The Present:

After that hand I got up, walked over to the rail and just tried to take in the moment. In every other thing in life that I’ve managed to be successful in, I’ve never stopped and taken a moment to cherish the present. I decided that I wasn’t going to let this present moment pass. As I stood and stared out into the other 30 tables full of aspiring Poker players; the grinders, the recreationals, and the future pros alike I felt like I was on top of the world. If I’m never able to feel this feeling again, I’ll be glad I got to stop and live in that moment.

The heater continued on Friday, making it 12 winning sessions in a row, and another two big ones this weekend, another 500bbs between 2/5 & 5/T.

Literally didn’t get to play any hands that went past the flop for about 3 hours and broke even until we got a table switch to an amazing game. We were able to get AA in pre for 630 and hold, then we had some interesting hands:

Our first interesting hand comes when villain opens to 40 from MP. We call in the CO with 99 and see a flop of 826 v jams his final 195 and we sigh call. Lose this time to JJ - I think against this v we can def fold but he’s capable of doing this with A high as well shortstcaked.

The next interesting hand comes when we play a hand against a spot at the table when he opens UTG to 15. There’s another caller, we call OTB with A4 and the blinds come along. The flop is a sweet A43. It checks to us and and we wager 30. Only original raiser calls and we go to an 8 turn. He checks to us again and this time we go 75. He calls once again and we see a 9 river. He checks to us a final time and we go for value once again, this time 125. He quickly calls again and says “you better have a set”. Unfortunately A4 is no good to A9.

Were able to get things rolling again when we open KJ from MP to 30. another whale (good table switch as I mentioned) calls OTB, V from last hand calls in the SB and the BB comes along as well. We go to a flop of J84. It checks to us and we cbet 65. Only the BTN calls and we see a 8 turn. We check and he wagers 150. Knowing this villain we are still ahead a lot of the time and we call. The river is the K and we check it over to him. He bets 375 and we have an easy call. We call and take it down.

5/T hands.

We play our first interesting hand when we open AK to 35 from UTG+2. One reg calls, and then an older gentleman who is capable of 3betting light makes it 165 from the SB. It gets around to us and we have an easy 4bet for value against this V. the SB is 1400 to start, and we cover. We make it 385 to go. The reg in the middle folds and the SB calls.

We go to a flop of KT7

V checks to us and we check back. I don’t see a ton of merit to betting here in a 4bet pot. I’m either W/A or W/B. The turn is the 8 and v leads out for half of his remaining stack, 510. We jam the rest of it in there and he sigh calls. The river runs out a blank and he states ‘A high’ and we’re good.

In the biggest pot of the night, one of the same whales who was in our 2/5 game moved up with us to the 5/T. He’s playing slightly tighter now as the stakes have increased. He opens the CO to 35 and it folds to us in the BB with A5. We see a lovely flop of AA2. We check to him and he bets 55. We decide to call. The turn is the best card in the deck, the 5 we check again planning the c/r and it works out as planned. Villain wagers 125 and we size on the bigger end, making it 475. V tanks for a good amount of time, and makes it 1200 with 700 behind. We jam the rest of it in there and have him drawing dead to scoop a 4K pot.

After that hand I got up, walked over to the rail and just tried to take in the moment. In every other thing in life that I’ve managed to be successful in, I’ve never stopped and taken a moment to cherish the present. I decided that I wasn’t going to let this present moment pass. As I stood and stared out into the other 30 tables full of aspiring Poker players; the grinders, the recreationals, and the future pros alike I felt like I was on top of the world. If I’m never able to feel this feeling again, I’ll be glad I got to stop and live in that moment.

2/5


5/T


Morning:




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Wp, good to see you're soaking up the heat.

Super awesome results and wtg with taking it all in.

Thanks bros! Can confirm we broke the win streak today at 5/T. Game was above average again, the write up will have some lol hands.

Glgl

Breaking The Streak:

We started off the session on Saturday quite rocky, quickly being down about $300 until the following hand happened:

One limp to us from a loose passive player and we ISO A8 OTB to 25. Only the limper calls and we go to a flop of T8 2. Villain checks and we wager 30. He calls quickly and we see a K turn. He checks again and we bet 65. He calls once again and we see an 8.diamond: on the river. He checks to us again, and we decide to go for all the marbles. We wager his last 405 and he calls. We’re good. And now we’re back up. We ended up the session +40bbs when the 5/T game opened.

In the second orbit, we play a fun hand against a reg we have history with. He opens the BTN to 30, and we look down at AQ. We make it 115 to go in the SB. The BB folds and the BTN thinks for 25s and makes it 280. I know he is capable of the old 4b bluff. We make it 640 to go. After about another minute he jams for 2k, and we call it off. We run it twice and lose both to AK. NH.

After punting off another 500 over the next three hours, we’re 1600 eff and we see a straddle and an UTG limp from an extremely fun player playing 90/10. We make it 90 to go with KQ. The BB, straddle, and limper all call and we go to a flop of Q56. It checks to the UTG limper who bets 125. We call and the others fold. The turn comes the Q and this time he checks to us. We go ahead and wager 310. What I did not expect was villain to jam for 1350 total. We call it off of course and are good against Q9o when the T hits on the river.

Unfortunately the last session ended our monstrous run at 14 winning sessions. Was glad to get another volume filled weekend with 22 hours. It becomes easier when you’re running so well.

Vegas Countdown: 17 days

glgl all!












Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Good stuff. You're probably aware by now but that AQ is a huuuge spew @200bb deep imo. You should be very pleased with the 14 session run, that's very very sick.

I think the exact circumstances it's not as bad as it seems on the surface....but yeah it's far from good lol

Yeah obviously I'm not aware of the meta or dynamic between you two... But in general it's bad to get AQ in pre for 100bb let alone 200! Do you think there's a chance he rips A5s in or something?

I'm 100% sure my exact hand in this spot (AQ) is ahead of his 4bet range in this spot, and I'm not looking to play OOP against him and just flat, so I 5bet to 640. That might have been the mistake (sizing). When he jams, it's 1360 for me to win 2650 - so I need about 34% equity. Even against the tightest of jam ranges it's close (this is not the case) - but a fold is probably better in this spot (in a vacuum).

As for A5s exactly it's hard to say. Let's say one combo. I think he's jamming AJs+, AQo+, TT+ (maybe one or two combos of T9s & 98s, and a combo of A5s)

What I did gain from this is future action against him & everyone who saw - take that for what it's worth. (something)

Villain must be a bit of a nut job to actually be shoving that wide!

I'll be honest Harvey, the more we talk about it the less I like it. I guess I didn't take into account the fact that although I am ahead of his 4bet range when I 5bet, his jam should take into account the fact that there's a 5 bet (and it's live poker - this stuff never happens), and not just our history.

Definitely wouldn't call him a maniac. It's controlled aggression and high level thinking on both sides (probably less by me ) I think we may have significantly less than the equity we need to call off here. Again, all I'm saying is that his range in this spot is not what it is for most (but not wide enough to call off w/ AQ).

Chances I run into this spot ever again - quite slim.
Did we **** it up - yep

Don`t 3bet and just call pre vs someone that is so likely to 4bet and put you in thin spots. You exploit him by having the top of your range in 3bet/4bet Pots.

Anyway. I would 3bet super tight OOP when you are deep vs players that can make plays.

It was SB vs btn no? You haaave to 3bet. How we play against a 4bet is for telly to decide - I have never been in a spot like this in my last 800 hours. My games are shallower and no one 4bets less than KK to begin with. So hard for me to comment on the spot really.

I don’t think AQ SB vs BTN is too wide, but I have to agree with your point and something I will keep in mind going forward

I think you’re spot on - like I said I don’t think will come up again for a long time (if at all) but I appreciate the comments from you folks.

200bb deep Poker is just a different kind of game. You are way more concerned with the turn play than you are with the preflop play.

I rather go to the flop OOP in a smaller Pot and build a pot later on by b/f or r/f on certain board textures than 3betting. If we know that villain can fold pairs and we are willing to represent QQ+ for him to do so .. Okay, but I would not recommend that.

I think Btn is way more likely to stack AQ in a scenario where he calls a 3bet than AQ is likely to stack Btn. Btn can play perfect and put SB in super tough spots.

Anyway. I think this hand just shows what we should try to avoid: High variance spots.

There's a difference between avoiding high variance spots and just blatantly giving up EV. If you know anything about me, you'll know I'm alllll about variance reduction. But if you're not 3betting AQ here, you're not 3betting anywhere near enough and while your variance will be low your EV will suffer too much to make it worthwhile imo.

You are wrong, but you will figure it out yourself, when you 3bet AQ and play big Pots OOP with 100s of BB behind.

I see both points for sure. While we don't want to be playing large pots OOP, a 3bet here is getting $$ in SO good against someone opening 50-60% of BTN's. Definitely a spot for me to look out for going forward.

The Calm Before The Storm


Officially less than two weeks until I’m back in the beautiful Las Vegas, NV. Played another 16 hours this weekend, lost some at 2/5 won some at 5/T for a small profit. Some hands below from Saturday below:

In our first interesting hand of the day we see a small raise from UTG to 15. UTG +1 who is a recreational doing his best to punt stacks makes it 45 from UTG +1. It folds to us in the SB and we make it 125 to go with AK. The 3-bettor calls and we go to a flop of K68. I️ go with my read and am going to hope to let him punt here so we check. He makes it 150, and we call. The turn is the 3 and we check to him again. One again, he doesn’t stop, he makes it 200. We call again and see the T on the river. The river goes c/c and we chop it up with AK.

Soon thereafter we make it 20 to go UTG with TT. UTG +1, MP, and the blinds call and we go to a 994 flop. The blinds check to us and we bet 55. Both of the players behind us call, and the blinds fold. The turn comes the 8 and we decide to bet again, this time for 115. the player behind us makes it 350, and it’s a sticky spot because he’s really only repping a 9. But it’s live Poker and we just lay it down.

A little later we see 3 limps and raise to 35 in the CO to 35 with AT. It ends up going 4 way to a flop of K4T. A player who limp called jams his last 155. He’s into the game for about 1500, and is jamming light here way too often as he’s quite tilted. We call, there’s a fold, and another player calls with 140 behind. The turn is the 9 and the aforementioned player jams his last 140. We call it off and lose to 85 (short stack) and QJo for the sidepot.

We’re also able to get set over set over set 77 vs AA on AK7 for $700. but all in all manage to end only stuck about 450 in a marathon 11.5 hour session.

Didn’t play any interesting hands in our short 5/T session but managed to get unstuck!!

Sunday update to come tomorrow or Tues.

glgl!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You should give info about the relevant stacks in each hand.

I dislike the 4bet in Hand1, because there is an UTG raise he 3bets UTG+1 and he is more likely to punt it off if we don`t show max strength. I like a flat here. AK is a tough hand to 4bet and get value OOP, because flops that we crush just look like flops that we crush. Even a massive punter isn`t to likely to put it in on A95 with air in a 4bet Pot ..

Check turn with TT with the intention of c/f. You will like never c/f the best hand here in this spot. If you bet, I would bet/fold super small. like 65ish ..

Good point about stack sizes. Will do moving forward. Both H1 was 1.1k eff with V,

H2 was 1k eff

H1: The reasoning behind the 4bet, is that although it was a raise from UTG, the standard open for this game had been 20-25, so it seemed like it couldn't be a premium hand. The 3bettor had been 3betting far too often. I feel like sometimes I 3bet too often and I was nowhere near this guys frequency. Although to your point - he has to be less likely to punt off in a 4bet pot for sure.

H2 - dont you feel like that is a bit too weak? We can certainly still get value from worse OTT I feel.

Thank you as always for your input.

The Calm Before The Storm: Part II

Before we departed for the weekend, we had a little 5/T to play, and another short-ish session of 2/5. Was able to leave up a small amount for the weekend all together and am content with our play. I think I'm making some mistakes in certain important adjustments in tight games that I'm continuing to work on.

In our first interesting hand we forget that there is a fold button. We raise KJ from MP to 20. A tilted player who lost a 3k pot last orbit and is going on a 40 hour session (he does this often) calls directly to my left, and so does the BB. We're 200BB eff with tilted villain and we see a flop of 223. The BB checks, we check, and V wagers 30. The button folds and we call. We go to a turn that is the 4 Once again we check, and this time villain quickly bets 65. I decide that I only have one button this hand and call again. The river is the T and I check again. This time he checks as well, and we take it down with K high.

Didn't really play any other interesting hands. I'm sure nobody is too interested about me flopping a strong hand and betting for value 3 times. glgl


Vegas Countdown : 9 days

Purple Swag



The hotstreak continued this weekend. Played a 13 hour marathon session and was able to end up with heaps (see below). This was the first time in as long as i can remember that a majority of the players I played with were unknowns. It also happened to be they were major spewers as well. The game turned out to be very deep for a big part of the night with multiple people unloading bullet after bullet. Game quality was 10/10. Countless 200+ BB pots were played. We conquered.



In our first interesting hand we pick up A9 OTB and see 4 limps to us from loose passive players. We make it 40 (500 eff with everyone) to go and get one call from a player playing 100/40. We go to a flop of 8T6 and he checks to us. We check it back and see a 5 on the turn. He leads big into us, 100 with 300 behind. We call and see a 9 on the river. He jams 300 into us and it's an easy call against this v (this is a standard line from him with ~40% of hands). Unfortunately, we run into the top of his range and lose to A7.



We were stuck about 1300 4 hours into the session. A few hours later about halfway through our session we were able to get back to even, nothing too out of the ordinary just able to hit big hands and get value from loose passive stations calling down 3 streets with 3rd pair (is this 2004?) (see below)



In a rare hand for the table, there's only one limp to me and I look down at QQ OTB and make it 25 to go. The BB calls, and the limper folds. We're 1.5k effective and see a flop of Q97. He checks to us and we continue for 25. He calls and we see a 4 on the turn. Once again, it's checked to us and we wager 75. He thinks for a while, and calls again. The river is the Q and he checks to us a 3rd time. We bet 225 and he calls. Ramarkably, our hand is good and we shop the pot.



The big hand of the evening comes when we see an open from recreational in MP to 25. Another player playing 90/10 flats in the CO and we see 55 in the SB. The BB comes along as well. Both main villains are about 575 eff and we see the amazing flop of 524:spade. Flopping top set with 5's. Feels nice. We lead for $60, the BB folds, and the original raiser makes it 150. The CO flats, and we have an amazing spot. With everyone having about 550 behind, instead of jamming we decide to make it $375. Original raiser flats, and the CO jams for ~550 total. We rejam and the original raiser calls.



The board runs out TQ and we hold against JJ & AA. This hand turned a good night into a great night. The game stayed awesome until 4 AM when I decided I had to go. The long drive is killer, and ended up getting home at 6 A.M., but I've never felt more alive at such an early time. The sunrise was the cherry on top of a superb night.

P.S. purple chips are my new favorite









Vegas Countdown: 4 days.



I'm excited to bring you guys pictures and reports from Vegas. I'm thinking of doing a TR in the LVL section, as this will be my third trip but Im undecided on that. Either way, get ready for food porn, sports wagers, and (hopefully) chips! Let's run good

loving the thread man keep up the great work.

Killin it, NJ!