I don't disagree, and we'll see how things develop.

This is my data on how much bb/100 I pay in rake to GG on 4card PLO reg tables (no rush or other formats).

Can't seem to win a hand to save my life TBH I'm very happy with my play as usual. Have been playing A-Game on great routines and habits. Just not hitting much. Keeping a mental game log helps me realize I'm not playing so bad, it's just bad variance and this has to happen. Maybe this is the way the game of PLO is meant to be. Go on a breakeven stretch for 100k hands before having some sick upswing for 20k hands or whatever. IDK, but this has been the story of my life since I started this blog in May apparently

Been playing a bit of 5card and 6card this month so this would be my graph. Am only up about 2k this month (after the BBJ), will need to find a HUD to track 5C and 6C, maybe gonna look into drivehud to share graphs here.

Month so far:



Last 70k hands



With the changes to PLO from 6max to 7max, and looking at the state of the games, and seeing how the games have seemed more reggy, which has combined into me looking for more action in other forms.

I've been thinking, do I want to play more on other sites to find some more soft tables or can I add in 5card or 6card and try game select them?

Well I figured GG is the world's largest site and that probably won't change for a while. In addition, I don't enjoy splitting my roll up accross many different sites, especially when it isn't too huge right now anyways. Finally, I just achieved Platinum Shark on GG, incentivizing me to stay loyal and put more volume in on GG. So yeah, it seems like GG wants more action in 5C and 6C, well if that's what they want, that's what I'll give them. Will be able to table select a bit better now playing all PLO formats. Will be somewhat interesting and majority of my study will still go into 4C but let's see what happens.


This downswing has certainly got me thinking about what's important in order to make money, how to handle variance. And it just made me realize, we are all at the mercy of variance, no matter how calm and well you play. You can play perfectly, executing a great strategy and still lose money. Therefore all we can do is try to control other factors than variance, such as playing well, playing when we feel good, and game selecting well to make sure we are sitting in profitable line-ups.

Some new rules I'll follow now that I've decided to include some 5C/6C.
1. Start by selecting the 4C PLO500 games, then choose 4C PLO200, finally check 6C and 5C for soft games
2. Never play any heads up!
3. 5C and 6C games I play must be one stake lower than the highest stake of 4C I play (as variance there is higher), so 5C and 6C only PLO200 for now.
4. Never play longer than 3 hours long without a break!

Been enjoying your blog and looking to it for inspiration. Great work and keep it up. I would highly suggest if you are looking including 5 and 6 card to start studying 5 card much more because their are guys who play only 5 card only and have massive edge on you if you only study 4 card so closing the gap their is mandatory. Your 4 card game is good enough to win when table selecting appropriately so trying to refine your 4 card game for small edges when you could be plugging massive leaks at 5 card doesn’t seem like the most efficient use of time. Just my opinion! I don’t think playing 6 card is necessary at all when it comes to getting enough volume. Gl!

Thanks,

I have a training access for 5C and have watched some stuff and checked out a few sims.

TBH though when it comes to 5C and 6C, like the solver stuff is so new there, a lot of stuff is still undiscovered and people are playing so far away from GTO that IDK how useful 5C study is tbh. I mean I watch some stuff but like, I don't think it helps as much as just getting reps in, putting in volume, reviewing hands, etc. And So far I feel like one of the best way to get good at 5C and 6C is simply understanding 4C on a deeper level and transfering concepts to 5C/6C keeping in mind 5C/6C simply requires more nuttiness, AAxx are weaker, etc.

As I said, the main reason I've been dabbling in these formats is simply, I don't want to just battle regs all day for leaderboard money. I mean I was playing some 4C the other day at happy hours, and there were 9 tables running of PLO500, but looking at the lobby, there was only like 4 fish, accross all 9 tables, so 5 tables were filled with regs only, obviously some of them were strong, and some of them were a bit weaker, but overall it simply wasn't worth it. I was just playing the regs and thinking like, why am I playing these games? I'm just breaking even with these guys, letting variance decide who wins for that sessions all the while losing to the massive rake, it totally didn't seem worth it. So I'm not really looking to put in more volume per se, more simply looking to find games where I can reliably get a bigger winrate by table selecting better. I had two options when thinking about this, add other sites of 4C, or add 5C+6C. I explained in the post above why I'm choosing 5C/6C, as I've already invested a lot of time into getting Platinum Shark.

If there's a massive whale on my direct right, even in 5C or 6C which I barely studied that table will be way more profitable than a 4C table of only regs, doesn't matter how perfect my 4C game is. I also really like how 6C is 5max and would prefer if all formats could go 5max tbh, would make it way more viable to play at a 1 fish table basically regardless of the target's position, at these 7max tables I feel like honestly, unless I got a good position, I'd want more than 1 recreational at the table. Well, I guess you can call me deciding to start "bumhunting" or whatever. I mean so far, I've been like the opposite of a bumhunter, and now I'm just starting to see, maybe it's not the best approach. Sometimes you need a downswing to think about these things. Obviously I won't do anything too extreme such as instaquit tables as soon as a fish leaves or swap seats but I basically want to put a bit more effort into game selection rather than just sitting everything. For all I know, I'll go on a heater and start sitting everyone again, who knows.

Another thing I like about 6C is it's totally new to GG. So really I'm one of the first regs to dabble in it on this site. I guess maybe other regs will play it from apps or whatever and other regs will join me from 4C. But I mean, it's new to GG so seems like a decent opportunity to try something out. Let's see how it pans out.

Month update:


Past few days have been the worst. Well I take back what I said about 5C and 6C. I hate those games, too much variance

Just going to stick to what I know best in 4C. Maybe in the future I'll dabble again in the other formats but right now isn't the time to be experimenting with other formats.

Will have to calculate the rakeback at the end, but I may well be having my first losing month in almost 2 years

October Poker Summary

I've just completed my final session of the month. Next week I'll be heading to Paris and I won't be doing anything poker related for over 10 days. A much needed break after this tragedy of a month. Will be using drivehud from now on. I enjoy their features and that they calculate EV correctly apparently compared to HM3 and can track 5/6Card PLO.



Rakeback calculations:
October Rakeback:
BBJ = $3431.28
GGcare = $165.39
Fish Buffet = $2036.49
Leaderboards = $4220
Total = $9853

October 2024: GG PLO200 and PLO500 -
Hands played: 39729
Hours played: 91
Hands per Hour: 436.5
Hours studied: 40
Hours worked: 131
Net Won: -$7997.3
Net won + RB: $1855.6
Net Won $/hour: $20.39
EV: -$344.66
EV+RB: $9508.34
EV $/hour: $104.48
YTD: $63582


So actually in total. I ended up not having a losing month somehow
This month really felt doomed but had a couple good sessions to end the month and the BBJ (winner) helped me to have a slightly better than breakeven month. Obviously I'd prefer not to run like 30BI under EV.

I put in a lot of volume in a short amount of time relative to other months. This is how much volume I may put in in a normal month. A few factors contributing to this:
1. My habits I've been trying to establish since the start of this blog have come into full fruition. Other than the first 2 days of the month when I was sick I grinded every single day this month! You can check my mental game log here, I update this everyday with how my sessions go. It's been helping a lot to see where I'm struggling, when I need to make changes, etc


2. When going through a downswing I get motivated to grind more. IDK why, but if I'm losing money, I want to get it back. It doesn't mean I tilted at the tables, it doesn't mean I made many mistakes I usually wouldn't, it doesn't mean I didn't take my breaks, instead I simply tried to grind a bit more whenever I had free time rather than just sticking to the mornings. I realize the only thing that will get me out of this is putting in the volume and eventually things will turn around. As a result I studied a bit less than usual this month, which isn't too big a deal but actually wouldn't like the amount of study hours I put in to go much lower than this.

3. I was motivated to get Platinum Shark and see how it affects my rakeback. I planned the Paris Trip on the 24th because my Platinum Shark challenge ended on the 23rd. It took me around 10 days into the month to achieve platinum shark and that gave me a nice boost in rakeback, then I tried some 5/6C and got some extra rakeback from that too. Although that didn't prove too fruitful. I'm happy to have achieved Platinum Shark, although I'm not sure if I'll be going for GG Platinum.

4. I knew I had a holiday coming up where I would put nothing into poker, so I felt motivated to put some extra effort in this month.

Overall very pleased with my volume, pleased with my month, couldn't control the results or variance, had I run at EV the month would've been quite nice. The downswing was nice to put some things into perspective and to think about how to make these happen less often. How can I change my game? How can I change my strategy? What mistakes am I making? Downswings put you into more tough spots and I feel like I did a good job of not spazzing too hard during this stretch. It also got me thinking about other things. Should I play some 5C or 6C? Should I play on some other sites.

As I wrote I experimented a bit with 5C/6C and I found it had a bit too much variance for me, at least at this point my career. Perhaps if I have an infinite roll I would enjoy those formats more but especially right now and in the middle of a downswing and when I'm trying to steadily build my roll I don't need to dabble in 5C/6C. Although I do plan to consume some 5C/6C content when I have some free time.

What I've done recently is focus more on game selection. And as I have achieved Platinum Shark which was a big longterm goal of mine I feel a bit freer not to grind every table on GG. Maybe game select a bit better and add some other sites. This is why recently I deposited a bit on stars and I'll prolly be playing a bit there. Also looking into maybe adding another site or 2 into the rotation and focus a bit more on game selection, increasing my winrate more than just playing the leaderboards and battling on GG. We'll see how things develop.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rest of Year plans
After having had 2 pretty terrible (only slightly better than breakeven) months, I feel quite confident that such a downswing can't last much longer, which is coinciding perfectly with the end of the year. The cold months of winter are generally the best times to grind in poker, I've been developing my routines and habits and have performed and shown up everyday in the toughest of times. Now winter is coming and the games should get slightly softer.

My fiance has agreed to allow me to take the rest of the year off Hungarian language lessons and to be able to fully focus on poker. Keeping that in mind, I want to have 3 very productive months from November to January. I'd like to average 50k hands each month over the next 3 months, whilst also putting in a good amount of time studying and improving my game. I think these next 3 months can be very good for me, and I'll look to put in 150k hands between November and the end of January, whilst game selecting a bit, playing A-game full focus and getting even better at the game.

For now though, I'm going to enjoy my holiday.


Anyways, long update. See you guys in November!

I like that you included a detailed rakeback section, I don't recall that always being included. It would be nice at the end of December to see not only December's results but a detailed full years result including this rakeback section.

Can def try to do that.

----------------------------------------

Back from Paris.

I fell sick again as soon as I arrived lol but it was just a mild cold so didn't intrude with the holiday too much. Got to do most things planned, although I'd like to spend more time relaxing in a less crowded place on my next holiday. Think I'm a nature or beach kinda guy. Regardless, it was very nice to have over a week without any poker whatsoever.

Some pics:








-------------------------------------------

Regarding poker, haven't played since my last post so read that for any monthly updates/goals.
Looking forward to getting back to the grind. Gonna spend a day or two catching up on some study and warming up a bit before getting back into the grind.

Month so far, not too bad, nothing too special so far.

Using this BR challenge thing on GG to track actual winnings after bonuses. About $250 in fish buffet so far this week too to add (+ whatever I play this weekend).


Haven't posted any hands in a while.

• Let's start with a funny one, obv vs a whale

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker HUD and Database Software

PL Omaha 2(BB)
HERO ($397.57) [
UTG ($256.96) [VPIP: 25.5% | PFR: 18.2% | AGG: 29.1% | Hands: 3738]
HJ ($80) [VPIP: 26.4% | PFR: 16.5% | AGG: 28.2% | Hands: 261]
CO ($204.10) [VPIP: 86.7% | PFR: 57.8% | AGG: 32.1% | Flop Agg: 29% | Turn Agg: 45.5% | River Agg: 50% | 3Bet: 50% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 46]
BTN ($363.50) [VPIP: 28.9% | PFR: 18.2% | AGG: 34% | Hands: 541]
SB ($90) [VPIP: 31.5% | PFR: 19.2% | AGG: 21.4% | Flop Agg: 21.7% | Turn Agg: 23.1% | River Agg: 16.7% | 3Bet: 0% | 4Bet: 0% | Cold Call: 24.3% | Hands: 73]

Dealt to Hero: A 8 T 9

UTG Folds, HJ Folds, CO Raises To $7, BTN Folds, SB Calls $6, HERO Raises To $28, CO Calls $21, SB Calls $21

Hero SPR on Flop: [0.74 effective]
Flop ($84): 8 Q 9
SB Checks, HERO Checks, CO Bets $40.63 (Rem. Stack: $135.47), SB Folds, HERO Raises To $203.14 (Rem. Stack: $166.43), CO Calls $135.47 (allin)

Turn ($463.24): 8 Q 9 2

River ($463.24): 8 Q 9 2 7

• This one I got a fish who kinda pot donks here, IDK too much about his tendencies but he doesn't seem like a fit or fold super honest type of player so I believe he could have any piece of the Flop and not only T4+ or mega strong draws.
• Anyways, I'm in a pretty awkward spot on the flop with a strong reg behind me. I have a seemingly unfoldable hand with the NOESD and a weak FD but really this isn't a fun spot to be in and maybe I'm better off folding to lower variance and avoid a weird spot. Or maybe I should jam to fold out the reg from some dominating flush draws and just kinda gamble with the guy who donked. Well anyways, I took the "easy but weak" option which is to call and see what happens.
  
• Then OTT, well again a weird spot... Curious on any thoughts here.

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker Tracking Software

PL Omaha 2(BB)
CO ($219.78) [VPIP: 29.3% | PFR: 22.1% | AGG: 40.1% | Flop Agg: 44.6% | Turn Agg: 40.5% | River Agg: 39.3% | 3Bet: 2.7% | 4Bet: 25% | Cold Call: 16.1% | Hands: 300]
BTN ($197) [VPIP: 35% | PFR: 28.3% | AGG: 51.6% | Hands: 62]
SB ($166.06) [VPIP: 77.1% | PFR: 51.4% | AGG: 36.7% | Flop Agg: 35% | Turn Agg: 42.9% | River Agg: 55.6% | 3Bet: 16.7% | 4Bet: 33.3% | Cold Call: 69.2% | Hands: 35]
BB ($106.01) [VPIP: 26.4% | PFR: 16.5% | AGG: 28.2% | Flop Agg: 25.5% | Turn Agg: 43.3% | River Agg: 35.7% | 3Bet: 8.6% | 4Bet: 25% | Cold Call: 19.8% | Hands: 261]
HERO ($244.89)

Dealt to Hero: 6 5 A 4

HERO Raises To $7, CO Calls $7, BTN Folds, SB Calls $6, BB Calls $5

Hero SPR on Flop: [3.54 effective]
Flop ($28): T 3 4
SB Bets $26.60 (Rem. Stack: $132.46), BB Folds, HERO Calls $26.60 (Rem. Stack: $211.29), CO Calls $26.60 (Rem. Stack: $186.18)

Turn ($107.80): T 3 4 A
SB Checks, HERO Bets $105.05 (Rem. Stack: $106.24), CO Raises To $186.18 (allin), SB Folds, HERO Calls $81.13 (Rem. Stack: $25.11)

River ($480.16): T 3 4 A J

• This one, we face a donkbet from a reg in the BB. Not too sure what to make of it, I don't see donks on these HHL board textures too often, although I don't hate it and GTO should do it. Though I guess people's ranges are really kinda not GTO here. Anyways with a pair, an OESD and a BDFD I can't really fold so we proceed by calling.
  
• On the turn, I hit bottom 2P and my BDFD comes in, and I decide to ship it against his pot sized barrel. Thinking is that on any river I'm going to be left with a bluffcatcher except an offsuit A or 9 basically (and I guess the 5 , 6 and a spade are still gonna be a must call). Though valuebetting without a Straight OTR will also be a bit weird if checked to. At the same time, our hand has a bit of enough equity vs whatever he could possibly have. If he has bare KQ or worse he could even consider a fold, while also putting a lot of his draws in a weird spot and probably I'm slightly ahead of his strong draws, while against his nutted sets I will still have some equity.

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker HUD and Database Software

PL Omaha 2(BB)
CO ($162.35) [VPIP: 19.7% | PFR: 3% | AGG: 24% | Hands: 67]
HERO ($268.84)
SB ($189.80) [VPIP: 56.1% | PFR: 19.3% | AGG: 19.7% | Hands: 57]
BB ($235.90) [VPIP: 22.5% | PFR: 11.3% | AGG: 25.6% | Flop Agg: 27.8% | Turn Agg: 35.7% | River Agg: 12.5% | 3Bet: 3.6% | 4Bet: 0% | Cold Call: 25% | Hands: 72]
UTG ($292.38) [VPIP: 23.3% | PFR: 17.5% | AGG: 22.7% | Hands: 105]
HJ ($183.25) [VPIP: 23.5% | PFR: 13.6% | AGG: 22.2% | Hands: 83]

Dealt to Hero: 6 T 5 J

UTG Folds, HJ Folds, CO Folds, HERO Raises To $7, SB Folds, BB Calls $5

Hero SPR on Flop: [15.26 effective]
Flop ($15): K 5 Q
BB Bets $11.10 (Rem. Stack: $217.80), HERO Calls $11.10 (Rem. Stack: $250.74)

Turn ($37.20): K 5 Q 6
BB Bets $37.20 (Rem. Stack: $180.60), HERO Raises To $148.80 (Rem. Stack: $101.94), BB Raises To $217.80 (allin), HERO Calls $69 (Rem. Stack: $32.94)

River ($472.80): K 5 Q 6 A

Players agreed to run it 2 times.

River #2($472.80): K 5 Q 6 9

• I guess a lot of people would just jam the rest in OTT when they turn an OESD, but really there's no point, we can fold some rivers. Anyways give me that EV.

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker HUD and Database Software

PL Omaha 2(BB)
SB ($74.11) [VPIP: 54.5% | PFR: 22.7% | AGG: 29.2% | Hands: 22]
BB ($217) [VPIP: 17% | PFR: 8.5% | AGG: 21.4% | Hands: 48]
UTG ($337.20) [VPIP: 25% | PFR: 25% | AGG: 57.1% | Flop Agg: 66.7% | Turn Agg: 50% | River Agg: 100% | 3Bet: 16.7% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 12]
HERO ($200)
CO ($192.36) [VPIP: 31.3% | PFR: 22.9% | AGG: 31.8% | Hands: 48]
BTN ($118.53) [VPIP: 11.1% | PFR: 11.1% | AGG: 20% | Hands: 45]

Dealt to Hero: A 6 4 T

UTG Raises To $7, HERO Calls $7, CO Folds, BTN Folds, SB Folds, BB Folds

Hero SPR on Flop: [11.35 effective]
Flop ($17): 8 3 2
UTG Checks, HERO Bets $11.90 (Rem. Stack: $181.10), UTG Raises To $52.70 (Rem. Stack: $277.50), HERO Calls $40.80 (Rem. Stack: $140.30)

Turn ($122.40): 8 3 2 7
UTG Bets $122.40 (Rem. Stack: $155.10), HERO Calls $122.40 (Rem. Stack: $17.90)

River ($367.20): 8 3 2 7 5
UTG Bets $155.10 (allin), HERO Calls $17.90 (allin)

• Here preflop, well I want to get involved with a pretty trashy double suited hand vs a minraising fish. We get squeezed on and this is probably the type of hand that can flop a magical low straight or 22x board lol, so yeah not folding.
  
• Flop the squeezer uses a nice size on this board for his range, don't think he wants to jam too often being 4 ways but he definitely has some KK, AK54, AA43 type hands that want to build a pot and get calls. Well my hand can't fold vs his sizing especially with our backdoors.
  
• Turn, prolly standard from both mostly. River well, if we consider he can value shove worse (which he is doing here) I can't fold, so yeah. Not sure about his play, certainly he has enough straights played like this to not need to do this with AA. I mean prolly not too bad, and prolly I'll call sometimes with worse.

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker Tracking Software

PL Omaha 5(BB)
BTN ($500) [VPIP: 31.8% | PFR: 22.7% | AGG: 30% | Flop Agg: 40% | Turn Agg: 33.3% | River Agg: 0% | 3Bet: 9.1% | 4Bet: 0% | Cold Call: 16.7% | Hands: 22]
SB ($500) [VPIP: 34.5% | PFR: 20.7% | AGG: 45.5% | Flop Agg: 50% | Turn Agg: 42.9% | River Agg: 50% | 3Bet: 18.2% | Fold to 3Bet: 0% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 29]
BB ($798.91) [VPIP: 32.1% | PFR: 25% | AGG: 43.8% | Hands: 29]
UTG ($355.70) [VPIP: 72.7% | PFR: 36.4% | AGG: 9.1% | Flop Agg: 0% | Turn Agg: 0% | River Agg: 28.6% | 3Bet: 0% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 11]
UTG_1 ($500) [VPIP: 16.7% | PFR: 4.2% | AGG: 0% | Hands: 25]
HERO ($500)
CO ($1163.72) [VPIP: 16.7% | PFR: 16.7% | AGG: 20% | Hands: 24]

Dealt to Hero: 2 5 4 7

UTG Raises To $10, UTG_1 Folds, HERO Calls $10, CO Folds, BTN Calls $10, SB Raises To $55, BB Folds, UTG Calls $45, HERO Calls $45, BTN Calls $45

Hero SPR on Flop: [1.34 effective]
Flop ($225): 2 5 K
SB Bets $75 (Rem. Stack: $370), UTG Folds, HERO Calls $75 (Rem. Stack: $370), BTN Folds

Turn ($375): 2 5 K 4
SB Checks, HERO Checks

River ($375): 2 5 K 4 4
SB Bets $370 (allin), HERO Calls $370 (allin)

• Nothing too special here I guess. Just nice to have it this time. I guess question can be 10% / 10% / jam or just 20% / jam?

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker Tracking Software

PL Omaha 5(BB)
BB ($715.32) [VPIP: 25.1% | PFR: 18.3% | AGG: 25% | Hands: 222]
UTG ($877.70) [VPIP: 29.7% | PFR: 19.8% | AGG: 29.4% | Hands: 102]
HERO ($500)
CO ($916.37) [VPIP: 32.1% | PFR: 21.4% | AGG: 33.3% | Flop Agg: 33.3% | Turn Agg: 37.5% | River Agg: 33.3% | 3Bet: 21.1% | Fold to 3Bet: 0% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 29]
BTN ($664.08) [VPIP: 22.2% | PFR: 16% | AGG: 39.1% | Hands: 82]
SB ($1372.70) [VPIP: 16.8% | PFR: 12.4% | AGG: 17.6% | Hands: 114]

Dealt to Hero: J A Q Q

UTG Folds, HERO Raises To $17, CO Raises To $58, BTN Folds, SB Folds, BB Folds, HERO Raises To $181, CO Calls $123

Hero SPR on Flop: [0.86 effective]
Flop ($369): 7 J 3
HERO Bets $40 (Rem. Stack: $279), CO Calls $40 (Rem. Stack: $695.37)

Turn ($449): 7 J 3 8
HERO Bets $50 (Rem. Stack: $229), CO Calls $50 (Rem. Stack: $645.37)

River ($549): 7 J 3 8 T
HERO Bets $229 (allin), CO Calls $229 (Rem. Stack: $416.37)

• OTF with the BDFD I'm more towards bet with this combo giving me more turns I can throw the money in on, whereas without I might rather go for XR or XC.
  
• Anyways, I feel like my blockers are perfect for barrelling turn and river, I mean hitting 3P OTR is like the perfect bluffing combo. Too bad he decides to call me down here though which I guess is GTO though in reality land a lot of people will give up their 2P both on turn and river compared to GTO so it's all about how people play especially if we consider that GTO isn't jamming nut flushes for value anyways OTR(and a lot of people prolly do this too much, also prolly people bet too much with sets OTF). Well, I guess people respect my game enough to call me here though this guy likes to ****-talk in chat xD .

Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker Tracking Software

PL Omaha 5(BB)
BTN ($500) [VPIP: 11.1% | PFR: 11.1% | AGG: 33.3% | Hands: 9]
SB ($591.43) [VPIP: 33.3% | PFR: 16.7% | AGG: 0% | Hands: 6]
HERO ($672.04)
HJ ($1050.45) [VPIP: 30.6% | PFR: 24.5% | AGG: 25.8% | Hands: 49]
CO ($675.38) [VPIP: 19% | PFR: 11.4% | AGG: 23.9% | Flop Agg: 38.9% | Turn Agg: 33.3% | River Agg: 0% | 3Bet: 4.3% | 4Bet: 50% | Hands: 112]

Dealt to Hero: 8 A 9 J

HJ Folds, CO Raises To $17, BTN Folds, SB Folds, HERO Raises To $53, CO Calls $36

Hero SPR on Flop: [5.73 effective]
Flop ($108): 4 8 J
HERO Bets $75.60 (Rem. Stack: $543.44), CO Calls $75.60 (Rem. Stack: $546.78)

Turn ($259.20): 4 8 J 4
HERO Bets $129.60 (Rem. Stack: $413.84), CO Calls $129.60 (Rem. Stack: $417.18)

River ($518.40): 4 8 J 4 9
HERO Bets $413.84 (allin), CO Calls $413.84 (Rem. Stack: $3.34)

Decided to record a quick session. Kinda hard to explain thought process and talk while I'm grinding even only 4-5 tables but I tried

Video link didn't work for some reason

https://youtu.be/b6TSXAoyPA4?si=pcrv0iwC7h0H3gZy

Youtube links on 2+2 are a little tricky.

You should insert only what's after https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= between the youtube tags.

Great video, please do more.

The change to seven handed was recent so you might not have any large sample size yet, but statistically or gut feeling wise, what impact is the change to seven handed having on win rate, etc.?

Not looking to be an influencer or anything, but could try post a video once a month or once a quarter or something I guess. Whenever I got time.


Changes to 7 handed IMHO are quite bad. And I had one of my worst months last month (even after getting a winner with a BBJ), obviously it isn't only due to the changes to 7h but also because I ran a lot under EV and also because the games just aren't good in this time of year. But yeah not good.

Rake hasn't changed, so it basically means it's harder to game select and you have to fight with 1 more reg most of the time to get the same action from the fish. As we know on GG, if there is no fish on the table, it's very hard to beat the rake. So the change to 7-handed has just made it harder. Also in 6-handed even if I had a bad relative position at the table I felt like I could sort of circumvent that with my skill, now I feel like my relative position at the table is more important. Also I'm getting a lot less hands/hour, not only because of the increase to 7H, but because there's less action in general. Less tables running, etc. So yeah overall pretty bad changes.

Well as one of the guys who never really put too much emphasis into game selection until recently I started to do it a bit more after the changes to 7 handed and I think it was kinda necessary. Also not a big fan of the changes to the VIP games, like what is GG doing? Do they want to lose their marketshare? I mean there's no action at nosebleeds now and I feel like action has been more dry in general even at midstakes, no idea if it's just me though. Will have to see how things develop but I really hope GG reverses some of their recent decisions.

Quite enjoying your blog, was reading all the intro before gf got curious into what I was doing, had to scroll quickly over the pics after cuz yeah that's just weird man, you know.

I've been a poker pro on and off since 2008, and since I read you mention a couple time that GG is the biggest site and that wont/cant change, let me share you one insight: it will for sure not remain the biggest site forever.

At one point Pokerstars had a much bigger monopoly than what GG currently have.

I think that after a while playing in these absurdly raked games must hurt the mental game. Like in reality you are totally crushing but your results show only 2-3bb winner or breakeven sometimes, then you start to question your game and modify it when its not needed

Haha not sure what you're talking about? What's weird about my pictures here in this blog?




It's true GG can always go down, I just don't see it happening in the near future, these things usually take time. However if GG keeps making these changes that are bad for the game (making highstakes invite only, making rake absurd, making PLO 7 handed), then yeah I can see GG losing its marketshare faster rather than slowly.

For me, I got Platinum Shark, and I've spent a lot of time studying GG rake structure and playerpool and how I should change my strategy based on that. I don't particularly enjoy hopping from site to site, so I rather stick to GG. But for many people I understand GG simply isn't the best option to play on right now and if GG keeps making bad changes I don't like then obviously I'll move onto another site too. GG certainly isn't the only option, it's just kinda "comfortable".



I guess this is true. Most regs on GG breakeven and make money from rakeback, the good regs will be slightly +EV (like 1-3bb/100) and weak regs are slightly losing etc. It makes it tough to go through long ugly stretches. But I think my mental is quite good

Decided I will stop blogging. Was fun.

No real news in PLO or poker really.

Main thing is right now, crypto's are picking up, bullrun is here and I'm dedicating a lot more of time towards navigating that market. I basically believe I could make more money from that than from poker over the coming months. So volume will go down a lot and don't think too much new will happen until the end of the bullrun in cryptos in poker for me. And don't really see the point of blogging too much stuff unrelated to poker here.

With that being said, peace!

It was a good blog to follow, found it recently! Also we have played a bit together in 200 pool.

Time to make the crypto blog? I would definitely like to get into crypto stuff as well. I assume you are going more into day/swing trading mode in there? Or just buy long and wait?

Thanks for the reads, it was very inspiring the dedication and work you put into your game.

Without sounding like a fool are you doing day-trading of crypto currencies or are you simply just putting your role into crypto for the ridealong anticipating a higher return than your monthly poker winnings? :-D

Hey guys, crypto took a lot shorter to look at than I thought. Just had to spend around a week like catching up on stuff, creating new buy and sell strategies for certain coins. I was worried it might take more time and I'd put all my time into it and basically day-trade. But that wasn't the case and I don't see much edge in day-trading unless I spend a ton of time learning the ropes, which would basically be as much if not more of a full-time job than poker. And it certainly could be more lucrative than poker. However I view poker as my calling and something that is not only a job, but something I truly enjoy and that gives me a sense of calm and fulfillment in life. Crypto cannot provide this for me.

Regarding how I'm going about trading cryptos, well it's mostly just swing trading and hodling on a medium to longish time-frame.
I have a few gamble coins in some alts where I got tiny parts of my portfolio in, in case they shoot up. These coins for now are in no particular order:
PEPE, MOG, LINK, NEAR, BEAM, ELON, APU.
However the vast majority of my crypto is in BTC and ETH.

Since last month before I went to Paris, my portfolio doubled from like $8k to $16k lol, so I took out about $6k recently, though may put some back in later if there's a pullback, which I'm kinda hoping for. Still think there's a long way to go in this cycle.

Well anyways yeah. I took like a full 10-14 days off grinding poker to basically look at the crypto markets, decide on what coins I want to bet on, create a bit of a plan for selling/buying and doing a lot of research. But after I finished that, I realized I wouldn't need to do much more. Just kind of watch the market a bit and take profits according to the plan I created. So got lots of time for poker again. Due to the time off for crypto (which I kinda viewed as necessary since it boosted my roll a bit and I need to handle that area of my life well), I won't be completing the 50k hands this month, but now that I'm playing poker again, I can resume the blog.

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Graph this month so far: Really nothing so special lol, standard swings as usual and breaking even isn't so bad. Prolly gonna grind another 10k or so hands.


With RB:


Also got the fish points coming in tomorrow:


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I've been thinking a lot about the upcoming year. What I can do to prepare myself for the future and where I want to be.

I know a lot of people disagree with me and think GG is a piece of **** and tbh their rake schemes and non-transparent rakeback is terrible. BUT I still enjoy the grind on GG overall. The fact is, I value "comfort" and just being able to sit down and grind without having to look at multiple lobbies and being able to grind during the day at off peak hours, which is quite tough to do on other sites. They have great software, great marketing, are open in many "shady" jurisdictions and thus can bring in many weaker players. So despite their flaws and their hate towards regs I am a loyal customer for now despite their terrible changes to making PLO 7max and removing the VIP games (though I hope they can reverse these).

GG is the largest poker network by far still, and I see it being that way for at least another 3 years tbh, and so I want to set myself up to really capitalize on that and be one of the most profitable players on GG. It's black friday and there's all these promotions going on. And I've been watching the $100k PLO playbook by Jnandez and his team and thought I'd create my own sort of "playbook", since while I agree with a ton of what he has to say, I also disagree with some things.

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So here is my playbook for 2025 or well, from this point onwards basically:
I've been playing a bit of RnC lately. The main thing is, when looking at the lobby for reg tables, there isn't always enough action to keep me happy only playing on GG. Especially in off-peak hours, which is usually when I play as I like to maintain a healthy sleep schedule, there might only be 1 table running of PLO500. And even on PLO200 either has no action or is filled with regs. Game selection is very important as basically everybody I've spoken with agrees (apart from maybe some HS players who battle on 0 rake environments). But for sure on GG game selection is extremely important with the high rake, especially now that the games have gone 7 handed.

And so lately I've really been struggling to add good quality games. It's hard to game select while playing only 4C reg tables on GG on PLO500 and PLO200. It seems like a lot of the soft games are in 5C and 6C, and that could open up a whole new opportunity. However obviously I'm not well studied in those formats so when I tried 5C and 6C out I felt like I was just punting quite a bit.

For example, here are a couple hands where I believe I could be punting in these games (without having any real knowledge of how the game should be played).

In this hand, I feel like I should have a premium, but facing a 3b IDK if this becomes a 4b/gii, I mean we are only 42% against mediocre AA which has to be one of the worst spots to GII preflop.
Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker HUD and Database Software

PL 6 Card Omaha 2(BB)
SB ($346.37) [VPIP: 75% | PFR: 46.9% | AGG: 35.1% | Hands: 32]
HERO ($213.26)
HJ ($247.81) [VPIP: 66.7% | PFR: 3% | AGG: 15.7% | Hands: 33]
CO ($508.05) [VPIP: 25% | PFR: 20.8% | AGG: 21.4% | Hands: 24]
BTN ($79.70) [VPIP: 89.2% | PFR: 43.2% | AGG: 39.7% | Hands: 37]

Dealt to Hero: T J K K A Q

HJ Calls $2, CO Raises To $9, BTN Calls $9, SB Folds, HERO Raises To $39, HJ Folds, CO Raises To $129, BTN Folds, HERO Raises To $213.26 (allin), CO Calls $84.26

Flop ($438.52): 4 8 Q

Turn ($438.52): 4 8 Q 6

River ($438.52): 4 8 Q 6 T




Another preflop punt Im pretty sure lol
Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker HUD and Database Software

PL 6 Card Omaha 2(BB)
SB ($233.81) [VPIP: 100% | PFR: 55.6% | AGG: 22.7% | Hands: 9]
BB ($154.09) [VPIP: 33.3% | PFR: 16.7% | AGG: 22.2% | Hands: 13]
HJ ($200) [VPIP: 33.3% | PFR: 16.7% | AGG: 36.4% | Flop Agg: 66.7% | Turn Agg: 100% | River Agg: 0% | 3Bet: 25% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 12]
HERO ($200)
BTN ($200) [VPIP: 0% | PFR: 0% | AGG: 0% | Hands: 6]

Dealt to Hero: 9 A 9 T Q Q

HJ Raises To $7, HERO Raises To $24, BTN Folds, SB Raises To $52.50, BB Folds, HJ Calls $45.50, HERO Raises To $200 (allin), SB Calls $147.50, HJ Calls $147.50 (allin)

Flop ($602): 5 3 4

Turn ($602): 5 3 4 4

River ($602): 5 3 4 4 A





Here's a spot which is probably just a fold preflop despite the KQJT triple suited looking quite pretty. And postflop like, it looks pretty again but then I'm almost drawing dead vs AA/AK with a nut flush draw lol.
Hand History driven straight to this forum with DriveHUD 2 Poker HUD and Database Software

PL 6 Card Omaha 2(BB)
SB ($278.25) [VPIP: 40% | PFR: 26% | AGG: 29.3% | Hands: 50]
HERO ($200)
HJ ($224.40) [VPIP: 100% | PFR: 100% | AGG: 66.7% | Flop Agg: 100% | Turn Agg: 100% | River Agg: 0% | 3Bet: 0% | 4Bet: 0% | Hands: 1]
CO ($200) [VPIP: 43.5% | PFR: 24.2% | AGG: 24.5% | Flop Agg: 35% | Turn Agg: 23.1% | River Agg: 22.2% | 3Bet: 10.3% | 4Bet: 0% | Cold Call: 36.7% | Hands: 63]
BTN ($263.31) [VPIP: 0% | PFR: 0% | AGG: 0% | Hands: 1]

Dealt to Hero: T J K 3 2 Q

HJ Raises To $7, CO Calls $7, BTN Folds, SB Folds, HERO Calls $5

Hero SPR on Flop: [8.77 effective]
Flop ($22): 3 A K
HERO Checks, HJ Bets $11 (Rem. Stack: $206.40), CO Folds, HERO Raises To $41.80 (Rem. Stack: $151.20), HJ Calls $30.80 (Rem. Stack: $175.60)

Turn ($105.60): 3 A K 5
HERO Bets $105.60 (Rem. Stack: $45.60), HJ Raises To $175.60 (allin), HERO Calls $45.60 (allin)

River ($432.40): 3 A K 5 8





So basically, while 5C and 6C games seem quite soft and a lot of the action seems to have moved to these formats rather than 4C, it's very tempting to play them. But my skill in these games is still very subpar and I'm making big punts and if I want to get involved in these games I need to put in a lot more time studying the game. Which is why I decided, right now is not the right time for me to be playing 5C or 6C just yet, although I like the idea of joining into the action in the future a bit.


I also tried to play on other sites, well so far I only tried pokerstars, but tbh the action there is simply even more dead than on GG. It seems like I'd have to add many more sites than just stars, I basically almost never found additional tables to play on stars. Maybe on stars there's only action at peak times or something IDK, but in the morning and afternoon there was literally almost 0 action for the brief period I tried to add some tables from that site. So I decided keeping some money on stars to play like 1 hour of poker on that site wasn't really worth it and I've been coming up with a plan to be able to put in more volume with "decent" game selection while keeping GG network as my main battlefield.


This is where RnC comes in. I've only played a few sessions so far, and tbh I hate the rake structure. The rake is even higher than at reg tables which makes no sense. But the rakeback is great at least. So if I can breakeven or even just slightly lose, then it can be quite a profitable endeavour. And thinking longterm, I think it can be a good way to build a roll through volume and rakeback preparing myself for higher stakes.

So I set myself some new goals.
I'd like to use RnC200 to get a bunch of fish points towards GG Platinum status. I need 4,500,000 more points to do that (or roughly 100k points each week) until next October.
And my plan is to have RnC200 be my main game until I reach GG Platinum as it is the easiest method to put in a lot of volume and get a lot of fish points.

Through my few sessions I've played, the RnC field honestly doesn't seem so bad. I mean the rake structures are terrible and I'd be surprised if anyone is really crushing these games. But it seems like there is a decent mix of players, some good regs, some medium regs, some weak regs, and some recreational players of various skill. I definitely ran into some players punting. It runs 24/7 and I can put volume in whenever I want. So to reach this goal of GG Platinum it seems like the ideal method. It seems like the fish at midstakes PLO have by and large moved to 5C and 6C at the reg tables as those games have took a lot of 4C action, however if they want to play 4C, RnC will always be there. At PLO500 and higher there is less action in general in all the formats, and as there is no RnC at 500 and higher, it seems like it kinda depends on the day which game has the action the day.

Considering that RnC volume is higher and the stakes are a bit lower than PLO500 the variance is also lowered a bit (at least in the longrun), which means I feel more comfortable with the money swings. In addition to playing 4 tables of RnC, I'll carefully game select PLO 500 reg tables and try to sit in good games whenever they run when I'm grinding. I found it a bit harder to game select and I often arrive late to the action since I always have a decision in RnC, but it should still be possible to table select and find some softer line-ups sometimes.

Until I reach GG Platinum this is my main plan going forwards regarding grinding and the games I want to play. I'm looking for steady "variance free" money, and hopefully after I have reached GG Platinum, my bankroll will be a bit bigger and I'll be looking to shot-take PLO1k and move away from RnC.

At the same time, my plan once I start playing PLO1K is to start adding some 6C and 5C into my rotation. In order to do this I need to prepare myself. For now, I don't have much additional content to study 4C, I mean maybe I could get an Elite subscription on RIO but my main source of study right now is mainly my study group, reviewing my hands, working with the solver, etc. Mastermind videos are honestly I find, kind of not so helpful for my level of play. Although their 5C content I find quite useful since I'm still a relatively bad player in those games. Thus I plan on soaking in most of their 5C and 6C content during my RnC grind.

If I grind slightly more than 100k points each week, then I should finish the grind to GG platinum before next Fall, which is around when I'd like to start playing PLO1k and adding some 5C and 6C into the mix. Hopefully by the time I reach GG platinum status I'm going to have finished all of mastermind's 5C content for preflop and postflop theory and done some training in their trainer and that would hopefully get me ready to play those games a bit. Well, there's nothing quite like actually putting some hands in, getting in the mix and learning from experience, but I tend to still prefer understanding a bit of theory before just randomly hopping into a game and hoping I can do well.

Until then, that's my plan. From now on, I'd like to only check my graph once a week, think I may care a bit too much about my results and it affects my day outside of the grind sometimes. If I win I can feel like the greatest player on Earth and if I lose it can just have me feeling down in life.

In the end, the only thing that matters is the quality of my play, not the results. I cannot control the results on a day to day basis.

I thought of something recently regarding variance to help me put things into perspective and realize why day to day results mean nothing. I mean this isn't going to be perfectly accurate, and tbh I haven't seen many poker players put it like this. But I basically decided to say that the results in a single day are 99% based on luck. I can play perfectly, but that isn't going to mean I'm going to have a winning or losing day.

Following this logic:

Remember that in a day 99% of results is luck. HOWEVER
In a week 93% of results is luck (.93^7)
In a month 74% of results is luck (.99^30)
In a quarter 40% of results is luck (.99^90)
In a half year 16% of results is luck (.99^180)
And finally in a full year only 3% is luck (.99^350)
So taking into consideration the results of anything shorter than a span of for example half a year is quite useless IMO.

Obviously you can change that 99% number to some other arbitrary number, but putting it like this makes me realize how meaningless short samples of 100k hands are or whatever, and therefore worrying about what happens in a single day is just terrible. I need to think more longterm, and I'll start by trying to only look at my graph once a week. At the same time I'll be taking Monday's off grinding to dedicate to more of a "study day", could also use Monday to post an update here or something I guess too.

Schedule would therefore look more like this:





It's been a long post. Lots to talk about and many changes and thoughts to share. Hope you enjoyed.

Your schedule reminds me of a Black Mirror episode, specifically S1E2.
Don't get me wrong, i respect what you're doing, but could never do it myself.

I have a very spontaneous approach, so its interesting to see.
Like i cant imagine quitting in the middle of a soft sess to do some solver stuff, instead im probably just postponing lunch and keep grinding.
But i read your previous posts about this and get it, gl!

This looks like hell.

That is why you are bum and he is one of the strongest players in his pool

Aggressive fan boy much? Lol

have talked about the schedule a bunch before and dont want to spend too much time talking about it anymore or my approach to it or my philosophy with it. Read the blog earlier if you want more insight on my thoughts on that topic.

Again, I don't find it particularly hard to follow, nor do I consider myself particularly disciplined or hard working. I dont follow it perfectly, just like to have a baseline to follow and something visual as a reference. And have a general idea of what I want to be doing at what time. Of course the times can change a bit, I can take time off etc. It just helps to be a bit more organized and stick to good routines. But for example today morning I'm not going to study, I'm going to pick up my coat from the dry cleaners and eat a brunch with my fiancé. Past 2 weeks I almost barely grinded focused on crypto, etc lol.

For some reason whenever I post a screenshot of what the schedule looks like I get some interesting comments.

In the meantime just finished reading the bitcoin standard yesterday. Kinda meh book, more about the history of money and monetary policy. Took me a long time to read since it wasn't so interesting.