I see I see. Iirc op plays like a million hours a week , I doubt he's doing half that in study? It also depends as well what you're actually doing when 'studying'. Some people's idea of off table work is to have a geez at some RIO com (half of the coaches are brain dead imo) while 4 tabling pornhub for an hour. If you're doing it efficiently I agree you don't need to do a ton of study, but imo doing effective off table work everyday while trying to move up stakes is going to increase your ability to wealth accumulation massively.

To be fair he's playing basically all zone and a big chunk of it is 2/5. Attainable winrates there are lower and although 3 and change evbb/100 isn't the highest attainable long term win rate (most likely), it's still very solid. Especially considering zone has no time bank. I would be shocked if his win rate wasn't significantly higher if he was playing regular tables.

He said awhile back his plan was 2 hours of study in the morning, 4 hours of play in the afternoon. Or something similar to that. But yeah studying is obv important either way, but you gotta play to actually get the $ return from that study. There's unfortunately a much lower ceiling as well on the stakes available to move up into. His hourly may even be higher at 2/5 zone than at 5/10 regular tables, and we don't even know what the online games/sites/apps are going to look like a couple years from now.

Not my place to tell others how to manage this, obviously OP and anyone for that matter can do what they think is best but one of the issues with a 4h:2h ratio is that there's only so much your brain can process and write to memory in a single day. The way I see it, you're better off looking at 1-2 spots and fully committing them to memory each day, as opposed to 5-10 spots less thoroughly and hoping you learn as much from each of those spots.

The cycle of identifying mistakes, identifying solutions and and then applying said solutions in game is really ***** difficult and takes a lot of deliberate practice. Taking the shot gun approach to this I don't think is the best way to learn I M O

Also not saying 5-10 spots a day is necessarily a shot gun approach, maybe it works best for some but I think if you spend your time wisely you can achieve that in <90 mins a day.

3bb is def solid. the better regs in the pool are winning for double that though so i don't see how putting an emphasis on study can be bad

yeah mate I too play 1380 of every 1500 hands identically to PIO

Ahah yeah . Feels like people that try the most to copy pio are struggling nl200 regs.

My2c, if you're not playing in the toughest line up in the game,wich means 500z/1K+ on PS, playing close to pio is lighting money on fire.

Personnaly I improve way more by reviewing my session afterwards and putting decent volume.

lol thanks man. I agree that an emphasis should be placed on volume over study. However, those regs who stay slightly ahead of the pack are there solely from their ability to study and implement those exploits in the current meta. The regs who fall behind are those that become complacent and don't study regularly. As I have begun to express in my later posts, I am concerned with how little volume I am able to achieve with the 2 hour study 4 hour grind split, especially now that I run x2 500z and 2x 500nl reg tables. So I agree that there needs to be a shift in the ratio of time spent studying to playing (something that use to be very heavily weighted towards playing). Especially when the future online poker landscape is unclear.
The reason why I have had the recent shift in motivation to study is because I know that higher win rates are achievable than what I am able to maintain in the very same pools. I have always had solid WRs between 3-4bb and I know I am a comfortable winner in most of the line ups I face, but there are clearly leaks in my strategy that are capping me from exceeding the 5bb+ mark. If I want to climb 1knl and have a winrate that is worthwhile moving up for I must simultaneously work on my game. I think I am going to shift to 1 hour study per day and 5 hours grind. This said, I have been 4x tabling 2 different stakes all year with a 15 second time bank. This is clearly going to impact my attainable bb/100 but has net me a very good hourly. So it is hard to estimate my true WR if I just 2x tabled zone all year.

Yeah interesting point. I think the uncertainty of online poker and holdem as the staple form of poker shifts the ratio to favour grinding over studying. But to attain the highest $ accumulation I need to be playing in the highest games offered which will require some study. Hence why I am going to switch to 1:5 split.

Disagree. It's not about trying to 'copy' an exact pio output. It's about understanding equilibrium and then using that knowledge to deviate and cuck villain. Without a fundamental understanding of the former it is very easy for those who have studied to exploit. But in general people use solvers incorrectly because they don't actually know what they should be looking to get out of a sim.

If you're playing 1380 hands a day exactly like Pio you're making more than 10 mistakes, mate.

Yo Scotty!

Just saw this thread for first time today, keep killing it! I'm grinding 50nl on ignition right now with $2k bankroll. Honestly feel like im killing the game, but hard to get volume in. Would you recommend going straight to 200nl zone when I hit proper bankroll or playing 100nl reg tables in between? Kinda annoying Iggy doesn't have 100nl zone.

Also started hitting the weights last month. I started using this app called "Strong" for IOS, I highly recommend it. You can input your workouts and it records all reps/weight for a simple/easy view of progression over time. Also has a weight measurement that it puts into a line graph. It's basically a lifting journal with extra perks. A very exciting part of my day has become stepping on the scale in the morning haha. More weight, more gainzzzz!

Hey man, depends on a few factors. If you have an income outside of poker that can support your roll take and aggresive shot at 200z (15-25bi). If not and moving up to 200z could hurt your progression, definitely keep grinding either 50z or 100nl (which ever you will have a higher hourly at) and build up a 40bi shot then go for 200z. As for where your hourly will be higher, either 50z or 100nl, it will depend on your hands per hour and bb/100, and only you will be able to calculate that. I would recommend when you can to do 2x 50z 2x 100nl reg. good volume and good hourly. glgl

Awesome thanks for answering!

MAY

Poker Study

total = 1650/1200 minutes. Insane study volume for me this month which I am stoked with. I would say that my game has improved roughly 1.5x. Spent a bunch of time in PIO and fixed some massive leaks in my game. Also spent many hours in HEM2 with Skuz finding population leaks. Experimented with both 2 hour study and 4 hour grind and 1 hour study 5 hour grind and can safely say the latter is more nutty. Will be implementing it going into June.

Meditation

total = 6 sessions. Pretty disappointing volume honestly. Would like to be getting 6x sessions a week let alone a month. Just had fluctuating motivation to meditate. Some days I am really keen and other it feels like a burden that is interrupting my grind although I know its so beneficial.

Mobility

N/A

Weight/Gym

total = 97.7kg --> 95.2kg. Avg weekly loss of 600g which is spot on. My strength isn't really decreasing and my mid section and face are leaning out nicely. 8 weeks until Europe so I am keen to see what shape I pull up in. Hopefully as my weight gets to around 90kg I wont have to drop my calories too low or god forbid incorporate cardio

Poker Earnings

total = $6,861.17 AUD ($4,763.05 USD). Pretty rough and volatile month all round. Swung up and down 10bi throughout the whole month. I think this was a result of less hands than usual (40k hands) and the changes to my game which have definitely increased my standard deviation. Not stoked with such little volume but that is the price you pay when you spend so much time studying. Will be hoping to get a minimum of 60k hands in June.

May Recap

Very average month on the grind. Ran insanely poor in distribution with an uncanny amount of top vs top of range. Obviously who cares when you run as good as me and EV just carries you through life <3. Dissapointed with volume and results but absolutely stoked with the improvements to my game. Hopefully the results will show in the next 200k hands. Me and big slick rick have been in the ****ing LAB punching out numbers so hopefully the population analysis will pay off. It is my birthday on the 8th so the study boys are going to Melbourne to get out of line, scout some potential future properties and play some live. I think June will be a hectic month all round. Glgl

$77,285.13/$150,000 AUD

May Graph



Year graph

gl for june scotty!

another solid month bro, wp! Will get those london recommendations over to you within the next week or so too!

gj bro gl in june, maybe a bit less swing swongy

Thanks fellas x

Easy man thankyou, look forward to it!

Wp but give me my ev back

1st June --> 14th June

Poker Study
Was in Melbourne most of the month so only got 3 hours of population study in. Also did a short Pio session when I was home continuing on BBvsBU.

Meditation
N/A

Mobility
N/A

Weight
95.2kg --> 93.4kg. Did that much ****ing cardio walking around Melbourne CBD and had a staple diet of mi goreng once daily that I just shredded weight apparently. Had one pathetic hungover gym session in the apartment gym but was tough to concentrate still half cut and listening to the old nonna excessively grunting on the elliptical, sigh.

Poker Earnings
-$14,217.06 AUD ($9,427.52 USD). Massive sad boi this month. Lost 17bi at 500nl over 10k hands, lost 10bi on PPP in 2.5k hands at 200nl and lost a small amount of money live playing and staking. Think my game is in the best spot it has ever been but variance happens. No losing months in 2019, im gonna grind out of this **** hole.

Fortnight Recap
Obviously a very rough start the the month of June. Volume and results have been super unfortunate. On a plus side I had an unreal time with the study lads on the Melbourne trip (pic below). Chucked in some live grinds on the first few nights, scouted some amazing properties for next year, explored most of the inner city suburbs, played a super fun home game with some Melbourne grinders, put in league shifts at some internet cafes, got munted for my birthday, flipped (and lost) about every group purchase on the trip and ate way too much mi goreng. Very +ev to take a "break" from the daily grind and got me super excited to move out next year.



2019 = $63,068.07/$150,000 AUD

Does the low ev winrate on the year make you question if you are making any mistakes in the study process? Sorry about the rough couple weeks, seems like you've got the mental game on point and I'm sure it will turn around soon. glgl rest of june.

Rough one m8, but happens to everyone. So easy to forget how silly variance is when you run good - when I'm running hot I like to remind myself of how dark the opposite effect of variance can be and how when you think it's bad, it has an uncanny ability to get even worse still. Last month me and my coach were playing the same games, I won 75 buyins and he won none and he's clearly much better than I am.

Actually yesterday I lost about 5k AUD ~11 buyins and did something you might find useful when you have horrible sessions. When I'm playing I tag every hand that I think is close, I'm unsure about, or is really interesting for some reason. After he day I go through and review all of these hands. I was expecting after losing 11BIs to find a whole bunch of horrendous punts/mistakes but of the 55 hands I tagged, only 3 were bad/clear mistakes, and none of them were horribly egregious either. 9 of the 55 were close/verging on the 'most likely bad' but not really clear cut mistakes, generally hands to inspect further Inna coaching session, and the remaining 43 hands were perfectly fine upon closer inspection.

So what I found was that even though I had a really tough session and felt pretty yucky afterwards, being able to see that it wasn't anywhere near as bad as it felt gave me all the closure I needed on the session.

I think the main thing is when you have big losing days, for me yesterday, it's important to make sure you get the most out of if. The way I see it is I invested $5k to learn/improve and quite often the big losing days are the ones you can learn the most from as you usually get to identify where new and exciting mistakes in your game are.

Just make sure you go through bad days with a fine tooth comb and really juice the most out of these periods because you will learn/improve waaay faster during these times than when you're sun running. The whole 'the key to success is massive failure' etc etc.

Anyway, GL turning this bih around, hope you book the W for June.

Not at all, the spots that I have thoroughly studied have seen massive bb/100 increases over big samples. I just still clearly have some leaks I need to plug and spend more time in the lab. Thanks for the gl's

Yeah cheers man, always over analyse hands the day after a big downswing.

Impressive run up in such a short period of time!

I have a couple questions for you regarding PIO.
1) Most important one for a PIO fish like myself who is aspiring to move up stakes - how did you learn how to use PIO efficiently? Or more specifically, how to get the most important ideas/concepts out of it. I think I have a general idea of how but I'm not certain and I seem to spend a bit too much time on it sometimes... (feel free to PM me if you're uncomfortable sharing it in post)

2) What do you mean by studying modules? For example - for BTN v BB in SRP - do you simply run sims on 'aggregate' board textures? And do you ever run multiple sims based on a particular situation (board texture, stack size etc) but with different ranges for V? Do you find if there's a big differences with how H plays his ranges (if the ranges for V aren't too far apart)

I would wish you luck moving forward but I don't think you'll need it considering the way you've been running + playing this year lol :P Crush em good!

Sup Scott, our fellow worker GetCreative asked pretty much what I was wanting to ask for a while. Could you enlighten us a little on our PIO adventures? Keep up the great work, remember that balance is key. Take care!

Hey man, thanks. Unfortunately too much to discuss I am sorry. Only getting PIO hours in will allow you to understand its features and the nuances between sims. What I mean by modules is focusing on specific range vs range spots on different nodes of a tree (i.e looking at the responses to a check raise specifically with BUvsBB ranges).

Tyty, see above.