My First Goal/Challenge on 2+2 - Make $15,000 playing NLHE, PLO, and Limit O8 by December 2018
02-01-2018
, 11:15 AM
Final Update for this Initial Challenge
Last night marked the end of January 2018, my best month ever in poker by a decent amount. The time I have put in studying, learning, building better fundamentals, etc. over the last 2 years seems to be paying off quite well. I put in about 2.5x more hours playing poker than I anticipated, and as a result crushed my yearly goal in the first month
I closed the month out today by having dinner with my mother at J. Liu, a nice restaurant near where we live in Dublin, OH. After dinner, I met up with my friend at the gym and we both hit the goals we set for end of 2017 on the Bench Press and squats. ( we were both pretty sick in December, so we gave ourselves on extra month haha). It's not a lot of weight, but growing up pretty scrawny, with little natural strength and muscle, I had always been pretty weak and never able to Bench my body weight. When we started our gym routine midway through 2017 I was doing reps of 105 and my goal was to get to my own body weight of 185 on the Bench and then 225 on Squats. I hit 185 last night for 15 reps and squated 235 25 times. The workout plan we have been utilizing is the 5x5 Stronglifts workout in case anybody is looking for a good entry level workout plan (https://stronglifts.com/5x5/)
After the gym, I showered and meet another buddy out for a drink. Went to a bar near the poker club and were hanging out there for a little bit and I decided to play a 30 minute session to test the January 2018 run good one more time (Don't judge me). As soon as I sat down, the game looked absolutely terrible: mostly smaller stacks, 2 big stacks from good players I didn't anticipate playing bigger pots against, and 1 stack of around 500 from a fun player. If I am making any money in this game, it's against the 1 fun player. I played 4 hands in the 30 minutes and one of them was this one below
Fun Player ($515) opens in UTG+2 to $10
MP2 & MP3: call
Hero (900): Raises to $40 on the button with QQ
Fun Player calls, MP2 & MP3 fold
Flop ($103): T73r
FP ($475): checks
Hero ($860): bets $50
FP: raises to $110
Hero: ponders about the best course of action, puts Villain on a range of AT, JJ, 89, T7. I didn't think he would raise a set here on the flop. Decided on a flat call, since FP executed a flop check/raise he probably plans on betting the turn.
Turn ($323): T73.....Q lol
FP ($365): bets $140
Hero: decides to jam for $365 effectively. With him putting almost half his stack in I didn't think he would find a fold on the turn, but might slow down on the river if his one pair type hand didn't improve.
FP: tanks, we engage in some conversation, I ask what he has, he asks what I have, I say I asked first...he starts laughing. I ask him if he has JJ, he says no, I respond "Whew, I got the best hand then"...he laughs, tanks for another 10 seconds or so and then calls of his stack with ATs for a flopped top/top that was no good.
The January 2018 run good was indeed in full effect. played 3 more hands and then racked up to leave...exactly 35 minutes after I sat down. Ended up +425 lol. My buddy just laughs and calls me a fish as we head back to the bar.
In conclusion after starting off the month with less than the initial bankroll of 5k (had $1,900 for -$3,100 towards the challenge), I was able to climb all the way out of the hole and hit my yearly target in just one month...I will be continuing to document my progress in a new challenge thread where the goal will be drastically higher, $100,000. Not sure if I'll be able to hit that goal, but I'd encourage you all to subscribe and chat with me on the way.
Updated Bankroll Challenge: $17,338/$100,000
Last night marked the end of January 2018, my best month ever in poker by a decent amount. The time I have put in studying, learning, building better fundamentals, etc. over the last 2 years seems to be paying off quite well. I put in about 2.5x more hours playing poker than I anticipated, and as a result crushed my yearly goal in the first month
I closed the month out today by having dinner with my mother at J. Liu, a nice restaurant near where we live in Dublin, OH. After dinner, I met up with my friend at the gym and we both hit the goals we set for end of 2017 on the Bench Press and squats. ( we were both pretty sick in December, so we gave ourselves on extra month haha). It's not a lot of weight, but growing up pretty scrawny, with little natural strength and muscle, I had always been pretty weak and never able to Bench my body weight. When we started our gym routine midway through 2017 I was doing reps of 105 and my goal was to get to my own body weight of 185 on the Bench and then 225 on Squats. I hit 185 last night for 15 reps and squated 235 25 times. The workout plan we have been utilizing is the 5x5 Stronglifts workout in case anybody is looking for a good entry level workout plan (https://stronglifts.com/5x5/)
After the gym, I showered and meet another buddy out for a drink. Went to a bar near the poker club and were hanging out there for a little bit and I decided to play a 30 minute session to test the January 2018 run good one more time (Don't judge me). As soon as I sat down, the game looked absolutely terrible: mostly smaller stacks, 2 big stacks from good players I didn't anticipate playing bigger pots against, and 1 stack of around 500 from a fun player. If I am making any money in this game, it's against the 1 fun player. I played 4 hands in the 30 minutes and one of them was this one below
Fun Player ($515) opens in UTG+2 to $10
MP2 & MP3: call
Hero (900): Raises to $40 on the button with QQ
Fun Player calls, MP2 & MP3 fold
Flop ($103): T73r
FP ($475): checks
Hero ($860): bets $50
FP: raises to $110
Hero: ponders about the best course of action, puts Villain on a range of AT, JJ, 89, T7. I didn't think he would raise a set here on the flop. Decided on a flat call, since FP executed a flop check/raise he probably plans on betting the turn.
Turn ($323): T73.....Q lol
FP ($365): bets $140
Hero: decides to jam for $365 effectively. With him putting almost half his stack in I didn't think he would find a fold on the turn, but might slow down on the river if his one pair type hand didn't improve.
FP: tanks, we engage in some conversation, I ask what he has, he asks what I have, I say I asked first...he starts laughing. I ask him if he has JJ, he says no, I respond "Whew, I got the best hand then"...he laughs, tanks for another 10 seconds or so and then calls of his stack with ATs for a flopped top/top that was no good.
The January 2018 run good was indeed in full effect. played 3 more hands and then racked up to leave...exactly 35 minutes after I sat down. Ended up +425 lol. My buddy just laughs and calls me a fish as we head back to the bar.
In conclusion after starting off the month with less than the initial bankroll of 5k (had $1,900 for -$3,100 towards the challenge), I was able to climb all the way out of the hole and hit my yearly target in just one month...I will be continuing to document my progress in a new challenge thread where the goal will be drastically higher, $100,000. Not sure if I'll be able to hit that goal, but I'd encourage you all to subscribe and chat with me on the way.
Updated Bankroll Challenge: $17,338/$100,000
