In retrospect I kind of agree but with someone 4b c. 150bb deep, being able to take a flop where we are very likely to not have to put more money in seems like a good idea? If we don't have UTG there to likely underraise and stop any further raises then I think it becomes a shove or fold situation.

Yeah I did ~6 months of audit work before going to university so about all I know is I don't want to be an auditor haha.

Would you be able to PM me your Skype? Would love to take you up on that offer!

I agree with Grim on the AKs hand, rip and enjoy the limited fold equity and embrace the variance.

Off to the Vic this evening if anyone is about and fancies a beer?

Pretty meh session again, -£299. Felt a little frustration coming in this evening so watched an episode of Brooklyn 9-9 and was back on it. Lost 150 with AT vs 88 on TT8, otherwise just a lot of raise folding.

Not too sure what the plan is at the moment. I’m not working so cash flow isn’t great, might be stepping away from the tables or looking for a stake until I’m back in work. Just looking to build up some results and move up while I’m off work but need to be responsible with cash. If it comes to it I’ll play online for micro/small stakes instead.

Sick downswing man, hope it turns around xx

Hey man, no downswing here at all, just a couple negative sessions. I ran pretty hot to kick off with so I can't complain.

You had a timbey bink. Surely you got a few more bullets to shot before you gotta worry ?

My financial situation is a little complicated. Life expenses wise I'm all sorted, but I'm not too comfortable using much of that cash to play poker. Unless I earn it through poker or work I'm not too keen on ploughing it into poker.

Some of the score went to a backer, some went on life expenses. We have reasonably high expenses so anything I can contribute while I'm out of work I look to put in, I don't need to, but I feel a lot better doing so, even if it limits my ability to play poker on my own dime.

Been a fun weekend, a lot of partying not much poker. I'm speaking with someone about a potential staking deal and hopefully we'll get that locked in sometime this week.

I'm going to be travelling a fair bit this month which won't be great for volume but I'm looking forward to it. We're heading to Yorkshire towards the end of the week for shooting and a charity ball, always a great boozy weekend but the drive back on the Sunday is grim. After that we're off to Moscow for a while then Dublin for a friends birthday. Probably more life content coming up than poker but depending on the staking deal coming together I'll definitely be getting some sessions in here and there.

Still not putting in any live volume but had a great meal at Chai Wu in Knightsbridge, had the Chicken, Lobster and Scallop Dim Sum to start:





And the Lobster and Beef Shoulder for main:





I'm not much of a foodie or photographer (obviously) but I thought the food was great, as did the wife who is much more of a connoisseur than me. Food seems to be a popular topic here so I'll try post a little more when we head anywhere interesting.

Otherwise keeping on top of Russian and Coding classes and getting ready for travelling. I met with a recruiter from Dubai about some opportunities over there but I'm not sure I'm overly keen on the move. We'll see how things pan out. I've also been playing a bit online again but nothing big. Might post results once I've got 10k hands in or so and update infrequently but online isn't really what I'm about.

I’m sure we’ve spoken before in other threads, but we’ve had a super similar career. I qualified in audit at Kpmg and quit the day I qualified to play pro. Mentally couldn’t take it so started applying for roles in strategy and equity (no M&A as hours petrified me).

I got offered a couple of jobs in research (stockdale securities and Canaccord) and a strategy role at paddy power (now PPB). None of them felt right in terms of future progress or role for me. I also got an offer from BDO at the same time in their transaction services team. I accepted BDO 4.5 years ago (I’m now 30).

TS is a great place especially at mid-tier as you get to lead deals, improve your knowledge of the process, doesn’t have all the bureaucracy of big 4 and it’s a real entry route into PE, M&A or commercial finance / strategy roles. In my opinion, you should avoid research roles as it’s a dieing role which has been pretty screwed by Mifid changes and very litttle job prospects in house apart from head of IR.

For me, When I joined BDO I planned to leave within 6 months, but never left as I really enjoy what I do. Were excellent in the gambling field which is mainly what I work in. In addition last year I was given a secondment opportunity to go to a PE fund and run a sale process, which was awesome.

I wish we got to speak sooner as I’ll always tell someone to get 6 months of M&A or TS on their CV from big 4 instead of being another audit CV.

If you want to chat further PM me... feel like a bit of a dinosaur in this space now.

All the best

Rob

Hey Rob, I remember speaking before! I'm not 100% sure I would be able to go back into a accounting/services firm at the moment. I left the Big 4 in part due to a number of conflicts of interest that made it impossible to stay without some major changes to my non-work life. I would have loved to get that TS/Deals or even valuations experience at the Big 4 but I had known that I was leaving for nearly 12 months before I did.

I'm not in any rush to take another job, I'm just applying to things that interest me alongside building coding and data science skills. The more proficient I become in these areas the more doors I'm opening for myself. I'd be interested in applying them to poker should I reach a good enough level as well - some kind of analysis of general population tendencies at the micros or something.

Ok, understood and when I was your age I felt the same way. I was making at least £100k pa tax free from poker, despised audit and wanted to do anything apart from being an accountant.

But let me put things into perspective. Since I quit kpmg and started here, I have absolutely loved my workplace. The hours are great (9-7 normally), Office based (baker st), great people, holiday perks rule (38 days including the 10 I buy) awesome clients and most importantly there is progression. Transaction services is a completely different world to audit and I love it. It’s essentially audit on speed.

A big 4 partner makes close to what the biggest online poker winner makes in a year.... consistently! A director makes more than way more than the top 2/5 zoom pros... every year! I appreciate money isn’t everything and no disrespect to what you’re doing, but someone with an ACA from the no 1 firm in the world should be doing far more with their life than learning a redundant language, playing 10pc rake 1/1 at the vic and learning to do a skill from scratch which you could probably pay someone in Eastern Europe £5k a year to do a far better job at.

Apologies if I come across as rude, I don’t mean to be... I’m just trying to help.

Rob

Hey man, no offence taken, it's all good!

I probably should have been clearer anyway. Given my circumstances with investments I can't work at the Big 4 - I would be privy to too much non-market information. I explored every avenue in staying, it was essentially liquidate all equity investments or leave. There are loads of interesting jobs out there that don't have this problem, or have procedures in place to make it work. We're in a position now where we probably could liquidate, especially if the London housing market sh**s itself soon so that could open opportunities back up.

I study Russian because I'm married to a Russian whose family don't speak a lot of English - it's more a courtesy than anything. I'm studying coding and data science because it's a hugely complementary skill to our ACA and a big value add. I have already learned things that would have been hugely useful while working in the Big 4. I'm not hoping to be a developer but I want to add another string to my bow and at least build up a strong understanding for when I'm working with coders/developers.

I have 0 interest in playing poker professionally but I'm not rushing into a job for the sake of having one. Everything I'm doing is just filling the time while I job hunt. I am not focused on short term money in my job, it's the challenge, the people and the long term progression that I'm keen for. Your gig sounds awesome, it is 100% what I would have looked at, although I might have stayed at the Big 4 for a little longer.

I really appreciate all of the advice and completely understand the point of view. I'm in a weird situation at the moment but my goals do not include long term playing of poker professionally, it is to find a great long term career that I enjoy.

Been a while since an update, been away in Russia where 2p2 isn't accessible easily. I'm keen to write a trip report but probably going to split it over a few posts as we did a lot over the trip.

Day 1

We arrived back from shooting in Yorkshire late the night before with a pretty reasonable hangover, definitely didn't make the drive back enjoyable. We woke up pretty dazed and emptied out our suitcases onto the floor and frantically packed for the trip. We were off for 2.5 weeks so basically anything warm was thrown into three big Samsonites, as well as a lot of tea and smoked salmon for my wife's family.

We flew out of Heathrow so grabbed a taxi and we got one of the new electric ones. I'm a huge fan of electric public transport including these taxis, they're quiet, smooth and really comfortable. I'm glad that they're being phased in now across London.

We flew Aeroflot to Moscow and it was great, we had booked into business class and we got lucky with one of their more modern planes. They had a good selection of entertainment and the food was pretty good too. I don't tend to eat much on planes but from my experience this seemed OK. I know there are a lot of stereotypes about Russian airlines (some of which will be confirmed later on in the TR) but I thought Aeroflot were good and would use them again if I can't fly with someone I collect points with.

I'm a big car guy so apologies if I talk about them a lot in this trip but travelling to Russia I was looking forward to seeing a lot of good eastern European metal. We started off a little more modern however and I got a look at one of the new S-Class Mercedes, seriously comfortable car to be driven around in and all the comforts you'd want both as a passenger and a driver. The drive was only an hour or so, we would be staying in central Moscow for the most part while travelling around. It was dark when we arrived but I took a photo the next morning from our apartment.



Day 2
We planned on getting as much seen and done as we could while we were there so we crammed our days pretty full. We went into a big shopping centre to grab some more winter clothes as it was around -6C, I just got some new boots as I'd left mine in the country, probably the ugliest things I've ever worn but they were warm at least.

We had some legal/admin stuff to do so we headed to my father in law's office to sign some papers. We arrived at a big building surrounded by parking but drove into the building and up a ramp like in a multistory car park. Once we were in there there were roads through the building with garages, all actually inside, it was quite surreal but you step through a couple doors and you're then in corridors and offices just like a normal building. I guess when it is freezing cold and snowing heavily it makes a lot of sense, also good for security.

Once we'd got that out of the way we headed towards the Kremlin, walked through the Alexander Park and walked around the Armory Museum. Unfortunately we couldn't take many photos inside but it was absolutely stunning. We didn't see as much of the Kremlin as I would have liked due to time but at least I have more to see when we go back.

We ended the day in GUM, a massive shopping centre which is essentially like Harrods but in Russia. I had my first traditional Russian ice cream but managed to not be tempted by shopping.

On the bridge opposite the Kremlin


Alexander Park


Can't remember what building this was but yeah...


St Basil's Cathedral


GUM - Harrods but in Russia


Will post more tomorrow!

Day 3

We kicked off Day 3 at the Tsaritsyno Park and Museum. This place was amazing, it had fallen into a state of disrepair over 100 years or so and was completely restored in the 2000s. the amount of time and money that must have gone into it was incredible. I took a couple of videos that I'm not sure how to post but they were playing music from Russian classical composers from the house which added to the atmosphere.



The interiors had been recreated as well, I'm not sure how much of the original work as left but from what I could see it was a near total restoration.



After we went around the main house we walked through the parkland for a while before heading into central Moscow and Gorky Park where they were setting up the ice skating rinks for the Christmas period.





We grabbed some food and my first Russian beer in a cafe in the park before walking back to the car along the river. The views were spectacular!





The scale of some of the architecture in Moscow is really impressive. There is a lot of the stereotypical soviet era architecture, but alongside it are some breathtaking buildings.

Day 4

Day 4 got off to a bit of a bad start as it turns out the the Kremlin is closed to visitors on Thursdays. Instead we headed over to the Tretyakov Gallery, probably the most important gallery in Russia after the Hermitage. Photography is forbidden inside but the collection is spectacular, I really recommend taking the time to go around if you're ever in Moscow. I did get some pictures of some good old Soviet metal though!

I believe this was a Volga:



This car was in beautiful condition, inside and out, someone had clearly spent a lot of time caring for it, or restoring it recently. I loved the whitewall wheels and the Fiat mudflaps.



We did some shopping on New and Old Arbat streets before heading to the Victory Park and War Museum, commemorating the Russian lives lost during the World Wars. There were some amazing exhibits inside, weapons, uniforms and vehicles as well as a load of dioramas showing various scenes from the war in life size.

While we were there a large convention for the military schools from Moscow and the surrounding areas. Loads of young cadets were there representing their schools in their uniforms as well as a lot of girls in traditional Russian dress performing dances.



Once again the architecture outside was amazing.







We grabbed supper with the family in the evening and ended up calling it a relatively early evening. We were walking around a lot during the day in the cold and it was more wearing that I had thought. We visited Rome earlier in the year and walked 20-25k steps a day but walking 15k or so in the cold seemed to tire us out a lot more.

great trip report

Awesome looking trip, Jake! Looks like the unemployed life is treating you well, don't give it up

Nice trip report, cool pics ☺
Do you feel safe as an English man in Russia? Seems like a fascinating country.

Thank you very much!

I'll try my hardest, so long as I keep finding stuff to do!

Thank you! I feel very safe in Russia, I have family there and am rarely if ever on my own. I am also a white male - I know these things shouldn't matter and I wish they didn't but I've heard from others that they didn't feel safe due to their skin colour. I haven't experienced this first hand but I imagine, like any country, in the wrong place at the wrong time anywhere can be unsafe for anyone.

Day 5 and 6

Days 5 and 6 were pretty quiet for us. My wife had a hospital appointment, a few long family lunches and a birthday dinner for an Aunt and wife's sister.

We did go out and stay in the house in the country. When we were driving out through a certain area the roads are all lined with huge high walls, like driving through a tunnel with no roof. Many Russian politicians and businessmen have dachas out here and they're all surrounded by pretty heavy security. We also crossed over the bridge where Yeltsin was allegedly thrown off in an attempt on his life (or he fell while drunk) prior to him becoming leader.

The food and drink in Moscow is awesome, we ate at a load of good restaurants and you can get pretty much anything you could want. Needless to say there was a fair amount of alcohol consumed as well which is always a big plus.

I did say I might go on a little about cars. They love an SUV in Moscow and I saw one of these for the first time. Based on a Toyota Land Cruiser, they call it the Invader... I'll just leave that here.



I didn't take too many photos these days as it was mainly personal/family events but I tried to make up for it the next day.

Day 7

This was one of my favourite days of the trip, we started off at the Technical Museum. I took an absolute ton of photos here but I'll only put a few up, if there is anything anyone would like to see let me know and I'll see if I managed to find one. It is a fantastic collection of war machines, as well as a beautiful car collection that is a mixture of stuff from around the world, as well as a beautiful collection of Soviet era cars.













After I had picked up my jaw off the ground we headed over to Архангельское Мусей. I'm not entirely sure what it would translate as but it's roughly Arhangelskoye Museum. It was another beautiful building set in parkland. We had a lovely walk about and then headed inside where we heard some opera and checked out the artwork that included a lot of Greek original and reproduction pieces.









After the museums we headed home for dinner and somehow a 5 figure prop bet was booked for someone at the table to hit a weight target within 3 months. There were some further stipulations that I missed as some of them were agreed in Russian but I feel like one side got an insane bet out of this.

We headed back into Moscow for the evening and met with some friends and family around our age for dinner at Magadan. A lot of the top restaurants in Moscow are owned by the Novikov group who also have a place or two in London. The food was great, this was a seafood focused restaurant which would usually worry me but it was amazing. We called it a pretty early night though as we were flying to St Petersburg the next day.

Days 8-11

We headed to St Petersberg for 4 days and it's a very different city to Moscow. I'm aware this TR is dragging on but please take my advice and visit if you can. As with the previous days, we visited as much as we could and enjoyed as much good food as we could.

While we were there we saw the Hermitage, Peterhof Palace, Tsarskoye Palace, ate at Mari Vanna (where we were visited by a cat) and Sin Toho and generally made the best of the city we could.










After all of this we flew back to Moscow and spent a few days with family before heading to Dublin. Russia was an amazing experience and I'm really glad I'll be spending more time there now. There is so much more to see, places to visit and people to meet, I really recommend if you have the chance to get over there and hit it up!

Hey, hope everyone had a good Christmas and New Year!

Just got back from spending a couple weeks in Dubai with the other half. I've never been before and it was really like no where else I've ever been before. Didn't do as much as we did in Russia in regards to going out and seeing things but ate well, partied a bit and had a good new year, by the far the most fireworks I've ever seen in one place.

It's been the first year I've not spent Christmas and New Year in the mountains for a long time, missing it a bit but will hopefully get out there before the end of the season for a week or so and catch up with friends.

Grabbed a few pictures of Dubai on the trip, will put up a couple here.

View from our balcony looking out over the sea:



Couple of photos of New Year:





I'm not much of a sushi guy so I couldn't tell you how good the quality was but it tasted great. That might have been all the wine and tequila though...



Found this absolute monstrosity outside The Dubai Mall:



Amazing views on the flight back over what I think was Northern Iraq or South Eastern Turkey - either way it was stunning:



I had an interview over there as well and have a couple lined up this week in London. I've had a great three months off since getting married but now in the new year it would be great to start getting an idea of what I want to dedicate the next chunk of my life to. I'm lucky in that I have options in going back into full time employment, either in a bank or a start up or going out on my own in full time property development and management. I think long term the property will be the best play but maybe spending more time doing it on the side along with a traditional job is the best play for now.

I've also started playing a little poker online again. I think it's fair to say I'll never be a serious high level grinder but I'm always keen to get as good as I can. Online will be the best place for me to really work on my game and improve despite the fact I massively prefer the live game. I won't bother updating much on this, maybe just as and when I go up or down in stakes or hit any milestones.

Good luck on the tables all!

Another year over, review and goals!

Review:

Today is my 29th birthday and the last 12 months have been fantastic. First and foremost, I got engaged to and married the girl of my dreams. We met around 7 years ago and were great friends for 4 years before finally getting together, I made it out of the friend zone. We had a small wedding in London for close family and friends before doing it all again in Istanbul with everyone coming for a big party.





Since then we've been travelling, doing some property development and just enjoying being newlyweds. I've also ticked off a few more countries that I'd never been to before:
1) Montenegro
2) Turkey
3) Russia
4) Croatia
5) UAE

I've bought one of those big map posters where you can scratch off the countries you've been too. We're going to try and make a dent in that and see how far we go. We're not sure whether to count places we have been to before we got together but there is still so much more of the world left to see.

If anyone is getting married soon and is looking for a stag destination, I can't recommend Montenegro enough. I went with 10 friends for 4-5 days and came back a broken, but happy man. If you're interested HMU and I'll give you some ideas about what we got up to, where we went etc.

Aside from relationship matters, I finally ACA qualified (CPA for those in the US) and left my job at the Big 4. I'm so glad I persevered through this, I had a decent job in sales before this but getting this qualification will be helpful whatever I end up doing with my life.

Back when I took the job I left a staking deal with Bena which was probably when I put the final nail in the coffin of taking poker seriously. Since then I've just played for fun and it's how I see it going forward. I had a small score at the Vic taking 3rd in one of their monthly tournaments and had some decent cash results but mostly now it is just an excuse to have a few drinks with my brother and have fun. I have to give a shout out to 247Solid who has a great PGC here who has had the misfortune of running into us when we've had a couple.

A post from his blog: https://lowstakesgrinding.wordpress....august-2018-6/

His PGC: https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...nding-1721885/

I love following all the London grinders chasing the dream, be it the online crushers like Ben and the guys in his crew or people like Labax and 247Solid out there grinding the live games. Please never stop posting guys, I subscribe to all the threads and live vicariously through you all! If there are any other London/UK players out there writing and blogging, let me know, would love to follow.

Goals

This is my last year before I'm 30 and I'd love to enter them on the best form possible. At the top of the list for this year is to get back into decent shape. I was probably in the shape of my life at 18-21 but since leaving university that had really gone to the dogs. I'm not overweight or anything but I'm just not happy with my composition or strength. I've got a membership with Virgin Active and if I get a new job I'll probably join a gym near the office to make sure I'm still getting sessions in.

Alongside getting down to the gym more, I'm really keen to improve my diet. I eat really well, but perhaps not too healthily. I've always been someone who can eat whatever I want without gaining weight but that doesn't mean it's fine to throw whatever I want down my gullet. I am a horrendous meal skipper so I'm going to force myself to eat at least three meals a day, trying to keep it as healthy as possible.

On top of this I am going to learn to cook. I know it isn't rocket science but I am appalling, I have no excuses not to get on with this so I'm going to try and learn two new recipes a month, as well as picking up some basic cooking skills.

On the work front, I should be hearing back about an investment banking job in the next day or so. I am hoping I'll hear back today if it is good news as it would be a great birthday present. I've had interviews with 7 people and a three hour exam, it's been a long time consuming process but this would be a dream job and I'm on edge waiting to hear back. It will be a huge time commitment but I'm ready for it after 6 months enjoying myself and it is a fantastic opportunity.

If this doesn't pan out I will keep pursuing other similar opportunities but I also have the option of taking on property development and management full time. I can see myself doing this anyway in the future but I'd like to get some more time in banking first to get some more experience. We have a few properties currently rented out which takes some time day to day but my wife is a fantastic landlady and is more than capable of taking care of it.

Finally, poker goals! I think it's clear that I'll never be much more than a recreational player but I don't think that means I have to suck. I'll be mixing it up in the live cash games in London and playing at whatever homegames I'm invited to. I will always love the game and will always study and work at it to get better but I don't think I'll be mixing it up (successfully) with the big boys. I do want to stay connected to the poker community and I'm open to ideas of how I can do this. Posting here is great and I try to keep in touch with a few poker friends through social media. I may consider having a small stable of players or working with someone who already does, running the books and being a point of contact etc.

Whatever happens this year, the last 29 have been awesome and I'll do everything I can to make sure it continues.

Good luck to all on and off the tables!

Jake

Nice update, good to see you crushing on all the important fronts mate.