The Best In The Business

[celtic]

I would need a very good reason to move to London. Probably the worst place I've stayed in and I was brought up in Glasgow!

[roshambo]

the best bit about Luton was "La Compagnie" direct to New York, all biz class planes only and own lounge at a reasonable price, that's until Brexit came along and the French threw a huff.

[Whollyflush]

I would need a very good reason to move to London. Probably the worst place I've stayed in and I was brought up in Glasgow!

this

[bagel]

Cmon guys, Stansted Airport is a million times worse than Luton. Luton is totally fine!

Have been through both recently, there is an enormous difference right now. 

Luton Airport is only half open, so no seats, and was incredibly stuffy.  Parking was on top of a mud bath, priced 60 odd quid for 4 days.  Waited half an hour for a bus back to medium stay.  In that time 2 buses arrived and went out of service immediately just for rubs.  The long stay people waited just as long only to lose the flip on which bus got there first.  Bloke in that queue had a meltdown with our driver which didn't help.  All sorts of traffic carnage outside right now. 

Sure it will be nice when finished, but go to Stansted right now, or use the train.

Anyway, back to the point, Pleno should definitely try and get close to a train/tube stop.  Buses go walking pace in the rush hour in London.  I guess it won't effect you too much, but trains can be hot and unpleasant in the summer, but it has nothing on the tube.  Trains are quicker too.  No way I'd go on the tube into town from Putney/Wimbledon if the train is a near enough option.

Forgot about Dulwich Village.  On the borders of Dulwich Park and trains take no time in to town.  I lived in nearby East Dulwich, which was nowhere near as nice, but is definitely coming up nowadays.

putney maybe a bit of a pain, but wimbledon is a really easy journey into town, i have done it every day for last few months. it is first stop on district line so you are 100% guaranteed a seat  every time you travel. 20 mins to earls court 30 to victoria.

also very easy to get to from lots of the nicer parts of south west  london that have been mentioned, i have lived in surbiton last few years and it is 8 minutes from here to wimbledon with at least 4 trains an hour.

if you are really not up for the tube, surbiton to waterloo on overground is 18minutes twice an hour

so many people only have bad things to say about london trains, many of which are completely justified,but with a bit of patience  and savvy choice of routes it is an amazing service for such a huge city.

my journey home tonight took best part of 2 hours , normally 40 minutes, just got to be prepared for the inevitable fuck ups that happen now and again.

if there are delays and cancellations, find a pub.

[Pinchop73]

Pads on a bus lol

[George2Loose]

I'll post some views up at some point as someone who has pretty much worked full time and tried to take poker seriously.

Just a general observation tho- great to see the diary with so many posts and some genuine discussion happening

[redsimon]

Pads on a bus lol

Best on the Bus-iness?

[Marky147]

Pads on a bus lol

Best on the Bus-iness?

[pleno1]

Before Punta Cana I went to London for 2 days with my girlfriend to look for places to live. I’ve been kind of getting tired of Budapest for around 6 months, its such a great city, but after a while of the same places and the same people, no matter where you are in the world places can always become repetitive and you start picking out the small annoyances than a few years earlier you allowed yourself to look over. The next “Stage” was a difficult one. Initially, I thought about moving to Malta, but after 3 rather unpleasant stays, I struggled to give it the benefit of the doubt that it perhaps deserved and decided to think about closer to home.

I’m from Newcastle which is in the North East of England so I’m not too familiar with the South, even London. Most of my friends who opted for the library on a Friday night rather than grind the $11 45 man SNG’s on Full Tilt Poker have gravitated towards London and now most of my initial friendship group from school and university are living there happily in 9-5s. London seemed like the obvious choice, despite working a lot on my online game and having good success since Vegas, I still think that my skill set is more weighted towards live poker and as online poker perhaps declines, live poker will be a sustainable route to a desirable income. “Close” to London there are pretty good games in Nottingham, and in London itself there is a lot of good value tournaments and cash games.

The lifestyle in London whilst desirable on one hand is the opposite when thinking about giving my dogs and family the best lifestyle possible. Sure if I was a single guy with no responsibilities living in a swanky studio in Chelsea and living it up could be the way, but what I really looked for was a good homely and safe area with good transport links and most importantly a house which was good for the dogs with a big garden.

In the 48 hours or so I spent in London I looked at a lot of very nice properties, but one in particular we fell in love with. A 5+ bedroom house in Twickenham with a very big garden, lots of office space, really modern interior, an enormous wine cellar and even some chickens in the garden making fresh eggs everyday! 30 seconds walk to a big green park and accessible to lots of really nice bars, shops, restaurants and cafes. The area is Twickenham, we would have slightly preferred Richmond as an area, but Twickenham will definitely more than suffice. The rent is extortionate and that was perhaps one of my biggest “life spews” but I know we will be happy here and to me you can’t put a price on happiness. We signed a 2 year contract with a 1 year break clause which we will undoubtedly use. In this one year we will spend a lot of time travelling around England and seeing different areas of the country that we may want to live.

I decided that this year I really won’t travel much, I’ll skip Vegas, likely skip all PokerStars events and only travel for really good trips. This year will be about being the best I can every day, its very easy to sit back and relax whilst all the horses print us money, but I don’t want to be that guy. I strive for improvement, I really like to see improvements in myself day to day, and when you’re in your comfort zone you really struggle to make those adjustments. I will spend at least 2 days a week playing live poker in London or the UK, will spend every Sunday playing online, will coach a lot, be involved in the stable a lot and be completely immersed in poker. It won’t be here forever, but right now I feel completely great about my game. 2016 is the year that most people improved more relatively than any other year. The use of piosolver has improved people a lot, not only about what exact things to do, but also how to think in hands. However because people aren’t super experienced with it means that will be a lot of misapplication. I will spend a lot of time working on counter adjustments vs poor application of attempted GTO lines. Both WCOOP/SCOOP I will be very prepared for and I will look forward to giving my all each and every Sunday of the year.

Outside of poker I want to start getting involved in more start up companies. We have learned a lot this year with bitB. Almost every stable in the world claims to be “the best staking company in the world” I’ve seen pocarr saying it on their sharkscope advertisements and other competitors saying similar stuff too. I really strongly believe that both our current performance and overall business model is leaps and bounds ahead of the competition and its important we continue to improve in all areas to reach the growth that I strive for in the company. However I also want to use the stuff we haven’t done very well in the company in future business endeavours, the one main thing that I’ve realised is that just because you are successful or able to do certain things it doesn’t mean others should naturally be able to. Hiring staff members is way more crucial than I could ever imagined, if you don’t make the best decision in acquiring key members of your team then your company will stagnate, stand still and perhaps even go backwards. On a similar topic, I’ve also realised that communication is absolutely essential not only for growth but for your own happiness. If somebody is repeatedly doing a poor job that makes you dissatisfied and you don’t tell them, its very likely they will not work out themselves that they are underperforming and will continue to have a negative impact on your mood.

Without trying to sound arrogant, I have way too much cash lying about not making me money, our company is at a point where we don’t particularly need financial investment, it runs itself economically and thus there is too much money in different poker accounts, bank accounts and other places that I just let stand still and not make more. To me this is very immature. I will spend 2017 to help educate myself on the best ways to move money, perhaps even offering personal guidance to somebody in return for some equity in my poker action. When you’re travelling every month to a different place its extremely tough to continue being very professional, checking markets, checking stocks, checking investments, controlling how and when you should move your money, one of the reasons for less time on the road in 2017 will be so that my lifestyle is more stable and with less variance. I will also aim to have a lot less variance with my health and diet. For many years I have gone 2 months eating very good, going too the gym, and then ruining it with the next 3-4 months because of living in different hotels and playing too much. Being in a stable lifestyle will allow me to be healthier and to control my health and diet to a point where I can keep myself accountable and not able to have easy excuses “but sir, i was in vegas” cry me a ****ing river Patrick.

[pleno1]

Probably the most interesting hand from the trip.

Its day 3 of the main event, I have gone from 30k starting stack to 250k progressively throughout the days without too much trouble. I had a good day 1 and good day 2. The very first hand of day 3 I lose a chip lead pot vs Martin Kozlov with KK in 3bet pot on Q627ssxx vs QTss which hit an off suit ten to send the frustrating pot his way. I rebuilt my stack to around 180k from mostly non showdown hands.

Blinds are 2k/4k, I have 180k, he has 350+.

I open to 8000 (nobody was 3betting me or cold calling wide enough so small raise seemed fine. He defended. I have QThh.

Flop: As

Check, check.

I think either betting or checking is good, I would control my frequencies here and cbet a little bit more than normal because i min raised pre flop and he likes to defend his bb thus will have all off suit gunshots, Kx bdfd, off suit 6x that I can get immediate value from now that will fold to a delay bet ott. I opted to check this time, which is a reasonable option too.

Turn: As (pot 20k)

bet 18.5k, I raise 60k, he jams 180k, I call.

haha, fun one.. So lets assume that he splits his sizings and his turn betting range for this size is initially 2 pairs, sets, oesds and flush draws. This gives him a range looking something like.










Ah
Ah
Ah
Ah
Ah
Ah















Ah
Ah















K2ss
K4ss K5ss
K7ss K8ss
K9ss KJss
KQss

Q2ss
Q4ss Q5ss
Q7ss Q8ss
Q9ss QJss

J2ss
J4ss J5ss
J7ss J8ss
J9ss

92ss
94ss 95ss
97ss 98ss

82ss
84ss 85ss
87ss

72ss
74ss 75ss


62ss
64ss 65ss

5c4h 5c4d 5c4s 5c4c
5h4h 5h4d 5h4s 5h4c
5d4h 5d4d 5d4s 5d4c
5s4h 5s4d 5s4c

7c4h 7c4d 7c4s 7c4c
7h4h 7h4d 7h4s 7h4c
7d4h 7d4d 7d4s 7d4c
7s4h 7s4d 7s4c

7c5h 7c5d 7c5s 7c5c
7h5h 7h5d 7h5s 7h5c
7d5h 7d5d 7d5s 7d5c
7s5h 7s5d 7s5c

7c8h 7c8d 7c8s 7c8c
7h8h 7h8d 7h8s 7h8c
7d8h 7d8d 7d8s 7d8c
7s8h 7s8d 7s8c

9c8h 9c8d 9c8s 9c8c
9h8h 9h8d 9h8s 9h8c
9d8h 9d8d 9d8s 9d8c
9s8h 9s8d 9s8c

This gives us a total of possible value combos: 50ish
This gives us a total of possible bluff combos: 115ish

I assumed that when I raise he will continue most flush draws, all oesd, fold all gut shots, jam all vulnerable pairs, trap good 2 pairs and sets. His continuing range should = a profitable value raise for us:

When he shoves I imagine his range will look something like:










Ah
Ah
Ah



- - - -

5c4h 5c4d 5c4s 5c4c
5h4h

(gave 30% of combos)

K8ss
K9ss KJss
KQss

(gave 50% combos)

Q8ss
Q9ss QJss

(gave 50% combos)


J7ss J8ss
J9ss

(gave 50% combos)


97ss 98ss

(gave 30% combos)

87ss

(gave 25% combos)

74ss 75ss

(gave combo draws only)

thus suspected range we get it in against vs his jam:

hands we beat: 20 combos
hands that beat us: 14 combos

Thus when we raise, with the money thats in the pot and suspected range we are getting more than a good enough price.


Food for thought:

In reality he’s likely jamming 100% combos of 54 or 0%, but we have to give a realistic weight for effective analysis.
He could potentially use this sizing with whole of range, meaning he will bet/call additional Ax hands.
He could have less combos of value hands, I have him here flatting AA and TT pre flop, both of which are clear 3bets vs my opening range. Hands like ATs, or even T6s could go into the 3betting range at some frequency, but have left them in so I’m not being optimistic. I also gave him all combos of AK/AQ both suited and off suit as hands to flat pre flop, also very unlikely. If we give him an aggressive and realistic 3betting range then its likely it becomes even better.
My particular hand is pretty good, it block AT, blocks TT, blocks T6 and blocks T3s severely hurting his value range. A hand like KK raising to “charge draws” would be far less effective. My kicker being irrelevant to his bluffing range and restricting some bet/calls from AQ is particularly nice too.
I’m likely in the top 3 players left in day 3 of a really great tournament with incredible structure, whilst this could be a profitable line, perhaps I shouldn’t take it
Being this tricky and forward thinking will stop players from playing aggressive vs me in the future and helping me realise equity. A guy with 14% flop c/r could decrease it to 5% vs me, or a guy with 40% turn probe could decrease it to 15-20% when playing against me
I’m not representing a lot of really good hands here, in his mind I play 33/a3 like this for value, this however is probably good for the player as it will increase the combos of flush draws and straight draws that he could jam with thinking I’m massively full of ****.


What do you think about the hand and what would you have done?

[Woodsey]

The rent is extortionate......

I think you might have answered your own question about where to invest your spare cash without realising it.

[horseplayer]

Good luck to you in London

Shame your company did not have the decency to even send a reply to the recent job opportunity I applied for but thats life

[Tractor]

The rent is extortionate......

I think you might have answered your own question about where to invest your spare cash without realising it.

Woodsey beat me to it. Hope you enjoy it down south.

[celtic]

Good luck to you in London

Shame your company did not have the decency to even send a reply to the recent job opportunity I applied for but thats life

I applied for 50+ jobs in Glasgow over a 1 month period that I didn't get a reply to.

It's not uncommon.

[bobAlike]

Good luck to you in London

Shame your company did not have the decency to even send a reply to the recent job opportunity I applied for but thats life

I applied for 50+ jobs in Glasgow over a 1 month period that I didn't get a reply to.

It's not uncommon.

But Nandos know you??