Nice blog man good luck in February

Thanks yoobsy Hopefully i can get some nice deepstacked spots since a lot of MTTs don't start as deep anymore ;(
Thanks mate, i'll take all the luck i can get!

February Goals

I actually set a tonne of goals for this month compared to last month. A lot of the poker goals feed into the main 2 goals with are playing+studying volume.
I'm okay with setting a larger amount of goals knowing that i'm likely to fail quite a few, I'll just keep what works and get rid of what doesn't work.

Weekly Schedule

Been doing schedules for almost the past year. I find they're really good for productivity, especially when you know what you're trying to achieve because then there's no reason not to do it if you know you're going to. Of course the most important thing is to be flexible with a schedule, otherwise you wake up 1h late and everything collapses, i can always reassess if needed. It doesn't look too exciting at the moment because its mainly consists of grinding.

Let's hope this month goes well!

04/02/20 session (d/m/y because UK boii)

I had so many deep runs, but just a little double FT to finish, shame i couldn't close any of them out either, but can happily settle for a small winning session.
Will run most ICM spots either tomorrow or friday, i'm quite sick right now, throat is really ****ed so i want to go to bed soon.
I also made it my goal to focus on 3betting aggressively vs LP opens, and i think it went quite well.

Interesting ICM spot
This is from the $11 250 cap

I think jamming here is like super borderline, especially with 2 slightly shorter stacks. Also good to consider that bigstack is BB so we can't apply as much pressure on him, plus he might call wider.
I imagine we play a limp or jam strategy here since getting jammed on by blinds is a disaster, although at lower stakes we may not get punished as hard for raising.

This is our jamming range given BB calls 55+/KQs/ATo+/A9s+. A3s is actually on the cusp.
In game villain called KJo (which is might even be losing in chip EV) and turned a straight so that sucked. The brazilians are too good vs me.

When we adjust villains calling range to be 16.5% (33+, A8o+, A5s+, KJo+, KTs+, QJs), then we are really in trouble with our weaker Axs.
So probably want to play more of a limping strategy when we think villains can be calling too wide (big stack, or just clueless about ICM).

Anyways i'm off to hopefully get a long sleep so i can feel better tomorrow.
Although i'm starting again in 12h from now (3am right now), which is slightly earlier than normal as i want to fit in an extra bounty builder series event on stars. Will be a looong grind tomorrow

05/02/20 session

Got a nice 2nd place to finish the session. HU i got into 120bb pot for the win 99>88, then couldn't grind it back. I think getting in 60bbs eff with 88 is fine considering villain was 3betting quite aggressively.

Punts

$5.50 PKO. I got snapped on the river expected flushes to bet smaller on turn. Thought he would jam 8x on river so expected a lot of folds once he checked but i guess not. Also wanted to jam turn but didn't expect many folds.

bb10k, so 15bbs eff to start. Flop goes x/x, then i x/j turn. My logic was that i expecting turn to be delayed a lot, so we put them in a tough spot with Jx and fold out some QT and other random stabs, plus if we get called by Jx we have decent equity.
I also thought if i bet turn+river its just a line that gets called down a lot.
However he sometimes checks nut flushes which we are drawing dead to. Also i don't really take this line for value so can easily end up being bluff heavy.

Anyways onto tomorrow

06/02/20

Got a nice little bink
Had a period of like 1-2h where we couldn't lose an all in so i had quite a few deep runs.
Spewed off some $4.40 PKO deepstack tourney quite deep which feels a bit bad, usually give 100% of each tourney to the very end.

Hopefully tomorrow i will go over some of the FTs from this week

gl

Exercise needs to be done everyday. You wanna be looking fly for the televised super high rollers. Not be a fat **** or a skinny weed.

Thanks mate <3
I don't know if televised high rollers are my end goal, but defo want to be healthy

08/02/20 Session
I actually made 3 FTs and 1 'bigger' FT bubble, so i'm up a little bit on the day, but feel just short of any real good results

• Big $7.50 - 10th - $80
• $11 8max - 9th (9 handed FT) - $64
• $11 Deepstack - 8th - $57.50
• $11 250 player cap - 4th - $114

Its a shame not to have got some slightly better placings given that i feel like i have pretty big edge on FTs. I feel like i have a pretty good FT strategy (tight as short stack, loose as big ) and i've studied ICM a fair amount. But if i just lose a flip, or get coolered, or run card dead as shorter stack, then there's not too much that i can do. But obvs i dont expect to win every FT i make (unless i come in as bigstack ofccc).

Interesting ICM spot

$11 250 cap FT
So obviously stack distributions are really messed up. Bigstack wasn't actually applying pressure, don't think he was really opening as wide as he should. If he's opening wider then i think jamming can be pretty good, i know that in ICM we can still pushback vs bigstack as smaller stack when we know they are opening super wide and will fold a lot. However this doesn't apply in this instance.
Flatting i think can be fine, but we really want to preserve our stack as much as we can, especially when the other 2 players are more likely to make ICM mistakes and just punt off, which basically makes us free money by folding. So if we call and then lose the pot it puts us in a much worse position too as we will be for certain in last place. Also if we flat, it opens up SB/BB to rejam which really fks us stack distribution wise again, however i had note on SB as ICM nit from a prior FT.
But folding just seems really stupid with such a good hand like QTs. But it was the option i took in the end.
I want to see what a profitable jamming range is for me when CO is opening standard ~37% and then ~60%.
38%

58%
I'm actually surprised that QTs/JTs are profitable against the 38%, although its very marginal, so probably play better as a flat. Then jam anything thats like +0.05 and above. Surprising that hands like 77/66 perform so poorly, but i think part of this reason is they block the folding range and unblock the calling range, also true for the stacks ahead too.


Anyways i was in bed last night and i had a strategy thought come up that i wanted to write about here but i'm too fkn tired right now so i might do it tomorrow, or just whenever i get time. I just want to run some ICM spots from my best placing FT since there was lots of interesting 4 handed spots (felt like it went on for about an hour) then go to bed.
Got a big sunday session tomorrow so i want some good sleep before then, hopefully all goes well. Really looking forward to playing some tourneys on ACR, but i really want to make sure that i don't overwhelm myself with tables, so i need to game select well and be okay with cutting certain games out if needed.

Very nice thread with interesting write ups after sessions. It's always nice to see a fellow Brit active on this site; I'm enjoying the deep runs and fts almost as much as the d/m/y date format.

Big up the UK thanks mate!

09/02/20 SUNDAY SESSION
Actually a really disappointing sunday, ran into a few issues but i dont think partypoker+ACR servers going down helped at all, it really threw me off, especially on party as i had 1 decent stack ITM.

The tourney never started again, but in a deepstack format this was defo my best spot of the day.
I had 1 small FT but its not even really worth noting.
Focus
Definitely what i a really big issue with today. I've started reading mental game of poker 2 by Jared Tendler and the first section of the book is about the zone, which is essentially a state of supreme focus.
Usually in my sessions i start with around 9 tables, after about 2.5-3h this increases to 12-15 tables, and this continues for usually minimum the next 3 hours or so. During these 3 hours is usually when i have the highest level of focus and i'm most engaged, i think this is due to a mix of lots of action which high tables count, which include 'bigger' events (higher BIs or GTDs) plus deeper runs (ITMs). Then usually about 7-8 hours into my grind my engagement starts to dip, mainly due to fatigue, but by this time i've usually stopped registering, and can just focus on smaller table count and deep runs.
But from the minute i started registering today i really couldn't focus and get engaged with my tables. I literally just pulled up a youtube video on the side and started watching it, wasn't a vid that takes a lot of focus, but it kept me engaged on something, otherwise i'd feel like i'm just staring at a screen and would get bored. I think running bad at the start of a session can have an impact on this for 2 reasons, firstly losing most all ins isn't very fun, secondly when you lose all ins you lose tables, and less tables mean less engagement for me.
Anyways i reach like 12+ tables and i really start getting into the zone, then not long into it the partypoker servers crash, and i have a few decent stacks there so it completely throws me off. I reach a point where i have 8 tables at a time where i often get overwhelmed with tables (sometimes 16+) and i should be at maximum engagement. There were even a few MTTs i skipped out on so i could prioritise partypoker MTTs, i wasn't really interested in max-late regging but i guess i couldve. But there and then i really felt like wrapping up my session 2-3h before i usually stop regging as i just couldn't get mentally into my session, but i soldiered on to little effect, plus ACR servers went down just for the icing on the cake.
So pretty unproductive session, can definitely look into and work on why i couldn't engage at the start of the session, i think a big part of this was due to the fact that i woke up, showered, had breakfast then instantly hopped into my session. No warm up, no meditating, no time to really chill before my session and i think it had a big impact at the start.

ICM spot

From an $11 turbo $1k GTD. Folded in game, just wanted to see what my shoving range would look like here, thought this would be cusp since ICM and tight is right.

I was actually stunned at how wide i could jam. I actually reran it and checked my inputs to make sure everything was right. And it made me realise how negligible i had been towards certain factors and i think this is well outlined when we look at the calling range.

SB/BTN is very similar then BB is a tad wider as expected. And given how wide the jamming range is, these ranges are still quite tight. But even when we cut off the bottom of CO jam range (anything not +0.05 or more) it only removed the bottom level of the call range, so quite similar still. Anyways the 2 takeaways for myself from here are.

• As a short stack, there are a lot more ICM implications 4 handed compared to 9 handed (should be obvious ) and we have to be a lot lot tighter 4 handed since the payjump from 4-3 is much bigger than 9-8 (10x in this tourney) so there is still a lot of incentive to try to double up and get a higher placing compared to just getting 1 payjump then being finished when 9 handed. CAN BE LOOSER 9 HANDED AS SHORTSTACK.
• When we jam into shorter stacks, we apply a lot of pressure to those stacks. At least when you openjam there is very good fold equity, when you call a jam there is 0. The calling ranges given ICM still have to be tight.

Review of week
Results were decent. Grinded good volume, and i think i played quite well overall.
In terms of goals i did pretty abysmally. I started reading MGOP2, but need to start taking notes on what i read and implementing the concepts i learn about. I meditated like twice, and one of them wasn't even for 10 minutes. I didn't write down my goals, but i set gameplay goals in my head, nothing for mindset. Then noting hands was a ***** disaster, i go through periods where i note 30+ hands a session then periods like now where i note barely 5, so i'm really unhappy about that.

Change for next week
Main change is i will probably remove unibet from my schedule, the main reasons for this are.

• Every tourney is rebuy+add-on. And the add-on is 2x start stack which is too +EV to not do. But this means €10 is actually a €20, and this is clearly outside my BRM. Plus adding on the busting 2 hands later is one of the most tilting things, moreso than busting 2nd hand of a tourney.
• Table aspect ratio is fked, its shaped like a wide rectangle, whilst others are like a square, and i don't think i can change this. It doesn't fit in well with tables on other sites making it very awkward to organise, which is frustrating in the middle of a session.
• I also just run like **** on this site, its insanely soft too which makes this more annoying. Obviously sample is small, but with the add-on thing this just highly increases variance and makes it very annoying to mincash as you need like 10x+ starting stack to mincash, similar to 888, its very inconsistent.

Will probably just switch my volume to ACR, or maybe dip my toes in an ipoker site and see how that goes. Both sites have fairly soft player pools and smaller field MTTs so its not too different.

Goals for next week

• Exercise once
• Start producing notes on MGOP2
• Note 10 hands per session. 5 postflop spots
• 10 minute meditation 5 times

These are all very doable, but will be very good if implemented, so hopefully i can smash them.


Anyways i have a couple strategy and bitb thoughts that i want to write up about at some point. But i'm a bit tired now and i think this is a good way to wrap up for today.

Also just wanted to say a big thankyou to anyone who follows the blog even if you're just a lurker (i'm defo a huge lurker, i don't like commenting on social media stuffs), especially the kind comments/msgs are really appreciated, there's a surprising number of people following along. I'll still stand by the reason i do this blog is for me, even if no one read i may still write, but i think its really cool having people come on this journey with me, hopefully i can progress to a high level as that would be pretty cool. Maybe i'll write about more personal things at a later point but who knows, for now my life is pretty much just poker. If you've got this far you're a true MVP, take care!

Strategy thought
So the other night i was thinking about something that happens very frequently in lower stakes MTTs.
Its about getting donked against on flush completing rivers.

Here are 5 examples to exemplify the point. Bottom 2 including showdown with 1 value and 1 bluff. I understand i make mistakes in some of the hands, but this isn't the point. The point is that getting donked on flush completing rivers is something that happens extremely frequently especially at lower stakes and vs fish. I probably run into this situation what feels like multiple times per session.
My response is to heavily overfold, I think this line is extremely underbluffed as its a spot thats very easy to do for value, but can be difficult in game as a bluff and find the trigger to pull as a bluff.

However the main thing i was pondering was if this is something that i should be doing. I almost never donk jam rivers, i typically dislike it and i don't think its very good. But when i was thinking about it i did think there are some benefits to it, as generally fish play pretty terrified when there's 3 to a flush on the board, much more so than 3 to a straight.
Pros

• On flush completing rivers fish check back too often, so allows us an avenue to get value. Can even be done as a block with some 2p and stuff.
• Could float close straightdraw hand with flushdraw blocker on the turn, then potentially win the hand by bluffing flush completing river.

Cons

• Can lose us value, if villain has strong value bet hand (2p/set/straight), as it will possibly call a x/r but not raise a donk.
• Doesn't really allow villain to bluff.
• Our hand is very obvious, and is generally an underbluffed line.

Theory
I ran a sim or 2, which is definitely not enough to draw any hard conclusions from but can definitely learn something from it.
I set both up for COvsBB 40bbs, 33% cbet from IP, then 66% cbet turn (sure betsizings aren't perfect, but in game i think these are most commonly used sizings).
The board: A54, then turn can be a blank. (yes in theory on blank turn will probs be overbet from IP somewhat, but i dont think happens in game much).
Anyways on the river there was not much donking happening from OOP even on the other board i did (Q turn). This screenshot shows OOP river strat: (9h had no donking before i nodelocked pls believe me). It does some donking on cards that complete straights for OOP (2/3/8) but nothing really outside of that.
However this is because given the line, on the river IP is expected to jam 2 pairs, sets, and even some top pair hands, then value bet smaller with some combos too.
However in game, given the current stakes i'm playing i do not believe this to be the case, i think people are massively overchecking and i have even seen people (fish) check back 2 pair and even sets. So when i nodelocked appropriately with a small frequency of sets and 2p being checked back, and pretty much all top pairs, the results for OOP strat came out as such.

I don't think its too much of a surprise but it makes sense. There were very few donks outside of hearts, a couple blocks with 2p which could be effective in game.

Conclusion
Donking in situations where villain is expected to check back a lot is generally quite an effective strategy. This concept applies on turns and rivers, and i think the example shown is a good example of that. I think its something that should be implemented into my game. I think this will be especially effective against fish who will check back strong hands a lot, but are also more likely to call down, i don't really expect them to fold top pair. I also think this could work very effectively as a bluff vs some regs, but i do think vs regs we can x/j more too since they will bet rivers at a higher frequency, thinner for value and probably more bluffs.
I even think donk blocking some weaker 2p can work really well, especially when we unblock top pair.
Obviously the board has big impact on the effectiveness of this strategy, i chose to use A high board as an example as i think it illustrated the point best. But if villain can still have a lot of flushes in his range then it can be a bit less effective, but the less he can have compared to us, maybe the better it is for us to donk.
Overall i think this is a really good 'exploit' to use against fish, don't really need to be bluffing to often either.

Just wrapping up my session for today, nothing too exciting really to report on.
Although party+ACR pulled through bigtime with their refends after the servers going down. Got back like $150 from party and $50 from ACR.
I guess there's also a quick thing that has been on my mind for the past few days so i'll type it out here.

My biggest BitB mistake
So as you know i spent most of 2019 with BitB academy, as i really loved the whole experience i feel like i learned so much and progressed a lot. Unfortunately they pretty much shut down the academy entirely, kicking pretty much everyone and putting like 3-4 players up to mainstable, so even if i didn't make this mistake or if i made 50k+ last year it may have not made too much of a difference.
Anyways i was reading a blog of the player Pwndidi/Alex, who really crushed it last year, and was one of the main coaches for academy (since majority of academy coaching was done by best main stable players), the guy is insanely good. But whilst reading his blog in pads 'poker squads' discord i came accross something he said that really made me think.

'Since I agreed to give up half my profits, I decided I would utilize everything offered to me to the absolute maximum and make poker by far my #1 priority in life for the coming years, and so I did. Me generally being a quick learner definitely helped, but I watched every single video in the library, read every single chat on the server and the forums, ran a million sims, was constantly railing higher tiered players/investors among other things and was quickly moving up in stakes.'

For me joining bitb was like my poker dream, it was the goal i had set out for the first day i became a pro, so once i achieved that i was just kind of happy to be there, and i was honoured to give away 50% of my action. Whereas Alex wanted to get the most out of bitb in exchange for what he was giving, he would make every penny given away worth it.
And this isn't to say i didn't work hard, i attended a very high % of the live group sessions, which was multiple times per week, and i was studying 10-15h per week, however i don't feel like i utilised some of the tools provided by the stable to the maximum, i didn't watch every single video in the library, and i didn't respond to every post in the strategy forums (was very hit and miss with how active i was), and these are probably the most effective tools for improvement. I looked at my video notes document for whilst i was there and it only had 30 documents in it, sure some will include multiple videos, and i will have watched some videos without notes, but this is still only like 1 video notes per 2 weeks for the period i was there, which is extremely disappointing. I think the reasons for not fully utilising the tools i had was partly because i thought i'd be there forever, i thought i could watch the videos at a later date, but also i held bitb in such high regard that i didn't feel like they owed me anything, so i kind of felt like i was there to serve them, and not them being there to serve me (kind of hard to explain), and because of this i basically never criticised them or said anything bad about them when some others around me were, however this changed a little bit towards the end when they started making some not very good decisions.
Even after i left and started speaking to other stables i held myself in a very high regard as a player (almost pretty arrogant), ensuring that i could get a lot our of whichever stable i signed with, which is weird because if i held myself to this same standard when i was in bitb i probably would've got a lot more out of it. I'm sure if i join another stable in the future i'll make sure to rinse everything i can out of the tools they provide me with.

Absolutely love this thread and look forward to follow you on the journey! Also love how you breakdown hands and talk about some exploits and strategies and will definitely be implementing them into my own play! Thanks and good luck!!!!

Just been catching up with this thread, all the best on the tables! I hope you can make it on your own dime and have the freedom to decide how you want to go about coaching/being staked in future.

I found your post on donking rivers to be interesting, but was surprised when you explained how you rarely donk-betted rivers.

When I set up my hands for my PIO solver work, I don't include a donking range for flop or turn but always include one for river. There's so many reasons why you might want to donk a river, many of the reasons you covered in your post.

The sizing of a river donk bet is also variable. For example you can have a really small sizing that works as a blocker bet, but you can also have an overbet sizing that is more polarising and can put a lot of pressure on IP's range.

Thanks mate!
I think me not donking rivers was just something i never did since i thought it was bad, more just a mindset thing that i need to get over.

With PIO trees i dont include flop leading ranges for BBvsX since its not a part of my strategy as i think it over complicates things and isn't very necessary, dont think we gain much EV compared to how much more difficult we make things for us.
However i do think having a donking range on turn is very necessary, as often there will be turn cards that benefit OOP range much more (e.g middle/bottom card pairing, some 4 to a straight).

13/02/20 Session
Past few days have been really dry, just bricking the absolute lot, sadly just not running too good. Had this decent little daysaver though.

Got sucked out on for the win so that was a bit unlucky. I really like GGpoker though, good structures, soft player pool, fun interactions, defo want to play more volume there.

Potentially overbluffed spot

This is something i've believed for a while, but i think this hand quite nicely sums it up.
Sure we can x/r flop if we want since villain will stab a lot after ISO'ing but calling is fine too.
Also his sizing on river is super bullshit since I think Ax clearly wants to size up.
However in these spots where we are playing widerange vs widerange (e.g SBvsBB, BBvsBTN, BBvsCO), when the turn checks through (flop can go x/x or x/b/c) and an A comes on the river, if we check to the IP player i feel as if it gets bet at a very high frequency (if not 100%), meaning all their air will stab, and it easily becomes overbluffed.
This same logic doesn't really apply when we play vs EP range since Ax makes up a significant % of their range, especially the xback range. Whereas in LP when they can open 40%-50%+, they just have so much air that they wont cbet or barrel then just try to rep A on the river.
And specific to the hand i posted, villain was brasilian low stakes reg, and a lot of them play very similar, i think they are taught 'non GTO' style, which is just another word for really bad in my eyes. Anyways when i limp, i think i'm getting ISO'd here so much, especially by this player type, which means his range includes loads of Kxo,Qxo,Jxo,Txo,9xo, the list goes on, then some Ax, but when he takes his line, by river he really isn't that Ax heavy, but will probably just always stab trying to get us to fold 9x or worse.
Also a sidenote i thought his hand made a really nice triple barrel bluff especially when a club comes on turn and he has club blocker, but might've just thought i have decent amount of 6x (which i don't in l/c scenario, esp 6xo, lots more Tx/9x, but hey 'non GTO' style !!!) and slowed down, but whatever.
TL;DR, widerange vs widerange as OOP, x/x turn, Ax river overbluffed by IP when checked to


Anyways tomorrows supposed to be my study day/day off, its been a pretty tough week so i might just use it to disconnect a little bit and rest, then go pretty hard over the weekend for the end of the BB series.

Sunday Session
Bricked the lot. Kind of sucks since i'm always so excited for sundays but can't do much.
https://i.gyazo.com/5bc4e1a2911d8313...f04b243930.mp4
x/c flop, x/x turn, block/jam river
This might be complete suicide but i thought blockers were pretty sick, block top pair/boats/nut flushes. Didn't think villain would have flushes/straights as i expect them to bet turn. I expect him to have some QT/JT type hands, maybe some AK, and other Ax that he might try to fold out of a chop? However i think targeting Tx to fold is a bit ambitious, but if i was in his shoes it would be pretty brutal.

Review of the week
Really disappointing week in terms of results, made like 1 FT and even that was a small one.
I actually took and unscheduled day off on Saturday since i woke up at like 4pm, so 30 mins before i usually start grinding and just wasn't there mentally, however i always hate missing days since i always feel really bad about it when i do.
Also completely flopped my weekly goals. Don't think i achieved any of them when they were pretty basic, so definitely disappointed about that.

Changes/goals for next week

• Grind 4 days
• Notes on first chapter of MGOP2
• Meditate 4 times
• Share 1 hand with group after each session

Also will re-do my yearly goals at some point this week. I don't think my previous set of goals had much meaning behind them, and they were pretty vague. I think setting a target for a point to reach would be much more productive than just saying i want to be doing X. E.g instead of 'Do exercise X times per week and be healthy', do 'Be able to run 5km non stop by end of the year'. Its a lot more specific and actually gives me something to work towards. Also i have a few new ideas that i want i want to include to make things more fun/interesting.


Its almost embarrassing updating this blog when i have no scores to update it with. Its been a really disappointing week (well disappointing 4 months ), hopefully next week can be better!

Adjusted yearly goals
I decided to make a few changes to my original set of yearly goals (didn't post full think here) and below i'll explain some of the goals a little more in depth, especially the life oriented ones. Just really wanted a new set of goals that had a real meaning behind it, and not just doing it for the sake of doing it.

7200 games - I think volume is really important when climbing the stakes and trying to improve at the game. You want to play a lot of hands so you can see a lot of spots and understand how population plays. Its also the best way to implement all the strategies you learn and really ingrain them in you head. Plus its where you make all the money. This doesn't have to be achieved through playing 16 tables at the same time, but high volume can be achieved through playing 5+ days a week and not skipping days just because you don't feel 100%.
Max 12 unscheduled days off - Consistency is really what i'm going for this year, trying to build some healthy habits when it comes to playing/studying as i think that's the key to improving, its turning up every day. I think 1 random day off per month is pretty fair when i'm investing 60h+ per week, but i need to be strict enough that i don't skip too many days as i have done in the past.
Read 3 books - Books are really OP in my opinion. And i think when spending so much time infront of a screen, it can be a nice way to disconnect from that, and i can simultaneously improve my mindset and myself as a person.
Run 5 miles without stopping - I used to be really active as a kid, i played a lot of sports, but i got really ill when i was 15/16 and wasn't in school for 3-4 months and even after that it was very low attendance for remainder of the year. But i didn't do any physical activity during this time and my fitness really depleted, and i was just never able to get it back up to a decent level so i really want to improve on that, and i think its a tough but achievable goal.
Go on a date - I realised the other day i haven't had a girlfriend or been on a date in about 2.5 years which is quite a while. This is the one i'm most nervous about since i'm really useless around new people when it comes to making convo etc, so this one definitely pushes me outside my comfort zone and i think that's beneficial long term. Also not a terrible to get some social interaction with someone new I was actually really against the idea of a GF whilst trying to get good at poker but now i'm more neutral about it.
Reduce/eliminate judgement - Its a concept i first came across whilst reading 'Inner game of tennis - Timothy Gallwey', and its basically about not linking good/bad labels to things, and just seeing them as what they are, and i think this has a lot of benefits to it, especially for example in poker when it comes to analysing decisions and my game. Also i'm just very quick to judge things in person, and i think if i can just refrain myself from saying things before i properly think about it, it would make me a much better person.

I'll definitely look to add/remove some of these goals throughout the year if i see fit. I guess any extra advice on what makes good goals etc is always welcomed.

Very interesting read !!

Thanks mate!

18/02/20 Session

Honestly has to be one of the most frustrating FTs i've ever played. I came in as 2/9. I won 2/56 hands, both were preflop jams SBvsBB, and 1 chop pot. Actually felt like there was very little i could do. Had 1 close postflop spot and a couple close preflop spots but overall i feel as if i just ran pretty card dead.

This was the final hand, i had no idea what i was supposed to do with a 2.8bb stack, whether to wait it out an ensure my bustout, or to try and double up and get back in. My bounty was pretty insignificant.

Pretty gutted to know i made the wrong decision. My ICM knowledge is usually pretty good. But in PKO situations its a little bit worse, especially with these weird stack distributions, and shortstack was being giga tight refusing to jam often being blinded into jams.

Also lost multiple chip lead all ins ITM (flips or dominating) in other tourneys, so overall just a really annoying grind.

Nice blog, subbed! Very insightful posts, well narrated. I should start doing similar study dynamic as you, although I am playing up to $5s atm.

See you on tables!

Hey, mentioned on table a few days back that I enjoy your blog and played a bit with you again today so figured I'd pop in here and repeat that I enjoy your blog and hope you keep it up!

Hey, thanks! I obviously a study approach should be based on what suits you best and your situation. So for me because i'm grinding big volume i focus on ensuring that i do a 1-2h cooldown after every session, i try to make is mandatory in the hopes it becomes a habit. You could also do a warmup instead, just whatever works best. But if you can having study days is also really good, and the higher stakes you're playing the more you should have study days instead of playing imo, unless you're somewhat new to the game. Best of luck!
Yess i remember this message, appreciate it mate, it means a lot

19/02/20 session
Another really frustrating session, kept getting ITM then losing first all in.
Had this 5th place though

This was final hand.

4/5 before this all in, sucks to get sucked out on for chiplead and bust. Rubs salt in the wound that he was even bm'ing me before i called the all in.
Was kind of curious what our calling range would be, think its pretty tight, but at the same time villain wont just jam AA/KK and maybe not QQ, making JJ/TT certain calls, i just wonder how wide we can be.
I gave us an opening range of 36%, and villain can go pretty nuts

You can see we can call off 99+,AJs,AQo,
Then when we adjust it to this 20% range

We can call like TT+, AK+
And the more we tighten up the jamming range, the only hands that get effected are AKo and AKs, TT+ still has to call due to the lack of AA/KK/QQ


Anyways i'm kind of in a sulky mood since i'm still running pretty horrible, and this was my earliest session finish in a while. Kind of want to just chill for an hour or so, but also remembered that i didn't do cooldown yesterday so i have 2 days of cooldown to do, so i guess i'll do that, maybe i'll post some hands here.

Sorry its been a few days since i've posted, been pretty busy!

So i joined PokerWinners stable. I really like their ethos of being very player focused, and not being locked into a long-term contract since i really like to have my future options open, even though if i'm happy where i am i won't leave anytime soon. So i'm really looking forward to working with them and seeing how i progress.
Also will be nice to play some slightly higher stakes again, think i'm going to start at around $20ABI, then move up as my confidence increases.

Sunday session
Was very very quiet, hence why i didn't update the blog, had to cut the session short since i was up early this morning due to a house inspection from landlords.

Review of the week
Not a great week in terms of results, and volume was low also since i only grinded like 3 days, since i had to do a bunch of stable admin stuff on thursday, then friday+saturday i went back to my hometown to see friends as well as say goodbye to my tennis coach who i've known for like 15 years, since he's moving away.

Luckily i've already played like 550 games this month

Changes/goals for next week

• Meditate before every grind
• Create zone profile, inspired by MGOP2, and include mental game assessment as part of cooldown
• 150 games
• Watch 4 videos
• Attend 2 webinars or warm up sessions
• 1 HH review

One big change i will try to make is to reduce my volume on partypoker.

As you can see this is a site that i've never done very well on. Bitb always encouraged me to play on party when i joined, since affiliations to it, and i actually really like the site, i think the table software is decent (lobbies suck, i keep misclicking those PLO8 MTTs), however they probably have the toughest pools and are pretty reg heavy. I will continue to play under $22, and especially pkos, as i still think i have decent edge in these.

Although results don't quite reflect that...yet but you can see the majority of my losses are just higher stakes events. Played a few 320s/109s that i always bricked. For 55's i actually had a bunch of F2T/F3T that i just always bricked.

I'm also planning on reducing my table count in general, my aim is to never go above 12, as i think after think is where i start playing my B/C game on a lot of tables.
I will however start playing on ipoker/microgaming, heard these sites are very soft and there's good money to be made. So far i actually don't mind ipoker software (betfair) its quite nice to play on, microgaming (grosvenor) seems kind of shitty though, can't hear anything so i easily time out when multitabling. Also will be picking up 888 again, and might drop some of the lower buyins from pokerstars.

Final change is i really want to adjust my schedule to be a lot more PKO heavy.

You can see i have 1/2 as many PKOs but 2x the profit (obviously 10k downswing in vanilla doesnt help ). But i think my edge in PKOs is significantly higher in comparison, and i should probably play to this strength.

Anyways lets have a strong end to the month!

25/02/20 session

Got this small podium placing to round out the day, couple FT bubbles here and there.

Generally enjoying playing some slightly higher stakes again. Especially missed the 22's.
Also enjoy playing on ipoker, i think the table software is actually fine, and its got a couple decent MTTs. I'm not a big fan of microgaming so far though.

Anyways onto tomorrow