blonde poker forum

Hey guys,

I'm making this blog so I can track my progress and thoughts, hope it may provide some insight/entertainment to you all. I never do any after session reviews and haven't talked NL strat with anyone for a couple of years, so hopefully I'll keep this updated regularly and it will generate some good discussion. I intend to post straight in here after a session and post the most interesting hands even if I've fucked them up.

I've been playing poker professionally for about 4 years now, all online, with the odd toe dip into live tourneys and some mix games cash. I'm mainly playing HU cash and table starting 6max, both NL and PLO, on pretty much every site there is. I did a fair bit of work at plo the end of last year before getting a coach, paying 2k for coaching and only having one session, due to losing 100BI at 6max and came crawling back to HU. I intend to get back into doing 6max work especially as starting tables never stay HU these days for more than a few hands.

I'll be playing anywhere between .5/1 and 25/50 for NL and 1/2 to 5/10 at plo.

Any questions welcome and I'll be updating later with my session results.

just one question from me:

whats your name?


also, gl.

all the best with the blog! Quite an eclectic mix of stakes .5/1- 25/50!

Where is most of your volume at?

I'd say mostly between 1/2 and 2/4, with anything above 5/10 quite rare.

Jon

No update since it's been the weekend, played Friday and yesterday, no interesting hands came up on HEM tracked sites, but on ton on non tracked sites did which is annoying. Hopefully the hand grabbers should be fixed soon so I'll be able to post some good hands.

Thought this was a fairly interesting spot. (sorry hand converter not working)

http://www.cardrunners.com/pokertools/session/2878331/replay/

And by interesting I mean I should be flatting the turn here 100%. Think shoving is a pretty huge mistake.

Rest of the hands are pretty boring/standard, I'll post some of em and see if people enjoy reading them.

Edit--not sure how to post HH in here, what converter do people use?

Alright mate, what sites do you play hu NL on? Also what did you think of the 2011 mix of pow? Personally thought it was complete trash.

Hey guys, I've been on holiday last few weeks so that's why I haven't updated.


New pow was pretty average imo. The old one reminds me of Uni and the uni bar/club getting smashed up whenever it came on. Play on most networks.

I've been saying to myself for the last few years that I'd go to Vegas and go and play the WSOP. It hasn't happened mainly to it not being worth if financially, me being terrible in tournaments and the online games being too good to miss for 2 months. However I feel this may be my last year playing poker professionally and I know I'd deeply regret not doing something that was one of the main reasons I fell in love with poker to begin with. So next year I'm planning on playing a full schedule. As many events as possible, every game, big range of buyins, no regrets. I've been putting a fair amount of work into lots of different games, mainly PLO and O8, and plan to be good enough to play all these events. I've been grinding 8/10 game along with HU and starting 6 max games, and have also started to play in a DC game regularly. TBH i'm really bad at stud/stud 8 and razz but I am thoroughly enjoying playing these games.

I'm gunna set a budget of $50k for the WSOP so I'll set that as a goal. Obv the budget may go up depending on the schedule but it seems like a good goal and to give the thread a bit of direction.

The month has gotten off to a good start, won about £1k playing 2/2 DC from 2 sessions and around $3k online, including 2 FT in 8 game tournaments.

I'll post a few interesting hands from the DC game.
First is 6 card plo h/l,  I 3bet an open and 2 calls in co with A34QJT, get 4 callers naturally. Pot around £120.  Flop is T62r, man leads for £80, I call. Turn is Kr, he leads pot with around the same back. Think this is a standard flat. River is a 9 and he check folds, meaning he must have had a low wrap as I don't think he folds any 2 pair getting those odds with the low bricking.

Next is a padooki hand. EP opens and I call with  Jc 7c 2s 3d, btn calls and sb calls. EP from what I've seen is bad at most of the games and stuck. BTN I've never seen before but everyone else at the table knows him and he picks padooki every btn so I guess he knows what he's doing. Sb is bad and stuck. EP draws 2, I throw the J, btn draws 2 and sb draws 1. I draw the  8h. EP pots it and I flat (pretty sure I should be raising here) btn flats and sb pots it to around £120 with around £700 behind. EP calls with around £90 left. I was totally lost in this spot. I was scared of making a huge mistake by getting in however many BB with an 8 and am not really sure on how strong my hand is relative to the action. I guess this just comes with experience and reads. I fold EP bricks out and sb wins with a T. I made a point after this hand of studying every padooki hand I wasn't involved in and seeing what people were doing. Seems people are doing some really bad stuff especially 8 handed and I won't be making as nittier folds in the future.
Do you call the open in the first place? Bearing in mind people are hardly ever 3betting non padookis pre.

Not sure whether to play the DTD deepstack this weekend. I haven't done an ounce of NL work that isn't HU cash for years but I have a pretty good live tourney record and expect it to be ridic soft as usual.

Deffo worth playing. If you cash it will be a huge boost to your confidence.

Second this. Definitely worth a go.

Are you playing Red-Dog?

Unfortunately not Hugo. Too many balls in the air atm.

Hey guys,

Long time since last update but I intend to update more regularly as I'm becoming more active on the forum. Been taking part in the Blonde Quiz which is right up my street as I'm a bit of a quiz geek. I'd love for my ability to remember useless shit to translate into remembering good poker theory but alas.
Last couple of months have been ok poker wise, even though I had my first losing month of HU last month. June and this month I've been smashing, and having 1 losing month in 5 years you can't really complain. I've been dipping back into 6max PLO more and more. I'm enjoying battling to start tables and am really liking 3/4 handed and the dynamics that come with it. Been doing a fair amount of off the table work this month so volume is lol bad but crushing kind of makes up for it.
Played live a few sessions, mainly DC cash and the monthly deepstack where I made a semi deep run, picking up a WPT seat a long the way. I don't think anything compares to making deep runs in tourneys, no matter the prize pool. DTD have also started a weekly DC tourney which is fantastic for my Vegas prep. I'm prob going to be playing it most weeks. The WSOPE is round the corner in Berlin, a place which I'd love to go, so I think I'm going to go. It coincides with Oktoberfest and a Germany qualifier game in Leipzig, and is a fairly cheap tourney trip all round. Def won't be playing the main unless I satty in, but will for sure be playing the PLO, Mix game and other NL events. Anyone else heading out there? Anyone been to Berlin before and can suggest stuff to do?
WCOOP is also soon upon us and I'm really reluctant to get involved. Reading Pads' thread (and others) and strat advice, I feel I'm completely out of depth when it comes to NL tourneys, esp online ones. Still it's once  year so might just end up flicking in depending on how the months going.
I'm a pretty big Man United fan (yes I'm from Manchester unfortunately). Watching the game tonight was pretty painful and I hope we sign someone to add to the attacking third. We def need some pace, or even someone who can link up quickly. United's attack has become laborious and Rooney looks a shadow of his former self. Mata has been played out of position since he came, and adds little out wide. Still the defence looks great, esp Shaw and Darmian. Smalling and Blind look solid. Hope DDG stays and can get his head right. LVG isn't handling the DDG situation great and I think it may affect players joining. People have some pretty choice words to say about him, but I love him the crazy fucker.
Will be playing the Sky 6max next week, hoping to better last times min cash.

Results:

June: Most of the volume came from 2/4 6max, with the rest general HU.

(http://i.imgur.com/60j3AsP.png)

July: Big downswing was mostly 1/2 huplo short which isn't too bad $ wise but makes for a shitty graph.

(http://i.imgur.com/B14w9Za.png)

August: Mostly 2/3/4 handed plo. I'm enjoying playing with same 2/3 regs and getting away from the table and breaking their games down and doing tons of work. Makes me feel like I'm actually doing something challenging.

(http://i.imgur.com/lE1X1h0.png)

Will be playing the Sky 6max next week, hoping to better last times min cash.


Look forward to seeing you there Mr Powwwwwww, come say hi please.

Huh? I thought it was great!

Very nice graphs. Having played seriously for >5 years how would you say your enjoyment of the game compares from when you started off to now?

I still love poker, but I prob enjoy it in a different way. When I first started playing I would just play anytime I could. Any stakes, any game, anywhere, all live. I just loved it. Then I started playing online and enjoyed the different dynamic and styles of play. After that I was just printing money and who doesn't enjoy that? Now I can kind of see an end to online poker for me. The enjoyment comes from getting better, being competitive and pushing myself so I can look back and say yeh I couldn't have got anything more from poker. I will def regret not putting in more volume a few years ago when games were great and there were tons of them. Obv thought it would stay like that forever, or at least 10+ years. But I def still get that little feeling somewhere whenever I go play a big live tourney, the same one I had going to play £1 rebuys at uni all those years ago. I doubt that will ever go.

Hey guys,

The Sky UKPC was at DTD last week so took some time off online to play it. Started on Tuesday with the high roller sat. My table was great and thought I played ok. Lasted till just after rebuy, then had a really bad 15 mins. Firstly I 3bet a guy who I'd played with in the deepstack last month, and knew was very loose/splashy/whaley etc. He min opened to 800 at 400bb from 30k, I 3 bet to 10k wTTh, he called. Flop 246hh, i bet 8k he called turn 4h. He hesitated a bit before checking and snapping with 35hh when I set him all in. Prob should go bigger pre maybe. Orbit later man opens UTG, whale guy calls UTG+1 and I sqz OTB to 10k again wKK, both call with 25k and 30k respectively. Flop 667, I shove for pot and he has 65o, then lost AQ v AK for 20bbish. Think walking out is the most tilted I'd been in a long time.

Wednesday I went down for the main sat with a friend with the intention of playing a bit of cash later and having a few beers together. We swapped 10% and I pure bubbled coming 11th (winning £120) with 10 seats to play for. Pretty nitty player shoved for 4bb and the guy in the BB folded off of around 15bb which was above avg at the time, on the bubble. I don't really know about sats or if this is a call with 2 other similar short stacked players but I was pretty tilted again busting 3 hands later. I drowned my tilty sorrows with a few beers and played some .5/1 sat next to my mate until Skalie popped his head round form the VIP room asking if I wanted to play 5/5 plo in there. Turns out it wasn't really 5/5 as there were multiple straddles and some pretty big stacks compared to the min 1k buyin which I had. So I played like a nit and the guys playing were super friendly and fun so had and enjoyable couple of hours with a few more beers. Made a couple of blocker bluffs with my super nitty image and broke even.

Played the main Friday. Table started off pretty meh having a look round at most of the tables in the room. Everyone was under 30 and knew what they were doing. Nothing really interesting happened till near the end of the day. I open QhTh to 4k at 1/2k and BB 3bets to 10k. I call and it goes c/c on Q83r. He bets 10k on 5 turn bringing in a fd and I decided to shove for 25k more. He thought about it for quite a while and I went from please don't snap to please call during the course of his tank. He eventually called with 53o and I didn't really know what was going on. River was an 8 so put me up to about 120k. Then the man who replaced him defended his BB after I'd opened QTo UTG again. He c/r KJ7hh really small from 8k to 17k. I kind of recognised him, he was an older guy but def knew what he was doing. I shoved for 55kish and he had a little think and shrugged flicked it in with K6. Can't really remember any history between us but he worked me. River was a 9 and I was up to around 180k. Chipped up for the last level and ended on 215k, about avg, to end the day.

Saturday I got there a didn't realise they did a table redraw. New table was better. Had an older gentleman to my direct right who was very friendly and a couple of the other guys and dealer were all talking about the football which had just started. Really nice table and I felt pretty comfortable. Then a hand occurred that I wasn't really sure what to do. I'd previously 5bet a cold 4bet after I had 3bet the older guy OTB. The BB in the hand was probably around my age but hadn't said a word all day so was difficult to know anymore about him. I raised OTB w89ss from about 300k and he 3bet to around 25k covering me. Flop QQ9, he bet really small, 13k i think, I called. Turn was 2d putting a fd out, he bet half pot and I thought for a little while before calling. River was an offsuit 6 and he jammed fairly quickly for maybe just over pot. I took a good 10 mins to think about it before having the clock called on me. I wanted to call pretty badly but convinced myself that people don't bluff in these spots probably 1% as I think they do. He didn't show and I'm not sure I wanted him to. The guy next to me said he folded a Q but I think it was probably the right fold. Couldn't really get much going after that pot, which left me with around 25bb. Got moved tables with the same guy from the hand and he knocked me out a few levels later AK<99.

I'd heard a DC game maybe on later so I stuck around and played some .5/1 cash. Turns put everyone wanted to play PLO so I got on the list for that and ended up getting in the same game as Thursday. I gave myself a few BI stop loss and convinced myself it would just be 5/5 and that the straddles wouldn't come out till later. Yep was wrong about that and it kicked off in the same manner it finished. I played super tight, except for putting on straddles up to £20 as I didn't want to completely spoil the game, even though everyone assured me I didn't have to, I suspect they definitely did. First big hand I was BB and completed a £40 straddle with AdAJ94, 6 way. I'd do this with my whole range as people were quite aggro preflop. It got checked (sadface) and the flop was AQ2dd. I checked and it got potted for around £120. I called planning to check jam any non turn diamond and pot lead any diamond. Turn was 8o and I check jammed getting sigh called by a reg who had bare QQ. Won a couple more pots without showdown and had about £3k. Then I picked 5 card and called OTB vs a raise from £40 straddle w QJT9xcc. Flop was KT8cc. It went bet, raise all in and was basically jam or fold to me (biggets stack in the hand was about £1400). I know next to nothing about these players but the 2 guys involved were on the tighter side postflop. I folded and felt pretty happy about it especially as they rolled over middle set and NFD+BDFD. NFD guy won both runs. Haven't ran the numbers yet but I assume it would be pretty close and I don't mind taking the nitty option when shot taking. I said I folded 2 clubs to make the guy with a set feel better as others had done but also revealed my other cards much to the dismay of the rest of the table. A few more comments about how tight I was and I felt a little uncomfortable 1. because these guys obv played together a lot and like action and 2. I was kinda spoiling that/not giving much action. Don't get me wrong, nobody said anything bad to me and the guys were all super nice/friendly and it's def one of my favorite live experiences ever. I just felt I was taking up a seat of someone else who these guys would prefer to have in the game. Anyway I decided to leave at a certain time and the hand before I left I got jokingly pressured into putting on the £80 straddle. I didn't wanna spoil anyone's fun and the bigger straddles were getting limped a fair bit. Anyway it gets raised small and I call with A553cc. It comes K53r and I c/c deciding to check jam any non 4/6/7 turn. We were HU and the turn was a 7 putting out a fd. He potted it and I just folded. Pretty annoyed at myself. Think I should just pot flop and take it down most of the time.He showed 754x and I left next hand. I'm torn between playing in that/or similar games when shot taking. Like I don't wanna hnr or just double up and lock up but I also don't wanna be playing £5-10k pots on the reg.

Gunna go play DC tourney at DTD tonight then some DC cash after. Really looking forward to it as I haven't played DC in a while and have been doing some 5/6card PLO/hi/lo work.

Hope Neymar doesn't go deep in EPT Barca as it may disrupt his incoming transfer to United.

Hey guys,

Thought I'd update as it's been a few months since the last one and I've once again been dipping my toe into live poker. The WPT was at DTD this week and after playing some online satellites managed to win a couple of seats to the £500 event to go along with my main event seat I won in the deepstack a few months ago. The £500 event had a pretty good structure and, unfortunately for DTD, a ton of overlay. My first table was very good except for a live mid stakes cash grinder from London on my direct right, who turned out to be one of the nicest people I've ever played with and gave me a lift a few days this week. I chipped up pretty nicely to around 45k from 30k. I then opened UTG with T9s, sb and BB call. Flop A78 I cbet both call. Turn 6 sb leads 3k into around 12k and bb calls. I'd played with sb before and even though I think he plays a lot he's pretty splashy to say the least. I raise to 12k and sb insta shoves, obv call and nice to see AJ drawing dead to take me up over 100k. Went a bit card dead for the rest of the day and ended up with 95k to end the day which was around avg.
Day 2 got a fairly good table redraw. However was pretty card dead again and ended up shoving 17~BB in the CO with A9, BTN calls with AK and the board runs out K5299. Bink. They had to call me back as I'd left as the flop hit. Couple of orbits later I opened UTG with AQ, Terry Jordan 3bet from MP and although I'd never played with him before I'd heard he was ultra splashy/loose, so decided to 4bet. He called pretty quickly. Flop Q52, I bet around 1/4 pot and he let out a big sigh and mumbled something to the guy next to him. Turn was another 5 and I jammed fairly fast. He tanked for a while trying to bait me into showing if he folded, said I'd let him pick one and he folded turning over the Q. This didn't quell his curiosity and seemed to tilt him a bit. I chipped up nicely approaching the bubble and had double the avg. Got moved tables to the right of Tamer Kamel, who was also extremely nice and chatty, with the rest of the table playing ultra nitty because of the bubble. Got moved table just after the bubble, with a slew of players busting just after leaving around 100 left. Again went card dead and I became quite frustrated at having to fold a lot, and seeing my once big stack dwindle to avg. UTG then open shoves for 300k ish at 16k bb and we call with KK, he has 55 and the door card is a 5. I would have had around 1m if I had won there and I think this was the deciding factor in the tourney for me. I managed to ninja shortstack for the rest of the which ended with 51 left and another bubble with the top 50 getting a £2.2k main event seat. This lasted around an hour but I squeezed in there.

Day 3 was short. Had around 400k/13~bb. Managed to get a couple of shoves through with the field falling to the mid 30's. Then I shoved A5o with around 10bb and CambridgeAlex tanked in the BB with what turned out to be a better A, he sigh folded after a little thought and I was up to around 15bb. Then couple hands later I shoved the BTN with A9 and the BB had AJ, no help and we are down to 2.5bb. Double with K8 v Ax and then bust Q8 v Ax bvb. Every time I bust a live tourney I remember why I hardly play them. The feeling I get is one I never get from anything else. Just bleugh. The money cushions the blow a little and as I had 2 seats I got a drink, composed myself and jumped straight into the main.
Table was meh but I think I played really well. Nothing really interesting happened and I ended the day with an avg 75k. Day 2 seat draw was terrible. It included Rich Trigg, Terry Jordan again and Billy Chattaway to my right with absolute heaps. Very nice guy but fucking nightmare to sit next to. Couldn't get anything going and lost 99 v AQ for 20BB~. Was super disappointed to bust, especially as I'd sold a bit of action, but I don't think I could have done anything different.
Played some live plo cash and made a nice bit in a really good game. Highlight including an older guy not seeing a flush and 3bet calling the river with a straight vs my Acxc. Nearly £10k week which is very nice, but still pretty disappointed to go so deep in another live MTT and not get that big score. Maybe it gets easier if you play more and I intend to try and win something significant before Vegas.

Also started playing a lot of daily fantasy football (soccer). Absolutely loving it and been doing pretty well. It's tough at first as I haven't watched Italian/Spanish/French football in years, but I've enjoyed sweating the games. Kolorov missing that penalty the other week probably cost me winning the main weekend Prem comp which would have netted me £3k. Didn't have chance to sweat it live as I was busy, and it was prob for the best.

Online has been ok. Last month I won a rake race on one of the smaller sites to win 100% rakeback for the month. Traffic isn't great on there but enough to make it a pretty good month.

Between 22k hands to 28k hands was pretty big stakes for me, playing 3 handed with a reg and a whale at PLO.  Pretty stressful and a couple of my biggest ever pots were played. Pretty good month overall, even if a stressful one.

(http://i.imgur.com/illyIF1.png)

Gunna play a few sats for Prague this month. Would love to go ( heard it's very nice) and I've got the live poker bug. May play a few UKOPS as well for practice.

Hey guys,

Long time no update, haven't really had a lot to shout about tbh. Since the death of HU I've been putting a ton more hours and work into 6max plo and mixed games. Been grinding huge at zoom and been having some coaching from a very good player and one of the best coaching programmes I've seen. EVBB/100 winrate is pretty solid for zoom and I think I've progressed a lot as a player. Not completely sure I'm a big enough winner to make this my main game, and the normal non stars PLO games are a different world. Hardly anyone is balanced at all and every pot is at least 3 way. Unfortunately my mental game is pretty horrific at the minute. I've been getting super frustrated as of late, which is creeping into normal life, snapping at the gf (which I've never done) and just being generally agitated by simple things. I'm very aware of how swingy 6max plo can be, and know that I'm not entitled to win or that being a pro isn't easy. Just like I know flying is the safest, best way to travel, I'm terrified of it. Completely illogical but I'm getting tilted at the start of a session straight away losing a standard flip or 60/40. The swings have been huge in BB terms and have def been a by product of my mindset.

This is since around the time of the last update :(

(http://i.imgur.com/6NK37Rx.png?1)

Been grinding lots of 8game/stud/triple draw as well, as I'm going to Vegas for the first time for the WSOP. Going to be playing the first 2 weeks which include the:

$1500 8 game
$1500 HORSE
$1500 dealers choice
$1500 2-7
and a couple of PLO events. Might supplement this with the Colossus and a couple of small NL tourneys or just play some mixed/plo cash depending on whats around. So going to be grinding tons more in the run up and do I full schedule for SCOOP low and middle buyins. Never played an online tourney series and doubt I'm +EV in NL anymore but will be fun and I like a good leaderboard chase to keep me motivated. Hopefully things turn around results wise and I can keep a good mindset. Just going to be aiming to make the best decision every hand and not look at results till end of the week.

GL at the tables everyone

Hey guys,

Been pretty nice since the last update. Online has picked up (actually won some $$$), there's been some crazy good games pretty much all month. Live was going great too till I dropped £3k at DTD on Friday night. I think I ran bad for maybe half of that and spewed off the rest, which I hardly ever do live, it's just so needless. I also dropped $9k on Friday on non HEM sites, might of been tilted but I wasn't aware of it. This put me back to even on untracked sites for the month. Def run bad in 4/5 bet pots then, although I haven't got the hands to review I think I played pretty well.

Also booked Vegas. Flying out June 3rd for 2 weeks. Going to be playing 5-8 tourneys and cash grind the rest of the time. Guys in the Vegas thread on here were super helpful and gave some really good advice. Decided to spend a bit more on accommodation and stay at the MGM suites. Having a nice place to be when your burnt out/want a break from poker is def worth the extra few hundred quid I think. Have some action to sell, although I haven't yet made 300 posts as per the live staking forum rules, If people don't mind I'll make a thread? Some posters know who I am in real life if that's a concern? Really excited for it, first time actually playing proper poker in Vegas despite going twice before. Got all my meals planned out and a nice gym routine sorted.

Also going to be playing (and selling action) for the WPT at DTD in a couple of weeks. Really like the schedule (PLO!) and excited to get some practice in for Vegas. Probably going to be blogging everyday in Vegas/WPT if people want to hear it?

Haven't played a SCOOP yet but been busy with house stuff all this weekend. Looking to buy but finding the right one is a nightmare (especially with the missus). Not got any plans now beside WPT till Vegas so grinding hard and putting the hours into theory stuff is going to be about it.

(http://i.imgur.com/POd82iD.png)

(http://i.imgur.com/yAClleH.png)

Gl guys!

Hey

Keep the updates coming and all the best for Vegas.

How are the cash games in Vegas during the wsop?

I would have thought the would have been tougher with regs coming from all over.

Also, all the best for the new house, exciting times:d

Thanks man!

No idea about the cash games in Vegas while WSOP is on. I've been once before when the WSOP was on and the cash games at the Wynn were incredible. I'd think if you do your research before hand and play all the games you can always find yourself in a good game.

Cash games are supposed to be amazing at 1/3.

Have avg stack first break of the £300 6 max. Had 2 tough table draws early on but moved to a new one and seems a lot better.

18 left, just lost 99<AJ aipf, down to 20bb

Out in 15th with 6 paid, 99<KK, absolutely raging

If you're raging after this in #1 of the package hate to see what happens in a few weeks!

I'll be a wreck.

Think my bust out hand was fairly interesting.

I have 38k at 2400/1200/400 in the sb. There's 15 left with 6 paid, I'm probably one of the shorter stacks and from the looks of it there are a bunch of stacks between 50-100k. Playing 5 handed UTG min opens, he's been fairly tight for a few hours but has been short for most of it. He doubled twice in the last 10 hands or so, playing around 60k. BB looks to be fairly solid, is defending his BB well and doesn't seem to be squeezy or get out of line pre.

Is 99 a shove here?  How many BB do we have to flat/3bet? What's our overall shoving range here?

Pretty psyched to be jamming 99 here

We could go 9.8k/call I guess, we'd be getting 1.9 to 1 so too good a price to fold at any point imo, I haven't run the numbers though

Would jam up to 25bb with 99 here I guess

99 very very happy Jam. Assuming he's raising around 25%
And calling tighter than he should be.

Yeh I shoved without giving it much thought, assuming it was pretty standard. The fact I wasn't sure on how wide he'd be opening/calling off here kinda made me give it a second thought. Thanks for the responses guys. Plo starts at 5pm :)

Just started the £300 6 max PLO. We're out in the pavilion, sun is shining, started HU for 10 hands, 3 handed for a few hands both guys drinking beers and then the 2 guys that sat down took a selfie together. Going to be a fun one.

Not a great start. Got set over setted in a pretty big pot early on. Guy limps it's his first ever tourney, I limp behind otb with A886dd, bb pots it, he's been fairly active, 3bet me pre a couple of times. We both call. Flop K87hh bb bets quite large, other guy calls fairly quickly. I call. Turn is Ad giving me a fd. Bb bets, guy calls I shove for little more, both call. River is 6 and newbie man scoops with bare 45QQ, vs KKTx. Reloaded and have around 14k now going into 500bb. Will post thoughts on the hand later.

Been floating around 10-14k for ages then pot call off otb for 12bb w QJT9ss backdoor a straight v AA. Have 25k at 1k bb

Made a boat and doubled again, 34k at 1200 be

Doubled again to 70k AAvAA, skill game

2nd in chips I think with 12 left, 7 paid

Spin, spin, spin!

Have avg going into final table of 7

Sorry guys couldn't get on blonde earlier for some reason. Chopped it HU for £5k. Had a 2/1 chip lead and did an icm chop. Would like to have played HU but was around 50bb effective and it was 4am. Think getting some sleep before the main today was prob worth more than the ev of the extra £700 we would have played for. Having said that really struggling to get some quality sleep. Will post some hands and overall tourney report while I play the main.

wpwp, gl in the main

Wpwp you chopped with my friend Steve who sent me a photo with the trophy.

Gl today

Nice One, very well done.

It was a rough start to the package but glad things finally turned around. Boom ;)

Thanks guys!



Absolute gent Steve, played really well too.

Just sat down for the main, which is starting 6 handed which is nice. First win w 67 on A668T 3 way. Def missed a raise in there somewhere. Absolutely raging. Up to 40k.

Congrats!

Don't get angry, things happen :)

Good job last night.

Love the catchphrase, absolutely raging

heres my notes for todays session, maybe use them too :)

ENJOY THE PUZZLES 

FAILURE WILL HAPPEN

BOUNCEBACKABILITY

COMPOSURE

PROFESSIONAL

DISCIPLINE

RELENTLESS

BE PROUD

Thanks Pads. Enjoy the puzzles is my new fav saying in poker haha.

Finished day 1 of the main with 80k coming back to 2kbb. Had a nice table and nearly double avg with 2 hours left but went super card dead.

Will prob end up doing a big write up for all the tourneys on Monday. Pretty tired at the end of these days and hate writing on my phone. Will still keep doing small updates.

Doubled up few hands into day 2. 88>AK, turned a boat, skill game. Got just over avg now 130k at 2kbb, nice table.

Lovely job, very well dine.

Thanks Tikay.

Pretty roller coaster first 2 levels. Been as low as 35k and at 140k now at 3kbb.

Lost AQdd v A8cc on 4c5c7d,9d,Qc for a fair chunk. Then defended bb w K8 5 way and flopped a boat, got some nice value from KQ then next hand sqz 99, flop QT9. Fair to say the PLO tourneys was far less variancey.

5bet got in AxKh v AQss for 300+k pot, board ran out AhJh6x7hQ

In the money with 30bb

Busto 91st, K9<TT on ATK9 defending the bb w20bb. Surprisingly no rage.

Big write up incoming!!!!!

Had a great weekend at the WPT at DTD this weekend. They put on a brilliant event as ever and the poker went ok. One thing caught my eye. I never seen so many women playing at once. I had a table that was half women in the main for a while. Very pleasing to see and the majority I played with played well. Don't know if it was an accessibility thing with PartyPoker or just variance but hope the trend continues.

First event was the 6max NL. Not my strongest game by any stretch of the imagination but thought I played fairly well.  Very annoying to be cruising all tourney then lose 2 hands and be out, but I guess that's the nature of the beast.

Was super excited for the PLO tourney. I've played very few PLO tourneys (2 live now I think) but think I adjust well to them, low variance, patient etc. People were def making some pretty big mistakes imo. Punting off 20bb+ stacks all in pre with average hands. I think it's very easy to play short (15-6bb) as there is no antes and defending BB is easier and people are way less aggro pre than I think they should be. Everyone was also much happier and having fun than from what I've experienced from live tourneys. Lots of people drinking, showing each other cards etc. I was short early on, busted the first one 2 bullets as it was a double chance. Guy who's first time it was playing limps, I limp btn with A886ss and BB sqz pot. Think this is close pre. Hand flops very polarised and the newb man will be making some huge mistakes, + I think the BB (for the avg player) will play pretty face up. Flop is K87hh, BB pots it and after a call I decide to call and ship for a little more than pot on safe turns. Turn is A giving me a fd. BB is prob potting any AAxx combo, any K+gs/fd, any pair+u/d, any pair+fd and the rec players cold calling range can be huge. Was pretty happy to get it in, however BB had bare KK and other guy had QQ45, river is a 6 and he scoops.
Was a pretty uneventful grind after this. Had 15k (starting stack) for the next 4 hours, dwindling down to 7bb at one point. However caught a bit of heat and doubled up a couple of times. Table then went 4 handed with a dead stack (god knows where he went). Was me, Marcel Luske and some fairly tight guy. Marcel was sb when I was btn and dead stack was BB. Won a lot of pots in this situation. He played prob the best of anyone in the tourney but was def susceptible to non standard lines. I raise J68T, he defends. Flop A75r, i bet he calls. Turn 9 he checks, I check behind. River J he bets quite large, I raise fairly large and he insta calls w AJxx, said he was c/f turn.
Down to 2 tables and my table draw was great, then got moved to the other table, 4 handed, 2 deep stacks to my left and both were pretty aggro. Found it really tough to adjust to bubble play with 4 very short stacks on the next table. I just nitted up a lot. Bubble burst at 7 players and play loosened up a lot. Managed to make straight flushes in back to back hands (same suit, same straight) to give me a good amount of chips. 2nd time was a huge cooler, I checked behind u/d+bdfd, he bet turn when I turned a wrap+fd and c/r all in when the river was a heart. He had set with nut flush. Pretty sick tbf. 3 handed the shorty refused a chop (which I would have done in his shoes) and I busted him couple of hands later. He limp raised AAxx bvb and I called with QT67ss, flop 568ss, gg sir. We were 50bb effective HU and it was 4am. HUPLO is my fave game but for the extra £700 and maybe hour+ of play I decided to chop. He gave me an extra £100 for the trophy and we both walked out pretty happy.

Had an awful nights sleep that night and woke up for the main pretty groggy. Starting table was great however. Chipped up to around 40k from 30k starting stack early on. Couple unsuccessful bluffs later and then a hand I played pretty poorly and I was down to 11k. Old man CO raises, I 3bet JTcc, he calls. Flop 523cc, I bet he calls, turn 5, I bet he shoves for a little over min raise. Absolutely hating life, don't think I'm ever getting odds vs his range and could well be drawing dead. I sigh call and he flips over A4cc. Bleugh. Such a silly hand to play, needless. I double up AK v TT, river K, then catch a bit of heat after, knocking a couple of shortstacks out and chipping up nicely. I don't think I really tilt playing live. Having that 2-3 mins of doing nothing between playable hands really helps me, and I think I can cool down from poorly played situations well. Online 6max plo is wayyyy different. I can lose my head at times, lose 10-20 BI pretty quick. So easy to do online multitabling plo. Think it's one of the reasons I never got on with online tourneys. Too easy to play bad/tilt and then just shove, bust a tourney and shut everything down and walk away. Have no discipline to grind out a short stack online, too many more stimulating things to do. Live you're trapped though. It's 30mins+ to get home, effort to get there, you have to look at whoever knocked you out, raging inside that you put so much effort into being good and some rando $22 qualifier can sit and laugh as they stack your chips up you just tilted off. Nah **** them, I'm gunna stay here and grind 11bb, no satisfaction for them.
I get moved tables and fluctuate between 60-110k. Caught myself a couple of times thinking, you should be folding that river, in fair sized pots. I really am a sucker for odds/ranges etc, have absolutely no feel game, live reads etc. Really gotta work on this to avoid spots like that. Bag up 80k~ at the end of the day, not entirely happy with my play but always stoked to bag up chips.

Day 2 and the table draw is a weird one. Have a semi whale 2 to my right, Terry Jordan (who is a notorious loose goose, very nice chap though) to my left, a couple of guys I played with day 1 who are pretty tight and the others fishy looking. Should be over the moon but found myself in awkward situations a lot throughout the day. Trying to iso a whale, only to have someone cold call your 3bets to your direct left can get tedious quickly. Swap us around and I disappointed to not be one of the chipleaders at the end of the day. Needless to say the day was pretty swingy.
I was disappointed in my play around the bubble. Just totally froze and played like a huge nit. With the 2 guys to my left and right 3/4xing and seemingly not bothered about busting and just folded nearly every hand. Won a big pot when I open co, btn calls (obv) and sb sqz. I ship AK and he calls AQ. That was for nearly double avg and didn't really play a pot after that till the bubble burst.
Bust out hand was pretty interesting. I think Danshreddies (of markup time of the year again thread fame) had been moved to our table a couple of hours before. He played quite well, fairly loose and aggro. He opens HJ and I defend with K9o, playing 20bb. He cbets AKTr and I call. His sizing was on the larger side and was only 4 black (5k) chips. He'd usually been betting a mixture of 5k and 1k chips. However I think he cbets here close to 100%. I'm fairly capped pre and have a ton of weak bluffcatchers (although I do have all my QJ combos) and think he has a significant range advantage as I'm defending here fairly wide. Turn is a 9 bringing a bdfd. He shoves for what might be a little over pot. Not sure why he chose this hand with this sizing. Infact it's really irritated me. My continuing range has maybe 4 outs at best vs his hand and given pre not sure what he's trying to achieve. Unless he's thinking lol set bet/allin, but I think he's way better at NL tournaments than me so must be some other reason. I'm either a level ahead or a level behind here, no clue which. Felt pretty silly snapping him off and being near dead. Talked with a couple of really good NL players and they agree they'd snap here given everything. They don't play tourneys though so would love to hear some feedback from everyone.

Busted mid way through the bounty tourney entry period, but felt it wouldn't be a good decision to play and just went home. Nice to get some profit on my first package for people who have invested. Very excited for Vegas now. Can't wait to get stuck in!!!!!!!

Yeah bustout seems fine, he should slowplay some better hands and plenty of draws are there. I can't imagine folding this being good vs him. I think shoving QJ would be much better than TT in his spot but its probably the right play still as splitting sizings will get messy and the spr is probably too awkward to fire two. Maybe he should size flop bigger as a lot of our hands are one and done and all his bluffs want to apply maximum pressure so they can make an easier turn shove with his backdoored equity. I'd have gone small on the flop with our range advantage in his seat as I'd be cbetting so much (I imagine but can't be sure without being in the seat) but I can see situations where a two street strategy is better.

Thanks for the feedback.

All packed and ready to catch the train down to Gatwick. On the 10:30 flight tomorrow morning. Would be fair to say I'd be quite excited if it wasn't for the fact I'm terrified of flying. Coincidentally a friend of mine is on the same flight with a stag party. Think I might join them for a few nerve settlers tomorrow morning. Absolutely heartbreaking to leave the missus this morning though. We haven't been apart for more than a week for the last 3 years. She's such a gem and always super supportive. Will be hard out there without that.

Last month went well. Low volume online but some great 5/10 games were around and 8game was amazing around SCOOP. Played only a few SCOOPS, 0/8 I think. WPT was a really big confidence boost, and was fortunate to run very good. I've also ran very good at live DC. Think I'm 6/6 on multi way AIPF at 6 card plo hi/lo for big pots. 

(http://i.imgur.com/5U4n6xs.png)

Will be updating in her everyday, and frequently on twitter- @wilblwforpinkit

Good to meet you at Gatters this morning John, hope you enjoy the flight. :)

Sorry I pestered you with questions, but it's good to learn stuff, I'm like a sponge, I try to soak it all up.

Hope you don't think I am being rude, but are you sure you are over 21?

Think you will need to take ID with you everywhere in Vegas, they ain't ever gonna believe you.

Thanks Tikay! Pleasure meeting you too. Any time you've got a question always happy to try and help. Still get ID for lottery tickets haha.

Flight to Vegas was ok. Having a really hard time adjusting to the time difference though. Think I was up 28 hours Thursday-friday and only slept for 5 hours last night. Have some kind of cold as well so going to be skipping the Goliath at 7pm today. Hope to get some proper rest and be ready for the DC tomorrow. Going to be my first Wsop event so pretty buzzing. Hope I feel better/fresher. Feeling pretty spaced out atm.

Completely normal for Vegas, takes a few days to adjust to the time difference.
The cold a common thing too, it's the air-con. I get cold/flu symptoms every time I go.
As Teeks mentioned you will carded everywhere.

GL out there, hope you get the lot

Thanks man.

Sorry for the lack of updates guys. My phone is being really sketchy with the wifi in some hotels.
Just busted the $1500 DC tourney. By the looks of it I got a fairly tough table. Lost a fair sized Big O pot early on in lvl 1, river completed a flush and counterfeited my low with a set. Ran very card dead in the stud games and a couple of guys picked badeucy which is my weakest game by farrrrrrr. They played it very well and I was def out of my depth. Busted in PLO half way through lvl 3. Raised btn with AdJT3, called by sb. Flop KT3dd, I bet he calls, turn J c/c, river 7d he bets 1/3ish pot and I jam for just under pot. He sigh calls Kdxd. Disappointed and kinda sad to bust as it was my first Wsop event and the one I was looking forward to most. Would have loved to play more but fairly happy with how I played.

Just regged for the $1100 MSPT at Venetian today. Grinding some cash before hand. Rather tedious game for thinking about things I'm missing from home.

1. Being able to cross the road wherever and whenever you want.
2. Bacon roll with brown sauce from McDonald's.
3. People walking in the direction they're looking.
4. The openings raise at 1/2 PLO being single digits.
5. The missus (obv in case she ever reads this)

No. 4 is making my head hurt.

Max open at 1/2 in the Wynn is $15. No idea how that works. You can straddle the btn for $10 as well. Very annoying.

6. Temperate conditions

7. Making it to the antes

Just about to sit down for the $1500 8 game. Really looking forward to this, hope to make it past lvl 3 this time.

Best of luck!

Thanks man!

Made the first break. 11k from 7.5k starting. Table is great.

Where are you?

I'm reporting this event - clue: I'm not the bald one :)

Sorry couldn't get on blonde for the last few hours. Made day 2 with 50k, 112 left 76~ itm I think. Loves this tournament.

107 left, 74 paid.

I'll keep an eye out tomorrow.

Just sat down for the 8 game. Table looks tough. Probably have to enjoy a lot of puzzles today.

Good Luck!

BOL!

Out in 80th, didn't win a hand all day, played awful.

Ok guys, sorry for the delay.
First few days felt pretty ill. Had cold like symptoms and pretty bad jet lag. Was awake for 35+ hours between leaving
my house and finally getting some sleep in Vegas, then only slept 4 hours before being wide awake.So I decided not to play
the Goliath and rest up for the next tourney.
Had a good 12 hours before the first tourney on Saturday, which was the $1500 DC WSOP event. Really excited for this, as it was
the event I was looking forward to most and my first ever WSOP event. Table draw was very meh, kinda recognised a couple
of the players and they were all American, which meant lots of Badeucy/Badacey, which are by far my weakest games. Lasted
just over 2 levels, losing most of my chips in Big O and PLO. Bustout hand I bet/check/shoved w AdJTx btn v sb on JdTdxAxd.
SB bet just over a 3rd pot on the river and I jammed for a little under pot. He thought about it for a good while. Really
don't like bluffing here vs random as people don't like folding flushes and he eventually called with Kdxd.

Next tourney was the MSPT $1k at Venetian. Woke up pretty early, so headed down there and played an hour or so of low stakes
NLHE to get a feel for the room/chips etc. Got nothing going here, table was pretty loose and fun but had no hands in pos
and ended up check folding multi way a few times. Dwindled down and lost a fairly big pot with JTcc v A9cc on ccxcx, I had
the lead on the river and though about shoving for just over pot after bet,call/bet,call 3 way, they changed my mind to
check jam then to check call after some deliberation. This left me with about 15bb, and I jammed over a late pos raise
wA3cc and ran into AK and AK.
Loved this tourney, the guarantee, buyin, chips, room (was out by the sports book) and regretted not firing a 2nd/3rd bullet.

Next up was the 8 game. Had a pretty nice table to start but soon turned tough with DJK to my left and some guy with tons of cashes to my right (forget his name).
Played really well all day though, and steadily built up to around 50k at the end of the day. This was nearly double the avg. Day 2 and I got
a really bad table draw. Portuguese pro to my right, Gavin Griffin to my left, some guy they all knew as well and a couple of American guys.
Ran bad first rotation of triple draw, bricking a 1 draw twice, 3 hands in a row. Then played very bad after. Tried to bluff the Portuguese man
in stud 8 w (KK) A236 (J) vs pretty obvious bare AA which I wasn't proud of and that left me extremely short. Tried to fold my way into the money
but busted in triple draw with 2 BB drawing 2 then 1,1 vs 3,2,1, he made a T vs my J and that was that.

Obv missed the millymaker due to day 2 of the 8 game, but felt so down from the way I played that day 2 that I though best not to play anymore
tourneys for the trip.

Thanks to everyone for investing, really sorry for lack of updates post Vegas but it's been quite hectic and annoying to not have internet.
Refunds will be posted back the way they came unless you PM me otherwise and I'll be giving all investors a % freeroll to my next $500+ tourney for
the inconvenience caused.

Refunds coming back-

$600- Goliath
$1500 Millymaker

both missed.

$2100 altogether.

Hey guys,

Had a pretty good month poker wise. Action has been ridiculously good and I've ran very well. Had a pretty slow start after Vegas and moving house. Was on 3G internet for the first 10 days due to internet not being installed and I cut out in a couple of big pots. Really annoyed as it was on sites without disconnection protection. Was struggling to play more than 1k hands a day for the first couple of weeks, but got my stamina back for staring at screens and have been closing in on 3k hands a day for the past few days. Really aiming for a big volume month next month. Action is amazing (which is unusual for summer) and I really want to take advantage by putting in tons of volume.

The house move went pretty smooth apart from some (very heavy) mirrored furniture turning up cracked. The delivery guys refused to carry it upstairs so me and the missus' Dad had to carry it up and down 3 floors a couple of times. Solid leg workout though. Really loving village life. There's a really nice local pub and the locals are very friendly. Been running a lot more, which I missed when living in Notts centre. So much nicer to do it in the countryside. Now we're all settled in we're looking at getting a dog. It's a flip between a Corgi and a miniature Dachshund.I'm leaning more towards the Corgi as I've heard the Dachshund have bad health problems and can be little menaces.  

I've been sweating the golf pretty hard. Really enjoying fantasy golf on Draftkings. Not sure I'm a winning player yet but have had pretty solid results so far. Will be looking at going big on fantasy stuff when the football season kicks off. Some of the lobbies are (were last season) pretty soft and I think you can grind out a decent profit with a little bit of work.

If anyone knows any good NL tourney coaches, drop me and PM please. I played maybe 20 sats for various things and I feel I'm way out of my depth. Vegas gave me the itch to get out and do a bit more travelling for poker and there's a nice schedule of stuff coming up. Possibly going to head to the Goliath this weekend to meet up with some friends and play some cash. Anyone been before and know what the cash scene is like (what they spread, limits etc)?

(https://s31.postimg.org/4ib9mk8cb/Results.png)

(https://s31.postimg.org/jpjf2iv0b/Results1.png)

Anyone know how to post HH on here? Have a few cool/interesting ones.

Gl at the tables guys!

Hey buddy.
 
I got some MTT coaching from Alex Goulder last year, he was very good and would highly recommend  him. He has got an excellent knowledge of all aspects of MTT's and a sharp poker mind.

New house sounds awesome, enjoy!

 

Have been finding myself increasingly procrastinating during the day if good games aren't running, motivation is low. So to give myself a kick up the arse I've decided to do a bit of coaching. Anyone who plays micro/small stakes plo wants to send me some footage (30 misish) along with their database (optional but imo more important and useful than live footage) or would like a live sweat (would be recorded on my end) and who don't mind the results to be posted/discussed in here, reply to this or pm me. Might be just the one off or could turn into a regular thing depending on how we get on. Totally free of course.

Hey guys,

Last month was pretty much a carbon copy of July, same amount won/over EV, same terrible volume. I need 65k hands to reach my VIP level goal so I'm going to do it this month. I'll be dishing out freebies to regular posters in this thread if I don't make certain targets, I'm way behind already so Shipitgood (for the tourney coach advice) and Tightend (for the Party help) both get either $109 ticket on Stars or Party for a WCOOP/Powerfest tourney, 70/30 chop to them, PM me for preference. Hoping to take some 5/10 shots this month. With WCOOP on games should be running and I'm keen to dip my toe with the best. Played a few WCOOP's and Party sats and I haven't been enjoying it one bit. This is the time I can now say I'll never be a profitable online tourney player. I haven't got any inclination to get better and really don't enjoy playing them at all. Weird how live tourney is my fav poker variant and online tourney my least.

Had no interest for PLO coaching but the offer is still open for now.

(https://s9.postimg.org/pp6yd5enz/Results.png)

(https://s9.postimg.org/rrsr4ilf3/Results1.png)

I'll be posting interesting HH in here and regular contributors will be top of the list for any potential freerolls.

Target 65000 hands
Played 595 hands (lol)

Anyone playing this diff? What do we do OTR? Range for calling river if we're folding this hand?

$1/$2 Pot Limit Omaha Cash, 6 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

SB: $200 (100 bb)
Hero (BB): $1,108.44 (554.2 bb)
UTG: $219.60 (109.8 bb)
MP: $272.43 (136.2 bb)
CO: $396 (198 bb)
BTN: $105.34 (52.7 bb)

Preflop: Hero is BB with Ks Jc 2h Ad
4 folds, SB completes, Hero raises to $6, SB calls $4

Flop: ($12) 8d 3s Kd (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $8, SB raises to $26, Hero calls $18

Turn: ($64) 2s (2 players)
SB bets $48, Hero calls $48

River: ($160) 9s (2 players)
SB bets $120 and is all-in, Hero?

Results: $400 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: 8d 3s Kd 2s 9s

Did you get an MTT coach? I'd recommend Buffyslayer if you want somebody reasonable priced and English.

Hey

Thanks for the offer, that's very kind of you, but I'm cool bud thank you.

That's really surprising no Omaha players took you up on your generous offer.

With MTT's, 6 max games are amazing, constant action, so much fun + they're normally over in a few hours. 9 max online games can be tedious.

All the best with your shot at 5/10, just Omaha, Or any NL?

Thanks Pads

Yeh just PLO, wouldn't dare step anywhere near a 5/10NL game nowadays.

I think in order for calling down i that hand to be really good the flop just needs to a be a little wetter... like K85, I know this way he has more diamond flushes when a diamond hits but when he just has so few consistent semi bluffs by the turn you're likely playing into a pretty strong range which gives your made hands showdown value (K2) a lot less value.

I think you just need tiniest bit more equity OTT, like AK52.

As for the river can see why you tempted to call with the Ks in your hand and the 8s on the board...

I think the flop is a fold. agree what suuprlim says. it's too uncoordinated for villain to have a light enough c/r for us to continue.
all of 88xx/33xx hands play close to this exact way pre/post flop with 100bigs and probs K8 too. Range for calling river is spades and sets for me

Hey guys,

Fell fairly short of my hands goal this month but for a good reason this time. Got a miniature Dachshund puppy just over 3 weeks ago. He might be the cutest dog I've ever seen and I love him to bits. Me and the Mrs are over the moon with him. He is (and I assume all puppies are) quite hard work. We've been crate training him and that involves letting him out for a wee every 2-3 hours per night. So I've been on the night grind, which works out kinda well as I get a little 10 min break from grinding every couple of hours then the Mrs gets up with him at 7am when I go to sleep. He hardly ever pees inside now but still hasn't cracked pooping outside. He loves to go toilet on rugs/mats and the Mrs has a few nice deep fluffly white rugs dotted around so we're watching him like a hawk after every meal/water break.

(https://s13.postimg.org/z7cq0v4af/IMG_0297.jpg)
(https://s14.postimg.org/5hcpabo8x/IMG_0324.jpg)

Grinding has been going well again this month. Cherry picked the best 5/10 games and been focusing on 1/2 tabling while doing this. The regs are pretty much the same so it's really just getting used to the $ amounts again. Haven't really put in any kind of volume this high this year so just getting back into the swing of things. Also got a small bug for limit O8. I think the games are good but I'm not 100% on my ability to spot leaks for O8 players yet.
Pulled the trigger on some fairly expensive coaching this week as well. Really really excited to get cracking with it, seems like a lot of work and will for sure push me beyond anything I've done poker wise in my entire career. Putting a goal of shot taking 10/20 zoom on Stars by the time SCOOP comes around next year. Think this is prob the toughest game that runs reg online semi often that isn't silly stakes. Would be delighted to be able to hold my own in these games.
Undecided whether to play the WPT at DTD this month. I'm itching to play some live poker, and the cash games are always unbelievable around this time. But got tons or prep work to do for the coaching and action is too good online to sink 7-10 days into a shitty tourney ROI. Might take an iPad and grind some 8game online at the same time, though I hate people who do this so might just stay home.

6max PLO
(https://s9.postimg.org/9ujp3quf3/Results1.png)

6max O8
(https://s15.postimg.org/61gdpa563/Results2.png)

Biggest hands

$5/$10 Pot Limit Omaha Cash, 5 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

SB: $3,177.55 (317.8 bb)
BB: $1,089.33 (108.9 bb)
Hero (MP): $1,785.87 (178.6 bb)
CO: $1,000 (100 bb)
BTN: $2,542.01 (254.2 bb)

Preflop: Hero is MP with Kh Jc Ad 8d
Hero raises to $35, 2 folds, SB raises to $115, BB folds, Hero calls $80

Flop: ($240) Jh 8s 6h (2 players)
SB bets $237, Hero calls $237

Turn: ($714) 4d (2 players)
SB bets $610, Hero raises to $1,433.87 and is all-in, SB calls $823.87

River: ($3,581.74) 6s (2 players, 1 is all-in)

Results: $3,581.74 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: Jh 8s 6h 4d 6s
SB showed Qh Th 9s Ks and lost (-$1,785.87 net)
Hero showed Kh Jc Ad 8d and won $3,578.74 ($1,792.87 net)

$3/$6 Pot Limit Omaha Cash, 6 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

SB: $594 (99 bb)
Hero (BB): $1,648.54 (274.8 bb)
UTG: $742.95 (123.8 bb)
MP: $1,671.20 (278.5 bb)
CO: $435.20 (72.5 bb)
BTN: $1,234.06 (205.7 bb)

Preflop: Hero is BB with Ac Ah Td 8d
2 folds, CO raises to $21, BTN raises to $72, SB folds, Hero calls $66, CO raises to $288, BTN calls $216, Hero raises to $1,152, CO calls $147.20 and is all-in, BTN calls $864

Flop: ($2,742.20) 2s 2c 5d (3 players, 1 is all-in)
Hero bets $496.54 and is all-in, BTN calls $82.06 and is all-in

Turn: ($2,906.32) 6d (3 players, 3 are all-in)
River: ($2,906.32) Qc (3 players, 3 are all-in)

Results: $2,906.32 pot ($3.00 rake)
Final Board: 2s 2c 5d 6d Qc
Hero showed Ac Ah Td 8d and won $2,903.32 ($1,669.26 net)
CO showed 5c 4c Kc Ks and lost (-$435.20 net)
BTN showed Kd 9d 7h Jc and lost (-$1,234.06 net)

$20/$40 Limit Omaha H/L Cash, 6 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

SB: $3,320.93 (83 bb)
BB: $800 (20 bb)
UTG: $3,472.75 (86.8 bb)
MP: $965.50 (24.1 bb)
CO: $1,665.78 (41.6 bb)
Hero (BTN): $817 (20.4 bb)

Preflop: Hero is BTN with 5s Ah 9d 2h
UTG raises to $80, MP calls $80, CO raises to $120, Hero calls $120, 2 folds, UTG calls $40, MP calls $40

Flop: ($540) Kd 8s 5c (4 players)
UTG checks, MP bets $40, CO calls $40, Hero calls $40, UTG calls $40

Turn: ($700) 7d (4 players)
UTG checks, MP bets $80, CO calls $80, Hero calls $80, UTG calls $80

River: ($1,020) 9s (4 players)
UTG checks, MP checks, CO checks, Hero bets $80, UTG raises to $160, MP folds, CO calls $160, Hero calls $80

Results: $1,500 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: Kd 8s 5c 7d 9s
UTG showed 6c Js Jd Ac and lost (-$400 net)
MP mucked and lost (-$240 net)
CO mucked and lost (-$400 net)
Hero showed 5s Ah 9d 2h and won $1,497 ($1,097 net)

Dog advice
Feed him outside after you've eaten
He will know his place n where to do his bizzness
Was advice given to me
It still works

Thanks mate, I'll give this a try.

Your puppy is beautiful! Don't be fooled by their small size and big eyes, they can be naughty too and need strict boundaries! I have a 13 year old dachshund cross and she still tries it on every day!

Thanks! Haha tell me about it, he's currently in a chewy stage, wood being a particular penchant of his. Nightmare.

Ours gets very possessive over stones! Don't ask me why...

Hey guys,

This month has been pretty good poker wise. Volume is still lacking however I've been doing a lot of off the table work, revolving around a new coaching program. Played quite of limit O8 as well, games seem amazing and it's great having something new to work on.
This is my breakdown of stakes played this month.
(https://i.gyazo.com/b17c7254f9fef9d9da7831c6efe37e6c.png)
Quite a varied mix but I'm just concentrating playing the most +EV spots, whether that be a great table at 1/2 or battling 3 handed at 3/6,5/10 with meh regs, or shot taking 25/50 in good games. Got used to setting all my results into EVBB/100 till the end of the week so it doesn't affect my play. Bit of a sweat at the end of the week but seems to be working out.
Played a fair few sats for the WPT this week as well. Party have been doing a great job of putting on huge sat guarantees and with the new software has been a really enjoyable grind. Managed to bink a few 500 seats and a Devilfish cup seat. Played prob my best NL poker in a while during the DFC sat and managed to fade AQ v K3 AIPF with 6 left, 5 paid when I was 6/6. 6th was $2.4k so wouldn't have been that bad. Haven't managed to sell any action for it, which is obv completely understandable. Haven't got any results or experience of 5k tourneys, although the way the sats played I think there will be a fair few spots. Hope to run good with the table draw and just play solid.
Later today is day 2 of the WPT500. Managed to make it through with 23bb. Not ideal but a little bit of run good at the beginning and should hope to make a deep run again. DFC is tomorrow then the I'm playing the main on Wednesday. Think a few blonde regs will be playing so will be nice to meet a few of you. Come say hi, I'll be the kid with the hoodie and headphones on. DTD always put on cracking festivals and I've been looking forward to this one for a while. Hope the cash games run like in the previous years. Games have been great and the mix of people playing always makes for fun games.

Nothing else really to report. The dog is still doing good, managed to sort the toilet problems out so now it's just a matter of wearing him out enough throughout the day.

(https://i.gyazo.com/f4c4826b88913776de1bb7c75c9ad9ff.png)

Good luck everyone playing the WPT, see you there!

You will stand out like a sore thumb I'm sure! 😉 That's like me saying to someone my wife is the small lady with straight black hair... In China! They weren't impressed lol! Gl in the tournaments, well done for the results and the dog training, keep up the good work

Thanks man!

Finished day 2 of the WPT500 as joint chipleader with 2.2m coming back to 25/50k. If I run tomorrow as good as I did today I will be £150k richer without a doubt.

GOGOGOGO! Best of luck!  Aspades  Ahrt

Busto 22nd AQ<55. Went a bit card dead and prob a bit to tight when down to around 20bb. Devilfish cup now, this should be fun.

Made day 2 with 27bb but just doubled JJ>AT. Both days have had bad table draws but playing okish.

Bleugh had 300 when avg was 120k then played a ridiculous 400k pot playing silly buggers. The lost last 15bb A9<55. Not my finest hour :(

Just sat down for day 1 of the main, table looks good. Let's goooooo

Busted the main. Called a 3bet w ThTs UTG+1 vs MP, c/c K87ss, led Js turn and jammed x river, man had A6ss for the best possible hand. Not sure about the hand yet, I'll post thoughts on that hand and some more interesting spots that have come up this week soon.

Hey guys,

Last month was a kinda frustrating one. Started off with the WPT event at DTD. Great series (as ever with DTD) and was a really enjoyable week on the tourney grind. Sat'd in to all the events and had been doing a bit of NL work in the run up to it, while playing the sats. Played day 1 of the 500 event online at the same time as the Devilfish cup sat, which was taking all of my focus. Can't really remember much of it but I ended the day with 65k~ which was around 23bb, so didn't really have high hopes travelling to DTD on the Sunday. Managed a nice spin up though, won a flip to double up then won maybe 8/8 allins after, knocking out short stacks including AJ>AA vs a very nice friendly amateur which did not feel nice. Got moved tables and then played a huge hand where I flat AKcc UTG+1 v UTG, it goes 4 ways and the flop is xcxcxc. UTG leads I flat everyone folds. Turn is an offsuit Q and he overbet jams maybe 1.5x pot, snap and he has JcTc for a huge cooler and the chiplead. Then lost JJ<AK<98 in a 3 way allin, 98 rivering a straight and won a couple more small allins ending the day joint chipleader. Day 3 was just meh all round. Ran a bit card dead but def played a bit too tight in spots where I should have been opening wider and putting pressure on people. Hovered around the same stack all day which put me at 15bb when I jam AQ in co and sb calls (12bb) with 55. Board ran out Q76 4 3 for maximum pain and then busted 2 hands late in 22nd. Trundled off to the cashier after another deep run in this event with my sad face on, had a drink and a moan to myself then jumped straight into the Devilfish cup.

Table draw for this was pretty bad with Firaldo, Simon Deadman, some guy I kinda from playing HU with online who is very good, and 2 DTD cash regs to my left. First interesting hand UTG (HU man) opens I 3bet Tc9c, this is usually a flat for me but I know HU man is opening wider than most here and Firaldo was squeezing very wide and aggressively and he was BTN this hand. Everyone folds and UTG 4bets. We were over 100bbs deep here so very standard flat I think. Flop KT8c he bets I call. Turn 7c he bets small again and I think a shove here is fine. I have all my KK,TT combos some 2 pairs and big combo draws are probably the worst hands I'm shoving. He tanks for ages and eventually folds. Lost a lot of small to medium pots after this. I was definitely one of the spots at the table (maybe 2nd worst player) and I got ran over a bit. Next interesting hand Firaldo opens UTG and it goes 5 way to me in the sb with 20bb and T8dd, flick in my 1 extra bb and go to a flop of T7T. Maybe I should be leading here in a vacuum but range wise with my stack I don't think I can be balanced enough here to have a leading range. Checks round and the turn is a 2. I lead leaving me with 14bb~ everyone folds round to the BTN who shoves. Such a ridic spot. Think I don't have any bluffs here, beat 0 for value and don't think with 14bb left and a PSR of 1 BTN should have any bluffs, esp when I'm leading into 5 people. So I sigh fold turning over my T and he shows 98o. Table is pretty shocked I folded but I don't think I can call there. From there I win KQ>KJ AIPF and AQ>AJ and end the day with 27bb.
Day 2 table draw is meh again. Have Firaldo again on my table who re late regged, Mitch, and 2 more DTD cash regs again to my left. Flopped a couple of sets and chipped up nicely though. Then I raise 9c7c in co, sb who I recognised from DTD (think he won one of the EPT 10k's and generally plays pretty high stakes tourneys) flats. Flop Q79r I bet he calls. Turn 4 he leads I raise he calls. River 2 and he jams for pot~. No idea whats going on here but 2 pair and that so I called and he showed AA. Nice bluff mate. Cruising at this point and chip up to around 300k. Then played a pretty stupid hand. I had been limping 100% sb v bb vs this DTD reg, so complete J9o and he raises to 3x, I call and the flop is J88r. He bets every small I call, turn 7 and he now pots it. Think this should just be a call but I decided to raise 2.7x his bet. Think it puts him in a tough spot with overpairs, Jx and I'm completely uncapped range wise, block the straight,JJ and have proximity blockers to his 8x. He calls and I had decided to shut down on all rivers bar a T, which it obv was. I bet half pottish, maybe a check is better, but I didn't want him to check back overpairs or 8x. He jams and I tank fold cursing myself for not checking. But in hindsight maybe a c/f would have been better anyway. I fold and he later told me (couple days later) he had T8. This was with around 50 left and 300k was double avg. Should have just nitted it up and played solid, £10k min cash with 90% action is pretty big for me and doing stuff like this is mainly just an ego thing I think. Busted a few hands later anyway losing A9<55 for 20bb.

Main was next up. First table was an absolute dream. Only recognised one person to my left who is a good live tourney player but everyone else looked like qualifiers. Played a couple of fun hands. First hand co opens, BTN calls, I defend bb with T6o. Flop 78x, checks round. Turn is a J, I lead and BTN calls. River J and BTN leads out of turn for half pot. I ask the dealer what happens now, while the bettor aggressively stares at me. Think this is a pretty common live tell for weakness in amateurs so after confirming with the dealer that his bet stands I raise fairly large. He folds and I obv have to show. Then I open AdTd UTG get 3 callers and go to a flop of 5d7d3x. I check and it checks round. Turn is an A checks round to the BTN who bets, I'm only caller. River is Kd. I check he bets and I think a little while and shove. Pot was around 7kish and we are prob 30k deep. He tanks for ages, muttering about the bare Ad and my bluff with T6 earlier and eventually folds. Then get moved to the worst table in history of all late reggers, avg age 26~, avg nationality somewhere in Europe and all very competent players. Back to being the worst player at the table. Nothing really interesting happens for a few blind levels then played a big 100bb pot. I raise TT in MP, next to act 3bets and I call. Don't think I should be 4betting here as I'd not seen him 3bet at all. Flop K87ss (I have Ts) check call. Turn is Js, think this card is better for my range, I have more flushes, straights, lead my sets and 2 pair. He thinks for a while and calls. Think he has a lot of pair plus big spades here, some KK,JJ. River is complete blank, theres around 25k in the pot and I have around that back. Think he folds a fair portion of this range to a shove here. Calls prob JJ+, he checks his cards calls and has As6s, gg Jon wp. Bit more fancy play syndrome to cap the week off nicely. Must play more solid!!!!!!!!!

Back to normality and the online PLO grind. This month I've ran pretty bad BI wise but well at higher stakes for a completely break even month. Volume has been low but I've been putting tons of work into this new coaching programme, involves loads of off the table work, homework and equity sims till your eyes are sore. Really paying off though for my game at higher stakes. Have a much more balanced game approach and have got my ranges pretty sorted in a lot of spots I was leaking money. Really happy with how I'm playing and the way my game is evolving. Same can't be said at lower stakes. I've completely knocked off my exploit game, which is essential at 2/4 and lower. Every pot is multi way and ranges are a lot harder to figure  out. Most regs have lol pre flop ranges, which in turn leads to them making huge post flop mistakes, and the vast majority of them are not balanced at all. Really hard to figure out their game when they don't know what they're doing themselves.

(https://i.gyazo.com/547a3dc749509ace4fc00b3fd4ddd39b.png)
(https://i.gyazo.com/9f108ba290cb63fea82f6c3db82d7a7a.png)

Then Friday night was ridic good. Games were amazing and managed to run very well vs a huge whale at 3/6 and another one at 5/10 for my biggest winning day in a couple of years.
(https://i.gyazo.com/c1b7dedca09473f14cafb9d1dc025a21.png)

$3/$6 Pot Limit Omaha Cash, 4 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

SB: $4,473.33 (745.6 bb)
Hero (BB): $1,921.95 (320.3 bb)
CO: $907.54 (151.3 bb)
BTN: $737.85 (123 bb)

Preflop: Hero is BB with 3h 9h 9c 8d
CO folds, BTN raises to $21, SB calls $18, Hero calls $15

Flop: ($63) 6d 2s 9s (3 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $42, BTN folds, SB raises to $84, Hero raises to $270, SB calls $186

Turn: ($603) Tc (2 players)
SB bets $601, Hero raises to $1,630.95 and is all-in, SB calls $1,029.95

River: ($3,864.90) 6h (2 players, 1 is all-in)

Results: $3,864.90 pot ($2.00 rake)
Final Board: 6d 2s 9s Tc 6h
SB showed Qh Qs 3d 2h and lost (-$1,921.95 net)
Hero showed 3h 9h 9c 8d and won $3,862.90 ($1,940.95 net)

$3/$6 Pot Limit Omaha Cash, 6 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

SB: $1,006.20 (167.7 bb)
BB: $3,508.10 (584.7 bb)
Hero (UTG): $3,812.73 (635.5 bb)
MP: $662.20 (110.4 bb)
CO: $146.50 (24.4 bb)
BTN: $330.40 (55.1 bb)

Preflop: Hero is UTG with Qs Ts Th Ac
Hero raises to $21, MP folds, CO raises to $72, 2 folds, BB calls $66, Hero calls $51

Flop: ($219) Td 3s 5s (3 players)
BB checks, Hero checks, CO bets $74.50 and is all-in, BB raises to $168, Hero raises to $762, BB calls $594

Turn: ($1,817.50) 7c (3 players, 1 is all-in)
BB bets $1,814.50, Hero raises to $2,978.73 and is all-in, BB calls $859.60 and is all-in

River: ($7,165.70) 2s (3 players, 3 are all-in)

Results: $7,165.70 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: Td 3s 5s 7c 2s
BB showed Ad 4c 6d 4h and lost (-$3,508.10 net)
Hero showed Qs Ts Th Ac and won $7,162.70 ($3,654.60 net)
CO showed 8d Ah As 5h and lost (-$146.50 net)

$10/$20 Pot Limit Omaha Cash, 3 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

Hero (SB): $2,000 (100 bb)
BB: $2,000 (100 bb)
BTN: $3,225.48 (161.3 bb)

Preflop: Hero is SB with Jh Qh Td 9c
BTN raises to $70, Hero raises to $230, BB raises to $760, BTN folds, Hero calls $530

Flop: ($1,590) Qd 9d 7s (2 players)
Hero checks, BB bets $1,240 and is all-in, Hero calls $1,240 and is all-in

Turn: ($4,070) 4s (2 players, 2 are all-in)
River: ($4,070) 9h (2 players, 2 are all-in)

Results: $4,070 pot ($1.75 rake)
Final Board: Qd 9d 7s 4s 9h
Hero showed Jh Qh Td 9c and won $4,068.25 ($2,068.25 net)
BB showed Ad 9s As Kd and lost (-$2,000 net)

Just going to grind like mad for the rest of the month till I go away with the missus to Paris just before Christmas and then Christmas is chaos, loads family to see at different ends of the country. Absolutely love it though. Too early to post Christmas songs? Nah didn't think so.
GL at the tables everyone!

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3Q9XyhC5P4

you seem to be able to consistently post solid months. The way to a huge roll is constant, steady wins, nice one.

Thanks man, I'd like to think that I can control the consistency of results through strong mental game, stoplosses, general discipline and attitude but I think (especially in PLO) variance is just too big of a factor to take credit for that. Def a lot of run good lately, and run good that doesn't really show up in any graphs/results. I'd like to see my avg equity flopped in 3/4bet pots somehow. Really feel a lot of tricky spots just become easy when you're consistently flopping 40%+, and like at the beginning of the year you can see from my results, a lot more variance due to maybe running bad range/range in tons of spots leading to big tilt. Running bad can take many forms and I think AIEV is a really overrated metric and is prob the one that is easiest to intrinsically attach your ability too. Think I'm winning at 25bb/100 at 5/10 this year evbb about the same and breaking even at 1/2 with an ev winrate of 5bb. No one in the world is beating 5/10 for 25 (especially me) but at the same time I think I'm def better than breakeven 1/2 player.
I'd like to think I'm a consistent solid winner, but really I'm only as consistent as variance lets me be, and I'm putting nowhere near enough volume in to get an accurate idea of my true winrates.

Nice results buddy. As you were saying impossible to actually tell what win rate is as the sample size will never be big enough and by the time it is you and the rest of the pool will have fluctuated in abilities a tonne without even regarding the mental state you are in. I was just wondering when you get into a hand what is your thought process like? Do you take your time and think through a lot of things or just gut? I've tried a few different things but none of them seem to have stuck. Because the one I have used most recently is just simple: my range, their range and then think of who has the ev advantage and then make decisions off that with reads added in if I have any. What does yours look like? if you don't mind answering obviously.

Great question, I'm not really sure how to answer this but I'll give it a shot. I think the answer to this is that the work you do off the table should lead you to making easier decisions and having a more "simplistic" thought process during actually playing. Ranges are huge in plo, board texture shifts are often and knowing how the value of your hand will change, how often we will have a top 99-90 percentile hand, 70/50 etc on all the run outs is important when constructing your action decisions. Knowing how ranges interact with diff boards, how ranges interact vs each other on diff boards and how actual hand value interacts with our overall range, then how that interacts with opponents range leads you being able to kinda autopilot decisions. Thinking about all this in game in going to cause (for me anyway) some absurd decision tree where I'm just going to be making mistakes and expending huge amounts of brain effort. This is where the off the table work is so key.

So my basic thought process would be:
What is our range?
What does our range look like?
what is our opponents range?
How do preflop actions define both sets of ranges?
What is the texture of the flop? (static/dynamic/heavy/light etc)
How does our range interact with it? (our value and blockers)
What are the possible runouts for this board, and how should this help define our flop strategy?
Same for the turn as previous 3
How have the actions on previous streets helped to define both sets of ranges?
What do all these mean for our opponents range and how he plays it?

A lot of these are intuitive (you may think of them differently but pretty much everyone thinks of them in some way or another).

Good stuff mate, cheers. While we're on the big picture stuff, what mental challenges do you think you've faced when playing poker or has it always been fairly plain sailing in terms of emotional responses, going with flow of game etc?

The only challenge I think I've actually faced on that front would be the when I first started out playing, having poker as my only source of income, playing micro stakes and having to fend for myself. That pressure you put yourself under in that situation is incredibly stressful and counter productive. If anyone ever asked me what to do when they first started out it would to be always get a part time job and play on the side till you earn enough from poker that all your monthly out goings are 5BI<. Having to win and then withdraw 10/20/30 BI just to survive while trying to move up stakes is incredibly tough, all the while you should be paying for coaching etc. You put yourself under immense pressure and (even though it didn't happen to me) I can imagine it would kill a lot of people's passion for the game. Kinda like Lil Dave said in one of the blogs, poker should be go hobby>passion>profession. At the end of the day if you're going to get out of bed every day for x amount of years to do the same thing over and over again you gotta love that thing. Killing the love for the game off in the first few months/years is such a waste of the beauty and depth of poker.

Maybe another mental challenge I faced would be laziness. Think this was mainly due to thinking poker would last forever and the fact I bumhunted HU for a few years. Seeing 500/1k running everyday, coupled with the fact I was printing with 0 variance (think I had 85 winning days in a row once) just put a huge dent in my ambitions for constant self improvement, which is (especially nowadays) every pro should strive for. I think this is just a general trend with all pros who have played for 5-10 years, wishing they'd put more effort in when games are good.

Also (maybe linked to point 1) realising that short term results aren't particularly important. Anyone can run good for 100/200k hands so stressing about how bad you've run one day/week/month is pretty silly, but I've yet to find a way round it that isn't beating myself up about looking at HEM every day.

i turned AIEV off on my PT for 2 whole years, on Gavz advice, was fantastic, didnt know how well or bad i'd run so i didn't care.

Then one horrible day it broke me and I had to look, online poker died for me that day.

That's pretty impressive. I wish they did a version of HEM that didn't include it at all.

Just be strong!

If you want we can do a bet or next year, go the whole year without turning on AIEV and I'll donate £500 to a charity of your choice, conversely if you break you have to donate £25 to charity everytime you look :)

It seems to me that if you're running bad you must be playing good.

Hey guys,

Hope you all had a great Christmas. Mine was quite hectic. First me and missus went to Paris for a nice weekend away. Weather was shit and there were lots of armed men patrolling but it's one of my favorite cities to visit and I think it's impossible to be bored there. Did a spot of Christmas shopping, ate some nice food, went ice skating in the palace (which was fantastic even though I skate like a baby giraffe) and just the general touristy stuff. During the meal on the first night we got chatting to a very nice Swiss man who was helping us translate to the waitress who spoke very little English, which was a nightmare because I'm useless at French. Conversation turned to jobs and after finding out he was some absolute baller (something to do with insurance) we got talking poker. I've never seen someone so enthusiastic talking about something as he did with poker. Showed me loads of pictures of his home games with his friends. Was so refreshing to see someone so passionate and excited about poker, took me back to when I used to play .5p/10p games till 7am at Uni. Made me think about how we as pros should act at the table in live settings. Stoking the fires of passion for amateurs who are using their free time to do something they enjoy should be a priority of every professional.

Back home we then did Christmas day dinner for 6 which went way better/smoother than I thought it would be. Managed to not kill anyone and they all seemed to have a good time. Then traveled a few hundred miles in the next couple of days seeing family in various parts of the country. It's been nice to get back home and into the usual routine the last couple of days.

Poker has been ok, volume low due to the above and below but games are always amazing in December so I don't mind playing less tables and cherry picking great spots.
(https://i.gyazo.com/707d296996347cae8904f0e25e70e333.png)

The coaching I'm having has been going great. Had maybe 3/4 aha moments in the last few weeks, a couple through purely maths based approach but also a couple from taking a step back from population tendencies and looking at if everyone played purely exploitatively /GTO and working backwards to what people are doing now. Few things have come up where nearly everyone (maybe 1/2 players exempt) is playing so far away from GTO in basically solved spots.
I've pulled the trigger on some more coaching, this time purely mixed games. Having set some goals for next year (see below) I'm going to give myself the best chance of hitting them if I can play all the games to a good standard. From talking and seeing some principle work on a couple of the games it seems people play very bad. Probably because the information doesn't exist in the open. Past old books and training videos there is hardly anything out there and there's not enough interest in getting deep in the maths for the players that do play (barring Trueteller/Sauce etc)

This year has been a pretty good one overall poker wise. Plo game is really coming along and have made pretty much what I set out to make. Only blight on the year is a site going down which I had $28k stuck on. Really stung and I'd say I have less than 5% to see any of the money back. Kinda the pitfalls of playing on non mainstream sites but risk/reward wise I think it's always better to play on them than not.

Goals for 2017

Win something!
Anything really, but taking down a WSOP event or a SCOOP event is pretty much the dream. WSOP bracelet is I think what a lot of people wanted when they first started playing. To be on ESPN, in the magazines, front page of Pokernews etc. After grinding cash all these years I don't really have anything to show normal people (they don't care about graphs) and I think it'd be nice for my family to be able to attach something tangible to my poker "career" after the lifetime of disappointment they currently have.

Play more live
Specifically plo and mix games. I'd wager a large amount of money that in any live game I've ever played not one opponent has spent more than 1 hour in pokerjuice and other software working on their game. They haven't done the maths, they don't know how to do the maths and they don't care. Pot limit Badugi/|Super stud and other games that come up in the live mix are so infantile in their development in theory they are just a goldmine to play if you know what to work on. Plus they are exceptionally fun and you meet some great characters/friends in a live setting. Live plo will always be great imo. It's so easy to play preflop badly, and impossible for players making these mistakes to not have a snowball effect on later streets.

Just play more
Volume has been horrendous this year. Playing zoom its easy to knock out 5k hands a day, but so much harder on normal tables. Have taken a very unprofessional amount of days off this year, prioritising poker should be top of the agenda given the current climate.

Study every day
I think every day that I play I'm going to split into 2 and have the morning session just be pure theory work.

Start coaching
Not sure on this one 100% yet. I'm awful at explaining things but if I get a solid program together I'd like to give something back to other players. I've had a lot of coaching myself and have benefited from it immeasurably from it. Plus you can't knock variance free money.

Hope everyone has had a great year and has an even better 2017.

Nice update, have to say this is becoming one of the best blogs on blonde, please keep it up in 2017.

Have a great New Year!

Thanks man! You too.

Hey guys,

Hope everyone is doing well, haven't updated recently as nothing interesting has really happened. Still been grinding away in the usual games, online PLO has been going decently and I swear the population is getting worse. There's a couple new sites about to be opened and games are great pretty much everywhere barring Stars. Still having coaching but that'll be coming to an end in the next few weeks (plo coaching anyway). This is where the hard work starts. I'll have all the info and data and it's just applying it to my own game in a way which helps me to play at a consistently good level all the time. Being able to auto pilot playing your A game is the holy grail of online poker.
Played a little bit of live poker at DTD. I'm really not enjoying live 6 card full ring plo. All the decisions are purely equity driven, I just find it mind numbing at times. Even if 4 card was the main game I'd be more motivated to play but 6 card isn't really for me. Maybe if some bigger games kickoff during the Millions I might play. I'm also aiming to be shot taking some bigger zoom games around SCOOP time, which may be one of the only time it runs this year. So April/May time will probably determine how the whole year goes. If it goes as well as the beginning then I'm prob back off to Vegas dream chasing again!

(https://i.gyazo.com/628e578689fc57387b71e3e4ed25e76f.png)

From this blog compared to others (Pads,Alex etc) it may seem like I have no life outside of poker, which is 100% accurate. So you'll have to make do with some vague plan for the year and a graph till I can think of something interesting to say.

GL at the tables!

Hey guys,

Pretty pumped for the Millions event that starts at DTD next week. Got a few mates coming up from down south that are staying me and we're all playing the main, maybe a couple of side events and lots of golf. Had my first golf lesson last Friday and have been grinding the range every day since. Played at Bawtry course on Monday and shot 104. I've shot under 100 like twice lifetime, so was pretty pleased for my first round in 4~ years. Going to be hitting it pretty hard this summer and am aiming to shoot under 90 before September. Will prob play the golf day run by DTD on Wednesday, lemme know if anyone reading this is. Got 5 more lessons booked in and currently window shopping for some new clubs. The ones I've got now are hand me downs, bit of a mish mash so will be nice to get a new fresh set. Any golfers got some recommendations for beginner/intermediate clubs?

I've got around 350k in the Millions main, which is way below the 1m buyin stack for day 1. Got a few $675 credits to play over the weekend and maybe a live one at DTD to try and spin up a bigger stack. Although with the blinds rolling back to 5k bb 350k isn't anything to panic at and we'll still get tons of play. I know the DTD/Party guys have worked really hard on this so hoping it's a huge success, pretty cool to have such a huge tournament series right on your doorstep. Have set a small portion of the roll aside for whatever cash games are running. Will play up to 10/20 or 25/50 if the min buyin is less than 5k. Take a few buyin shots at the games, see what happens. I suspect there may be a huge gap in the cash game stakes though, maybe something like 2/5 and 25/50+ running and nothing in between. Been doing quite a bit of pre mixed game coaching work, which has included a lot of 5/6 card plo work, but I don't think it really helps that much in live games. Just gotta play well and embrace the variance. The coaching starts in a couple of weeks. Just in time for SCOOP, and we're doing specific weeks for specific tourneys that are happening. Really excited for the next couple of months. Got a bit of the tourney bug again while playing Millions sats, so going to be playing a nice full schedule of everything $1k<. Maybe shot take the higher PLO comps and ideally would love to play the 10k 8 game but would be a silly thing to do. Really enjoying tourneys through twitch as well. One of my oldest friends in poker has built up a great stream from the bottom up. His names Spraggy and if you haven't seen his channel I implore you to check it out. He's a very funny, witty guy, just perfect for streaming. He's also not too bad at poker and has had some great results recently.

Online has been going steady, back in the NL streets every now and again. Battling a bit of HU and 6 max, to go with the PLO as well. Action is still fairly good and it looks like games on Stars are picking up a bit as well. Really hope some zoom runs around SCOOP.

I'll be posting more golf stuff including videos of my play etc in the coming weeks, be nice to get some feedback from all you golfers out there.

(https://i.gyazo.com/9c723f966784f4b326fa86b864959013.png)

If people are interested I'll post daily updates from the Millions, tourney/cash HH etc, if not see you in a couple of months.

GL at the tables everyone.
    

Hows it going big guy?

Hey man,

Going really well thanks. Just in the process of buying a house. It's right across the road for where we are renting, in the village we want to be so it's really ideal. Slightly smaller house space but much larger garden than the one we're in at the minute, but also has a garage and 2 more parking spaces. Very happy with it overall, however as this is the first time we've bought a house we're a bit pensive that everything goes through smoothly. Would be devastated if it fell through or something.
This does mean that i'm going to have to knock 10/20+ on the head poker wise. Obv I can't get a mortgage and with the missus being a nurse we've a fair way to add on as a deposit to get to the right amount. Not a disaster by any means, just means no Vegas this year and some really hard work to be able to get back into the higher stakes hopefully by the end of this year. Action still looks good everywhere so I'm quite positive.
Played only a couple of SCOOP events, no luck. Gunna be missing the 8 game ones on Saturday sorting house stuff out, which is a bit annoying but should be free to put in a full Sunday schedule both this week and next. With all 3 major sites putting on huge series at the same time it really is a great time for online poker.

The Millions event at DTD last month was really great. DTD did an amazing job putting it on, the events were all incredible, they all made the guarantees, place was buzzing. Hope it becomes a regular thing as it's so good for UK poker and nice to see DTD's hard work pay off.
I came into day 1 with around 350k, having sat'd in through a phase 1 online. Table draw was pretty bad, recognised a few maybe old school regs, and from the table chat seemed there were no legit fish. With the slow structure there was no need to panic and I had a rather dull few levels of folding. Then we pick up JThh UTG+1, UTG raises, think I have maybe 30bb, BTN calls, sb calls and BB squeezes. UTG calls and I not sure if this is a call or not. Think it was 8bb so a large portion of my stack. But has anyone ever folded JTs pre? Didn't think so, so we go 5 way to a flop with a PSR of 1< for me. Flop is obv Q98dd and it small bet, call, I call, btn calls, sb shoves for chunks covering everyone and we win vs his ATdd. So not only do we get the full double up we get a quad up with all the dead money. Up to 1.2m and loving life. Few orbits later and we get in 100bb pre with QQ vs the sb from previous hand AA. Never usually get so many in pre in a slow tourney but think we had a pretty nice dynamic for it. He raises co, btn who is the only fish at the table calls, sb calls I sqz BB, he 4bets, I 5bet small and call a shove. Turn Q and we're up to 2.7m. Nothing happened for a while until we cold 4bet in the BB vs co raise and btn 3bet with AKo. Btn thought for maybe 5 seconds and ripped in 2.5m, which was like double avg stack. No idea what to do here, couple of friends have said I gotta call but I don't know. Think the QQ hand affected my decision tbh. Felt silly getting in so much way behind. So we fold feeling confused and silly again. NL is hard man.
Lost a couple of medium ish pots then we pick up A9ss, UTG limps, +1 raises, we call and go 3 way to the flop. J6Jss c,bet,call,call. Turn 9, check check to me. Think this is a check but the fish being in the hand really messed up my thinking. I bet half pot and the fish jammed, was so annoyed I had bet. Had seen him do some funky stuff but I still think I should have folded. Called and bricked vs JTo, and that's all she wrote. I'd prob rate my play as 1/10 for the whole day, and it was the whole day, busting maybe 25 mins from the end of day 1. I'd have liked to play more events but I was so frustrated with myself for messing up that hand I decided against it and just played cash.
5/10 PLO ran every day which was ideal. The VIP room game was 25/50 with min 10k sit down so that wasn't for me, and they had a what looked like 5/10/20 etc game running most nights. Lineup looked good but everyone had 5-10k. Straight 4 card I'd be in but 4/5/6 I'd prefer to play slightly smaller. Ended a small loser for the week but was really pleased with my play. Would have liked to ran slightly better in bigger pots but the poker gods were punishing me for the QQ hand. Can't have everything.

Online has been the same really.

(https://i.gyazo.com/3ede9ac4f6005edd0909a5d09a499da3.png)

With non HEM tracked sites and rb this is the quickest I've hit $100k for the year by about 2 weeks. Very pleasing for 2017, EV wise not a massive amount over but def think I'm running well in other spots.


The less said about United last night the better. Awful performance, going to miss Baily so much in the Final. Haven't seen Ajax play at all, but from what I've heard this Ajax team is really quick and exciting going forward. Think the main department we can really dominate them in is just overall power and bullying. Pogba is massive and really hard to get the ball off, same with Fellaini, Herrera is a right knobhead all round and I think with the overall play and mentality of Prem teams, a team of young lads from the continent is going to find it incredibly difficult to deal with. Good luck whoever the ref is.

Will do an update post house purchase.

Good luck at the tables everyone!

Nice keep, Keep up the good work !

(https://i.gyazo.com/0a355c909a23e7daa4675afee5dcfd8d.png)

(https://i.gyazo.com/923b4b12203bd157639079b9217ffd67.png)

Blimey, that graph looks pretty neat.

Care to put some meat on the bones? What game, stakes, period, etc?

Very well done.

Thanks Tikay.

(https://i.gyazo.com/12676fba5a15eabc006a2352998aff67.png)

Think I've hit $1/hand (over 100k sample) once before. Obv running super hot. Think my true winrate is prob closer to 5BB/100 and that might be generous.

Mix of stakes between 1/2 and 5/10, looks to be a fair amount of HU and 3/4 handed and a very surprisingly low number of 6 handed hands.  Really enjoy table starting on multiple sites, not only is it the best way to guarantee playing a fish alone for at least a few hands, it just stimulates the games to run more often. Played quite a fair bit on non tracked sites as well but have put in fairly low volume compared to other years. Think this is mainly due to lots more studying, both PLO and the other games, and the death of Stars. Used to be so easy to fire up 1/2, 2/5 zoom and grind out 5k hands in a day if action was dry elsewhere. Games have been the best they've been for a few years this year away from Stars thankfully.  Poker looked pretty bleak a couple of years ago with all the segregation, everyone killing HU, lack of new sites etc.  If the segregated Euro sites come back soon and or America (partially or fully) then I can see myself doing this for quite a while to come.

Some tekkers are goooooooooooood.

Sick results. Congrats!

(https://i.gyazo.com/bd0997c732c816b4c79de63bae81cd70.png)

Had to keep this quiet for a couple of months as well but absolutely over the moon for him. One of the nicest, funniest guys you'll ever meet and his streaming is great. I'm not really a fan of Stars in the slightest anymore but I think this is the happiest I've ever been for a friend. Thoroughly deserved.

How you getting on mate?

Hey man,

Sorry for the late response. Haven't really been playing much online poker this last week or so. The missus is on holiday with her parents so I've been putting tons of hours in to Destiny 2 (xbox game). Volume was weak in August, as it always is due to slow games, so it's pretty naughty of me to take another week off to play Xbox but I'll just count it as a holiday week.
Results have been pretty decent since the last update, despite the drop off in games during August. A couple of PLO solvers have dropped recently so just in the process of putting together a new, very expensive, high spec computer to run sims. Prob a year or so behind the main guys who have been doing this, but have had reasonable limited access to some of the more basic stuff through some nice friendly contacts from former coaches. I doubt I'd be that far behind most of the actual stuff that would be worth using in today's games. PLO has a very NLHE 2011 feel about it right now.
Also played GUKPT Leeds last week. Had a free ticket so used that and another bullet but didn't make antes. Had a great time though, meeting up with a couple of old poker friends, had a few beers and played some 1/1 cash later on. Seems like there's a nice friendly community up there.  
Plan for the next few weeks is to do some more solver studying, play a ton of sats to WSOPE and the Caribbean thingy. Also going to be mixing in a few 25/50 shots, buying in short when games are good.

(https://i.gyazo.com/5a62b46f2dbbf0b5d84b8c8a86971e23.png)

BB is Bill Perkins, sure he won't mind

SB: $1,856.25 (37.1 bb)
BB: $8,342 (166.8 bb)
UTG: $6,836.65 (136.7 bb)
MP: $2,046 (40.9 bb)
Hero (CO): $3,239.25 (64.8 bb)
BTN: $1,800 (36 bb)

Preflop: Hero is CO with 2d 2c 7d 7c
2 folds, Hero raises to $175, SB raises to $575, BB calls $525, Hero calls $400

Flop: ($1,725) Kc 4d 3d
SB bets $1,281.25 and is all-in, BB calls $1,281.25, Hero raises to $2,664.25 and is all-in, BB calls $1,383

($8,334.75) 7s
($8,334.75) Th

[spoil]Results: $8,334.75 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: Kc 4d 3d 7s Th
SB showed 8s Ah Js Ac and lost (-$1,856.25 net)
BB showed Qs 6d Kh 8d and lost (-$3,239.25 net)
Hero showed 2d 2c 7d 7c and won $8,331.75 ($5,092.50 net)

Hey guys,

Finally pulled the trigger on a new computer. Was pretty close to going balls out and getting a really high spec one to run any sim you could possibly want for PLO, but I reigned it in a bit as a lot of the really high intensity stuff is all preflop. Aside from the fact a lot of this stuff has already been done and somewhat available, it's all basically for extrapolation purposes anyway. No one is close to playing what the solvers say for preflop PLO and rightly so. Ended up with a top spec Threadripper setup. Now this is me trying to sound like I know what I'm on about but I haven't the foggiest tbh and have had someone put it together for me. This means I'll still have to use a server for the really intensive stuff (looking at you O8) but should be able to melt through all post flop PLO and NLHE spots.
Poker has been pretty decent again this month. Beginning of the month was a little testing. Think I ran fairly bad and tilted properly for the first time in a while (I'll come back to this later). Also played the £1k at DTD. Sneaked in via an online sat to Day 2 with 20bb and lasted maybe 10 hands. Didn't fancy an hour drive back home so quick so re entered  and finished about 10 off the money. Stayed for a while after and ran pretty hot in a very good 2/5 PLO game. Got in very bad AAAxxx for £1k pre and flopped the nut flush, held then just won a bunch of smaller pots for a nice win.
Nearing the end of the mixed game coaching I've been having for the last 6 months. Thoroughly enjoyed it and am itching to get out to Vegas next year to make a big run at everything. Motivation to improve is at an all time high and I feel with a solid routine and learning path I can get seriously good by the time June rolls round.
(https://i.gyazo.com/1e379b1b86b028ac6f659579217af9c6.png)
Took a boys trip away to Lisbon last weekend for a few beers and a bit of football. Weather was great, company was superb and we managed to witness Sporting win 5-1 (Bas Dost hat trick as well). Before the game we somehow stumbled into what looked like a Sporting Ultras garage party, with Sagres on tap for €1. We got a few funny looks for speaking English and being dressed head to toe in the club shop merchandise but everyone was super friendly and the atmosphere pre and during the game was fantastic. 

Back to the poker, I seem to have developed a really bad superiority complex over most of the players I play against. Beginning of the month I raged in chat for the first time in years during a few HU sessions vs regs. Chatting shit to regs achieves absolutely nothing other than massaging my own ego, but I just seem to lose it over the most innocuous stuff. I'm pretty sure it's not affecting my actual play to an extent it's a problem but it's just a nobhead thing to do. It reared it's head again during the live session. Caught myself a few times ranting to myself (in my head) about how bad everyone was, why don't they come play me online, how dare he 3bet me with this hand etc etc. It's something I really dislike about myself at the minute and if it's not costing me right now it certainly will in the future. I suspect it may just end up with me ego tripping a very good reg and getting smashed for a lot but it might be what I need.

Ahh don't beat yourself up too much mate, happens to the best of us. Just remember it's not personal, it's just cards.

I had a friend who liked to rant in the chatbox. Maybe rant isn't the right word, as it tended to be a venomous berating. Eventually, after a year of explaining this to him, he was sat at a table on a small network we both played. He berated someone whilst one of the owners was at the table. This guy promptly decided that he was tired of my friend and just to ban his account including the funds. He was talked out of it at the time and luckily enough my friend received everything back including access with a strict warning to leave any time the owner sat and his chat was permanently banned. Funnily enough it was his second account on the network and his previous one also had his chat banned, after one of our mutual friends reported him! He was trolled for around a week by the owner who would just sit for an orbit, wait for him to leave and sitout. Great stuff for me, and whilst I felt a bit bad for my friend, it did feel like justice, particularly as I had been the target of his rants on a few occasions.

Any time I have been berated by another reg, I have almost always found it both funny and encouraging. It is always nice to get a headsup on your mistakes and have someone remind you that maybe you haven't cracked poker like you thought. And, you never know, maybe the network owner is watching :)

Ego is both a blessing and a curse in poker. Due to the variance, every poker player needs a little ego to prevent the crippling self doubt that can accompany downswings. However, its also extremely important to keep in check. Ego and tilt are highly correlated, and this is something every professional has to be aware of.

Have you had any mental game coaching? This is a text book Elliot Roe thing and I couldn't recommend him enough. My friend from above would also pass on his recommendation too I think.

The nerd in me would love to play around with some o8 sims. How usable are the resources? I have Piosolver but I've not bothered with any of the plo software out there yet, mainly because my opponents don't play very close to a solver style, so I am unsure on how useful running sims would be. I'd mostly like to see NLO8 too, which probably would involve some ridiculous level of computational power.

I really wouldn't mind if it was coming off the back of a bad downswing or some huge break even stretch or something like that, but I've been having a really good year and can complain about literally nothing. I'm not actively thinking about outside of play or at the start/beginning of sessions but it's coming from somewhere while I'm playing and I really don't like it. I'm subconsciously turning into a massive self entitled twat.


Yeh I may look into doing that if only for 1 session. Def can't hurt and I suspect I may have some other mental leaks I have no idea about.
There's only one program that does O8 that's not a bot as far as I know. The solves are huge though and you'd be paying a lot to rent a server to do a full perfect preflop one. Haven't even thought of trying a NLO8 one or even a NLO one. Def worth looking into though. From whats already been done it seems solvers prefer playing waaaaay tighter pre than everyone is at the minute. But it's hard to extrapolate when there would be one fish or more at the table. I suspect cold calling ranges and 3bet ranges would change dramatically, pretty much to what people are doing now anyway. Rake also has a huge effect on every preflop solve, and O8 I'm betting would be even more extreme. 

Regarding the o8 preflop, that actually makes a lot of sense. With how close equities run, people started defending extremely wide which is particularly strange when they never ever seemed to pull some of the more aggressive flop plays that would be needed to defend correctly vs even the flop cbet. These sims really love capturing your equity. Tbf I don't think I could accurately give 3b ranges in o8, I ran a lot of preflop stuff ages ago but its not exactly been a workmans game over the years. Feel players game still, possibly for a while. I have noticed some of the Russian 5card accounts that emerged from some of the other mixed games battling in the streets lately. I wonder how closely that coincides with the sim stuff, but 5card o8 is probably a technological advance away.

I think Elliot has probably paid for himself five times over at this point. Can you really justify coaching for the mixed games but not for your mental game! A lot of the potential issues come from something that can have a much greater effect on your overall life too, its not just poker.

Do you enjoy running the sims or does it feel like a grind?

Not particularly. With this new comp though I can run 3-6 postflop spots at the same time so will def help a lot get things done quicker. The thing I enjoy most about them is taking the results then filtering out the spots on the general population. Really cool to see how the top guys are deviating then try and extrapolate why. Then do the same things with the top regs in my games, then the next tier of regs and so forth.

Gunna be heading over to Blackpool this weekend for the GUKPT. Haven't been there since I was a wee nip. Anyone else heading there? Recommendations on the best place to stay etc?

You can get a shithole for £40 a night or a huge shithole for £35 a night, it's blackpool, enjoy it it's fucking class :)

I booked one of the afore mentioned shit holes so after busting the tournament in unspectacular fashion, doing my bollocks in on DC cash, rocked up at 4am to find it completely shut with no night porter and no way of getting in so drove home and got in at 8am. Fucking fuming.

Yep, never found a decent hotel or a decent restaurant in Blackpool.

You don't go to blackpool for decent hotels and restaurants!

Me and Tabby found that out when we went :D

amazing how 9 pints of snakebite change your perceptions isn't it :P

Hey guys,

Had a pretty meh month on the poker front. Volume wasn't great, although I did have 2 weeks off, but I got a ton of off the table work done in a few games. Also hit a very nice personal milestone on HEM.

(https://i.gyazo.com/f480bc0bdae51f0609f1c96e0bc47a7b.png)

I've been lucky enough to be able to retain pretty much every hand I've ever played of online poker (that can be imported to HEM). I still specifically remember the day that I hit $1k, $10k and $100k. As a purely cash game player it's really the only thing you get from all those hours so it's nice to be able to look back and visualise all that sweat and tears.
The reason why I actually checked my lifetime graph was because a maybe not so famous (infamous) crusher retired this week and shared his. I think a lot of people knew on the down low he had made a ton but his winrate and just sheer dollar amount I think have surprised nearly all. He's one of those players who you'll do a database review on and not really be able to get much out of it. He must have the biggest notes file on the internet. King of exploit.

(https://i.gyazo.com/41fe327a3af919fbc16d46679c7749ff.png)

Obv a massive inspiration, for both talent and sheer dedication. From personal experience I know how valuable having the top tables of a lobby are. To have them all, at every stake, on every site on the internet is ridic and it's not that surprising he made so much. God bless HU. I def know of one of player who has a better winrate over a similar sample size but not sure he has won close to $7m.
This is his interview from yesterday. Def worth a watch, even if he is a little (lot) awkward.

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YE2kKAgU0UU

Sick.

Amazing you played 1.1m hands and made $20k but just ploughed on through kept discipline etc super impressive actually youre straight up crushing, nice one. Good to see hard work etc pay off

Nearly half of these hands were in a span of maybe 3/4 months 24 tabling full ring on UB trying to win the BBJ. I was grinding 50nl on there and it hit one day and I think you got around $300 a table for every table you were on. So naturally the bigger it got the more you got per table and during that span it got up to around $1.4m. So never having played fullring I just played it purely for the $500~ a table payoff if it hit. Managed to play for 28 hours straight in a grindpit at a friends house, took a break to watch Spurs v Arsenal and obv it hits during the 2nd half, at 50nl as well. Just devo'd so I tilt cashed out of UB. This was maybe a month before UB went down. Run good comes in many forms lol.

sick graph g. How's the rake in HU PLO or our edges so big no one decent cares?

Between .25/.50 and 5/10 its pretty huge and game selection is prob one of the biggest skills a decent pro could of had. Especially on the Euro sites (.fr/.es etc) where before rake winrates could be anywhere between 25-50BB/100 and around 2-5BB/100 after rake. I remember a few fish on Winamax who would limp call 100% pre, they were impossible to any money from.  Above that I don't really think it's an issue.

Anyone interested in me restarting the blog. Mainly poker (plo) and golf? I have a number in mind of yes replies to restart.

Yes yes yes.

That's three.

That's 6.

yesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyes

That's 1030.

aye

1031 was slightly larger than the figure I had in mind so here goes..

Hey guys,

Long time no update. Had a bit mixed year last year. Poker volume and results weren't great. The world cup and great summer meant I took a lot of time off, I had a great time but not the best decision in the current poker climate. Me and the missus also bought a house. Absolutely over the moon with it. We'd really struggled to find a mortgage lender who would lend me any money. We'd nearly given up when we found, I think, the only lender in the whole country that would give us a mortgage based on her wage and have me on the house deeds as a dependent. Had to put a 60% deposit down as they'd class me as a dependent and minus avg living expenses from what they would lend Leah. We've been renting in a little village for a couple of years and have really settled here, so after a couple of possible houses had fallen through we were very lucky for this one to pop up round the corner, and to find the mortgage at the same time.
My poker roll obv took a pretty large hit, and the back end of last year I ran pretty bad. Not in the sense of running way under ev, or dropping tons of money quickly, but just not getting hands or making hands. I think it was prob around 100k hands, and honestly towards the end I was really fed up. I wasn't looking forward to playing, i'd cut sessions short, I'd find excuses to not play. I was just flat out bored. Not with poker as a whole, as if I wasn't playing I'd be studying, but just with having to play, having to just take shit day after day. I started playing NL again to try reignite the passion, and I even started playing tournaments for a couple of weeks, going so far as to fully apply for BitB.  I withdrew the application at the final stage as I didn't want to tied down for a full year with no way out.
Thankfully Party decided to in essence bring back a form of Supernove Elite. Their own version and this has been a great boost for me and my motivation. Knowing I can play 5k hands a day of 1/2, 5 days a week for 10 months of the year and be guaranteed $120k at the end lifts a big weight off my shoulders, esp with what happened the end of last year. I've been 9-12 tabling 1/2 and have been loving it. Haven't checked my results in ages, really feel in the zone playing that many tables. I'm really really enjoying playing again. I'm still comfortably rolled for higher but I'm trying to get this focus and mindset ingrained into me before moving back up. There's still a few bots knocking around but there's a decent chat group set up between regs to try and regulate it, and Party have actually been fairly decent at investigating and banning the botters. Fair play to them, they've kept to their promises they made last year.

I've also been really getting into golf recently. A few guys from the village played casually the end of last year and after a few beverages at the put I made the bold statement that I reckon I could hit 80 within 4 months of taking it seriously. Wagers were taken and I am firmly in the shit. I started having lessons at the end of Jan, so have until the beginning of May to get it done. I got a membership at the local club, which has two great courses. However they at the minute have only one proper coach, so I've been limited to a lesson a week as he is so busy. Originally I had a very wide take away that really opened up the club face, as you can see on the pic (top one is now, btm one is at the start). This would also cause me to come over the top of the swing plane, and my natural shot was a tad slicey. We've changed my grip, take away and got me shallowing the club out more so I come under the swing plane, causing a nice draw. Gotta work on being less handsy in the downswing now. I tend to release the club way too early in the downswing, and despite having long arms and generating tons of power, I'm losing it all by flipping the club out. This is also causing me to thin the ball sometimes, and my ball striking is way off.
You can see it here with my driver. The club is flipping out half way down, and even on a good day, I'm only hitting it 250 yards max.
http://www.hudl.com/technique/video/view/VHDcYGEU
The tail is wagging the dog as they say.

This coming week should be one of the best of the year. We've got The Masters, starting on my birthday, and the WSOP-C at DTD. Going to be watching and betting on every second of the golf, while hopefully winning some money. Let me know if anyone is going to be at DTD and you can buy me a birthday beer :)

250 yards straight >  any other distance not straight.

to hit something like 80 you have to play every hole well and not have any blows up. so just focus on 200 < x < 250 straight a high % and then work on short game around the greens and that will be the biggest improvement to cut shots out.

The range looks like Woodhall Spa but i believe they have three coaches

Too much daylight between your legs, so your losing upper leg power

Nice to see the blog restarting they are all interesting reading for me thanks

Have you thought of getting an impact-bag?

It's a great tool for getting rid of that flip at the bottom of the swing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dl3sh_00lXY

Good to see the blog back and pleased you are enjoying the game again.  Can't help you on golf, but good luck with it.   Suspect I could play for years and never hit 80.

I am quite shocked I didn't realise it was the WSOP-C event this week.  I was going to play the big Sunday million on stars, but might have to reschedule to the Omaha.   Any livd tournament will be good practice for the WSOP, but I shouldn't duck an omaha one.   I could always play the million if I crash and burn early.   Can't see me playing any others, as the missus is away until Wednesday and am doing something on Thursday.

Yeh my coach said he didn't like using them, but has some different drills that generate the same results. The vid below is one of them. Changed grip and feels waaaay better. Right hand stronger, more finger grip. Didn't mention it in my original post but I had developed a shooting pain down my left thumb when using driver. This was caused by the grip, and you can see in the first vid when I get to the top of the back swing as the club keeps going it was pushing my thumb back and kinda hyper extending it. Really hard to figure out the root cause in real time but very obvious with the slow motion (the vids I've linked are from an app that records in super slow motion, not sure why the website links are only half speed max).


It's Gainsborough (now renamed Thanock Park)
Struggled a lot with the lower body stuff. Right leg tends to get very lazy on the back swing, and I get way too much knee flex.

So this was from the first session of grip change.
http://www.hudl.com/technique/video/view/VrSWdeYq

Second session beginning of this week so will post and hopefully see some progress.


I'll def be there for the plo with the milly on an iPad, unless the Masters is shaping up to be too good to move away from.

Do you still get an excellent carvery at Gainsborough?

I haven't tried it yet, but you're the third person to say this so it's definitely on my list.

Ran the Lincoln 10k yesterday. I by no means at all a runner, and I don't really enjoy running. It seems fairly boring and repetitive, but there's a few guys from the village who run it for charity so I've tagged along for the last couple of years. It seems like a fairly good litmus test of how generally fit I am, and if age is starting to catch up on me. So I hardly did any training last year and went for only one test run this year of 7km. I've had the sniffles all week as well so wan't expecting big things. I ran 53:56 last year and a surprising 48:27 this year. One of the guys who also ran was going for sub 40 mins so I set off with him at the start and tried to keep pace for as long as possible. Needless to say after 2km I was gassed. Had to slow right down and the 45min marker runners passed me by. I was determined to beat last year so tried to stay at a steady pace where I could see the 45 mins marker up ahead in the distance and not be able to see 50mins behind me at all. Around 7km all the phlegm from my cold has loosened and I coughed/spluttered up a huge ball of gunk right in front of some cheering kids and parents. This really knocked me out of my rhythm  and a few hundred meters further I did the old pretend there was something in my shoe trick. Took a knee and pretended to mess around with my trainers and socks to give me a breather for a few seconds. Really struggled for the last 2km and the last kilometer up to the cathedral is on a steady incline which was a killer. Still fairly happy with the result though. The other guys were on a bit of a high afterwards and talks of half and full marathons were in full flow. Don't really think it's for me, but the missus did the Great North Run a couple of years ago and she's keen to get back into it after foot surgery last year, so I maybe convinced.

Forget the carvery
Have you ever been here ?
http://www.uptonchippy.co.uk/

Nope, but any eatery that is only open 6 hours week has my attention!

Gainsborough is where the Ping factory is located, wish I'd known that when I went for my custom fitting a couple of decades ago.

Yeh it’s right next door to the driving range, where I have my lessons. Wish i’d Have seen it sooner as well. Bought a set from American Golf, but I suspect the Ping guys would know a lot more.

You always used to be able to get a free custom fitting for any Ping set there, you may have to wait a month or two for your appointment though.