Been a while Martin. How's the business coming along?

Hi Guys!

So I have now been at home for a week now - trying to rest and get better. Unfortunately the pain (not terrible) does not seem to be getting any less!

I think I may have been doing too many things. Only small things like hanging laundry out or tidying kids toys up. But I think I have to stop doing ANYTHING for the 2nd week of my rest to give it chance to heal properly.

I changed some of the dressings on my wounds last night and they seem to be healing up nicely. I think it is on the inside where the issue is!!!

Poker

I have had a good few weeks now to think about where my poker is heading.

To summarise, I have been in a Coaching For Profits deal for 8 months now which seems to have gone backwards for me.

The month before the deal I was riding a wave and taking 25nlz shots...



(It is small sample I know)

And then for the next 8 months it looks like this...



Again, not a great sample but what is really frustrating is I seem to spend most of my time playing 5nlz.

Also I play scared that I am going to hit stop loss and have to move down all of the time.

The main thing is that a lot of the enjoyment has gone out of it lately. My heart is not in the coaching deal any more and I am disappointed in the results.

To be fair to the coach he put a hell of a lot of effort into me and I feel bad that he has not made anything back out of me either.

I guess the time is here where I have to accept that I cannot be good at poker.

Going Forward

My coach and I have ended the deal (hopefully amicably).

This does not mean I will stop playing poker nor does it mean I will stop learning poker!

I love playing this game!

I will go back to playing in a more relaxed and fun manner.

I will also go back to studying some of the mathematics of the game. That side of poker always interested me more than anything so I will go back to ENJOYING my play and ENJOYING my study.

And who knows? Maybe it will be like last time I left a CFP deal and I will start printing money again!!!!!!!!!!!!?

Poker This Week

I will get a lot of time to play! I mean surely sitting at the pc clicking the mouse counts as rest and recuperation right!!!???

I will play 5nlz and just get a sample there for now before thinking about moving back to 10nlz. Main reason for this is I want to play totally relaxed for a while and not care about spewing a few buy-ins here and there.

I am not too sure what I will do for study and improvement right now. I think just playing and HAVING FUN is the priority for at least this next week. After that I might go back to reading Janda or something similar as that is the sort of material I enjoy.

Conclusion

- I need to go and rest as even writing this was a bit tiring
- CFP deal is over
- Play and study for FUN
- 5nlz for 40k ish hands to see where I am at (but mostly just to relax)
- Get well and then decide what to hit hard in life (martial arts, fitness, property, poker!?)

Have a great week amigos! The fun starts HERE!!!

Thx man, PM'd

i dont know if other people have already said this (sorry if they have)

but u should def spend as little time as possible playing 5z. Extended period playing such stakes have been known to kill people. I'd say play 25z and keep on playing unless u lose 20 BI. One thing u should never do imo is shot take e.g. 25z and then move down to 10z after losing 3 BI. Seriosuly bad for ur mental game.

Always spend as much time as u can at the biggest stakes u can reasonably play (e.g. if u have $1k dedicated to poker, please dont play 10z or lower..) ESPECIALLY TRUE IF UR NOT A PRO. does absolute wonders for ur game no matter how much u decide to do off the table work.

Offer for a free hour always on the table mate. Skype me.

If this has been a long standing offer how have you not taken TDA up on it. Guy is a boss and seems like a great guy.

any reason why u don't wanna go back to HU?

Just jump on like all sites possible, play micro's and use wat u learned with BPC. Sit out any super aggro fish and just play the passive ones, profit, continue to learn how to beat more aggro fish as your BR increases. Like im sure 100% that vs somewhat passive/abc fish you can win 10bb/100 its the aggro/regs that were messing with ur winrate no?

Hey KP, do you do a summary of the past 4 years anywhere in the thread? I've gone through the first 10 pages but I gotta say it's a great read, but a huge one! I'd love to see how someone as busy as you were (at least when you started, I don't know about now) managed to fit poker around your life.

If not it's fine, it'll just take me a while longer to catch up to speed!

Have you ever tried Unibet mate?

The NL5 equivilent NL4 is as soft as anywhere you'll find because they offer 4(IIRC) free NL4 tickets so a lot of guys just go all in every hand with ATC just trying to clear the tickets so they get the money.

There is also a 200e welcome bonus to clear, worth a try..I did and I haven't played anywhere else for like a year. I hadn't played online for ages but jumped on into NL4 and I'm now at NL50 in that year without playing half as much as you have.

No HUD's/no seat selection/auto rebuy and pretty much anything else 'regs' exploit so it might be a bit of a shock to you for a bit but you soon get used to it. I think it could be perfect for you given your fresh approach to the game.

Yeah good thanks Husker, moved to bigger premises and even have staff now but seem to be working more hours, not sure im doing it right. Hope you are good.

VLOG

Hi guys, VLOG of what is going on lately and my thoughts on moving forward (time stamps below)...



00.12: Emergency surgery!
04.05: Advice if you had your gallbladder removed today!!!
05.02: Poker
05.45: Ending Coaching For Profits deal
06.29: Playing for fun wut?
07.00: Gone backwards!
07.35: Standard lines?
08.30: Total confusion
09.00: Me and CFP deals suited?
09.36: NOT QUITTING!!!
10.20: Offers of help
11.38: Let's open up!
11.42: Over rolled
11.55: STOP FOLDING!!!
12.22: Nothing has worked so change something
12.55: True bank roll and stop loss is futile
13.40: Sucker for punishment?
14.26: KMA?

Have a good weekend, see you at the nosebleeds!

Today I was reviewing sessions and in one hand I folded here...



My immediate reaction was that this might be close and that it could be a continue.

I have done most of my working out and it seems like an easy call to me now, especially as it is 2.5x open preflop AND it is only 0.5x flop cbet.

However, I am not good at deciding which hands are better to continue with on the flop in some instances. I know it is not an exact science but I was wondering...

Should I prefer AJo and ATo as calls on flop (quite likely the best hand + could improve to best hand BUT I am hoping for it to check down unimproved). Or should I prefer J6s (with BDFD that can turn equity and I can bluff river if turn goes XX anyway)?

(Assuming villain is unknown but exploits would be nice to know too)

Hi Chris, great thread, will be following!

About the K7dd hand, I think we can fold it on the flop, better continue with al Ax with a bdfd and some strong A high's like AT,AJ. We also have all gutshots to defend here by raising or by calling. If V. is cbetting high frequency, which on this board he probably is, we should adjust to that by having a wide check raising range.

Cheers!

Bearing in mind Its been a while........Im not sure its a bad spot to 3bet pre. If anyone is watching it improves your image at the table and your hand plays pretty well the times you do get called. Calling you are pretty much trying to flop a bit stronger than this so Id probably fold on this flop and not think about it too much(If I did think about it I wouldnt mind a check raise on this flop if I had more back door outs but you pretty much need to hit a K or a diamond and a thinking player is going to know you are bluffing most of the time on this board, but then I do miss levelling wars ).

As I am still off work I am trying to study a lot.

I have just had a brief period (10 days?) of playing tonnes (too many tables and very low focus) and although I lost lots of buy-ins (at 5nlz) it was good for me to blow off some steam.

I will post in here what I am studying...

Read Mental Game Of Poker

Mental Game Fish
- I am a mental game fish because I "play badly when the stakes are too small for them to care" - it is a big possibility.
- I am a mental game fish because I "Feel like a failure when they lose a hand that was played profitably" - hmm, maybe???

How To Use This Book
"When rushing to understand your mental game, it can be easy to get overloaded with information" - very relevant for me so fifteen minute sessions only!

The Adult Learning Model (ALM)
It is absolutely essential that I understand something mathematically to even attempt to get to the stage of Unconscious Competence. All of my previous coaching has been "do this and win" coaching (which may or may not be profitable) but for me I absolutely must know the WHY to compute it.

22 minutes done! Up to pdf page 24 "Inchworm"

Biggest take-away - I am not sure I know anything about poker to the level of unconscious competence - I don't believe anything anybody taught me any longer!!!

Of course you do, you know tons. Do you need to think hard about opening 72o UTG?

Yesterday I did check-fold flop in BB 9/17 times (53%) which is a little higher than I would like.

This morning I reviewed those hands and think it is just sample issue and all were okay.

Only close one is this...



It is a board villain is going to cbet bluff this size often (I think) but it is also hard to realise my equity if I call (I am basically hoping he is one and done).

I do have odds to call against a polarised range full of his air + semi-bluffs + strong hands so maybe this is in my call once range.

Basically I am calling 66 here and folding 44 but it could be a mistake?

---

The Mental Game Of Poker (Study)

Inchworm

In the bell curve the left side represents the C-game where decisions are terrible. JT gives some examples of when these bad decisions might be made...

- "Mind going blank in a huge pot" - this happens to me sometimes but usually when I have worked 10 hours then play in the evening and cannot expect to play much better. I wonder if we will find some way of improving it...

- "You're bored and your terrible bluff gets called" - I would never say "bored" but it happens sometimes that I make a play first and then realise it is a mistake because, for example, villain is not a reg (less then 100bb). I think this is also a focus issue due to weariness BUT it could be something else entirely (like thinking I am better then I really am OR thinking these things are not important OR not valuing the money enough).

---

"The inchworm concept illustrates how consistent improvement happens by taking one step forward from the front of your bell curve followed by another step forward from the back" - so improvement happens at both ends, improve my weaknesses AND improve my best.

---

There is a client story from "Samoleus" that makes me think I might suffer from two conflicting things... I do not care about the money enough BUT I also am too attached to short term results.

I think I have become less attached to the results since leaving my CFP deal (but not anywhere near detached enough) and this is mainly because I have some specific areas to improve on and am focused on those rather than results. Also having the 1 buy-in stop loss/drop down rule affected me badly I think.

So at the moment I am happy just if I played better on the flop because I KNOW I need to play better on the flop to get anywhere and I also know WHY I need to do XYZ (thanks to Ivegotyrouts) on the flop. Even if I lose 2 buy-ins (like yesterday ).

As for not caring about the money... Not sure, could be both good and bad. Have a funny feeling I WILL care when I get to NL100+.

Hopefully I will get more focused on playing the most EV+++ in each spot. This does seem to be happening...

And that is 25 minutes on mental game done!!! Up to pdf page 26 "Two Common Learning Mistakes".

---

I just worked out my continuing range on that A55s board above and it is pretty close but if I fold 44 there I think I am a over-folding a little. Probably no biggie after rake but a good exercise nonetheless.

---

I am going to play 30 mins then study 45 to 60 minutes around 4 times today. Will also find time to watch or read something motivational.

I will walk down to school to pick kids up later. I am still sore on the inside of two of my wounds but it is not far at all so should be good.

Have a good day amigos. Keep persevering, you never know what is just around the corner!

LOL! Good point. But I also think it is not a bad stand point for me to come from too!

44 is probably a slightly better call than 66 there due to the BDSD and I think with a heart it's probably a flop call. You might benefit from running some sims in these spots to get a rough idea - or even just do street maths and calculate what your threshold call is if you defend 55-60%.

Yesterday I folded versus flop cbet (SRP, HU) 43% IP and 45% OOP (small sample).

This is close enough to what I am aiming for and on review of the hands I think they are all played well.

I will do 3 more flop (facing cbet) analyses today...

---

The Mental Game Of Poker (Study)

Two Common Learning Mistakes

Ignoring Weaknesses: Because the back end of my skill range isn't moving much my whole range (bell curve) is getting flatter. It is taking too much mental effort to take in new concepts without also improving my weaknesses.

JT mentions two consequences of this approach to learning that are VERY relevant to me:-

- "You have a lot to think about and often get confused or miss important details of a hand" - definitely!

- "Playing your best takes a lot of energy so it doesn't happen that often" - Probably! Though possibly partly due to trying to do too much.

Solution: "You must stay focused on learning the correction to your weaknesses until it is trained to the level of Unconscious Competence" - Okay I get it! I fold(ed) to 3bet way too much AND fold(ed) to cbet way too much! I will get these sorted before I learn any new material!

Just for the record: In 2017, before my operation (June) I had these ridiculous stats... FvCBflopIP=56.7%, FvCBflopOOP=59.8%, Fv3B=68.3% (and turn and river do not get any/much better). I am working on the flop stats for now and they have reduced a lot already. I will continue to work on them until I am unconsciously competent!

The Process Model



This is something I have focused well on lately (thanks again to Ivegotyrouts). I am working especially hard on evaluation and analysis. In fact I have made videos of my evaluations every day and most of my analyses are hand written now and pinned up on my wall!

One day soon the results will catch up with doing all this other stuff!!!

Preparation

My preparation tends to change too often.

Some things JT suggests that I will implement 100%:-

- "Review your long term goals and set goals for the session"
- "Review a list with the corrections to your common poker mistakes"
- Use meditation and visualisation to steady and focus your mind"

28 minutes mental game study done! Up to pdf page 28 "Client's Story"...

---

Plenty of study coming up today and a bit of play (I tend to reward 45 minute study with 30 minute play!).

---

My wounds are sore again today (well 2 of them). I am going into work for a few hours tomorrow as it is month end but I am dreading going in car (seat belt) and generally dreading the mountain of work.

---

The more I learn (mental and strategy) the more I realise I was never ready to crush poker. I was blind but I keep digging and vision is gradually coming.

Good luck at the tables amigos!

---

Hi mate, yes I did the "street maths" and I need to be calling 44 to defend 55% (with MY range). Thanks.

POKER VLOG

Quick update of what has been going on this week...



Have a great weekend - your dream is calling you!!!

Weekend was a bum rap for poker.

Friday I went into work for a few hours then had to do moral support for wife in the evening (she was decorating/building her carnival float).

Saturday was Carnival Day so I had son almost all day which was great! We went and watched the Carnival Procession go by twice and it was possibly the best one ever! (I had planned top take both days off poker).

Here is a pic of the float my wife and her Brownies made...



I have got more good pics but they have got all the kids on and apparently I shouldn't share them!!!

---

Sunday went not to plan! Had a "family altercation" on Saturday night and had to do some emergency repair work!!! Fortunately everything seems to be sorted fine now and hopefully it is forgiven and forgotten!

---

I just did a review of my last session.

Here is a hand I folded but my instinct in review said it might be closer than I originally thought...



I know it depends somewhat on my preflop range but after working out how much I can continue on this board I think I am not going to be folding any off-suit broadways here.

---

Mental Game Of Poker (Study)

Preparation (revisited)

JT's client says how important warming-up is to him. I know that when I was winning at a good hourly (after leaving CFP @ BPC) I was warming up like a beast. I meditated, watched some short hand analyses and visualised. Must get back to this 100%!!!

Performance

I must make sure I am not evaluating hands that have finished while I am still playing! That is what review is for!

Results

I have to stop quantifying my results and use more qualitative methods. How well did I play, how good was my focus, did I tilt much?

Evaluation

Post session grade the quality of my play instead of using money won/lost to measure performance.

Analysis

Review the session but preferably not immediately after (for me).

Understand that although this is not the most fun part of being a poker player but be sure that it is likely the most valuable!

I think I have made a nice adjustment here already. Over the past 9 days I have studied/analysed way more than I have played. This has always been a strange one for me as I had the (incorrect) belief that I needed to just play tonnes because my playing time is so limited.

Use the Process Model Every Day/Session

Reminder...



PART III - EMOTION

"EMOTION IS NOT THE PROBLEM. It's the key to mastering your game."

The answer is not necessarily to KILL emotion.

Emotion is not the cause of the problems but rather is a symptom of problems (often in mental game).

Emotion serves a valuable purpose because it highlights the flaws in my game.

Realise that getting emotional (angry) after a bad beat, for example, points to a lack of understanding of variance and poker. So that emotion has been useful as it is pointing to my weakness.

Resolution

If I can start to view emotion as the symptom and not the problem emotion becomes purely positive. I can use emotion to resolve the underlying cause and then remove the negative emotions.

This is the only way to develop true mental strength. Simply ignoring or blanking out emotions does not bring about resolution - they are still in the background just waiting to come out.

---

And that is another 25 minutes of mental game work done!!! (up to pdf page 33 "Malfunctioning Mind")

---

So, I have already done 80 minutes of study today (session review, hand analysis, mental game).

I will do another 90+ minutes of study, play for at least 90 minutes and meditate.

---

I really feel that things are going in a good direction here.

I am not saying I am getting any better at poker yet but I am definitely becoming what I would call a "professional".

---

Mother Nature put a dream inside of us all. You either lose it and stay unfulfilled or you keep it, fight for it and die for it and become your best self. Destiny is calling...

Have a good day amigos, remember, this is not a practice run...

KJ is a flop defend all day long if you're defending appropriately wide; however if villain is adjusting to your likely PF tightness (unlikely), you can get away with a fold.

Thanks for the confirmation Sir.

Yesterday was a good day for achieving volume targets for study, play and mental game etc...

[x] Play 90 mins
[x] Study 150 mins
[x] Mental game 20 mins
[x] Meditate
[x] Visualise

---

Already done 50 minutes study today and now it's mental game time!!!

---

The Mental Game Of Poker (Study)

Malfunctioning Mind

This basically states that "when the emotional system becomes overactive, it shuts down higher brain functions" or in other words I am not able to think straight!

Although it is not possible to control this (because it is natural fight-or-flight response) it is possible to gain control of my emotions and improve my mental game by:-

1. Start to control my emotions before they reach the "emotional threshold" and shut down my higher brain functions (i.e. my ability to think).

2. Utilise this with the Adult Learning Model. So when I am getting to the emotional threshold it shows me exactly where my weaknesses are. Or in other words, it can only happen if something is not learned to the level of Unconscious Competence!

Two Causes Of Emotion

I already read that emotion in game is caused by flaws in Unconscious Competence like bad beats and mistakes but there is another place emotion is created: The Mind (Holy ****, not that old chestnut again!!!)

JT says that when I become aware of anxiety, anger or low motivation "the mind can make that emotion multiply". This increases the amount of emotion I have to deal with, therefore making it even harder to stay in control. E.g. I could get mopre anxious because I recognise I am already anxious.

Accumulated Emotion

After reading this paragraph I wonder how much I could be suffering with this.

It seems a hell of a long time since I had a decent winning session (just looked, it has been 18 days of play since I had a 2 buy-in win [and it was just about 200bb]).

Firstly it seems emotion can rise and fall just within a single day. It can often arise in session but can often be gone before the next session.

Sometimes it takes a bit more to remove the emotion (like hours after the session and doing a workout or something).

However... "Sometimes emotion doesn't completely disappear". So this means that the next time I play, if the emotion isn't gone from before, I am not starting with a clean slate!

I must quote this...

"It may not seem like much, but this extra emotion (tilt, overconfidence, doubt) means that your threshold has lowered and less emotion than normal needs to accumulate before you cross it. Consequently, you tilt quicker, you protect a win faster, or your mind goes blank after playing fewer pots"

I quoted it particularly as that word "doubt" hit me pretty hard and I think it is a big issue for me.

I don't think I "protect a win faster" but I think I fold to try to "save" money - like I know I am about to make calling mistakes because I am tilting so my "go to" protection is to fold all of the time.

This could be massive to me.

I know it is a lack of unconscious competence (now) so hopefully I can work on it. In fact studying all of these flops where I can can continue (instead of folding all the time) is improving my knowledge and might help take me towards unconscious competence in some areas.

---

Ok! That is 30 minutes of mental game study today and that was bloomin' HARD WORK!!!

I think I learned a lot again!

(Up to pdf pg 34 "Spectrum of Emotion")

---

Now I am going to meditate, visualise and be thankful for this amazing life!

Then I will watch a poker video, play for 30 minutes and then repeat a few times!

---

One day amigos, one day my poker dream is gonna come true!

Have a great day - NO REGRETS!

Come on amigos!

Become my friend on FB here and I will help inspire you daily and help you to be positive and have this never say die attitude like I have got!

Live the dream with me amigos!!!!!

Smashing it this week so far...



(Green = achieved LDO)

Today is mostly a rest day as my mom is taking me out for the day!

We are going to see The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time which is a play (and book) about an autistic boy. I will let you work it out for yourselves.

---

Reviewed yesterday's flop play and all looks okay but I will analyse these flops to see if I could continue on them rather than fold...

1.


BDFD with undercards doesn't excite me much so instinct says okay fold.

---

2.


I haven't looked at any flops BB v EP yet so be interested to see what this comes up with.

---

3.


I resorted to my thought "when he cbets this board he is going to barrel a tonne" here and folded this weak pocket pair but I think I could call it, especially v half pot and with a heart.

---

No mental game study today (not enough time) but...

After yesterday's study I definitely had a nice shift in attitude at the tables.

I lost a couple of big pots where I was lost (eg 4 bet AJdd SB v BB and barrelled 8s4h2s flop and 2c turn gave up on 4s river BUT THIS IS NOT THE POINT!!!).

Instead of mulling it over and affecting my play and my emotional state for the rest of that session I marked it and totally forgot about it!

I just looked at my pregame routine which emphasises to focus on flop decisions facing cbet and tried to play my best in those situations only.

And it worked really well, I continued to play much better than I would have previously!

Probably standard stuff to you pro guys out there but for me it was good, especially as information overload is a huge issue for me.

---

Okay, time is short so will analyse one of those flops, meditate and then play a 30 minute session.

---

Really looking forward to getting out of the house for a while today but I am also really sore still so I am a little bit nervous!

Have a great day amigos - it's you v you, don't lose!!!