After hearing about your fast and finishing Tools of Titans, I just completed a 3 day fast. It was easier than I expected, but still rough. Each day, I had 2 coffees with MCT oil and a bunch of lemon/salt water. I slept terribly, but I'm unsure if that's because I slept on the floor (to simulate Ferriss' practice poverty) or if because I found it hard to sleep being hungry. The hunger never goes away but if you stay busy and distract yourself it's not that bad.

I lost 6 pounds. I don't think I have 6 pounds to lose. I experienced minimal negative effects in terms of productivity and energy. I think you could do it very easily, especially if you had a lot of projects/activities planned out.

Good luck with it Tyl0r

Awesome that you lost 6 pounds whilst keeping yourself well hydrated. That's gotta be good news. Purged a bunch of ****, probably. Also it's good to hear that your experience went well overall.

Ty Mikey, looking forward to giving it a try.

I've also been giving the MCT oil(with ketones) a try over the last few days. It tastes decent(maybe a bit too buttery), and it does seem to impact energy levels. It gives a slightly more elevated and balanced caffeine high that seems to last longer. Also, normal coffee tends to make me hungry while this puts off hunger for an hour or two. The preparation and cleanup are an extra few minutes each(butter is annoying to clean).

Some of those positive effects are attributed to cold showers / meditation. Not sure how much, but that probably deserves some percentage of the consciousness/energy level gains.

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I've been reading a book called "ayahusca in my blood". It documents a explorer/enthobotanist's 25-year experience with ayahuasca. Seeing his perspective has been addressing some of the question marks surrounding my experience. Its been an interesting read so far. I recommend it to anyone that has already had ayahuasca experiences.

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I found a local gym/studio that has 2 free trial courses. They have a kettlebell training program I'm going to try (assuming I'm not deep in the main). I'm thinking I may buy a couple kettlebells for exercise in Sydney.

My plan for Sydney is to buy a bike and rent ~6-8kms south of the city. I plan to position myself a couple kms from the BJJ gym and university.

I'll start planning for this today. Its Chinese new years.. which means the city is going to get ~400k Chinese flying-in making it difficult to find a place to rent.

I'm playing the Aussie millions main event. Day1 was yesterday. I made day 2. I got an awesome table draw. 4-5 fish, 1 meh reg, 2 good regs. The fishies busted early and got replaced by good regs. I think at one point I was probably losing at the table. I decided to bump up the variance and 3b/4b marginal spots against the really good regs.

I got into a ton of really interesting spots which made the day very eventful. I got into a bunch of spots pre with a player whom seemed like a sicko. Turned out it was Martin Jacobsen. I didn't recognize him until I saw his name when we were bagging. Great.

Anyways, I don't feel like writing about the spots at this time, but I may write about them later.. Overall, I played well. Better than I expected myself to play. There were only a few mistakes I know I made. Certainly there were mistakes I didn't realize I made, but yeah.. to be expected as MTTs are not my main game.

Got 150k (5x starting and 3x average) going into day2.

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In other poker-related news, took a shot at the 25/25/50 PLO. God seat opened and I was next on the list, so I snap took it. Played a couple orbits and lost in a fairly standard(but higher variance) spot getting it in good v hand, and meh v range. Also, got into a 3-way 15k pot in 10/20/40 with nfd+oesd v pair+gs+fd and pair+gs+fd and lost twice. I'm still in the midst of a medium/large plo cash downswing. Also, I can't seem to remember 25/50 shots I've taken that have resulted in wins. :\

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I'm taking today off. I've got **** that needs to get caught up on.

220k going to day3. Bubble is today, min cash is really low($15k) and payout is super top heavy with monster jumps at the final table. Also, play goes to 6-handed at 36 players. Both of those factors are quite poor for my game. Difference between 300k and 1.6m isn't much for me, I rather it much flatter. Also, my 6max experience is quite limited relative to the field so I'm going to be in timebank theory mode and ~oblivious to meta trends.

I've played a few tables of the MTT now and the field good. I should be playing more of these MTTs. It's so much softer than what I expected a $10k to be.. and I think there is no tax? Yeah, this MTT makes me believe poker still has some legs left. However, large field live mtt variance is super high though, so life a pro would still be treacherous in 3-5years.

Play well man, TID!

barring slightly less antes in the pot to steal - 9 max is just 6 max after the first 3 guys folded. A lot of people get tripped up by this, but I think successful 9m players can play 6m easier than successful 6m players can play 9m.

win all the chips and stuff

Was thinking exactly this about 6 max. Take away first three seats in 9 max and you get to play more poker.

Glgl win it!

Ignore post

Sorry - issues with Tapatallk. Carry on - catching up on great thread!

Well, no chance to play 6max..

Bustoed 64. I'm happy with my play overall. I think I played about as good as I could have expected from myself. I had some interesting spots where I think I misplayed, and some spots where I think I played really well.

Some interesting hands:

Early levels(100/200), everyone is really deep. Hero opens 475 in utg2 KQhh, btn calls(older rec), SB calls(rec), BB calls(seems like sicko reg)

Flop(2000) 9h2h3s

Check, Check, hero ?

Yeah so I chose to cbet here. I think it's probably +EV (I chose 1200), but I think checking is similar or more +EV and much lower variance. It didn't seem close to me in-game, but now that I think about it I think its really close, but not all that intuitive to check here. Against reasonable ranges(say 22-TT, T9s+, QTo+, some AK for btn/sb, and ~60% for BB), I think check is the best play. Villains will have more sets when ranges are tighter, and more NFDs. getting c/r'd in this spot is horrible. Against wider ranges, I like cbetting more than checking. We don't get c/red as frequently often, we get lots of higher equity hands to fold, we have equity and good barrel cards when called.

Quick maths:
dead cards: 9h2h3s
Hand Optimized Count Base Count
KhQh 1 (0.08%) 1 (0.08%)
23%!4%, 22-55 212 (15.99%) 260 (19.61%)
26%!4%, 22-44 253 (19.08%) 304 (22.93%)
70%!7% 682 (51.43%) 832 (62.75%)

Players 1/2 will have ~15 combos of hands that can c/r, BB will have ~20. So yeah, getting cr'ed by btn+sb around 15% + bb ~3%, or 18%. If btn/sb widen up to include ~50-100 combos of hands and fewer AKo 3bets(fish ranges), cr frequency moves down to around 12%, and there are more draws/hands that flat us which we dominate or will be in a +EV position going to the turn/riv.

The clock showed 66 players left and 64 was next ladder($5k). There also seemed to be a small delay on the clock. I have 8.5bb on the btn and get dealt A6o. There was an extremely long bubble and many <10bb stacks on tables around me(I'd say there were ~4-6 <10bb stacks). I think timebanking for 2 minutes and shoving is by far the most +EV play. I think we bust ~25% of the time here, and those 2 minutes are going to pay jump us around 10-25% of the time. So, timebanking 2 minutes is worth around $200.

Also, I think the biggest trends in mtt land these days is to cbet a very wide range with a really small sizing on any favorable board, and check back medium low-medium sdv. I also find people are folding to flop cr's with hands they should be calling. That said, cr'ing flops prints money.

Edit: Another observation. Lots of players(even seemingly good regs) tend to get tired towards the end of the day. I played Sunday and there were a bunch of ~sleepers. Also, I feel like playing the last flight of day1 when there is a 12:30 start on day2 is really spewy, but it seems thats the flight most people played..

Qk hand we bet to take it down there sometimes, can barrel any t,j,q,k, and h, and have equity to call check raises. What if it checks through and turn is an off suit ten? Now we face more players than if the field had gotten thinned by bet. 923hh isn't a board that gets crd by more than 22,33,99 and occasional tt/jj? Heart combos but not all would check raise, if even most?

This is one of best flops for your hand without k or q. 5 or 6 ways would say that bet wins the pot there a fair amount.

I dunno math but would assume you meant getting called 25%~ by blinds and we still have equity when called, often around 30%~. In even better shape but called more if bbs calling near what covers your shove range. So your play is fine,
Can even shove a fair bit wider than ax assuming we're not on the first bubble where our stack's value is within getting paid. Can shove 47% here down to 96s,56s, t9o etc

Nice job man, sounds like you cashed and played well in a 10k. And with some mental edges over bett r players!

For the kq hand I understand the reasons for betting. I also think betting is +EV. Yeah, I ran the sim and didn't include tt/jj but we get cred by that sometimes, perhaps. Either way, getting CRed 18-20% on this board when we bet sucks.

Part of the reason why I like checking is we just dont have that much FE. Here is a reasonable calling range in combos;
44-88,TT,JJ,8h7h,JhTh,Th8h 45 (3.39%) 45 (3.39%)
44-88,TT-JJ,Tx9x,9x8x,ax9x,JhTh 52 (3.92%) 55 (4.15%)
9xx,T9,98,J9,9Q,Kx9x,9xAx,2sJs,2sQs,2sKs,2sas,4x5x , Jhh,Thh,8hh,7hh 102 (7.69%) 142 (10.71%)

BB is actually probably wider, he is unlikely to fold a hand like a4ss and has k9o/a9o, so lets bump his combos up to 125. So yeah, depending on assumptions we get a call [1 - (~ .78 * .78 * .80)] = ~51.3% when we bet.

So when we bet ~60% pot it needs to get through ~30% to be immediately +EV. in this case we are getting called or raised ~67-72%, so it seems very close to neutral EV to me. Obv we have some EV from future streets when called or raised, but I would assume its not that high.

EV of check is much harder to estimate, but of course its greater than 0.

I watched a run it once video with a similar hand and the RIO coach(Daniel Dvoress, Jan10th) preferred checking. The board was wetter though and he had slightly less equity when called, so his hand did favor a check more in that spot. However, he seemed to highly prefer a check to bet.

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The a6o hand is clearly a shove. I would shove wider than standard nash here because I expect the BB to overfold(rec player, ~60bb), and the reggy sb had ~20-25bb. The reason why its a timebank is because it allows other players to bust close to the ladder. In a tournament where my expected outcome is low, waiting 2 minutes for a small chance at the payjump is just massive printing(talk about highest hourly of the series). As it happened, someone was walking away from being paid out $15k as I approached payouts and I got paid $20k.

And thank you. I'm quite happy with my play. I think I played close to as well as I could. Stayed focused overall, conserved energy well, didn't make many mistakes I was aware of, took some creative exploitative lines.. Yeah, very pleased.

I had my biggest spew of the series yesterday. Thankfully for backers, it was entirely on my own coin. I'm not really sure what caused it. I was in a state of boredom, which is the worst.

400/800 100, we have 19k, old man(25kish) who I played with in the main(and opens surprisingly wide, but likes to fold to 3bets or just play poorly postflop) makes it 1700 in hj, folds to hero on the btn, hero makes it 4200 with j2s, villain never looks at my stack and calls relatively quickly.

Flop (10k)
Acjc9h

Villain stares at the flop, asks how much I have, and goes allin for ~15k effective.. hero.. folds. Also, not really sure whats going on here. I figure he has some hands we are beating, but is the type to just randomly jam a hand like ATs or KJs. I folded.

I think way before the money this just isn't going to be effective against this villain. I suspect he may have been folding more in the main because its a bigger mtt and we were near the money.. I think in this exact spot hes folding <50%, which makes my play spew. It's probably -EV with a hand like A2s, which makes it horrible with j2s.

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There is a $1k turbo today. I think it should be good value. I'm not super well versed on push/shove but the field seems to be ~******ed in regards to these types of spots and lots of the foreign pros are leaving or have left.

There is the $5k PLO tomorrow. I will almost certainly play. There is a small chance the field is like <25 people with 1 or 2 fish in which case I wont reg. I'll probably late reg by a couple levels. In these super small fields you can sort of table select based on when you reg and I think that's a huge edge that most people overlook. Also, in these mtts there are generally a few regs that are good cash game players that play PLO mtts like cash games.

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Also, I'd like to write a bit about my dreams. I haven't had any "big dreams" lately. Nothing super interesting / wild. The strangeness has lowered a bit and I still have varying degrees of lucidity in some dreams(which is very unusual-- years ago I was either lucid or not lucid). I've had several dreams over the last couple weeks where I am essentially sleeping (on a couch or bus) while things are going on around me. I remember visiting far fewer "characters" in my dreams lately. Fewer animals, fewer old man encounters, no spirit characters.

I've also had far less energy gather around my third eye. It use to be dozens of times a day and now it happens only occasionally, generally during meditation or float tank sessions. The colors have also been far less frequent.

I have some things I'd like to write about. First off, Aussie millions 2017.

The cash games were significantly worse than I was expecting.

The 10/20/40 was particularly bad. There were edges to be made because of the buyin structure, but overall the games sucked. I had a total of 12 tables break while I was playing(all before midnight, often around 7-9pm) over 3 weeks. It was typical to have 3-6 good regs, 1-3 decent regs, 1 weaker reg and a ~fish. The game would continue running until the semi-fish left. I played 47 hours at 10/20/40 and I'd say only 10 hours were in 7+/10, with most hours being 4-6/10.

Thankfully, some the decent/weak regs couldn't adjust to shortstacking, so it was quite +EV to buyin for 25bb. The biggest edges were being made from decent/bad regs opening hands like k874ds in the HJ with two <30bb stacks in the blinds. Or, some of these meh regs were overfolding the SB/BB to 25bb btn opens. The fish would make classic fish mistakes, but with only 1 or 2 per table there wasn't that much printing to be done.

The 5/5/10 PLO was much better. Most games were 7-8/10. However, the rake is very high and there is a sitdown fee. So yeah, even though my winrate is around 7-10bb/hr under normal rake, its closer to 5bb/hr under rape rake structure. I also think that the 5/5/10 was better because the better regs were playing the bigger games. It's probably not as good outside of the series.

The MTTs were incredible value. There were legions of donks everywhere. I just wish some of them could find their way to the PLO cash games. The magnitude and frequency of mistakes going on was much higher and larger than what I see in a typical mid/high-stakes live PLO game.

All said and done, I played a total of 103.5 hours during 3 weeks, which is far below my typical series grind. This is due mostly to poor cash game quality. I ~failed on the physical exercise front, often substituting quick 10-15minute sun salutations or plank routines. I kept up with daily meditation and spend a few hours in the float tank. I kept up with cold showers, and I kept to my new diet. Overall I felt very sharp(except the first 4-5 days), full of energy, and believe I played very well.

I had one of my top 5 losing days this trip, and barely cleared my expenses for the trip despite cashing the main-- so results were not ideal.. I ended up losing in Calgary in November/Dec, so my last ~310 hours have been ~breakeven. This is essentially a downswing afaik.

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I get the general impression that PLO cash game death has accelerated over the last couple years. I think this may be because I have been playing less, so I notice the difference. Games have certainly got much worse year over year over the last 3 years. I suspect the rate of decline will slow down over the next couple years as winrates of the best regs go to the $40-80 range, and the decent/poor regs earn minimum wage.

I haven't played in Sydney yet, but I expect the 5/5/10 games to be 6-8/10 with rape rake structure. The best regs are making $40-80 in this type of game, and when I say best, I mean top 3. I don't think its much different in a place like Tampa or Calgary. The landscape seems to be alot flatter than a few years ago and there doesn't seem to be (m)any gold mines left..

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The last couple days have been relatively stressful. I've been searching for a room, bike, and woman in Sydney. It's a tough gig. I've spent 10-20hours searching online, sent ~100 messages, and only heard back from a few people.

As far as rooms go, I inspected one room that looks promising at a good price in a good location, I will hear back soon. I'll be checking out two more rooms today and two later this week. The rent here is pretty killer, at ~700-900usd/mo for a room in a 3-5BR house that's 3-5km from downtown/the casino.

I've also been searching for a road bike. I figure spending $200-400 on a road bike and reselling for $150-300 is huge +EV life. I'll spend 10-15 hours buying/selling, and save ~7hours/wk and ~$70/week on commuting/bus. Plus, I get exercise and biking is fun.

I've also been on the dating grind. OKcupid.com is my favorite, so I've been mostly using that. I went on a couple dates in Melbourne which were pretty lame. I met a girl on the bus and we got along much better, but she was only in town for a week. There is a ton of potential on OKcupid sydney. Got 4-5 conversation going with what seems to be awesome women.

I feel like I could keep writing for hours. I've got a ton on my mind and haven't had enough time to spew it on paper. More updates to come.

Right, so I bought a bike. I got a great deal, which is awesome. The bike is aluminum frame, carbon fork. It's a racing/road bike, so its ultra fast/smooth on pavement, but can't handle much else. It went for $1200-1400 new ~10 years ago, and is on ebay in the $400-700 USD range. I picked it up for $325USD with $80 clip-on shoes and a odometer. Boom. My first ride was horrible and involved me checking my phone every 3 minutes for navigation in downtown Sydney during rushhour. My second ride was worse-- I got stuck in a thunderstorm on hilly roads checking my navigation every 3 minutes. So much danger...

The room search business is difficult. I've put myself at a serious disadvantage by only needing a room for 2 months. If 4 people look at a room and 3 offer 6months+, I'm pretty much never getting the room. I've seen 3 rooms and get close to written off after I say 2 months. I found one room geared towards people like me, but its also ~$100/wk overpriced and doesn't require bond-- which attracts ****ty tenants.

It's a strange spot because there are no leases, so I could just say I'm staying 6 months and then peace out after 2 months. I get stuck in this spot with dating a lot, too. I'm a big fan of the honest way, but I'm also a big fan of not ****ing spending 5 hours a day searching for a place to sleep. So yeah, I've only got a few days of honest searching before the lying commences.

Holy ****, I thought prices were high in Melbourne. Sydney is worse. A convenience store tried to charge me $5 for 1L of water. I laughed in his face and went to the subway next door to get free water. Unfortunately, the subways don't offer free water in Sydney. However.. I took out my nit-rage on the subway. I ordered a salad, but got no lettuce, only a bit of baby spinach, and ~a pound worth of vegetables. I had to ask for "a little more" green peppers about 5 times before the dude understood I was casing the joint for vegetables.

I'm here primarily to make the money, so it makes me anxious that I'm going to be spending >$2k/mo on living in the city. Here are some pro-tips I'll be using for saving money in aussie-land;

1- Butter/coconut oil coffee in a thermos.

Right, so butter/coconut oil are ultra cost effective for the energy. For a serving (which I consider ~1L of coffee, 3 tablespoons of butter, 3 tablespoons of coconut oil, and some cinnamon). That's around 60g of good fats. It takes ~5minutes to make and costs around $3-4 in Sydney. It's got to be one of the most effective(delicious) things to consume-- particularly on a ketogenic diet.

2- Farmers markets/local produce

Most cities have farmers markets on the weekends that have local produce. It's often a bit cheaper than the supermarket produce. Its often healthier/more nutritious, and supports farmers instead of shareholders.

3. ~Bi-weekly fasting

Hell yes! The system has been hacked. Fasting seems like the nuts for saving money. You get to save time(eating/cooking), money, and flush the body clean. Boom. I'm not quite sure whats optimal for fasting, but I think 2 or 3 day fasts every 2-3 weeks has got to be +EV health versus not fasting. Plus, its certainly +money.

4. Cook large meals, pack meals.

Right, so time is money. I probably spend 4-5 hours cooking per week on average. I want to move that down to ~2-3 hours. I plan to spend 20-40 minutes making food for 3-5 meals. I eat some immediately, then pack away the rest. bulk cooking+Tupperwear+fork=fast cheap meals.

5. Go to the cheapest supermarket, go at night.

Markets can vary quite a bit by price. I find the extra 5-10minute commute to get to the cheapest one to be well worth it. In Sydney, thats Aldi.

Also, at night the meats/fish are generally price-reduced for quicksale. I cant tell the difference between meat that's spent 2 days or 3 days on the shelf, and you probably can't either. I like to buy it just as it gets marked-down, then cook it that night, or the next afternoon.

Welcome back - at least that's what it feels like to me.

Fun reading again. I get a kick out of the travel on a dime writing, plus the dating stuff, plus the poker. Oh, and health stuff. Thanks again.

I do not see eggs talked about above. I see you do eat meat, eggs have a ton of protein and omegas. I try to eat a few hardboiled eggs at the casino. They have a shell so you can stick them in a pocket or leave them somewhere kind of cold for a long long time. Plus a hardboiled egg keeps its nutrition contained better than frying the egg in a pan. I do crack them raw in a morning smoothie with coffee. Very convenient either way. When eating raw eggs I prefer brown at the min, but try to buy brown organic. Gl sorry to ramble.

Hey man, been looking into using coconut oil in a similar way you do. Do you use any particular kind (organic/extra virgin/refined/unrefined)? Wondering if its worth it to get the expensive stuff or if the normal stuff at the grocery store is fine.

Organic unrefined. It's not that much more expensive, and the unrefined stuff you can taste a big difference. I also do something called oil pulling aftee brushing my teeth. It heals cavities, makes teeth less sensitive and whiter, and pulls toxins out of your body.

Glad you are enjoying it

I realize most of the stuff I've been writing about lately is only of interest to a small minority of people. I was going through joe rogan youtube videos yesterday and noticed all the ones that were the most interesting to me (on psychedelics/neuroscientists) were the least viewed videos. Meh.

Eggs are a major part of my diet, I make an omelette most days. Also, I've started making keto ice cream which uses eggs.

For eggs, I find its tough to figure out what to buy. The labels can be quite misleading and different words mean different things depending on the rules where you are living.

I think the most important thing is the living conditions of the chickens. Chickens don't do well in crowded environments. In crowded environments they produce a bunch of hormones related to stress. They've been known to peck each other to death. Its bad news if you are eating the ~offspring of animals kept in those types of environments. Any sort of antibiotics/hormones is bad news.

Also, with the crowded environments, the **** becomes a problem. Chickens **** a **** ton. They are always ****ting. Often times in these big barn operations (or even semi-barn operations which are classified as "free range" sometimes) there are so many chickens per acre and so much **** that the **** starts to seep into the water, which is in turn fed to the chickens, and you get ****ty environment.

Buying eggs is high variance afaik as its really hard to know the true conditions of the coup based on the labels. I think the local/small farms are more likely to have reasonable operations (But again, I'm sure there are "label-frauds" from farms pretending to have a small organic local operation).

Yeah, I'll agree with cafepoker. I've used both and didn't notice a difference on energy levels, but the organic unrefined tastes different (better).

On the health front its not clear to me that unrefined is healthier based on brief research, but I imagine the equity that it is better it is worth the ~$1/100g.

Also, hes right on using the coconut oil for dental health. Taking a tablespoon or two of coconut oil and moving it around your mouth for 5-10minutes is very +dental-health.

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So, I thought twoplustwo was down for the last 3 days. Turns out my wifi at home doesn't allow access to twoplustwo, and also doesn't show a page saying its blocked by the ISP. I find it comical that the ISP doesn't seem to block porn related to horses ****ing black dudes, but that poker strategy forums are off-limits.

In regards to poker... my downswing has continued. I've been taking shots at the bigger game on my own BR-- which is something I rarely do. These shots have been met by 3 consecutive losing sessions of a medium-to-large magnitude. This seems to sum up my shot-taking experiences lifetime. Some of the hands I've been losing are just disgusting.

I'm going to take a few more shots before I consider selling action or moving down.

I do find it interesting that since positive-variance has been more important for me/my family that my experience has translated into one of the worst downswings of my career. I also think that I've been playing the best during this time, which makes it even more unfortunate. Oh well. I suppose the cool part about this situation is I get to see how good I can play while recently experiencing negative variance. This is an opportunity I don't get that often..

I hope things turn around for you soon, keep at it. Losing at shot taking sucks!!

Thanks! I've gone 0/4 now on my own coin, which makes it the biggest failed shot I've ever taken. Its only 5/10/20/40(sometimes 80), which plays a bit smaller than $25/50usd. I'm min-buying and taking even small edges, which is perhaps not the the best strategy(variance) given my life situation. This strategy is actually higher variance than buying in for 100bb, but I think its also more +EV in most line-ups. I've written extensively about this, as it seems to be a highly controversial topic. For the record, I have noticed some of the better regs have also adopted this strategy.

Two days ago I was playing the smaller game, $1/2/5 $1k max, and managed to win 10 buyins in what was a 9/10 game over about 12 hours. The variance in this game is pretty wild. I won back most of the shot$ in one session of low stakes.

I made a call in a spot on the river where I normally fold. I found the hand quite interesting, so I shall post it;

7 handed, 5/5/10 game, limp in EP, hero($1400ish) is in the hj with Ax9x8h7h, and raises to $50, CO calls(50%!5%), btn calls(fish, probably has ~85% minus 8% 3bet here), BB(decent lag reg) calls.

Flop ~$220

Kd9h4h

check, check, check, btn quickly bets $200, fold, Hero calls, fold.

I think the flop is close to ch/f and ch/c. I like ch/c v btn because I think his BvC is high and we have decent equities.

Turn ($620)

Ah

hero check, villain quickly bets $400, hero ..

Yeah so I think this is really close. This is my first session with this player. He doesn't seem afraid to bet post or jam pre. I think he bets Kh flushes and maybe some Qh flushes for value here. Obviously Khxh is in his range. I think he also bets most Kh combos, and TJQ(with a heart) combos most of the time.

I call.

River ($1420)

Ks

hero($920) check, villain bets allin.

So I normally fold here. He's repping very thin for value and bluffs here. He probably checks all his flushes. He doesn't have many full houses. I suppose KK, AxAxKh, AKhh, some strangely played axkhxx, and a few K9, maybe some Khxh. We block his value range pretty hard.

He doesn't really have much for bluffs, either. I think sometimes he would check trip K on the river, hoping to win(even though this is not possible). So, hes only got some Kh bluffs, some airballs like JTQ(which I think he takes this line some % of the time), and maybe some random combos of spazs where he just keeps betting v checks because hes on the button and the board is scary.

These river spots I find particularly difficult readless. Villain is repping very thin, and most villains that realize they are repping thin on the river as a bluff wont bluff. Although, some people are not like this, and this player is someone who hasn't played all week and seems to be a bit spazzier than most. I ended up calling, and he showed AsKh7c5d.

Given the hand he showed up with, in retrospect, I think call is best. If hes playing this hand pre, his pre range is super wide. (which was my read to begin). If hes got AK75rainbow pre, He's got all KhTQ$ss, KhJT$ss, KhQJ$ss combos pre.

Also, If hes betting this hand on the flop, his flop betting range is wide(which was my read).

If hes betting this hand the turn, it means hes more likely to bet trip Ks with the Kh on the river, because he didn't check MDSV when his hand is rarely good.

So, in retrospect we have more info. Against this type of villain hes going to get to the river with a ton of BBB$ss, KhRR$ss type hands. We don't block any of those, and we do block his value range, so bearing no additional reads about river aggression, its a call getting 2.4:1. Probably a call at 2:1 too, given no bet sizing read.

The river reads in this spot are very important, though. His line is repping very thin for value, and it looks like we have some strong hands on this river. Some players will give up bluffs almost always in this spot. So against some players, its just always a fold. Against most players that play 80% of hands on the button and like to bet versus check, 'tis a call.

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In other news; I've been crushing the volumes. 55.5 hours in my first week here. The games are good, so I play the games.

My energy management is working very well. I feel quite energized/focused despite a couple nights of 6-7 hour sleeps. I think a large part of this is attributed to the ketogenic diet. I normally keep a healthy reserve of fat (21-23% BF, BMI is 23) in normal life. I think this has decreased to around 20%BF, BMI22 over the last month of the ketogenic diet. I've been exercising less than normal, so to lose BF% it seems a bit unusual.

I'll also say that I've been actively managing my energy a bit more at the tables. I pay more attention to the action when I have fewer reads on players, and the game is playing bigger. I tend to just breathe/relax when its with players I'm more familiar with and the game is playing nittier. My old strat was to go hard 90% of the time, which is a decent strategy if playing 30hrs/wk, but not optimal for marathon volumes.

Nice blog...will real more, if I have time.

Thanks Martin.


I took a glucose blood test at the pharmacy for curiosity purposes. I got 4.2mm/l which is actually slightly outside of normal range on a ketogenic diet(1.5-3mm/l). I think perhaps the higher reading was because it was a few hours after waking, and within an hour of eating.

Yesterday was an interesting session. I dropped 4 buyins in 40 minutes in very standard spots. I then got a message from a friend letting me know I made a huge mistake and he was furious. I made what is probably a bad decision and kept playing poker.

It's really hard to be objective in these types of situations. I could feel a wide array of emotions and being with them/processing them at the table was a bad choice. I ended up playing a few spots pretty poorly, over the next several hours. Here are the misplays:
One spot I called Ad7d7hJh on the btn v a lead in the sb 4 ways on a 862r and checked back a 3hh turn.

I called a raise from mp on the co and checked back A987ds in position on a AKTr Qr 5r run-out 3 ways on 3 streets. (This is spew, river is clearly a bluff).

I flatted a 1/3 pot size allin with KxKx3d4d on a KdTs5d with 2 fish behind who had 2-3x pot behind.

Another spot; fish raised to $15 in ep, 3 calls to me. One of the callers has $110 I make it $65 with KKJTds in the sb, call, call, caller goes allin for $110. We go to the flop 4 ways(~$460), one allin. I ****ed up the sizing here. I have $1k behind and jam a 862r (one bdfd) flop, run into pair/wrap. (flop jam is +EV I think, but I got raped for making a mistake pre).

whale 3x raises to $60 in HJ, hero calls CO KhQcTh2x (probably a small mistake), folds to bb who 3b to $260. whale folds, hero calls.

Flop (~$600)= 9c8c7s

Villain bets $400, hero (~$3.8k) folds. I think this is always a raise. Villains betting range is weak here and he would bet 65/98. I have the Qc, good stack size to make it $1300(I think he b/fs more than 50%) and eval turn.

Anyways, I ended up getting into a $8k pot that I 4b from the sb pre with AKK9ss. Got it in with an SPR of .75 on the flop and ran into the 8875ds and lost. Last night was probably one of the wildest emotional rollercoaster sessions for me lifetime. (The $120k equity pot with QQ v 88 at the florida final table a few years ago was worse).

I suppose life as a poker pro can't be easy, or else everyone would be doing it.

I really enjoy your in depth posts about life in general.

A question out of the blue. Your 5 favorite books? Sorry if you're talked about this somewhere, haven't read through all of this thread.