Crazy AM session I just wrapped up. Wanted to get some hands in before the family gets home but there was only one table running. About half way through my 80 minute session a second and third table started up. On the third table that opened I had one of those mythical sun runs. One of the hands I had AAxx on a J52 two tone board and was like 11% (according to PT4) on the flop even though I had the best hand. With the SPR, blocking one of the possible sets and how bad the two villains were I went with it and I managed to fade the world. Here's the graph and the big hands I scooped.





Hand 1


Winning Poker Network (Yatahay) - $0.10 PL Hi (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

MP: $9.72
CO: $6.90
BTN: $16.28
SB: $10.00
Hero (BB): $10.00
UTG: $14.82

SB posts SB $0.05, Hero posts BB $0.10

Pre Flop: (pot: $0.15) Hero has 2 T A A

fold, MP calls $0.10, CO calls $0.10, fold, SB raises to $0.50, Hero raises to $1.70, MP calls $1.60, CO calls $1.60, SB calls $1.20

Flop: ($6.80, 4 players) 5 J 2
SB checks, Hero checks, MP bets $1.61, fold, SB calls $1.61, Hero raises to $8.30 and is all-in, MP calls $6.41 and is all-in, SB calls $6.69 and is all-in

Turn: ($31.42, 3 players) K

River: ($31.42, 3 players) 4

MP shows T 6 5 9 (One Pair, Fives)

Main Pot [$30.86]: (Pre 34%, Flop 56%, Turn 33%)

SB shows J 7 A Q (One Pair, Jacks)

Main Pot [$30.86]: (Pre 28%, Flop 28%, Turn 36%)
Side Pot#1 [$0.56]: (Pre 34%, Flop 38%, Turn 39%)

Hero shows 2 T A A (One Pair, Aces)

Main Pot [$30.86]: (Pre 38%, Flop 16%, Turn 31%)
Side Pot#1 [$0.56]: (Pre 66%, Flop 62%, Turn 61%)

Hero wins $29.85


Hand 2


Winning Poker Network (Yatahay) - $0.10 PL Hi (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 5 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: $19.47
BB: $17.36
UTG: $10.30
Hero (CO): $29.35
BTN: $12.12

SB posts SB $0.05, BB posts BB $0.10

UTG bets $0.20

Pre Flop: (pot: $0.35) Hero has 9 A A J
Hero raises to $0.75, fold, fold, fold, UTG calls $0.55

Flop: ($1.65, 2 players) K J 6
UTG checks, Hero bets $1.17, UTG raises to $5.08, Hero raises to $16.81, UTG calls $4.47 and is all-in

Turn: ($20.75, 2 players) 6

River: ($20.75, 2 players) 4

UTG shows 8 K J T (Two Pair, Kings and Jacks)
(Pre 35%, Flop 48%, Turn 8%)
Hero shows 9 A A J (Two Pair, Aces and Sixes)
(Pre 65%, Flop 52%, Turn 93%)
Hero wins $19.72


Hand 3


Winning Poker Network (Yatahay) - $0.10 PL Hi (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

UTG: $6.00
MP: $19.61
CO: $17.06
BTN: $10.00
Hero (SB): $44.62
BB: $16.71

Hero posts SB $0.05, BB posts BB $0.10

Pre Flop: (pot: $0.15) Hero has 9 J T T

fold, MP raises to $0.35, fold, BTN calls $0.35, Hero calls $0.30, BB raises to $1.75, MP calls $1.40, BTN calls $1.40, Hero calls $1.40

Flop: ($7.00, 4 players) 8 6 7
Hero checks, BB bets $3.32, fold, BTN raises to $8.25 and is all-in, Hero raises to $34.72, BB calls $11.64 and is all-in

Turn: ($45.17, 3 players) Q

River: ($45.17, 3 players) 4

BTN shows A 9 8 4 (Two Pair, Eights and Fours)

Main Pot [$31.75]: (Pre 22%, Flop 32%, Turn 19%)

Hero shows 9 J T T (Straight, Ten High)

Main Pot [$31.75]: (Pre 50%, Flop 53%, Turn 72%)
Side Pot#1 [$13.42]: (Pre 60%, Flop 85%, Turn 92%)

BB shows 7 A 8 9 (Two Pair, Eights and Sevens)

Main Pot [$31.75]: (Pre 28%, Flop 15%, Turn 8%)
Side Pot#1 [$13.42]: (Pre 40%, Flop 15%, Turn 8%)

Hero wins $42.92


Monthly Hand Goal: 1,457/10,000


Oh and 27% rakeback is finally active. I received an email from the affiliates a few weeks back saying it was done. I was no longer receiving combat points but wasn't seeing rakeback in the cashier. I emailed ACR last week, got an auto respond email and when I checked the ticket status it was closed. I did a live chat with support last night and they said the transition wasn't completed but they would push it through. Sure enough when I logged on today my rakeback is finally active. Needless to say I'm pretty happy about it.

Logged a few more sessions since my last update. Nothing major to report but I wanted to log my had progress for the week so I can track my monthly hand goal. Had one interesting spot in today's short session where I went for a big river bluff. Not sure if this is a spew or not. Villain appears to be a regular as in I would never pull this against a rec. I'm basically repping some type of combo draw that got there with 54xx but I think it's plausible with how the action went.


Winning Poker Network (Yatahay) - $0.10 PL Hi (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

BB: $25.08
UTG: $3.72
MP: $10.00
Hero (CO): $13.45
BTN: $21.65
SB: $10.00

SB posts SB $0.05, BB posts BB $0.10

Pre Flop: (pot: $0.15) Hero has 6 2 A T

fold, fold, Hero raises to $0.35, BTN calls $0.35, fold, BB calls $0.25

Flop: ($1.10, 3 players) 3 Q T
BB checks, Hero checks, BTN checks

Turn: ($1.10, 3 players) 6
BB bets $1.05, Hero calls $1.05, fold

River: ($3.20, 2 players) 2
BB bets $1.90, Hero raises to $8.74


This is probably a better bluff if I actually hold a 4 or 5 at the same time he probably doesn't have many 4's/5's in his BB defending range. Having clubs blocks some of his drawing range on the turn but I don't block any of the diamond draws so he could have some Ad/Kd/Jd combos that brick. I'm blocking two of the possible sets he could pot on the turn which gave me a little comfort that he has fewer made hands he will be reluctant to fold. Not sure how I like it, probably a marginal spot but I'm not terribly sure. I will say another factor that went into it was the timing of his river bet. Took a bit longer to act which I read into as a sign of uncertainty which I obviously have no way of knowing.

Anyways here's the monthly hand count. Pretty much right on target for the month but I have two weeks off at the end of September for my Vegas trip which will only be four days out of the 14 off.


Monthly hand goal: 2,228/10,000

Just got off work about 90 minutes ago AND my overtime was cancelled for tonight so I'm a free man. Since I don't have to get to bed right away I spent some time studying two areas of PLO that I've been thinking a lot about. When I switched over and started playing PLO I found that I was stacking off in certain spots with what looked like good hands only to find out my equity was lower than I expected versus my opponent's range or actual holding. So the first thing I did this morning is write out a series of hands and then calculated the equity each had against one another. For example I looked at top set versus various hands like naked flush draws, FD's plus wraps, FD's with an OESD etc. I also did the same for top two pair, top pair and overpairs to the board. I wrote these out in the notebook I've been using for study purposes and am building a cheat sheet so to speak that I can reference and continue to study percentages.

The next area I worked on was SPR. I came across an old YouTube video that covered this topic that I found to be rather insightful. Specifically how many pot sized bets it takes to get all-in with various SPR's and the equity needed for stack off ranges based on those SPR's.

So basically with these two cheat sheets that I will continue to study I'll have a better idea of how much equity I need if stacks go in, how many bets it would take to get there, and how my hand stacks up against potential hands I could be facing. It's a lot to digest but I feel like knowing these numbers is a must.

ah, found your thread

I like the bluff in the hand above, I'd only be doing it on a fairly nitty regular though I think.

Know what you mean about having a hand that looks really nice and then finding out it doesn't have great equity, I recommend odds oracle for that, don't know if that's what your using? I need to buy that again for my new laptop cause it was good, don't know whether you can use PT4 to work out the equities too though.

GL then Strappz looks like your putting in the effort to climb the stakes

Thanks for dropping in.

Studying is a challenge but I know it's necessary. My attention span isn't the best for stuff like that. I've developed some routines while playing that help me stay focused but the study portion gets iffy. It's easy to get overloaded with information and I have the tendency to over adjust to topics I'm working on.

I've been using the simulation section here: http://www.propokertools.com/simulations

I'm not familiar with the odds oracle but I see you can download it in the same place so I assume that's what you're talking about? PT4 calculates odds for you in hands played but it obviously requires knowing both players hole cards which you don't always get even at showdown on ACR. So the money has to get in before the river or you have to call your opponent's bet versus them calling yours. I think on PokerStars you can check the hand history on mucked cards and still get to see what your opponent had. ACR doesn't do that.

I did get a fold on that bluff hand but I'm not sure how good it was. I have very few bluffs in that spot repping a super narrow range and I'm targeting two pair combos. I block a bunch of those as well as sets. It was mostly a timing thing with how the opponent acted that led me to the decision and I'm not sure if my analysis on the hand is me justifying my action or not. But it worked.

What a demoralizing session. Played for 8 hours and logged about 2k hands in which I'm now even for the month. Lost about 10 buy-ins. Not sure where my leaks are but I'm losing a **** ton in the money without showdown category. Last week went great and then tonight was terrible. I really couldn't get anything going at all. Only ran 1.5 buyins below ev too. Bled off three folding before showdown and managed to lose another six when I went to showdown. I'm playing pretty tight and paying attention to position I just keep showing up with the second best hand or there's some gross turn/river card where I'm folding. It's such a minefield playing these stakes where half the table is limping every hand and raises do nothing to narrow their ranges. I just don't know where I'm going wrong.

Monthly hand goal: 4,352/10,000

i guess we played some hands today today then
gl at the tables mate, plo can be brutal

yeah I find studying a challenge too, the Cumicon guy on Joe Ingrams podcast said he never really studied so I guess there is hope

oh yeah I think odds oracle and pro poker tools might be the same thing.

shame about your last session, guess in those type of games not much you can do against people who won't be folding much other than showing down the best hand, sounds like decent games though.

Wonder how much I donated to you then? The swings don't really bother me, it's the uncertainty of knowing if your actions are correct or not. Once I have a larger sample I should be able to start combing through my database and looking for holes in my game.


Sometimes I wonder if limp raising pre is a better option from early position to try and build the pot and lower the SPR for postflop play. It's counter intuitive to my experience in NLHE and again I'm not really sure if it's a smart play. Perhaps it could be at these stakes with certain hands. Then again if I wanted to play with lower SPRs I could simply buyin short, but I don't really like doing that.

Overall my preflop stats aren't crazy, they're pretty tight. Running 21/14/4.5 for VP$P/PFR/3bet. I think given that I'm probably not mixing in too many marginal hands. I'm looking over my DB right now by position and it looks like I'm possibly defending too many hands from the blinds. My PFR trends highest towards later position but my VP$P from the SB/BB are my second and third highest spots. That could be a problem right there. I'll have to keep an eye on it.

I wonder, if it limps around and you check your option in the BB does that increase your VP$P or does PT4 not count that? Anybody know?

I wouldn't have thought limp raising pre from EP would be a great strategy to be honest, an original idea though

should be beating the game fine with those stats if they are quite splashy games then, depending on how high the vpip of your opponents is maybe you can play more hands too.

I don't know whether PT4 would count it when you check in the BB, i would have though not as your not voluntarily putting money into the pot but not sure

good luck for the next session !

Took yesterday off to recharge the battery and clear my mind. Spent some time reviewing a few things in my DB, watched a few play and explains for micro stakes and a few other non-play strategy videos. I think one thing I've been doing is playing/defending too many hands from the blinds. I've also been betting too many medium strength hands post flop. I think I need to adjust some of my starting hands as well. The overall percentage of hands I'm entering pots with is reasonable but I may be overvaluing hands that "look pretty" but don't have enough connectedness and playability while omitting hands I should be playing in their place. Stuff to work on.

Did get two hours two tabling in today before work, which I'm getting ready for here in a moment. Fun stat of the day:

AVG ALL-IN EQUITY: 76.65%
Ran 3.3 buy-ins below ev

Tomorrow is another day and the bankroll is sitting pretty.

Ahh we posted at the same time.

No, limp raising pre is probably not the correct adjustment. I think there are times where someone else limps and you're not required to iso if the players behind are coming along at a high frequency regardless of the action before them. I mix in some limps with AAxx if I think there's a good chance I'll be able to reraise preflop. You don't have to balance against these aggro tards but it's table/villain dependent.

As for the BB VP$P thought I looked it over today and I don't believe it counts towards your VP$P when you check your option. That obviously makes sense but my VP$P in the BB was kind of high. Turns out I'm just defending too much OOP.

if you are who i think you are then you didn't donate to me

how much are you defending the bb? there's a preflop frequencies cheat sheet on the mastermind that recommends 30% call and 10% 3b vs BTN 100bb deep. at first glance it seemed kind of tight but i guess its makes sense in these high rake games. vs SB it goes way up to 60% call 11% 3b.

check out plomatrix.com if you haven't already, very helpful


edit: and yeah you're right, pots that limp around to you checking in the BB won't affect your VPIP

VP$P by Position (PLO10)

BTN: 28%
CO: 19.4%
MP: 15.3%
EP: 15.8%
BB: 23.3%
SB: 21.8%

Currently profitable from BTN/CO/MP but losing from EP/BB/SB.

As for who I am on ACR, this would be my screen name acronym "iDD". Am I who you were thinking of?

I had same issue. sB can’t be higher than cutoff. A lot of mines was completing the SB with lower medium suites hands for the price. But position matter so much in this game and u can’t steal pots multiway that are limped. Also I can’t control the pot. Again position matters so much. .

SO ur SB completion percentage must be skewed to higher medium hands. Once I cut the SB my redline and we rate improved a lot. But it’s honestly something I have to keep check on bc u see so many people limping crap it’s temping. But in reality being first to act 3-4 handed with no initive or insight on anyone’s hand strength sucks.

haha i was right! ill say hello when i see you at the tables next

i meant BB VPIP vs button raise for example, filtering that will give you the right numbers to see if you are defending too much or too little.
i only have 1.5k hands on you which show youre under defending (76% fold bb to btn steal) which could be sample size problems but idk just something to watch out for

I was kind of surprised to see how high my VP$P was from the blinds when I started looking at it. And redline is definitely a huge issue. I'm bleeding so much by putting money into the pot and then folding before showdown. The other issue I think I'm having is not playing enough hands from late position. It's tricky though because there's so much limp/calling pre that even with position I feel like hands I should be raising in LP lose value/playability because we often go multi-way. Maybe the spot I'm missing out on is not raising enough hands when it does fold to me in LP and I have the ability to raise first in. So much to work on.


Well now how the heck did you figure out who I am?

I'll run a filter for that probably tomorrow when I have the day off. Does that fold to BTN steal stat only apply if the SB folds and it's potentially a HU situation? I guess what's a bit counter intuitive is if position is so key how is defending at a higher rate profitable? Is it just a matter of range advantage? So if the BTN is stealing say 50% of hands we have an advantage by defending with say 40% of our range in that spot?

when you said played for 8 hours i only had to choose from 3 guys, and im pretty sure you aren't a russian bot reg so that narrowed it down further

Yeah that stat would just be a HU pot vs BTN.

We are still at a slight range disadvantage but with the 1bb already invested we're getting a better price to call than any other position.
we're always going to lose money in the blinds but if we can win our share of pots and bring that number down to -35bb/100 or a little lower we're doing super well.
like if we folded every hand in the bb our winrate for that spot would be -100bb/100 so -30bb/100 bb winrate would be 'crushing' which is certainly attainable by having good bb ranges
BUT the rake is so freakin high that it still correct to fold a good chunk of those marginal defends

Oh yeah that's right, my marathon session. I can only think of a few people I saw for the majority of that session. Not sure which one you were though. Guess I'll have to wait until you say hi in game chat. Or I can just figure it out by whomever is hammering my BB from the BTN.


That's a really helpful analysis of BB defense. I appreciate it and will have to work on it.


So I did get some hands in yesterday and I'm going to say this. I don't tilt. I honestly rarely tilt. I used to when I was younger but with age and years playing poker I know all about the swings. In fact playing PLO with the understanding that there are huge swings makes it even easier to stomach than NLHE. But yesterday I went on monkey tilt. The moment it set it I closed the poker client. Didn't even play the few hands I was in the middle of I just disconnected.

What set me off was so subtle but it was enough. Actually there was one hand in the first orbit of the session that started it off. Blind vs blind and a villain who 3bets 10%, we get it in with my AKQQ single suited. Guys of course has AAQ4 single suited. Not only am I blocking AA/KK combos but he blocks my A and QQ. Just silly but whatever it happens. So fast forward to the end and 4 of the 5 opponents at my tables are just complete spew tards. I'm watching guys reraise river bets with mid flushes on paired boards and getting paid off by trips. Just silly stuff. So I get into a hand HU with TTxx versus a guy playing 84% of hands. Flop is 9 high and I call a small cbet. Pick up a gutter on the turn, call another small bet. River is a 7 which gives me the second nut straight on a rainbow board. He bets, I raise and he just calls. Sweet, I'm good. Nope, he has JTxx for the nut straight. I have two tens to block that exact hand and somehow, like always, the guy playing nearly every hand just happens to have it against me.

So yesterday after that session I typed up this whole rant in my thread and read it a dozen times until I stopped fuming and then deleted it. Sometimes it helps to simply write things out and vent, but at the same time I don't want to be that guy that's bitching and moaning about every bad hand/session. It's counter productive and frankly nobody wants to hear it. Honestly I'm running poorly, probably playing poorly too but all it does is motivate me to get better. I don't need money from poker but I do plan to improve, move up, and use the extra money to fund something bigger and better. I'm going to figure this thing out and succeed. I have no doubts about it. I can't wait to play later today.

About how much rake you pay every 1k hands? Do you ever qualify for beast payout?

In my last three session I played 1,640 hands and paid $12.76 in rake according to PT4. After the first week of the month the top ranked players for The Beast payout had over 20k points and I was still under 1k points. So no, I will get nowhere near the minimum payouts on that promo.

I mostly play 2-4 tables depending on how many games are running and average about 2 hours per session on days I work. When I'm off I might get 2-4 hours of time in per session. With the volume I'm able to squeeze in and stakes I currently play I'll never sniff the payouts.

Played another session yesterday that ended up being very short. Had some run bad to start followed by some play bad . I recognized that I was not very focused on the game and more focused on how badly I was running/playing the second week of September so I ended the session immediately. I need to do some work away from the tables. Today was one of the few days I had off of work and I decided to spend it outside of my home office and just relax and do nothing poker related. Watched a little TV and football with the wife, had dinner and now everyone is in bed. I'm not going to play any cards tonight but possibly some tomorrow.

One thing I did was check out the PLO Matrix website a few people have mentioned. I have four more nights of work and then I'm off for two weeks. Four of those days will be spent in Vegas which means I'm going to have 10 days free. During that time I plan to get a membership to that site and start working on my preflop game. No other updates to be had so here's where I'm sitting at for my monthly hand goal of 10k at PLO10.

Hand Goal Progress: 5,184/10,000

Nice discipline to step away, have fun in Vegas Strappz, going to play any PLO there?

Yes I do believe I'm going to play PLO, NLHE at a minimum. There's a regular I've been chatting with on ACR that lives near Vegas and we've exchanged info off the site and are going to try and meet up. He has a few recommendations for where we could play. Should be a fun time.

Discipline is key. I'm not willing to let tilt affect my bankroll. I've been doing a lot of work away from the table on preflop hand selection and post flop decision making that I think will help realign my game to more favorable decisions. I've learned a lot these last few months and am miles ahead of where I was when I started. One thing I keep reminding myself is that when I was first learning NLHE I was a slight loser for the first five or six months before becoming a consistent winner which I kept up for five years until I stepped away from the game. Players are better now and there's less room for error. One thing about poker is you get immediate feedback on how you're doing and there's no remorse.

Tonight's my last night of work before vacation. I'm chomping at the bit to get some serious sessions in.

Let the two week vacation begin. Ahh it feels so good I don't know what to do with myself. Oh wait yes I do...play some poker.

To my surprise games were running this morning so I hopped right on and logged 500 hands on the nose. Managed to book a win of about two buy-ins. Marked a few hands for review but here's one that I really wasn't sure about on the flop.

Villain is a very aggressive bad reg. Not sure if the SPR makes this a get it in with top two, gutter and BDFD.


Winning Poker Network (Yatahay) - $0.10 PL Hi (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

CO: $10.36
BTN: $31.23
SB: $9.45
Hero (BB): $14.53
UTG: $4.36
MP: $29.95

SB posts SB $0.05, Hero posts BB $0.10

Pre Flop: (pot: $0.15) Hero has J A K 9

fold, fold, CO calls $0.10, BTN raises to $0.45, SB calls $0.40, Hero raises to $1.90, fold, BTN calls $1.45, SB calls $1.45

Flop: ($5.80, 3 players) A K Q
SB checks, Hero checks, BTN bets $5.51, fold, Hero ?