What's up guys (and girls)? September was a pretty hectic month for me, which kicked off with a small trip to Germany to reunite with my GF despite lack of flights, troubles leaving Australia and COVID fears in general. I'm still living with her in Kiel (small city north of Hamburg) and would say that I've 'semi-relocated' here given the uncertainty around restrictions for getting back in to Australia. Somewhat fortunately for me, most of the sailing competitions in the Australian summer have been cancelled, meaning I don't have an urgent need to return home before then. I was planning on entering some competitions over here, but there are some issues with COVID restrictions, so I'm taking this time to really focus on poker, and assess what the next few years will look like.

Since coming here, I've jumped on to GG/Natural8, and begun grinding there, given the daily leaderboard and reasonably low rake at the Rush n Cash/Zoom tables. I started my playing there with an insane heater, where I begun taking a few more shots at 25NL which went well, but variance caught up with me and since then, I've managed to lose nearly every big pot to leave me stuck a decent amount. I've made a lot of improvements to my game, including upping my aggression and winning a lot of pots which aren't 'mine', but I've also gotten a little careless with running big bluffs costing me a few BI's. Given GG rakes 3b pots pre flop, I was thinking that I should be 3 betting less than I would at a normal micro stakes game, but in doing so, I think my range has also become quite capped on a lot of board in 3b pots. Running in to the nuts fairly often has also lead me to being a bit nittier than in the past, so need to keep concious of that, and not let results affect me from not pulling the trigger. Nonetheless, I'm pretty happy with how my game is going, and working on it harder than ever with more volume at the tables as well.



This was a bit of an impromptu post, so I might come back with another one in a few days with a couple of interesting hands. If anyone reading lives in the Hamburg/Schleswig-Holstein area, let me know and it would be cool to meet up! Thanks for reading and GL!

I recorded a short session I played 2-tabling 10NL Rush n Cash/Zoom the other day. Sound quality is a little ****, but if anyone wants to take a look and offer some feedback, that would be much appreciated!

https://youtu.be/nZrVfjPIFWg

What's up 2p2? Another month in the books, and a lot of improvement poker wise (at least that's what it feels like).



The downswing from September continue a bit further in to October, but I think I hit the bottom of it, and have grinded my BR back to the point where I first started playing on GG. Throughout the month, I made some pretty big changes to my approach to the game, and it seems to be going pretty well so far. It doesn't show on the graph, but I've won another 10 BI's or so since the start of November, and with another RB spin coming up shortly, I should be able to start shot taking 25NL again.

In other life news, Germany has started another lock down, so I should have a bit of time this month to click some buttons, and work towards the goal of shot taking 50NL by the end of the year. Throughout October, I found that my motivation to train for sailing was waning, while my motivation to grind poker was at an all time high. With that in mind, I've made the decision to take a step back from sailing, and put my focus in to reaching the highest levels in poker. This may be a temporary hiatus from sailing, but after having spent 5 years focussed solely on one task day in, day out, with very few results to show for it, I think I need a break from the life of an athlete. That isn't to say that I won't approach poker with less intensity than I did sailing - ever since I was a kid learning to surf at age 7, I've thrown myself fully in to any endeavour which I was trying to succeed at, but I want to approach poker with more 'balance'.

The thing I've come to realise is how important it is to approach a task in a way which fits your personality. Throughout my career as an athlete, I have very little doubt that I was putting in way more hours than the rest of my peers, and forcing myself to do so at times when I didn't feel like it. The result being the burnout expressed in this blog, and a lack of passion for a sport which I spent years trying to perfect. Everyone has heard the stories about people like Kobe Bryant, Michael Phelps, Michael Jordan etc grinding day in, day out at all hours of the day to perfect their craft. This approach has obviously worked for them, and probably suits their personality types, but it's also an approach which is easy to glorify from an outside perspective. Seldom do you hear about the people who only trained 'when they felt like it', yet are able to achieve great success. Further, I think it's easier for a lot of successful people to recount the days where they trained for 12 hours straight, but fail to remember the days where they binged Netflix for 12 hours. I may be completely off about this, but I think long term consistency and purposeful practice is a much healthier recipe for sustained success. Sure there will be days where you 'don't feel like grinding', and you may need to push through these occasionally, but I think neglecting those feelings consistently is a recipe for disaster. I'm naturally very disciplined/driven, so I don't think putting in the hours will be difficult for me, but I would like to try and use more 'feel' when approaching my grinding/studying, rather than trying to tick off a certain number of hours each week. Other people may need to have a target each week to keep themselves accountable.

I'm sure there's a lot more that can be said about this topic, but those are my immediate thoughts, and I'd be keen to hear any other opinions/disagreements below.

Thanks for reading, and GL in November.

November in a nutshell – won a bit, shot took 25NL, lost a bit, dropped back down, lost a lot, rebuild…



After building up my BR to the point where I was able to shot take 25NL again, when I had to move back down to 10NL after hitting my stop loss, it made me more and more eager to put in the volume to allow me to reach the point of shotting 25NL again, and that’s when I managed to drop a large number of BI’s – around 20 in two days to be exact. Once that happened, I decided to take a couple of days off, and I came to the realisation about how much my play is impacted by trying to ‘force’ volume. As Nick Howard said in this tweet, ‘impatience is 2nd biggest leak in poker’.



With the strategy upgrades I’ve been making recently, I’m on the path to fixing the passivity, and now I just need to remain patient and trust that the gains will come. Moving forward, my goal is to try and stay more mindful of my emotional state whilst playing, and not being scared to keep my volume lower if necessary. Sorry for the overload of Nick Howard content, but I can relate to a lot of what he talks about through struggles I’ve experienced both as an athlete and now in poker.

Whilst playing slightly less volume, it gives me the time to work on my game off the tables, and really develop a clear picture of my game plan. Since my game is constantly evolving, grinding heaps of volume with a continuously changing strategy seems somewhat unproductive, and it also gives me the chance to focus on aspects outside of poker, as per my last update.



Thanks for reading, and happy holidays since I probably won't be updating this again until the New Year.

In typical fashion, I’m posting this a little late but nonetheless Happy New Year to everyone reading this. This will be a short post summing up December, and the year as a whole. Having been spending time with my GF’s family since the 21st, I wasn’t able to get that much volume in during December, but I managed to run decently well and begin taking more shots at 25NL. I’m basically only playing reg tables now, and be able to table select, and exploit harder is definitely helping my win rate. I’ve also merged my DB for both GG and ACR, as I’m now mixing tables from both sites.

December;


2020;




So overall, lost in $ throughout 2020, but in BB, I’m slightly winning both EV adjusted, and overall. I’m not entirely happy with how I approached the game in 2020, but I’m fairly confident I’ve now found a process which works for me, and will help me get to my 2020 goal of shot taking 50NL (albeit a few months late).

Looking towards 2021, I’m going to continue with this blog as I think it’ll be a cool ‘memory capsule’ to look back on which documents my whole journey through the stakes. I don’t think I’ll set any concrete goals for this year, but some of the things I want to achieve include;

- Join Poker Detox – this is the first I’ve mentioned this on the blog, but I think the approach of the stable really resonates with me, and being able to move up in stakes whilst being staked faster than I could with my own roll seems massively beneficial.
- Get a proper job and establish myself somewhere in Europe.
- Get in to the best shape of my life (at least aesthetically). I think somewhere around 10-12% body fat is reasonable, but I don’t want to get attached to a number.
- Continue to get in good volume, in a relaxed, stress-free mindset whilst making sure I’m in the best games possible.
- Become more active on 2p2 especially in the PG&C thread.

I want to thank all the people who’ve helped me throughout 2020, and everyone who’s taken the time to comment on my posts. GL to everyone this year!

Awesome man! Look forward to following in 2021! You should update this more often like your blog in the server!

Subbed, will be following. Also sent you a DM with some questions about GG. GL

Just found this. You should probably focus less on playing and more on studying in 2021. I focused almost entirely on studying in 2020, and will never regret it.

GL buddy!

Thanks man, that's part of the plan for this year

Thanks for the sub!

Good advice man, thanks. I've put a heap of time in to studying in 2020, but never really implemented it effectively in game. What did you study process look like last year?

January 2021



My love-hate relationship with Zoom continued in January, first few weeks of the month was spenty purely grinding Reg tables, and then after seeing some weak looking Zoom pools, jumped in and managed to crush to bring me a bit better than break even on the month.

With the massive heater this last week, I'm solely playing 25NL now, and hopefully shot taking 50 sometime in February. I've spent a fair bit of time studying this month, did a big DB review, and am focussing on plugging some of the major leaks that came out of the that.

More importantly, I've been pretty mindful of my emotional state whilst playing, and I think I've done a good job of making sure I'm playing in a good mental space, in good games.

Life-wise, I'm at the leanest/lightest I've been in a number of years, but I'm keen to get back in to a gym once the lockdown here is over. There's only so many bodyweight exercises one can come up with to do in their bedroom.

Cheers for reading, and let's crush Feb!

February 2021

February's over and it's been a month full of ups and both in and out of the online poker streets.

Life wise, we had some pretty polarised weather here in north Germany, with some flash snow storms and frozen lakes in our local park, to beautiful 15ish degree weather.





For my first winter here, it was pretty cool to experience some of this 'abnormal' weather compared to the winters I'm used to in Australia. With the lockdown here dragging on, it's been great to get out and do some running when we've had some of the better weather days.



Fitness wise, me and my gf are still keeping up with 3-4x home workouts a week, but I'm looking forward to getting back in to a gym sometime soon. I'm down to the leanest I've possibly ever been, and going to keep working on that for a bit longer.

I'm still working on trying to establish myself here in Europe, and getting a proper job is a slightly bigger challenge than I expected. That being said, I've got some part time gigs on the horizon, but I'll have to sort out a visa at some point.



Not the best results this month, but managed to win a little bit post RB and GGCare. I took some shots at 50nl this month, which went well, but lost a number of BI's at 25nl, so dropped back down. There's some big things coming up for me poker wise, and I'm looking forward to continuing to improve and plug some leaks. My plan is to switch up my routine a bit, and start adding in more study, which will probably cost me some volume going forward. I'm thinking something like 1-2 days of study per week then 3-4 days of playing per week will work well.

Hey man, I really like your attitude and wish you the best of luck. I also the love the photographs, the one of the water and sunset is really pretty.

Unless you put in 100k-200k hands a month you are wasting your time. Thats what a lot new people trying to make a living at poker don't get. You have to beat the variance not the players. You can be average player but if you put in the volume you will profit every year. But you need to put in 6-8 hrs a day just like a job across several tables in cash games. In mtts you got in 15-20k mtts a year. All it takes is few losing months or one year and its a wrap for a lot of players. They have to many bills it eats away at their roll and they are done. Lower limits are good where your br can't be busted and you can slowly grind the money up. br management is a must. THis is the honest way to make a living at poker.

It sucks nobody wants to do this but this is how you really have to do it and you will get used to it over time. don't worry about a few bad sessions or some bad beats. You want to focus on winning more smaller pots. All the small pots your losing after a session go through all of them and see where you can win more of those. Even if its just 1% more of those a day through a full year it adds up. The bigger pot even out over time. Everyone else that i know who played over 5 years tried to bum hunt, play less hrs, less volume all of them no longer play poker. Everyone I know put in volume and hrs are still playing poker or retired winning player. And the more you play the better you will get. It becomes more instinctive. You start seeing all these spots people never bluff and spots where people bluff to much and you start making better decisions in those spots and deviate from what pio would do. It takes time to build up a lot of volume so add in more volume over time but focus on volume not the money. The money will be there. And its ok to play mtts with cash if you see a cheap one that has a big gtd play it while you grind cash. It wont effect your br that much but if you won few k from it nice boost to your br. MTT are fun to play too if you run deep in one.

Its not easy to do cause through these long sessions lots of things go wrong or don't go your way and you have grind through it. You can't quit cause your running bad cause you wont be able to the put the volume in. You have to grind through it. You can take a mini break but have to get back on and play. and i think where it makes most people realize they can't do it for a living. The bad beats and bad variance can drive people insane. So there you go thats what it really takes. I see people on twitch really hard on themselves thinking they aren't good and question how they play and trolls in chat tell them they played a hand wrong. Its mostly just variance. Don't be hard on yourself when you lose. Everyone loses. Trust the process and the money will be there. You played over 40k hands last month. You can do 50k hands. Make that goal to do maybe 5k to 10k hands more a month until you get used to it and then put in more volume. the key is beating the variance and ya its a lot more grinding then someone would assume.

These are the kind of hands kind of play themselves out. Its pretty standard spots. i might fold the 99 sometimes I might not just depends but its not wrong either way. the AA hand a double check raise they really don't bluff like that so I would just fold the turn here. But calling is ok u do have AA and if you don't have any info on villain then your play is ok. but in general I am probably folding here on the 2nd raise. And no i wouldn't check back the flop if i know this guys a fish. Hes playing K5 so i think the cb is good. People saying to check back to save money is foolish. It depends. I would check back here if im really deep and i dont want to play a big pot with a 250bb effective stack. But in general cb is good here especially against someone playing a wide range who plays poorly post. I think all hands are played fine.

Example- Focus on smaller pots where you are leaking money and ask should i double barrel here or give up? Is his range weak enough to fire 3 barrels. These are the questions i think would help your game a lot more long term. Just cause the pots are smaller people for some reason don't want to ask questions about them. Its mind boggling to me cause smaller pots is where the real money is.

A+ post.

Thanks man, yeah it was an amazing time of day by the water once we'd finally emerged from our abnormal snowy weather. Hope you're still crushing!

Hey, thanks for taking the time to read and comment. 100k-200k hands a month not playing solely zoom seems pretty insane, but maybe I'm just soft haha. I imagine that sort of volume 4-tabling zoom is reasonable, but I don't think I've got the ability to 4-table zoom at the moment. Personally, I would've thought my time is better spent improving my winrate through study, rather than trying to grind out 1-2bb/100 for 100k hands + per month. At the moment, I'm going to give extra study/less volume a go, and if it doesn't work for me, I'll happily post here and tell you that you're right . I'm a big believer in there not being a 'one size fits all' and that each person needs to find what works for them. I've seen people who have 'made it' playing tonnes of volume and learning through playing, and then there are also people who 'made it' playing 25k hands/month and studying way more. Up until now, I've been doing something in the middle, so time to switch it up

Hey man ! I was following your stuff on RIO, Nice to see you here! I see you've been doing a lot of work. That's what we like to see!

Hey man, thanks for following! Just checked out your blog, looks like your putting in some work. Will be following your progress GL GL

What's up 2p2!

Managed to find a bit of run good in March, and now I'm mostly playing 50NL. Played a little less volume than usual, but also dedicated two days to study per week. I've mostly been working on my SRP pot game as preflop caller, and I feel like I'm becoming a lot more competent in this spot. I'm pretty happy with how I'm progressing at the moment, and feel like I'm getting in high quality sessions. The plan for April is to keep up the study hours, and continue to add new upgrades to my game.

Off the felt, I'm finally in the process of getting my visa/residency sorted here in Germany, but still on the job hunt. In uni, I studied to be an Actuary, and I'm looking for roles in this space or as a data scientist. My goal is to land a 'real world' job, and develop poker as a profitable side hustle.

In line with my 'objectives' fromt the start of the year, through a mix of intermittent fasting and calorie counting, I'm down around 7kg and pretty stoked with my progress in this area. Whilst gyms are still closed here due to the lockdown, in between each poker sessions I'm doing a short routine of push ups, single leg squats and bodyweight 'desk rows', to help keep the blood flowing and get in a few more sets during the week. I'm hoping that this lockdown can come to an end soon, but it has definitely been good for dedicating some hours to poker.

All the best for April!

Great thread, nice update, and good luck for April - subbed!

Dope results and hot red line bro. Keep it up

Thanks fellas!

April Update

April has come and gone, and boy is this year is going quickly! I've spent most of the month grinding 50NL reg tables, and started playing on a few different sites with some decent RB.

In the vein of my 'goals' for the year, even though I haven't joined Poker Detox, I've taken what I believe, is an even better step for my poker journey. When I first set out in joining Detox, it was thanks to my friend Patrick (freenachos on RIO forums), who had given me a heap of free guidance, and was a member of Detox at the time. Since reaching HS, Patrick has left Detox, and started his own CFP 'Nachos Poker', which I've now joined. The ethos is similar - using MDA based strategies to exploit player pool leaks, but also creating a grounding in solid fundamentals as you move up towards HS. There's a good group of guys in the team, with most of us playing 50/100NL plus a few others at 200NL+. If anyone wants to hear more about the team, feel free to PM me! We're on the look out for more motivated players who are willing to commit to this sort of strategy.



Results wise, break evenish, but I get the feeling that I'm still improving. When I start going through a patch of 'run bad', it doesn't seem to be as bad as they used to be, but who knows, still small sample

I'm basically in line with how our teams strategy should be carried out, just gotta wait for some heat now. Whilst I'm clearing some bonuses from new sites, I'll probably do a bit more grinding during May than studying, but I also want to make sure I don't let my game start to slip.



Life wise, it looks like I'll be starting an internship at the end of June, so that should give me a few more 'real world' job prospects after gaining a bit more experience. With the weather starting to warm up a bit here, I'm getting back in to some recreational sailing, and I'll even be doing a kite surfing course this weekend. One of the new Olympic Sailing disciplines for 2024 is going to be a kite surfing event, and I've gotten the feeling that I'm not quite ready to give up on trying to qualify for the Olympics, so this may be a new pathway for myself.

I haven't been particularly active on 2p2 lately, but I'm going to try and comment on some other threads a bit more regularly, if time permits.

Kinda all over the place sort of post, but hopefully doesn't come across as too scrambled...

May Update

It's about time I got around to posting this! Things have been pretty full on here over the last month, and I haven't been able to get that much volume in. Gyms have finally reopened, so I've been in there 2-3 days a week - getting back in to it has been a bit of struggle, and it's pretty crazy to see how much strength I've lost despite staying relatively active since last year.

I've also been doing some work with the German Sailing Team helping them with some statistical analysis in preparation for the Olympics in a month. Those two things alone have been taking up a bit of time, but I could also improve my schedule a bit to get some more poker time in.

Poker wise, was basically break even for most of the month, then went on a massive heater towards the end, and built my roll up to the point where I can now play 100NL reasonably comfortably. My plan is to keep mixing sites, and to play 100NL as frequently as possible, while staying in good games. Working with the team in the CFP is going great, and the whole team put up pretty solid results over May, so I'm pretty fired up to keep working on my game.