Hello 2+2,

I'm Carlos from Mexico, 28 year old.
I've been a lurker for a while and I want to change that so the goal of this thread is to create a space where I can set goals for myself, keep a record of my poker travels, post pics, discuss hands, talk about bankroll management, get feedback and whatever arises from there, I yet don't know if I can but if I'm able to give something back to the community I'll be more than pleased.

I've been involved with poker for over a decade now, started playing sngs with buddies from college for fun and beers until that one day out of the week wasn't enough for me so naturally I jumped into the online ground where I learnt more about the game and built a bankroll grinding micros cash games, later on I would made the transition to live poker for several reasons, found out to be way more profitable games for me after my online background, more enjoyable and overall the game just suits better for me, I still put low volume few months out of the year just not get rusty and keep working on my game, overall I think I'm stronger player in live games than online. It was until '14 when I was in between jobs that decided to take a more serious approach since poker became a passion right away and also fits with me, since I can remember I always had this drive to compete and improve at almost anything I'd do. These days I'm just trying to become a better player with the intention of capitalize myself from there and meanwhile just have fun and enjoy the ride.

2016
This year kicked off great, decided to try luck @mtts and I won an online satellite, a package to Nuevo Vallarta to play a live tourney, I got 23/550 for a small but decent cash, I was happy because I've almost no tournament experience (<10mtts), right after that I won another satellite, this time to a tournament in Guadalajara and got 3/565 on that one, couldn't close it at the end -I want to talk about the hand that got me out later- but still was very good score and a bankroll boost for Vegas this year.
A poker fest begins tomorrow again @Vallarta so I'll be coming back to play 4 events, lets hope the good run keeps on, I'll be spending one week over there and the plan is not create expectations, try to play my game and just relax and chill as much as I can.

Vegas
The goal for this summer is simple, to play at least 250hr winning 7bb+/hr. I will be focusing at cash games NL500 mostly, recent mtt score motivated me and I might try a couple low buy-in mtts. My plan is to arrive to Vegas on June 6 and stay for at least 2 months, most likely I'll be staying with some buddies/grinders from Spain and Colombia I met last year.

Next 1,000 hrs
I recently logged 1k hours and I'm very happy with results so far but I'm still half way where I want to be, when I started this journey I told to myself I wanted to net from poker $1mil pesos (mxn) while still being at my 20's, that would be around $60k usd with current exchange rate. I still have more than a year to get those hours that would get me there so race is on.
I'll post graph where it is today just to set a starting point but I'll try not to in the future, all graphs shown in USD.

- Cash games | volume NL200-70%, NL300-20%, NL500&600-10%
- Tournaments
- Overall


Good luck to everyone who's on a challenge

In!

From which part of Merxico are you? I'm moving there after WSOP for a couple months. Where do you play cashgames, specially NL500-600??

Anyway, good luck!!

hey, I'm from Hermosillo, Sonora.
the closest NL500 would be Phoenix, Arizona in Scottsdale which is like a 5-6hr drive and that is actually spread limit.
NL600 it plays at least 5 times a week at the local casino and the blinds are actually 50/100mxn.

Wow didn´t know that! I will be over in yucatan, so i guess I won´t find such games...

GL!

Where are u winning the satellites to the local events in mexico? Is it the shady mexpokerlive/aconcagua or however its spelled?

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yes, one was in mexpokerlive and the other one was just a homegame in ps
agree with you on shady aconcagua, I only heard bad stuff/stories about it, rake is too high, also the software sucks and also their support. Still the only software who offers packages to live tourneys inside Mexico.
btw just got back to the apartment busted day1a, Ill just stick to cash games tomorrow and try flight C the next day.

Update:
I ended up playing day 1b and went busto on level 4 QQ<KK aipre against the most aggro player in the table, felt like I could of got rid of that hand maybe -not for being result oriented- but being used to cash games, in my mind I saw an EV+ spot and took it, now recaping I'm thinking I could of reduced variance and not get it in pre since we were deep and I think I have an edge postflop over the avg field, still I'm glad cuz I'm gaining tournament experience and I see I have a lot of room for improvement and lot of study ahead.

So today I played day 1c, third and last bullet and made it to day 2, it was a rough day, I had a little hang over and just layed low 12 levels, no good spots, card dead all day, I managed to survive basically went thru with 18 blinds, avg is around 40-45bb. hope I can win the flip tomorrow and make a deep run again.

Cash game: I played only for 2hrs after busting day1b and got a bad beat, got it in on the flop in a 3bet pot, A56 and couldnt hold AK<AJ, called it a day right after that and went drinking with the roomies, so far I'm stuck 1.2k or so. I'll try the cash games again for sure.

Update:
Around 140 players out of the 491 entries came back today for day2, I had a tough seat draw, a PS team online pro to my right and to my left one of the most respected mexican pros with a monster stack.
First 3 levels of the day I had a good run, catching good cards good spots nice timing and I was able to built some momentum, went from having 1/3 of the avg stack to pass it by almost two times, gave me the rope I needed to go play my game, later on the day I suffered a big hit to my stack when my top pair couldnt hold against a flush draw and that sent me back to the 15blinds stack, I managed to navigate with that stack the rest of the day and I'm coming back tomorrow with 27 players left.

Fun hand I'll remember: blinds 1.5k/3k I've around 80k, new player arrives to my right. He opens 2x from utg, I flat AQss from utg+1, pro flats from utg+2 the rest fold, flop JT3 with two diamonds on board, goes check check utg+2 fires 11k, original raiser folds I call, turn is a blank 5c, I check expecting him to fire again since I think it is a good spot for him to double barrel and put the presssure on and so it does, he fires 25k and I go tanking, I'm looking for a tell cuz I see either a fold or a shove at this point, so I put the laser beam on him so hard until he cracked, he couldn't hold the poker face and laughed, I shove right after that and now he tries to give me the look, I just give him a small wink looking very confident and he snap folds, felt good to win that battle and be able to trust my instincts like I've been doing.

Busted 26/491, couldn't improve from my last mtt @Vallarta, things didn't go well on day3, I came in shorstack and picked up TT on the 2nd hand of the day, I shoved for 12 bigs or so from mid position and another ss woke up with KK that left me almost out. I ended up allin when all folded to me on the small blind, I saw just a Kh which was enough for me to push my remain stack since the pay jumps was the same until place 19, big blind called with AT flop A88 gg.
Out of the four events I wanged to play I only did the main event since I made a deep run again I couldn't play the KO event neither the freezeout and the other event that was scheduled for today which I was excited to play, a 6-max got cancelled cuz of the great government we have who takes care of us the players (yeah right) poker in Mexico as in many other countries isn't regulated and its all blurry when it comes to law stuff. I guess someone didn't get the paycheck and decided to screw us all, oh well, it is what it is right?
Instead I went to the beach with the roomies and had a fun day outside the casino, nice meal couple drinks sun beach jetskies, again I had a great time here at the Riviera Nayarit. I'll post some pics when I arrive home tomorrow.

Wow the government again I was at the lapt in vallarta when it got shut down, did they let the me finish out or they just cancelled the 6max because it was an unapproved format?

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The ME finished but they moved the final table to some condo, I dont know for sure what happened but the last two events got cancelled, I heard that government story from one of the roomies who is a media guy, they sent him home too basically.

I went to the casino today and I've mixed feelings, I had a profitable day but can't help feeling like a douchebag. I went to the 50/100mxn table, first session after tournament trips, I play this table often but never been part of their group sort of thing, they basically all know each other and show their holdings, play soft on each other, etc. Not me, they know I'm there to play the game and I've always marked the line between. Said hi to everyone and some people asked me questions about the tournaments experiences, felt good vibes and not so good vibes from others, I don't know exactly at what point in the session things heated up or turned odd and somehow the table turned not so friendly or enjoyable anymore and I think it was probable on me. I remember having this exact feeling when I was a child, used to happen at almost any sports team I tried, in some way I think I take things too far, I let my ego completely dominate me and it reaches a point where I create barriers/disconnect with people, like the game doesn't even matter anymore, I sort of do this thing unconsciously.
No one likes cocky people and sometimes I feel I just can't help being one, I only realize this after I said or did something that seemed cocky to others. The thing is I'm way too competitive and serious at what I do and I feel people misinterprets this often and I can't blame them, to me its like I'm only competing with myself all the time but to them seems to be on a personal level, I don't know if that's even clear what I'm trying to express. On the other hand I guess its just part of the game and its hard to balance image when you win over and over against the same guys.
Anyway back to the session, all profit came from the same vill, we have history already, he thinks I'm a nit (he's probably right since I always show him the nuts) and I think he's a bad lag. These two were the only big pots I played.

Hand#1
This hand happened almost at the end of the session and at this point there were also two or three more guys just railing and it was very clear they were all rooting for him lol.
6 handed, eff stack 8k villain covers, hero AQo in btn, all folded to me I make it 300, sb folds villain makes it 1k I call, flop A66 rainbow he cbets 1k I raise to 2.5k for value, he snap shoves I snap call, he asks me if I have the 6 and how many times I want to run turn and river, I said one he showed QQ.

Hand#2
Last hand of the night announced since two players already were making their way out, eff stacks villain 10k I cover. One limper and I make it 500 with KK in the btn, sb folds villain calls from the big blind, limper calls, flop comes K75 with two spades on board, checked to me I cbet 1200 and villains raises to 3k I click it back to 6k he shoves I call, he asks the same thing how many times I show my kings right away and he just mucked saying he had 2 pair.

So that's it, people leave and as I'm racking the chips villain comes in to me and asks me to lend him 8k, I just said no. I'm not sure when I'm coming back to that game, in for 8k out for 29k.