RE the QJs hand- I would defo have this turn as one I would continue on but I'm not sure I would always barrel off OTR. Once villain calls twice he has a fd or Ax and there a lot more Ac combos than there are FD. Blocking AJ and AQ is nice here as villain has less TPStrongKicker hands and more A2-5s which he is more likely to fold. Is villain a reg or fish? A fish I think I give up but v a reg I'm happy with your line

@WantNL100 Thanks! Good luck, always keep going forward and you'll succeed!

@robstars7 This is as @CrazyCookie says - against a reg you must bet this river, but against fish you can even check turn (which I wouldn't do with so much equity), because they just don't care and won't pay attention to such silly thing as balance. Playing against regs you don't need to focus on your holding, but look at your whole range instead and go from there when deciding optimal line.

Actually you should look at both your range and your villain's range. When it comes to that last hand you posted I actually really like your reasoning, but the fact that you block two hands that you can put the most pressure on by betting the river (AQ, AJ) becomes quite important as the ranges become narrow (and they almost always are when someone calls 2 barrels). Because of that I'd be inclined to consider not going for a 3rd barrel even vs. a regular.

@MattVIP Of course, range vs range, I thought it goes without saying.

Post-weekend update

My brother came from UK for a week (master's degree, but has to emigrate anyway...) causing interruptions in my schedule and damaging my volume. Thanks to Red Bull managed to play evening sessions, and I guess I delivered quite okay.

Month: +60$ 888 RB



888 stake breakdown:


-----------------------------------------------------------
Here is me on my HUD. Any comments on my stats?


1. RFI/VPIP looks badass - exactly my target points.
2. FvST quite high. Detailed breakdown; really would love some suggestions.


3. Widen up my 4bet range against regs - those guys usually have 3bet above 10%, wtf.
4. Double and triple barrel 5-10% more aggressive.

Hey! Great blog. I read all your first post to the point I reached the, "I don't expect anyone to read this" part. Lol!! Those regulars are changing the meta-game. LAG all the way!!
Good luck!(y)

I won't play poker until Tuesday, so I might update now as well. The reason is my 22nd birthday (on 16th), but I'm throwing a party tomorrow (2 day event haha) and going for a short roadtrip Sun-Mon to Estonia. Very tough weekend ahead!

I finally feel like I've earned this weekend! I've put in a lot of work in my game, and the results are coming along! Also feels good to finally not run like aids every sessio! Still a lot to do, but at this point, nothing can stop me from becoming truly successful poker player by this time next year! I could only dream about this point where I am now when I got into poker. It's been so fucking tough journey so far.. Haters

Month so far, yo



Volume is not that great - I've mostly studied afternoons, and played just on evenings when NL50 games really run (NL50 SNAP runs only from like 19 UK time).
Bad news - I've cleared my 20% deposit bonus on 888. I'm left with 4% RB (can make it up to 8% for gold status). I'm planning to split my roll into the Hive (45% RB), so I can find more juicy NL50 games even off peak hours.

NL100 shot - here I come, bitch!

Oh babyyyyyy that graph is a pretty sexy sight to behold! Nl100 lets mfkin do this yo!

You have 100% earned your 2 days party and happy birthday man! It is my Birthday on the 18th so i will be somewhat celebrating by your side

Get some pics of your party and when travelling! Would love to see it all.

Had a great weekend! 2 days hardcore clubbing (don't remember much of the 2nd day) and then went straight from the club into 2 day family roadtrip to the deep countryside. Great rehab!
I had a welcome drink made of closest legal thing to doping combined with moonshine 2:1 proportion. Fortunately nobody got a hear attack..

Taking/posting picture's is not really my thing.

Anyway - back to the tables and just won the biggest pot of my life! Can't complain about my run good..

Booooooom!

Nice wp, i like the 3 bet with a5s pre flop.

Why the c/r on the flop, i know a lot of the time this flop wont hit u but once u c/r doesnt that give your hand away as overpair even with a dimond doesnt take this line. Maybe even a set is unlikely to take this line so basically when you c/r dont u always have a flush here? + its vs 2 other players oop so if this isnt nut strength then i dont know what is.

@robstars7 BB is 86/11 whale with 0 FvR. When he pots and reg from CO fold, you can just forget about balance and pump the money in since whale won't fold. Also there are many turn cards that can kill the action and we are 200bb deep - I wan't to take it all.

Sick to come back and win your biggest ever pot. Bet it felt incredible when you saw he was drawing dead and didn't have a set or anything?!?!

Wheres abouts you go clubbing? Fully recovered??

I had a strong one on Tuesday night it now takes me a good 48 hours to fully recover lol. Old age!

Yeah, it it felt good haha!

Idk, usually when I get drunk I don't play at all the following day since playing tired/hangover can result in some huge losses from my experience. Imo it more +EV to just fully recover a day, stay away from tables on do off table work instead and then just come back when you're ready to A game.

I remember when I was 17-20 I never had hangovers, no headache or shit like that. Getting old as well. :/

Some of my friends are throwing a good bye party tonight since they're leaving for Erasmus next week. I have a bad feeling that I won't have much memories of the night... Shame that I'll have to piss away the juicy weekend again, but what can I do.

Bleh, first time in a long time I quit my session because of tilt. Played OK I guess.. Just couldn't win really.

I deposited into the Hive and had my first try out today. 1.2k at NL50. Games are good, but nothing much is running. Broke even pre RB (1 BI below EV tho).

MTD: My hot run is over :/



Week to go in August - can I work out some magic and finish with style?

BONUS
A very weird HU hand from the Hive. (EUR table)
Villain seemed decent so far. My thoughts on the river - I was gonna call anyway, he can x/back some worse hands so fuck him I donk. /was somewhat tilted at that point/ Am I retarded?

Just finished my most tilting session ever! I was on jesus seat against 100/5 guy whale who was donk potting 3 streets... and he was fucking goodmoding the shit outta everyone. runner runner everything. I'm so tilted atm.... Played shit on other tables as well, -300$ session. Good that I won 100 earlier. Haven't felt that much like a shit for many months now.

I guess I should take tomorrow off and cool my head. Prob will play anyway. #byebye2kmonth

OK, I've coolered up and now it's time to look back and analyze: why I had the major breakdown yesterday night?

Lets look at the lines straight away. These two were going simultaneously for a total of 6h15min.

888



Hive



As you can see, things were OK for the first 80% (hand ~450 on Hive). So what the heck happened?

A)
1. I wasn't making hands on 888, my bluffs didn't get thru. Basically playing good, but loosing (which is fine with me usually).
2. On Hive a guy showed up on my right and just hit everything.. While I couldn't even hit a pair against him. Standard hand against him was like I iso him w/ AQ 5bb, he calls, flop 347r he donk pot (12bb), I'm pissed and call, turn brick, he pots I fold. I started to iso him quite light to "get my money back" but kept bricking and folding.
3. From this point I went banana. Started to call off his pots with TPNK, 2nd pair. And he had NUTS every time. I hadn't seen anything like that for a long time.
4. At this point I also was playing bad on 888. At the end I donated a stack on 888 simultaneously as my 2p lost to whale's 2p and I made the best decision of night by insta leaving all tables (no matter if I had blinds already invested in a hand or not).

So this is the route how to get me tilted. How to spot that I'm on tilt?
B )
1. I have kind of a feeling of pressure in my head, like there is something stuck inside causing pressure, i dunno.
2. I don't go thru my HUD during the hands - I just button click my own holding yolo.
3. Not checking my ranges - playing too loose generally.
4. I don't even think about villain's range. I just hero call with my 1p because he can be bluffing and fuck him.

How to prevent it?
C)
1. TAKE BREAKS! I wen't 6h with just quick bathroom breaks. It's never a good idea. I should take 10 min break every 1.5h or so and go outside to breath some air/eat some fruit/vegetable.
2. Force myself to quit (or take at least 30-60 min break) when I notice anything listed in section B.

This is what I can come up with myself. I'd love to hear some additions to that! I'm sure every single poker player has gone thru the same issues.

To sum up - I go on tilt when a cycle like one mentioned in A happens. When on tilt, I do B and forget about C.

Pretty nice self analysis there and you said a lot of things most players would not be able to admit to.

I always think a nice thing to do to prevent tilt during a bad session (if running bad) is to look at your month long or lifetime graph. On a lifetime graph it will be the tiniest of blips ever and if you have lots of hands you will barely even see the green line downswing. So this refreshes thought that it really is just one bad day, these things happen but long run and overall you are winning money by doing what you are doing so keep at it.

I would say pre game preparation is to always just make sure you are alert/awake, feeling good, not juggling other things and just ready to grind with a drink/some food by your side.

AUGUST

Lines: Got random 110 eur from the Military, so made ~1.1k$ in August. I'd been super happy about it 10 months ago.. EV line should be 100$ higher as well.



Stake breakdown over 888, Terminal and Betfair.



Hit a 15 BI downswung at 888 NL50 tables which is never a cool thing, but what can I do. Also I didn't play that well in the last stretch.

Short update.

Been pretty busy with personal stuff so far September, just ~5.1k hands so far. +350$ or so.
I attended my very good friends first child baptism (the power of Christ compels you haha). Funny thing to start seeing my friends poppin' up with kids (will be 3 kids in my close cycle in 4 months).. Good for them tho.

I did 5k xc race for the military today. Had ultimate fun player on my table yesterday night, so couldn't quit and had just 3-3.5h of sleep, good enough. Almost died in the race, was like 2-2.5 min off my PB..

In influence of Joe Ingrams podcasts of Isildur latest battles, I've started to learn PLO! Just for a week or so. I throw in a 30-40 min session of PLO2-6 when I feel tired. Fun game. I don't enjoy 6max, but HU PLO is sooooo good if you're not playing scared money! I really enjoy it! I have HM2 Hold'em pro, so no HUD/data on my PLO sessions, but I'm up ~20$ or a bit more.
I started to feel very burnt out and losing motivation, so adding PLO as a side project sound like a really good idea! I'm also considering playing occasional donkaments. Had a lol moment at PLO, when I was holding KKXX on AQQ flop, called min bet on flop and blank turn, board ran AQQXQ, I knew he had an AXXX hand and he min bet river, I called, saw he actually has an Ace and spend next 30 sec wondering why the hell the chips went my way haha.

Also, here is a problem I've noticed in my daily routine when I go for a full day grind.
Lets say I wake up 13:00.
Hit the tables 14:30
~17:00 lunch.
18:00 - here the weak spot. I feel so tired and sleepy, like I need power nap or smth. I take coffee, but it doesn't help. I've started to throw my PLO sessions here, since I can't possibly A game NL.
19:00 Take a break, take some food / coffee again and I'm ready to finally A game.
21:00 Perfect time for a short workout, right?
22:00 Dinner
22:30 Back at tables
1:30-2:00 Stop playing, watch a movie / go over HH's here.
3:00-4:30 time for lala land.

This is somewhat my daily schedule when I'm not disturbed from outside. Note, that I'm +2 hours of UK time. How does it look?

So the question is - how to avoid this annoying afternoon weak point?

BONUS:

The power of GTO flop min donk. BB is the ultimate fun player and there is a bit of history of min betting nuts on the flop, over betting turns at this table.