So happy we got out when we did. Been a rough month for people.

Got back from Morocco last night and I can't recommend it enough. We were desperate for some winter sun and some time off together after a pretty rough start to the year. The hotel was awesome, the people were lovely and what we saw of Marrakech itself was beautiful.

The hotel itself from the outside is traditional red clay and completely conceals everything inside it, you have no idea what you're walking into until you come inside. Once you make it through the first walls you find this large pond with a fountain in the middle but a fire at night.



Once you're through the reception hall you find this internal courtyard, all hand carved plaster. The whole hotel took around 12 years to build on the site of an old olive farm, they've kept as many of the trees as possible and they still produce olive oil which they use in the restaurants and give away as gifts to guests.



Right through the hotel they have this amazing 'canal' as they call it.





We managed to get a villa with a pool where many Casablanca beers were consumed.



Right in the distance you can see the Atlas mountains, in a normal year they would have a lot more snow on them but they were a fantastic backdrop to the trip.



Back to London and work now. January was fantastic for me in some regards, I made it through dry January, got stuck into work and felt pretty on top of the life game in things I can control. February is always a little rougher as the 6 Nations start, it's my birthday and I try to get away on holiday. For March I'm going to try and get back to January and focus a bit more. Next 4 months are going to be tough at work and I won't be able to get much time off so going to try and get to the gym 3x a week, play online poker and survive.

On poker - as soon as I hit 10k hands I'll give my first update. Takes a while when I only one table Zoom, getting close though...

10k Hands Update

First 10k hands are in the bag! Took a little longer than expected but I only one table and time can be hard to come by. Really pleased with the results so far but my understanding is that GG does something funny with the rake. Given how my results look I'm sure that they are not as good as this but at least this is telling me I beat the underlying game.



As I said - this is going to be a pre-rake winrate but its currently at 13.42bb/100. I don't know what the rake is but it must eat reasonably heavily into that because that is not a real looking winrate for where I think my abilities are.

I'm still loving playing on GG Poker, it just seems like they are making efforts to make the game a little more engaging here and there for recreational players. As a result I want to play more than I have in the past as well, although I'm sure the results are having something to do with it as well. I know I can do better than this though, there are times I've been playing on my phone while not paying 100% attention. This probably won't change because I play a lot while in taxis etc. where I have 10-20 minutes go get a short session in but I know it's affecting my winrate as I'm not pushing every small edge.

Anyway - onwards and upwards, next poker update at 20k hands!

I've been experimenting with flatting some 4b pre with AA and KK. I'm not doing it much but I've had a couple of spots where I want to give people the opportunity to keep putting their own money into the pot.

I'm probably being a fish but it's been working out ok for me. I feel like people could think I 3b a reasonably wide range so I hope some people may be 4betting me a with a slightly wider range.





I know overall I must still be running very well but I also feel like I'm playing a lot better than I have done in the past. I had some horrendous leaks that I'm beginning to address but I think more importantly, I'm identifying areas of my game that are still super weak and I need to work on. I haven't found the answers yet but at least I've found places I think I'm playing badly.

the rake is weird sometimes it looks like 5% other times more like 6 or 7%. could you export your hands to HEM or where is that graph from mate?

edit found this

https://www.natural8.com/poker/rush-and-cash

The graph is from Excel - I’m tracking my sessions there based on Pokercraft session results so I have an offline record in case something goes wrong. I could export the hands into PT4, I might give it a go for February hands this evening.

I’m not an expert in rake rates among sites to be honest, give me some of that juicy rakeback though!

What’s most important to me now is know I beat the underlying games and moving up when I feel confident I’m good enough. I’m not sure how many hands that should take but I’ll keep grinding out the results at 10nl until I’m goaded into moving up.

Just wanted to post a couple hands from my session today:

Getting absolutely stomped!



Hate how I played this - would have liked to have ripped it in on the turn



Can't believe he called behind...

Quick update here!

First things first - I try to keep track of the other micro PGC threads here and follow the ones that last beyond the first couple of posts. In the spirit of progress and community I've started a Discord channel for anyone who is interested, a place to just chat poker a bit more casually than formal posts, quick HH reviews etc. DM me for details if you're interested.

Second piece of housekeeping - we're moving house! I mentioned earlier in the thread that we've bought a house and were planning on renting it out for a couple of years before moving in ourselves when our family had grown. We've had a bit of a change of plans and are hoping to move in over the next couple of weeks. My wife is going back to Russia to visit family and travel could get difficult with the coronavirus stuff but once she's back we'll hopefully be in by the end of the month. We'll then rent out where we've been living up until now.

As we'll be finally living in a house we've also decided that we would love to get a dog. I've lived with dogs before but have never been solely responsible for one. We'll look to get something relatively easy but I have no problem with the exercising them. I can also take them to work which is an hour walk each way which should tire them out.

On a poker note - things are going well. Only updating every 10k hands takes a while but more frequent updates would just be prone to variance and not very interesting. Hopefully next update soon!

Exciting times ahead! sick

We've made it to 20k hands! I've started playing two tables of Rush - crazy I know. I'm pretty comfortable with the game I'm playing and I hop I can keep grinding out the results. Progress has been pretty good, here are results to date:



Obviously GG doesn't include rake in the results, but even after rake (whatever it is) I'm still super happy at the moment, running at 16.2bb/100. I know I'm running hot and rake will be eating into this but still, I'm beating the underlying games and as this is just practice for playing live and private games, that's all I'm really looking for!

In other news, my office has closed for the foreseeable future so I'll be working from my home office. This will cut down on commuting time etc so hopefully more time to grind. Coupling that with now 2 tabling I hope updates can come quicker.

Sounds pretty much like my exact plan at the moment. I think I dropped in the thread a couple of years ago but took some time away from poker and now I'm WFH instead of having to commute into London I've got lots more time to play poker.

How are you finding GG? Was torn between depositing there and Unibet.

Results sounds sick though so far, glgl.

ez game

More like permanently closed. Home office furniture sales will increase.

It is a good possibility you will stay with the lady bois in Thailand since what business man with big cash is going to risk running a airline when a virus can destroy his business fairly well overnight?

Obv I'm staying here lol, not sure what relevance that has to this thread?

None.

With all these social distancing quotes being bounced about on the ABC news here in aussie will you get close enough to your ladybois in the near future or beyond?

Can't rule it out!

Good Luck!

Just a quick update this evening - through to Day 2 of the Anniversary Million with 66bb, in the upper third of the pack.

Next 10k hands of cash results should be coming in the next couple of days, playing 2 tables is really speeding things up.

Sick stuff, glad to see you doing well boss! Glgl tomorrow.

nice, hope you receive some of the money i donated in that tournament. gl

Thanks guys!

Unfortunately I was thwarted with 4500 runners left for $800 or so, AQ vs A9 AIPF for 40bb - would have been a sick sweat going forward with that stack but it wasn't to be. Really pleased with how I played but I am definitely a donkey for MTTs in anything except things like these.

30k Hand Update

Another 10k hands down!



Poker is still going well, had a decent run in the Anniversary Sunday Million that I mentioned above and cash results are still coming. It's a big step up to 50nl but I feel like I could be beating the games there now. It wouldn't be fun to step up and get crushed right away though.

Away from poker I'm sure that you've all been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The UK went into lockdown last night. It won't massively change how I've been behaving for the last week or so but it has massively thrown our move into question. Right now we're sitting in our apartment, 90% of things are packed up in boxes and we've been planning to go ahead with the move, switching utilities, council tax etc. I think we're going to have to wait and see what the removal men say, the lastest we heard is that they can come, fully masked and gloved up, get the move done and let us unpack and everything on our own.

Whether this happens we don't know - I think if we go ahead we will spend a night or two sleeping in a room that no one goes in at the new house. The top floor has two bedrooms and a bathroom that we're not currently planning on using right away. If no removal men go there we can live up there for 24 hours to let anything die downstairs.

Often I'd say postpone/cancel the move but given how far we're through with packing, switching bills etc I'm not sure what the next play is. I think we'll wait and see what the removal team say. My wife and I have been in isolation for long enough that I believe that we won't be putting the removal men at risk and I also believe that given the space of where we're moving to and the equipment we have we can protect ourselves. However, if we have to postpone, so be it.

I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy, at least the poker games are insane at the moment!

Decided now was a decent time to take a shot at 50nl for 4BI and lasted less than 700 hands - I got absolutely murdered.









Pretty demoralising to have to go back to 10nl and grind another million buyins to take the step back up but it is what it is. It's a shame it's such a step up between stakes as shotting is difficult. Back to 10nl we go.

Never played on gg so idk how much they take. But when the stake jump is 5x I would be running it twice and possibly even taking insurance (in spots where it’s ~breakeven).

Ul with the **** I’m sure you’ll get the chance again soon!