the organization is on-****ing-point. Never took me more than 2 minutes to get food or drinks anywhere. Amazing!

Some impressions:


I spent most of the time at the main stage just for the experience, but also quite some at the techno floor and, surprisingly, the raggae floor! I went early to snap some pics, today I'm gonna go when it gets dark because it's just way too hot.

There were definitely more than 40.000 people there, covid really is over here. Maybe I'll just stay in the Balkans, I love the freedom they still have. More on that when Exit is over.


Hope you have a great day guys!

I am leery of online 5-card Omaha games online; it seems sooo easy for colluders to share info about blockers and dominate the game.

Sick thread! Subbed.

I think that's a little bit too paranoid to assume to happen even semi-regularly. A little off-topic but: Join date 2002, daaaamn! Veteran over here.



In all the time I have been playing poker, I never understood how No Limit Hold'em could have possibly become the most popular form of poker. In fact, I am one of those freaks that enjoys Limit Hold'em more than the no limit variant. Let me try to reason why:

Let's say you have a $10k bankroll – You can reasonably play $20/$40 FLHE with that, where the average pot may be around ~$100-150 .. or NL100, where the average pot is like $20 in a decent game.

FLHE plays faster (especially in a live setting), it is more intricate and more showdown bound. There is just more action.

Meanwhile, we got a game where it is CORRECT to fold a lot. Where the motto is “tight is right”. I mean, come on. A game in which you need a massive fish for a it to run because due to the tight limitations of GTO play, there is not much value to be had from even weaker regs (or OMCs in live games). Try playing tight and/or passive, even if you are semi-decent, in a FL game and good regs will absolutely demolish you.

Not only that, the game being no-limit means that at any time, you have to be cautious of being facing, well, all-ins, which further leads to timid betting and pot controlling.

But I do get that people like big pots (compared to the blinds) and the freedom of betting it all.

4 card PLO is a significant step up. Pot Limit, in general, has a completely undeserved, terrible reputation. It is the perfect compromise between FL and NL. How nice is it that after a raise, you can generally always be certain you will be able to call a 3bet?! How great is it to be able to 3bet wide, given the fact that equities run close and you won't be shoved on!

Board structures are more dynamic and instead of just betting just both sides of your hand ranges' spectrum (nuts and pure bluffs, “being polarized”), with equities running a lot closer, you are given more freedom for aggressive lines with weaker, but still strong holdings, plus different from NLHE it is possible to have both a made hand with a draw. BUT, still, strong made hands still reign supreme over draws in this game, particularly sets. Which again, leads to there being a lot of set hunting and passive lines with draws.

Enter 5 CARD PLO! Striking the perfect balance of made hands and draws running similar equities on a range of flops, a game where on a paired flop you can reasonably expect both (or none!) of the players to have hit trips. A game where you can conceivably structure your ranges in any kind of way without immediately getting into -EV territority, depending on player tendencies and table dynamics! A game where fish can play 50% of their hands and get action in most, if not all of them, getting big pots and still not being absolutely crushed.

The structure, action, dynamic, complexity and value of that game is just perfect. Every other variant pales in comparison (with the exception of Short Deck, which has very similar characteristics but has the disadvantage that players who are used to NLHE are confused by the different hand rankings and deck size). It is, by far, the best variant of poker and we should all play it. There are so many other factors that I could talk about, the fact that it can easily be switched to Hi/Lo, that solvers will have a much harder time with it, that edges between different kind of regs can be significant and therefore games run longer and more consistently. The list goes on.

In short: PLAY 5PLO, YOU DUMMIES!

In other news, I'm down another -$1k last two days. **** that game.

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Currently on the train to Budapest, more live poker action incoming hopefully!

Have a great day everybody.

Don't think 10k for 20/40 limit is comparable to 10k for 100nl. More comparable to say you could get away with 10k for 20/40 limit or 2/5nl which are pretty comparable size games. But limit games def make for a much healthier environment for sure. Everything can be more relaxed/friendly/fun because you can't have a huge loss rate from a single hand/decision.

$10K for 100NL is more or less like $50K for 20-40 LHE.

But wouldn't limit hold'em be terrific if it had, say, a big blind ante? Say, 20-40 with $10 and $20 blinds and a $20 big blind ante?

I agree that it is more comparable to $1/$2, but not $2/$5. The difference being that you can't be "deep" in limit hold'em. Especially in most live games, $2/$5 NLHE will often play 300+bb deep or be straddled etc.

250bb is plenty for FL games if you are flexible in moving up and down, atleast from my experience when I grinded it.


Speaking of deep live games: Duna Poker Centre has plenty of that.

I arrived late yesterday after getting scammed by a taxi driver for the first time in years. I put myself on the 500/500 Dealer's Choice list, but only 100/200 NLHE was running. There was a "small" game and a "big" game, and I chose the latter.

The big games has a min BI of 250bb and a max buy-in of 1000bb. So blinds are 33c/67c, but you can sit with $670.

I didn't understand that at first, I may have been the only non-hungarian in there, so I sat with 100bb.

The table couldn't have been set up more classic: 2 good online regs including me, 1 bad live reg, one guy who complained about his bad luck every hand - which isn't more refreshing in Hungarian than in any other language -, one obv. gambling addicted calling station mega fish and an old guy who played one hand in 4 hours. The game is wild, 500 and 1k straddles happen all the time from both UTG and BU.
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First hand, I get TT and raise to 1k, mega fish calls and online reg calls in BB.

Board: 6 3 2r. Mega fish donks 1k, online reg calls, I make it 6k. Mega fish calls and reg shoves. Meh. It's 55€ and we're here to establish an image, so I call and fish tankfolds.

Turn 7
River 8

He has 22. Rebuy for 50k, by this point I had understand the dynamic here.

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Couple hands later we pick up 44. Online reg raises 2k (10 big blinds!), bad luck calls, I call, mega fish calls.

Board: A 8 4 rainbow. Bink!

Reg bets 6.5k, call, I call, mega fish calls. lol.

Turn T, bringing a flushdraw, checks to me and I decide to just overpot shove ~45k. Everyone folds. Nice.

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2 hands later, we pick up AA and raise to 1k, another live reg who recently sat down to my left and bought in for 200k raises to 3k. Mega fish calls, as mega fishes do, it comes back to me and I make it 18k. Call and mega fish is all in for 12k or so.

Flop: 9 5 2r and I ship for the remaining ~50k, reg calls. I show my AA, reg has QQ, fish has Kc9c.

Turn: X

River: A Easy peasy.

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By this point, the EM soccer finals were in overtime and play grinded to a halt. EVERYONE but one in the room was rooting for Italy, so I thought I'd join in. Mega fish was stuck a lot and complaining that play stopped, so everyone basically just looked at their cards and folded unless monster.

I get AJ and raise to 1k, he calls, online reg also calls.

Board: J 7 5, I pot, mega fish calls, online reg folds.

Turn: 9, pot, call.

River: J, pot all-in and he calls me to show A8. I usually don't feel bad for these guys, but here in Hungary, you just know that even these comparably small stakes mean something to some of these people and there really is no player protection at all. Oh well, if I don't take it, someone else will. But still...

Italy won (SPOILER ALERT) and the table broke a while later. I had hoped that 500/500 dealer's choice would open but apparently, that happens REALLY late at night, if at all, so I decided to call it a night. Loooong train ride.



The poker room is pretty nice, I have to say, there were ~10 tables running, the dealers were friendly, games were good, waitresses were super hot - Western Europe, please take notes: We don't want competent waitresses, if we wanted good service, we'd eat at a nice restaurant. We just want to look at and lightly flirt with some hotties! - all in all, I'll give it a 8/10. Apparently, there is $150 tourney on Fridays with some satties the day before, if I am still here by then, I will probably check that out, too.

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One more thing I want to note is that Budapest is f*cking BEAUTIFUL! Seriously, the architecture is exactly to my taste, everything is clean, people are open and nice (and speak better English) and I scored a studio apartment that, for $36 a night, I'd actually rent for a month!

8g is very happy here. Hope you guys are, too. See you later.

Okay... someone please explain to me the meta of table switching in live games. I consider myself pretty well versed in the live environment, but this part I just don't seem to get.

I join one of 3 100/200 tables, two are full and this one has 7 players. We have one guy who is stalling. f*cking. constantly.

Two people leave annoyed, now we are 6. I ask for a table change, floor man acknowledges it, 30 minutes (and like 4 hands) pass and nothing happens. Finally someone stands up and I walk over to floor man. He tells me I can't switch because my table has too few people and will break. When my table fills, I can switch.

Buddy, my table is empty because of this ****face, what else do you think would be the reason?! And it's not like you are getting a new player every 3 minutes anyways.


In-between rant: Slow players should be kicked off tables and, if they keep doing it, banned from the poker floor. No exceptions. Now, this guy didn't do it out of malice, he was just dropped on his head as a kid. I'm not saying this to be an ass, he was very obviously mentally challenged and couldn't fully follow what was happening.
But here is my point: I don't care. Warn him twice, kick him, ban his ass.

I don't care if you are a trashtalking douchebag at the table, I get it, it changes dynamics, whatever, it can help or hinder you. Even angleshooting I will tolerate, it only ever helps the angleshooter but some of it can be sneaky and funny even. But slow players do not benefit anybody. The casinos' profits are halved for that table, players are bored out of their mind and the ret*rd won't get any better either. There is a reason most competitive games have a (shot-)clock.

Anyways, all the floor achieved is that instead of switching, I just left, the table broke anyways and he pissed me off. Good job! Quick aside: When I think of the job of a floorman, I really cannot imagine it to be that tough of a job. It isn't, is it? And yet, most floormen genuinely suck at what they're doing. The dealers are usually amazing, the waitresses are fine, but floor? Always bad. Whatever. Atleast I have time to watch Black Widow now.

In for 50k, out for 65k, +$50 or so.

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Budapest zoo is very nice.

In my experience with live poker, a significant number of floorpeople sought out the job because they needed the money to support their poker habit. This particular branch of the career path does not select for competence....

Yesterday's game was insane, pretty much exactly the opposite to the day before.

I sit down with 80k in a 100/200 game - and find out, yet again, with 400bb, I am a massive shortstack. There are three people with over 500.000 stacks (that's over $1600 in a .30/.60 game!!). There is a mandatory straddle to 500, but 3 people button straddle to 5k every hand. Everyone is playing instantly every action and we are all there for one mega fish who is constantly talking on his phone and just super, super maniac.

Unfortunately, I am absolutely card dead for the whole period (I got 99 twice, that's it), but to give you a taste, here is a hand between two other players.

There is a 5k straddle on, it is raised to 20k (100bb!) and there are 3 callers, including the fish.

Board comes QJ5 and one of the regs bets 75k, the businessman fish calls.

Turn 3 and reg goes all-in for ~180k. Businessfish thinks for like 30 seconds and folds QTo, reg shows J4c


Now, the game is obviously super juicy and I don't mind play effectively $5/$10, my only problem is that I don't have that much cash on hand here, and I don't really feel like travelling with a couple thousand in my pockets either.. I think my play here is to get $1000 from the ATM and just gamble it up.

But it's also nice to see that I will never, ever have to work a day in my life, given games like this run all around the world (although this one was extreme ). You could always just get an appartment here and clean up these games for high 4 digits a month, if you wanted to.

Anyways, we end up -32k (-$106), but it's worth the info/experience.

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Earlier that day I went to Széchenyi Thermal Bath and it was fantastic.

I have no pictures, as much as in the casino I felt it inappropriate (despite being allowed), but it is the biggest hot spring thermal bath in Europe, built in 1881.


There are 3 pools outside and I spent most of my time in the hot one (38°C) and what can I say... after ~one hour in there, the muscle in my back that has been tense my whole adult life suddenly spasmed and then relaxed! In what I can only describe as a feeling like 100 simultanous orgasms. I genuinely almost started crying. The last time that happened was ~4 years ago and involved a chiropractic, an inflamed nerve near my spine and a LOT of pain.

In short: I don't believe in healing powers of "special water" or whatever but: The Széchenyi hot spring has healing powers! 100/10 experience, would recommend.


Have a nice mid-week everybody!

Guess who took a break on Wednesday? Sorely needed, too!

But yesterday, we were back in action to play a longer session at the Duna Poker Club! I got talking to a guy from here who spoke good English and now I know why people straddle and play so mega deep here: There is an old regulation in Hungary that prohibits higher limits than 500/500 ($1.60) from being played. Therefore, they play 500/500 and just make it whatever they want with straddles! Stupid regulation, smart solution and definitely good to know.

I played 100/200 though, and this was the first session I played here that was “standard”. Even played a few interesting hands:
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First hand we get 75 and make it 1500 (bought in for 100k). The guy I talked to calls and so do two others.

Board is JT8 , two checks to me and I bet 6k. Guy and fish call.

Turn is the K (pot 24k). Check and I have a tough decision here. Guy behind me has ~60k left and the other one has 33k but I believe he is on scared money. Usually, I shut down here but the K card to bluff here, as I can represent AQ, all of the sets etc and I need to find some combinations of bluffs I can have here to bet with. My hand seems like a prime candidate and I decide to bet 20k with the intention of folding to Guy and call against the scared money guy.

Both tank a long time and then fold.
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Next hand, we get QQ in SB with a 500 BU straddle on and we make it 2k. An old, bluffy/spewy guy makes it 5k (we are ~130k deep) and there is an overcall from the scared money guy. I make it 19k, call and scared money shoves for 30300. A little annoyed that I didn't check stack size to be able to reshove, I call and so does the other.

Board: A J 9r.

Checks to me and again, I am in a tough position. I believe checking is fine. But, given that I want to valuebet all my strong hands here, again I need to think of some combinations I can have to bluff here with and I think QQ fits the bill quite well. I make it 27k, old guy tanks even longer this time and folds.

Turn and river brick and I win the $300 pot.

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For the last hand, We pick up Ako in SB vs. 800 BU straddle and make it 2500, CO (an older, semi-decent player) and BU (spewy) call. The board comes AKT and I bet 6k, CO calls and BU folds. Turn is, to my delight, another A and I bet 10k, he quickly calls.

River is an 8, pot is ~32k. By this point we both still have 125k left. I have bet two rivers against him before and he folded both times, once I told him I had the nuts (which I did) and once I showed him a made hand. My options here are betting small to milk or overbet and after considering for a second and thinking he might be suspicious this time around, I decide on the latter. I bet 41k and stare at the 1k chip. He tanks for a good 2 minutes – and decides to reshove all-in.


THANK YOU, COME AGAIN. I snap call and show, he throws A8 on the table and immediately jumps up and leaves. $950 pot my way!
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Bought in for 100k and cashed out 278k, for a profit of +$584.

I am really enjoying Budapest, so I booked another 4 days here. Today, there is the 50k tournament – probably not the best use of my time, but it should be fun.

I hope you enjoy the live poker updates, and I see you later!

Hey.

Just to keep this one going, don't feel like writing a lot:

Played in the club all last 3 days, Day1 was the tournament which, ofcourse, I hard bubbled. -50k (-$164).

Day2 I played a super nice table and talked to an investment guy and super non-believer in bitcoin for hours, made two straight flushes along the way (in one live session!) and ended up +183k (+$601).

Day 3 I wanted to play a long session and went early but the table was meh and my friends wanted to play counterstrike, so only +16k ($52).

Nothing much else happened, it's raining cats and dogs today and because I travel super light, I don't have proper clothes for that kinda weather, so I'm staying in and watch "Split".

Also, I have booked a flight from here to Luxembourg via Amsterdam because it was the only reasonable-ish option - still cost 140€ - and decided to just stay here until then. I love Budapest and the poker club and I simply don't wanna leave yet.

Sorry, no hands today although there were a few pretty cool ones. I'll try to be better!

Okay.

Now that I have played a week at Duna Poker club, I think I understand the dynamic there better and it is actually pretty interesting.

First of all, the club is surprisingly big. Even at like 4pm, there are already 9 tables running, which for Europe is huge! Except for maybe London and Rozvadov, I don't think there is a bigger room in Europe.

Secondly, the games play deceptively big, because they are super, mega deep. I haven't played 50/100, but 100/200 (which is 33c/66c) actually plays like a deep $1/$3 game and 500/500 ($1.4/$1.4) is more like NL$1k. Which is actually pretty cool, but I feel would be offputting to new players and one-off tourists.

Third, the games are exceptionally friendly/casual, even without alcohol. Ofcourse everybody wants to win, but the vibe is still more homegame-y than that of a regular casino.

All of these facts, I genuinely like. Even NLHE can be semi-interesting when you play it 1000bb deep! Who knew.

Yesterday, I played this hand. 500/500 with a 1k BU straddle, SB calls, BB raises to 4k, I call KQo, BU and both blinds call.

Flop is 754 . Checks to me, I check, BU checks too.

Turn J. Checks to me again and I bet 15k, BU calls, SB calls, BB folds.

River J. Check and I think I have a bet here. My range includes most of the value hands on the board and we can represent them fairly well (since we can bet for thin value here if we have a made hand), BU will have a hard time calling with a player behind him and ofcourse, against a raise we have an easy fold. So we Bet 35k, BU folds and SB, a spewy suuuper cool bodybuilder type guy calls - with 95o.

Why do I include this hand? Well first, because it was the only interesting one of the night. And secondly, he proceeded for 10 minutes to call himself the greatest, that he KNEW I was bluffing, he just KNEW it and trying to goad me into some kind of reaction.

And I just love when something like that happens! It is so. freaking. cute. I wish I still had that in me. After 15 years of playing and being financially stable, the game is just numbers for me now. I am the guy who doesn't like playing final tables because.. well, it is kind of predetermined what will happen based on the hole cards the table gets. There's just no skill involved. Similarly, in soccer I always get disinterested when it gets to a penalty shootout because.. well, it's just a coinflip, maybe slightly tilting in one direction.

It reminded me of this post-game chess interview of Vassily Ivanchuck, an absolute must-see. The main point to me, except for his absolute brilliance ofcourse, was that he prefers "creating" an interesting game over an easy win. He will actively seek out sharp, unclear positions over theory and actively thanks his opponents for letting him do so.

I feel, with poker we are in a similar situation. In a post-solver era where GTO is available, some players try to create situations where, again, intuition reigns supreme over the math-heads - either with button straddles, super deep games or straight up playing different variants of poker. This is what drew me back to live poker, despite its slow and boring nature - the human component, live dynamics and reads and stuff, allow you to stray away from theory to create something different.


Anyways, we lost 35k (-$114).