Except the poker maths you've put assumes they shove each of these hands with the same frequency as each other... Which he isn't!

You probably need to get rid of 80% of AJ AQo and 88-TT, then 60% of JJ and AQs and still 30% of AQs QQ.

Against that range you are not going to make money

I don't try to put a fun player on a specific range, and you shouldn't as well. You will end up value owning yourself when he shows up with Q4o (and they do show up with Q4o). What imo is more useful - finding out break even threshold, thinking if fish will show up with something outside it. Yes - call, no - fold.

Yeah sure, but he may show up with a random trash hand 5% of the time he has a trash hand, unless he does it often.

Sure find the break even threshold but you are saying he always ships 88+ AJ+ which he won't be doing!

Also you are saying you are working out the EV of a call... To do this you need to use a realistic range which this isn't.

Took a while, I'm not the best writer, but here it is!

My first major live poker event experience

How it all started

So, it all started couple months ago when I decided to deposit some monies on Unibet. I did that and noticed I've got some free 2 EUR Unibet Open ticket. I'm a cash game player, and LOL donkaments obviously. I viewed this ticked as waste of time. One evening (I guess I was a bit intoxicated) I decided to fire up this 2 EUR satty just on backround of my normal cash tables. I didn't pay almost no attention to it, but fast forward I finished 'ITM' and received 10 EUR step. I preceeded to luckbox this 10 EUR step, 50 EUR step in same manner, but 250 EUR final I took seriously, even did push ups in breaks... And BOOOOM, I'm going to Malta!




Pre - Tournament

Unibet Open is a 1000+100 EUR tourney. I had time to prepare for it, but I didn't do almost any preparation as it could very well end with just a single cooler or a flip in first few hand. I went with no expectations, just to enjoy some kind of vacation! I was scheduled to start in day 1A, in 26th of May, so I arrived in the evening of 25th. I took a shuttle bus to hotel, and quickly realized they drive on the wrong side wtf, also driver was driving like it was a matter of life or death. We stayed at fancy 5* 120eur/night hotel. I checked in, went to dinner, and it was like 9pm, so I decided to go for a walk and then head to bed. When I got out of hotel, I realized it's a one big party all around. I didn't go to pubs or clubs (yet) as I had a tourney to bink in the morning, but when I got back to hotel, I checked map and it turned out the hotel was located in the heart or Paceville, and when I googled Paceville -"Located west of St. Julian's, Malta, Paceville is the name given to an informal district heavily populated with nightclubs, bars, strip clubs, pubs and restaurants, and is an important nightlife hub on the island." Good enough!




TOURNAMENT

It started 12:00. 30k starting chips. At first table was short handed (which I liked), but then it filled up to 8-9 handed. I didn't spot any obvious fish. The one I thought was fish turned out to finish top 6 or so. There was a Lithuanian woman who ran hot and finished day 1 as chip leader. I never gained momentum. I got playable cards, but couldn't connect post flop. I still played aggressive, but chipped down anyway. I made several sizing errors as I'm not used to physically counting out chips and following pot size etc. I felt totally out of my comfort zone. I've heard many top pros like Dan Colman had similar experience when stepping into live field, so I guess it's all right. But yeah, fast forward and I'm sitting with 1/3 starting chips, blinds 200/400 with ante, and there is one crazy pro gamer to my direct left who's trying to win every hand. I have 88 UTG, I limp :))), he limps behind, the big stack aggro Lithuanian woman pumps it to 1.2k, BB cold calls. So the pot is 3.8k, I've got 10.5k left ---> I jam. Gamer thinks a bit and calls, 2 folds. I expect a flip, but he has A5o lol, and I hold. Niceee! Gamer open jams Q8o UTG next hand and busts out. Nothing happens, until the last hand before break. I look down to AsAx UTG+1 I think, I open, get caller on BTN and SB. Flop K10Xss, SB donks out, I call, BTN folds. Turn 10x, he bets, I call again. River 9x, he bets somewhat smallish. I call and he flips over QJ for rivered straight. I guess I should have folded, idk. Now down to 5.5k, which is 6-8bb. Soon I move in with KJ, get 2 callers (perfect! One will fold out the other post flop!), flop comes K85r (sweet!), but when one of them bets comfortably, I think fuck, KQ, other one folds and villain indeed has KQ and I'm out! I feel nothing, no tilt, no regret - nothing. To be fair it got very boring. Live poker is so slow! It takes getting used to I guess.

Malta experience

First night

I busted out around 17:30 on Thursday, plane is on Sunday, so now I got 3 night in Malta! After busting out I fire up tinder! (if you use tinder daily and don't restart it - you're doing it wrong. I could write short Tinder GTO if anyone wants haha). Not too long, I've a set up 'sightseeing' date next evening with a local girl, and a date with a Asian girl that night. I never had 'Asian experience' before, so I was particularly interested in this one. Good enough! I head to dinner, start smashing some free wine. After dinner I buy some Corona's, and it's like 22 already so I start getting in mood for the Asian chick. She writes shitty English, pretty messy, and I realize she's drunk lol She disappears for a while, and I start to think this is not gonna happen. I even started to consider going to bed, but around midnight she writes asking me where am I and that she's near. I get ready quickly, find her, and as I expected she's not very sober. We bullshit a bit, but it doesn't take long to be back in my hotel room. In morning it got a bit weird as she liked me a lot and didn't want to leave.. I have to work on morning getaways more!

Day 2

Now Japanese girl has left, I eat some breakfast and pass out for couple hours. Date is set for 8pm, so I just go to the hotel's roof pool to catch some sun. All good, but all of the sudden girl texts me asking if we can move our date to next day. Sure, whatever, but now I got to find a new date! I tried hard, but failed to deliver. Oh well, I head to Unibet's 'Welcome drink party', but it's pretty lame. Just 1 free drink, quite few people and everyone talking poker. I don't like talking poker 'outside of work', I've tried to avoid meeting poker players IRL as bulshiting poker is not for me. So yeah, I leave this 'party' quickly. I go on to drink few beers, but no action. Failure.




Last night!

Tough day ahead as I've got 2 dates! 1st around 1pm, 2nd 9pm. Can I double deliver..? First girl comes a bit late, and we go have some food, drinks and precede to some pool party. She has a shift at hospital soon, so schedule is tight and I lost hope for happy ending. But it was fun and she was nice!
For the 2nd date I have to take the buss to Valleta. I drink some wine at dinner and around 8pm I'm heading there! The plan was that she'd show me around and than we head back to Paceville for clubbing. I meet her, we walk around and bullshit a bit. Aaand we head to a whiskey bar for drinks. She asks me if it's all right if her gay-best friend joins us (but doesn't go clubbing with us). Ok, what ever. Aaand he comes with his boyfriend! I'm not homophobic, I like lesbians, but here in Latvia it's not really accepted and ppl hide it, so this was my first gay experience! It was weird, they talked really gay but it was quickly clear that Griffindor will score. 'Drinking' ends, me and girl take taxi back, straight in some club, but don't even buy drinks before we decide to go to my hotel room.. After a while she takes a taxi home and I go out for the lone final beer of Malta! As I go back to hotel, some hot girl stops me outside strip club. 'Heyyy honey, you wanna private dance yadayada, you wanna see ma titties? 20 eur, come come!' I'm pretty sober, I know it's usually a rip off, but why the fuck not? Never been to strip club before.. I ask her 3 times if she'll really dance totally naked and says yes (tricked me ofc). Ok, we go in, she starts grinding my lap, eventually just grabs my dick and asks 'you wanna a massage? Happy ending? Wanna lick my sweet pussy? 100 eur, pay!' I'm sober, just laid, semi-broke so refuse. She goes like 'come on, when was the last time you made love boy?' '30 minutes ago'... She got a bit annoyed here as realized I won't give more money, and soon I headed back to hotel again. Decent night, huh!




Finalle

Plan was to play live cash till my 7pm plane (hotel check out noon), together with PokerVIP superb community we raised a bullet for 1/2 game, but unfortunately there was just 2/5 table going. I wasn't in mood for waiting, and went for a long walk after check out. Nice lunch, and that's it, time to go home (via 23:00-07:00 overnight stay in Istanbul airport :D)!

Résumé

I surely enjoyed Malta! I didn't bink the tourney, but I'm happy that I busted quick insted of deep-no-money-run. Would I like to return to Unibet open? Yes. Would I do it on my own dime? No. All the travel & living expenses will make it pretty -EV, so luckboxing satties is the way to go!

I want to thank all of those who followed and supported me throughout the event! Beers on me If you ever come to Riga!

God dammit all that praying for MG paid off! What an epic trip lol

Think my highlights were the Asian not leaving and then the stripper story......who cares about the poker!

Nice work bud and sounds like you played some hands well there.

Quick update!

I haven't played poker since 16th (except 2h yesterday). Reason - I was in Finland to compete in 7 leg orienteering relay. I did well, also team performed well and we finished 93rd out of 1707 teams (and 2nd best Baltic club, 4th best non-Scandinavian club) - this is the best place ever for a Latvian club, so I'm a bit proud of it! (Note: almost all top guys compete for Scandinavian clubs, including me usually).

I'm heading to country side to celebrate Ligo fest, which includes heavy drinking for couple of days, so I'm not sure when I'll get back, hopefully Sunday, so I can grind 4 more days this month (with 2k hands/ day).

Anyway, I've put OK-ish volume 1-16th June, roll has grown step closer to NL50, so hopefully I'm back there in mid-July or so.



Also, I just cashed out all of my 888 roll. I'm gonna move it to LotosPoker, which basically is a Russian skin for 888, so I get 20% first deposit bonus instead of 0 RB.

Have fun weekend! This is what I'll do tomorrow night (maybe not that sober tho..)

STOP

Do not make that deposit!!!

I have something for you....

One question: You happy to play fast fold variants?

well now I'm interested also

888 cash out delayed, but yesterday I finally put monies at Lotos. Played an orbit yesterday before ISL-ENG and stacked a Russian while at it (a good sign huh?). Today got just 1.5k hands in as well, but running all right, deposit increased by 20% already. I've got a huge advantage for now by me having HUD on regs, while they got nothing on me.

Tomorrow I finally have a full day to grind, gonna wake up 9am and go battle!

How did the battle go?

MG is battling hard!

Battle 1:


Battle 2:



MG is the master of rostucko!

Battle 3 is yet to come

gogogogogogogogogogo

Master of rostucko indeed. Are you using any kind of warm up routine? At some point, I've noticed that I tend to lose/play badly at the beginning of my sessions and warming up helped with that tremendously.

Double espresso counts? I'm not doing any particular warm up routine, just making sure I'm sharp and physically capable to perform +EV game. If I think I'm too tired / life tilted, I'm not gonna play. All in all I think I'm not playing badly at start of sessions, those above were just me card dead and losing standard big pots. Meanwhile...

Battle 3:


1) Running good. Folding full house too tough, I'd have folded tho.


Battle 4 may or may not be yet to come

gogogogogogogogo

I'd highly recommend introducing short warm-up routine before your sessions. It doesn't have to be anything elaborate like hypnosis (which some poker players claim to be using with good effect). Just 5 minutes of seating meditation or brain games using a site like lumosity.com has the potential of actually adding to your win rate by getting you into the A-game territory faster than you would otherwise.

And as for the hand, it's nice when opponents just barrel their stacks into you though you had to help him a tiny bit on the river

Thanks, Matt! I'll certainly try it out!

Oh boy, this rostucko was really intense..


Meanwhile in morning battle, grew a nice 550bb stack. For zoom it's no big deal, but for regular tables it's something special.



I'm probably done for the month, gonna write summary later.

June

Stakes:


Graph:



Just 31k hands (and just 85 hours), so happy with results.

July poker goals:
1) 50k+ hands (I'll be away most weekends);
2) Move back to NL50.

Month started badly with me dropping 120$ this morning, but I ran super bad and 80$ below EV, so all good, gonna show them whos the boss!

nice to see you getting back on track
any of that on stake or all yourself ?

All myself, I've never been on stake. I had just 350$ left in my poker roll (+ sufficient life roll for a while), I started NL20 with just 17.5 BI's hmmm.. NL50 when I have 1k EUR in Lotos account.

In few hours I'm heading away to compete in Latvian Olympics! Gonna compete in orienteering (if you know what it is), sprint relay tomorrow and city sprint on Sunday. I'm far from needed physical capabilities to aim high, but it should be fun at least!