Honestly man, you'll get through this downswing. It only lasts so long. Variance will finally come your way. I'm rooting for you just believe in yourself.

Looks like someone proved to be the superior 2p2 blogger in this grudge match.

Have U even FTed a SCOOP in your life?

Confirmed no one runs worse than WalmartCNXN in SCOOPs<<<

#WhenWillItEnd

Vamossssss

What a young god

Gg mate gl for the rest of scoop

thanks d00d, heard ur joining this grind house haha

ye thanks a lot. ul for u at the end there, nice ladder game tho

haha thanks for the kind words i ll try to keep my head up

haha no i dont think ive ever played a full scoop series tbh, last year was doing some life loving in australia and didnt touch it. every year before that i either still sucked at poker or was busy with uni (the former is still debatable)

ty

thanks bud gl to yoself as well look forward to seeing u ship the main

just went out for a nice therapeutic walk after this hand:
https://www.boomplayer.com/23833525_45DD081432

haha i mean its all good, ran good to get to that point and i was definitely due for a stat correction in terms of EV last week or so. during the walk i decided i would post in here partly to lull myself to bed, and partly to post about a few realizations, and partly to post a few hands.

I think I've posted about it before that the four most important categories in my life are: health, wealth, relationships, happiness. My end goal is to have a healthy balance of all four of those categories and in a way, I believe they all feed off of each other. For example if you are happy and healthy you will probably gain net positive improvements in your relationships or wealth and vice versa.

The main issue however, is that balance has always been somewhat of a challenge for me. I'm sure I'm not the only poker player that feels this way? It's so easy to get wrapped up in finding GTO c-betting strategies, or slinging boku87 like volume, or battling some of the end bosses in the monday 6 max that it becomes so easy to forget about so many more important things in life: relationships, nutrition, fitness, and so much more.

Anyways, I've been going to the gym almost every day so far with the friend I'm visiting and the routine is really feeling good. I'll always be grateful for his help with that. It's so important to surround yourself with positive people who are trending upwards because their habits rub off on you as well (and vice versa). Still so much work to do and it's gonna be a few more months of dedication but I think I can emulate this routine for when I get back to Waterloo. Hopefully I can return the favour by helping him with poker You guys can do me a favour by checking out his stream when he gets it up and running, I'll let you know!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Reviewed a couple of my recent games yesterday and super happy with how I've been playing. Unfortunately, didn't boom most of the hands I liked or found interesting but here's a couple, would love to hear thoughts:

https://www.boomplayer.com/23832710_43DB45E721
i mean at first glance this was about 25 off of ITM and it might seem like a massive punt at first. villain is a very good reg and I really thought I could pull one over him here and force him into a huge fold. i have so many nut hands here: 55 KK TT JJ AQ flushes...and really tried to give the image i have 0 bluffs. given the prog nature i think he has 0 traps pre flop and is quite capped post flop (basically never has a nut hand imo)..anyways yeah maybe it is a huge punt but min cashing a prog isnt that special just because of the flat payout structure. on the bright side he used up a tonne of time bank and probably was puke calling this off so leads me to believe my bluff is somewhat good (maybe i need more chips)...at least there will be future ev when people see that boom hand and think im a psycho blaster

https://www.boomplayer.com/23831308_FBA070B9E1
meh idk, i value bet ax/QQ/KK/7x the same way most of the time. basically targeting hands like Qx and pocket pairs. prob not a great bluff spot as villain should have decent amount of ax here.

https://www.boomplayer.com/23830495_9DAC3EDCB9
seems good

https://www.boomplayer.com/23829476_9DAFD28CDA
seems ok

https://www.boomplayer.com/23827879_3E35D0CC27
paffchen is villain

https://www.boomplayer.com/23785903_A8B7193693
igor kurganov is villain. i think when he overbets he polarizes himself quite a bit and its convenient that im blocking the nut straight significantly. if he starts value betting 2 pairs etc this way he owns me a tonne. who knows.

let me know what u guys think

gym tomorrow morning then firing a nice sesh legooooo

GL this weekend everyone be back sunday for usual update.

cheeky little 29k score there

just found this, in will read though in a bit glgl mate

the cheekiest

thanks

a little food for thought: almost everyone says they think rationally, yet they drink coca cola instead of kale juice

big weekend of grinding ahead. played super spewy and pretty bad overall today which is unacceptable this weekend. wanted to make a little note about that to cement the fact in my head that I WILL bring my A+ game this weekend.

GL this weekend my hombres all the best

o ye i forgot to mention i got that idea for above ^ from this video. disclaimer: most people will probably hate this video but i think there is a few guys out there who will get inspired by it. to those guys: i hope u enjoy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqyTDR03b4U

Burnt out. That would probably be the most accurate way to describe my state at the moment. Let's just get into the weekly update:

Health:

Workouts Completed this week: (5/4)
Times leaving diet guidelines: 2 (a few small cheats which weren't too bad)
20 Minute Meditation Session: 1/7 (it was a super long one though , gonna aim for 7/7 this week and get back into meditation.
Books Read: 0/1
Body Weight +/-: -11 lbs. (since beginning of year), probably more this week but forgot to weight myself...assume im down minimum 2-3 lbs. just since i've been in alberta.

Wealth:

Training Videos Watched: 1/1
Hours in the lab: 2/2
Sessions played: 6/4
Hours put into researching new avenues of revenue generation: 0
Weekly Proft: +24 486
Yearly Profit: +36 988
Live Poker Profit This Year: +5 918

Book Review: Way too busy this week to read. Probably won't read something til after SCOOP.

Story of Leaving Comfort Zone: Nothing too relevant this week. Been so busy with grinding and gym haven't had too much time for anything else.

Hands:

https://www.boomplayer.com/23876250_F3AC2D0D54
lol_ft. this is a huge blast by me vs a nitty reg. i like everything except river jam, this is the nut worst river card ofc. im really just repping kk/aa. its kinda funny he time banked forever before calling when he has like the nut nut nut bluff catcher. so maybe my bluff aint that bad if he even folds some kx sometimes. or maybe it was just a slow roll i really am not sure

https://www.boomplayer.com/23875817_D7E348DCC8
its tough to have a bluff lead range here on the turn but i sort of find this is necessary in these spots with weak flushes

https://www.boomplayer.com/23854406_A4A1CDCAA9
gotta catch em all


Random Rant of the Week:

I feel like I want to change things up a little bit this week. Instead of ranting about random life stuff I want to write a little bit about backing and my whole experience with it. After all, I assume 100% of the audience reading this is involved with poker and it's something we all have in common. If not, shout out to the stalkers man.

Not sure where to begin or how to go about this. I guess I'll start by talking about my story with backing.

Up until ~2012 I was working at Walmart and attending high school classes. I believe I was around 19 at the time. I was always a break even/losing player and would regularly purchase 50$ prepaid mastercards which I would upload onto Pokerstars to play some 2.20$ 180 man SNGs. Funnily enough, those 50$ cards would be a good portion of my paycheques haha. Sometimes I would spin up a roll and bust it in bigger games/cash it out (I never liked having big $ online), most times I would lose it...rinse and repeat. I didn't really know any better and I didn't really have anyone to teach me any better.

Fast forward to my first year in Uni. After having poor spending habits through high school and enormous costs to attend school, I was broke. I believe I had a net worth of ~100$ (and got a little bit from student loans too). I really didn't want to have to take out more loans/wasn't allowed to take out more, and I didn't want to burden my parents. After talking to some friends, one of them referred me to the idea of staking. My first stake was for 2.50$ 180 man SNGs. Although it was petty, I was given a foundation and network of professionals (well professional enough I guess). I had a mentor/coach who worked with me a lot and showed me a lot of the fundamentals of poker. I slowly moved up stakes and swung in and out of makeup. One time I had 5k makeup and it seemed like a million dollars at the time...man I was worried haha. After some differences I decided to go on my own for a little bit after clearing makeup. I went broke again.

I won't get in depth about every stable I've been in. Long story short I was in a total of ~5 stables of all different skill sets/professional levels/friendly levels/etc. I spent a lot of time in makeup over the last 5 years or so, but I also learned a lot. I'm just going to list some advantages and disadvantages to make it easy.

Advantages:
-You are provided a bankroll to play with in games you are likely under-rolled for yourself
-often gain access to other high level players who seem more willing to help just because you are in the same stable
-coaching is often supplied and encouraged
-memberships to training sites and payment of important software is often provided
-it helps poker seem like a career with bosses etc (this might be good or bad)
-personally, helps me take poker more serious because i dont want to punt someone elses money
-backers often help with loans if need be
-helps you gain references within poker community
-allows you to keep life roll separate from poker roll
-you don't have to risk your own money
-backers arent as biased as the horse. they often have them in money printing schedules which is usually best for both parties. the horse might not have that same discipline without staking.

Disadvantages:
-the idea of makeup is quite arbitrary imo. it's almost like some term created that means "debt" but it is not quite debt if you choose to quit poker. but most of us who have been staked know: it is very tough to walk away on makeup, because you feel like you owe it to your staker (an honest deed). we also know, most backers probably would not let it down easy if you decided to quit poker. in a lot of cases, it would probably be tough to quit without having your name dragged through the mud to some extent. whether or not that is reasonable is up for debate and likely a case by case basis.
-you have to give up some % of your profit. in my case it's meant a few hundred thousand $. although i would never be that much in profit without backing imo. i would prob still suck and be depositing 50$ prepaids/have quit by now.
-makeup always feels like some overhanging cloud and an intense obligation to get it paid back (for me personally)
-being in makeup can suck because it means you have to grind games where you cant profit yourself a lot of the time
-the backer/horse relationship can often get awkward and often i felt i would be treated better or worse as a human depending how much mu i had rather than how hard i was working off the tables. (I might ship a tourney and get tonnes of praise whereas the week before I would be in 30k mu working my ass off and nothing said)
-your freedom in poker can often be very limited if staked.


Anyways guys, I thought I would talk about some of my thoughts of the backing industry after being in there for about 5 years. I havent been staked for about 12 months now and I'm really enjoying the freedom. I definitely would have been far worse off without backing but for my current life situation I'm glad I don't owe anything to anyone anymore.

Here is one of my favourite poker quotes of all time. I like referring myself back to it after having some decent wins to keep in check:

"The inflated ego you get (from winning) can create mental turmoil when you're on a downswing. Try not to ride the highs and lows." -James Obst

Day off tomorrow...let's finish SCOOP strong bros. Make the most of this series whilst it's in motion. Good night and GL.

Mike

Good job you at not forgetting about enjoying the journey, it doesn't matter that we haven't get to the limit of our dreams yet, what matters is living the day, living the cost of going thru the path; I don't want just to get there without any struggle, the one I hope to convert into pure happiness

^amen! it's so important to love the process just as much or more than you love the prize imo

Sattied into the 2k today and played pretty solid imo, these 2 hands devastated me (bad beats inside)

https://www.boomplayer.com/23899706_F478E5B239
his call seems horrid fwiw. tbf i dont think i even have AQ here ever its prob AK+JJ+ (and prob dont jam AA/KK) feel like i should prob be inducing this as i 3 bet some frequency from here but just tilting to get flatted (people fold so much less to 3 bets now, and also dont tool out wiht AJ or AQ)

https://www.boomplayer.com/23899397_99B6D49A23
idk this doesnt seem great by him either but its prob standard. i guess he is trying to rep strength to fold out my JJ/1010 type hands?

anyways ye was cool to battle some of the bosses in that for a few hours. made a couple decent runs today but nothing worth writing home about.

tbh i look at these higher scoops and the "spots" in them are basically regs who used to be good back in 2009 or w/e and are behind the game (but still arent huge blasters or anything). prob just not worth it for me atm for like a ~menial (i think?) ROI w/ sick variance. might play a little higher on the weekends but during the week i think im just gonna keep the stakes fairly humble for now.

still feel like im sort of on my B game which needs to be corrected for tomorrow and the first step im taking to fix this is playing a little lower. perhaps subconciously it is difficult to play 50$ tourneys at the same time as 2k$ tourneys and the higher stakes take quite a bit more focus i find.

anyways gonna end this little rant here and leave this quote for some motivation tomorrow:

"The game has its ups and downs, but you can never lose focus of your individual goals and you can't let yourself be beat because of lack of effort." -Michael Jordan

GL today!

thanks dude you too! huge day lets bring our best legoooo

hello beautiful people. SCOOP has come to a bitter sweet end and so has my nice hour long cool down stroll. Here's my weekly update and a few things I've been thinking about recently:

Health:

Workouts Completed this week: (4/4)
Times leaving diet guidelines: 3-4
20 Minute Meditation Session: 3/7
Books Read: 0/1
Body Weight +/-: -11 lbs. (since beginning of year), forgot to weight myself again but i assume I'm down at least 5 lbs. since coming to Alberta, and probably 15 on the year. Need to remind myself to check at the gym tomorrow.

Wealth:

Training Videos Watched: 0/1
Hours in the lab: 2/2
Sessions played: 6/4
Hours put into researching new avenues of revenue generation: 0
Weekly Proft: -2641
Yearly Profit: +34 581
Live Poker Profit This Year: +5 918

Book Review: Way too busy this week to read. Probably won't read something til after SCOOP.

Story of Leaving Comfort Zone: Nothing relevant yet again. Mostly things have been strictly business during the series. I think when I get home I want to try some of these comfort zone challenges I've been reading about. Really want to start testing myself.

Hands:

https://www.boomplayer.com/23971402_C5827B6017
this turned out to be a huge disaster. so the villain in the sb is massive whale playing like 53/32/28 or something so i really was fistpumping vs him and obv willing to gii. i really got thrown off by the cold 4 from a gold star low stakes brazillian in the bb (stupid me prob getting ghosted anyways). really felt like he will only stack off with AA in a 1k given its way above his ABI etc, so didnt really want to get stacks in. I guess sometimes you just gotta pay the man his money though. Flop could be looked at as a disaster i really dont know.

https://www.boomplayer.com/23964700_018460D90B
rekt

https://www.boomplayer.com/23964603_0570515702
putting on the cape like clark kent


Random Rant of the Week:

First off, let's summarize this series. I've had a great time grinding out here and hitting the gym/eating healthy. It truly feels quite therapeutic to detach from everyday life for a couple weeks and hang out around new people and see a new place/do new things. Poker wise I'm fairly content with my performance through the series. Like anyone else, there was some ups and some downs. Very thankful to bink that 215 M 6m for 30k on my first day here because that gave me some confidence and breathing room for the rest of the series. Unfortunately, I ran pretty sour in SCOOP events imo and really for the rest of the series. I didn't lose too much $ though and probably profited close to ~25k over the course of SCOOP. Could be worse

Anyways, I wrote about how there is this cemetery I walk by on my nightly walks (when I'm back in Waterloo) a few posts ago. Funnily enough, there is a cemetery I walk by on my nightly walks here too. It's a crucial reminder that every night I walk by there I'm one night closer to being in there. As much as it's been good to take a breather from everyone in my normal life I have some people I really want to hang with and catch up and show them I care about them when I get home. Ya know? Sometimes when you take a step away you realize all of the BS that's just a distraction. I really want to be a good person and give the best and most genuine version of myself to the people that deserve that.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alright, now that I got that out of the way...should I rant about a poker topic or thin edges? Welp, seeing as I'm writing this by myself and there's nobody else to ask, I'll flip a coin...thin edges it is!

Ever here that epic speech by Al Pacino about "inches"? If you haven't:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myyWXKeBsNk

In life and poker the difference between the worst, the mediocre, the best, and the elite is often just the difference of a few decisions everyday. Literally, that's all it is. Eating a salad vs. eating a cheeseburger, sleeping for 9 hours instead of 8, clicking all in or clicking check, etc.

As we see poker progress further and further along the spectrum of life, inherently, we see the difficulty of the game increase substantially. Edges are becoming razor thin and competition is becoming fierce. Slowly but surely, players are being eliminated from the game for one reason or another, and the fittest are surviving.

What I want to talk about is the importance of taking small edges that you have available to you in the game. It's so important to take every edge you have, because if you don't: there will be some other reg who is willing to fight for that extra inch on you. In the long run, these inches become feet, and these feet become miles. These cents become dollars, these dollars become thousands. Small decisions and edges manifest and grow exponentially upon themselves over time. Here's a few small edges you can implement today that will help your poker game:
-get 8 hours of sleep. don't play under rested.
-eat healthy and give your body the proper fuel to function at optimal capacity
-work out before your sessions
-get a standing desk
-make sure your computer is optimal for a session
-take necessary time off
-stall for payjumps in tournaments
-meditation
-do a study prep before a session
-keep table counts optimal

There are so many small things we can do daily that will lead to a significant edge in the long run. The hard part: convincing myself to do all this stuff daily!


Anyways guys, thanks for reading and I hope you are enjoying the posts/getting some info or motivation from them. I appreciate all the love this year (we're almost halfway YIKES!) I think I need some time off of poker to focus on other stuff for a few weeks. I think I'm gonna head out to Jasper/Calgary/Canmore type area(s) and then possibly BC. Really want to do some hiking/fishing/golfing out in the mountains for a week or two. After that, I'm heavily considering WSOP this year. It was sort of always a goal of mine to play a bunch of WSOP events and that's become a reality for me this year. The weird part is that it doesn't seem all that appealing haha, I might just take a shot though...

"We must not allow other people's limited perceptions to define us."
-Virginia Saitr

This is so true! Thank you for sharing your own perspective!

Also Virginia Satir is a good influence

no worries glad you enjoy, i dont actually know who she is just like the quote

as i forgot to put in weight update last 2 updates:

since start of year: -19 lbs.

since coming to alberta: -8 lbs.

in other words, the first few months of the year wasn't very efficient in terms of weight loss and i was pretty lazy/undisciplined (losing only ~2 lbs. per month)

since coming to alberta and making some big shifts in lifestyle etc ive lost about ~3 lbs. per week. of course the first few lbs. are the easiest ones to shed so makes sense. also, with my broken hand i haven't been doing full intensity workouts or w/e. that being said: it's nice to see some concrete progress and in the latter half of 2017 health is definitely going to be my biggest focus. eventually i want to start working more on dating etc but for now i need to just focus on myself for a few months (does that sound selfish?)

so a rough timeline for the next 3 months is going to be: -calgary/banff/mountains for 2 weeks, vegas for 2-6 weeks (depending how im feeling about it), -then back home to waterloo to enjoy the summer months etc... not to mention that during this time i want to focus strictly on my health routine. i still haven't forgotten all those goals i set at the start of the year and i think i can achieve almost all of them if i put my mind to it!

cheers

It is not selfish at all. One key trait in successful people is working on themselves before anything. If you feel you need to focus on yourself for a few months to get where you need to be, then that is what you should be doing!

I recall an earlier post of yours ITT about how society has taught us to think that we need to get married, have kids, etc. to live a happy life, and eventually that leads to a high percentage of failed relationships because both people have not worked on themselves enough. While typing I just found the post.

There is no need to rush into dating.

haha thanks trent yeah i agree

anyone in Calgary wanna meet up or can suggest some good live games? (Preferably 2-5+) gonna be a long 10 days out here if I don't chill with a few people

wrote out a bit long post and was gonna post it but realized it wasn't very coherent at all and I can't keep my eyes open any longer. will be back in the mix tomorrow after a good rest. GN and GL