Zooming from NL2 to ...

Is x-x-x-x-x-x GTO wrong?

When I took up poker again this summer after 4-5 years break, I didn't remember much. However, I liked to bet a lot, much more than I liked checking. It was almost like it was an obligation for me to stab at the pot if villain didn't claim it.

I played almost purely zoom, so I didn't get to watch flops that other villains played without me.

At some point, I got the idea to maybe spew less and, the horror, just check/fold down to the river.

I remember my first hand that went x-x-x-x-x-x all the way! I was shocked! Really!?!?!?? Villain will allow me to pick up the pot without me betting at all?

Later, I incorporated slowplaying so that I can punish villains who were just like me and stab at everything.

The thing I am wondering about is:

Is it practically never GTO optimal to check all the way?

A "reason" for answering yes could be that there is this inherent advantage to betting, and that it pays off to just incorporate all your air hands in some betting range on either street.

My practical experience, though, is that, yes, indeed, sometimes it is better to just check all the way (especially OOP), but that may of course be heavily environment dependent.

What about high stakes HU? Are x-x-x-x-x-x lines rare there?

August 5 recap.

Summary: 1-tabled throughout the day. Played mainly 5NL Zoom, then a bit of NL2 Zoom, NL10 Zoom, and 2-10NL reg. Played only 65 NL10 Zoom hands, but was on a heater

Overall: A day of concentration and decent results.

Mental state: I got into a super-concentrated, serious and analytical mindstate. What I did when I started off the session was playing very slowly, giving my mind something to work on. For instance, before folding Axo preflop, I would ask what Axo I would open here. And before folding, I would take a glance at all opponent stats and stacksizes. Etc.

Towards the end of the day, I got tired as usual and just one-tabled 2-10NL reg tables.

Gameplay: I think OK. Can't recall any huge spews, but I did make mistakes. But they seemed more like analytical mistakes rather than emotional mistakes.

Physical state: Fairly OK.

Other notes: The NL10 regular table seemed quite fishy. I should look further into this. The problem is I hate playing regular tables and see them break up all the time. Well, that is stuff for my planned "things that I have to learn to love" post.

Hands: Both during the 65 NL10 Zoom hands:

1) I flopped a royal flush in a 3-bet blind vs blind battle when I called 3-bet with JT of hearts. Flop went check-check and turn was a 10. I bet out half pot, he slightly more than clicked it back, I re-raised, he folded. Perhaps I should have just called turn and led out river smallish, allowing him to bluff-shove or consider any weakish hand of his good enough for a call.

2) I won a stack when I called SB 3-bet with K6s on BTN and flop came K63 two-tone. Villain c-bet half pot, I raised, and Villain shoved. He had AJs flush draw, but I held up (67% equity on flop).

August 6 recap.

Summary:

1) Started off 1-tabling NL5 Zoom. Was completely card dead! In 729 hands, I didn't get AA once, and KK only once. I practically couldn't hit a flop either, I actually went through all the flops and made a tally of what I hit. Thing is, I lost 2 bins without playing any big pots, they just dwindled away, and I had to figure out if I was really card dead or wtf was going on. Also, my c-bets didn't work, either they were called down by 3rd pair, or they were raised by crazy Ivans. If I didn't c-bet, I would be bet into immediately while holding air or hands that could hardly take any heat etc.

2) Then 3-4 tabled NL2 regular tables for 542 hands and won 1 bin.

3) Progressed to NL5 for 276 hands, but that was a cooler. Bluff-spewed in 3 hands, and then I hit set with 55 but ran into a turned wheeled straight that I didn't think to pot-control against (not that I should, dunno).

4) OK, about 14 dollars down, but I was not tired, so I decided to 3-table NL2 Zoom. I was practically BE for very long here, but finally I turned a straight with J9s in BTN in a 3-bet pot vs. SB who went all-in with KQ two pairs, giving me 1.7 bins.

Shortly after, I coldcalled a biggish 3-bet from SB with JJ (BTN had 3-bet UTG), UTG called. I figured I could set-mine here because BTN was about 200BB deep, I just must hope that UTG doesn't raise. Flop was 7JK two-tone, BTN c-bet almost pot, I raised, he went AI (UTG folded). Luckily he didn't have KK, but AA, so I won 2 bins.

5) So, now only 7 dollars down, and still not too tired. Went to NL5 Zoom again, and won two stacks during 300 hands: UTG openraised AI with JJ while I had KK in MP, and another hand where I had AA in CO and 3-bet x3 UTG x4 open, he re-raised biggish, I went all in, he called with AKo.

Overall: I was down, but kept grinding in an OK mental state and ended up BE.

Mental state: Not super fresh in the start of the day, but I stayed OK fresh throughout the day, more than usually. My mood was fairly unaffected by the downswing, I think it helped that I just went through the flops etc. and realized I was just card dead and that I had not been spewing too much.

Gameplay: I think OK. But it's of course huge work in progress.

Physical state: Played with mouse in left hand first half, until I 3-tabled NL2 Zoom. Right arm liked the pause, I guess, but we'll see tomorrow.

Other notes: It was interesting to 3-table NL2 Zoom. It seems like the brain can pick up some patterns better when there is more volume within a given period of time, so it's definitely something I should do from time to time.

The "theme" of the day was the typical difficulty in Zoom:

1) When you bet, you may get called down by stations. So only bet 2-3 streets with fairly good hands, right? (or maybe bet and then check and call)
2) But when you don't bet (or bet and stop), you will get bet into by maniacs.
3) So you get the typical feeling that when you have air or a weak hand, you will be bluffed away by villain's air if you give up the initiative. But if you bet, villain will float, and if you bet again, you will be called by a station, while if you stop, a good villain will bet you off your hand again with a properly designed betsize/line.

So it's all about balance and figuring out exactly what part of villain's range you are targeting with your bets or calls with your given hand (or, which of your hands in your range to use for which lines given the board etc.).

I noticed during the day that I many times was not thinking well enough in this respect (or, more precisely, actually forgetting to think in this way). BUT! I think it really helped to 3-table NL2 Zoom, it was like I was getting intensive practice in deciding what to do with hands quickly in terms of my overall ranges (when to bluff with some equity, when to give up immediately etc., when to go into bluff-catching mode, when to check-raise bluff, when to bet and then go into check-call mode, when to bet for protection or whatever, etc.). Also, when to be overall defensive or overall aggressive depending on flop and position.

My thinking process in all this is super far away from systematic, but at least I must keep all options open and make some conscious considerations and judgement calls rather than just "I c-bet because I don't think Villain has a king too often here", which is just guess work, and fish villain will call you down with 3rd pair or A-high anyway.

Hands:

I really liked your blog and the fact you do deep analysis of your play daily.
Also enjoyed reading the theories you posted.
I believe this is doing wonders for your game, so keep it up.

Thanks, that is great to hear!

Best of luck to you too!

Just read a couple of comments in another blog I really liked:

1) "improve player recognition/adaptation"

2) "Mentally I've been improving my mindfullness at the tables. I must work on letting the game come to me instead of trying to force it - saving a lot of energy, and keeps you in that Zen alertness mode."

About 1: This is something I know I really have to improve on. Essentially you want to develop your memory structures for this (if they do not come to you naturally). I attempt this sometimes by being really focused on opponents while playing regular 6-max tables. I also practiced it a bit when the HEM2 hud was down for Zoom and actually liked playing this way for a while, sensing that I was developing my memory.

About 2. Just golden advice that I must be very alert never to forget. And, if I sometimes then get the feeling that I am being run over by being passive rather than patient, then it's maybe time for a short break and some instant analysis of the session.

Just started session for today with some 1-table NL5 Zoom. A note:

Had some not too uncommon feelings of

1) it being ages ago I had last played (it was yesterday). This is something that really confuses me and that I want to discover patterns in and possible effects of (whether it is something natural or something to do something about).
2) a sense of fear of the opponents.

On the flip side, I used the "slow and thinking start" and it definitely helps towards hitting the zone and build calm confidence.

A hand from the start of the session that may illustrate a theme I am thinking a lot about these days: river bets to protect ranges on earlier streets.

I have KK in CO, MP opens x4. He has normallish stats, but I have only 20 hands on him. I decide to just call, even though there are no squeeze monkeys behind.

Flop is Ad 9d 5h.

Villain c-bets 0.30 into 0.47, I call. Pot now 0.97.

Turn: 9s.

Villain checks turn, I check behind.

River: 3h.

Villain checks river.

Now, bet or not?

I decide to bet 0.50.

Why?

1) To protect my calling range on flop (villain can't c-bet so easily on flop then and hope for a "free showdown" on river).
2) To allow me to bluff on river.

I could also have bet turn, but perhaps other hands in my range are better for that.

As always, the risk of betting (whether on turn or river) is that:

1) You may value-own yourselves.
2) You give OOP player the option of raising your bet.

Here, I more concretely thought that:

1) I might get value from PPs.
2) I allow myself to bluff with failed draws like JTs, forcing villain to call with PPs (but I might have bet them on turn, dunno).

Two things to figure out:

1) How to play my Ax hands in this spot on turn and river to balance things well. (Well, really how to play all my hands in this spot, of course.)

2) How a typical player would play in my spot and thus how villain will perceive me. Note: The average player could easily have a different range and style in this spot than me.

.

Thanks! You are welcome :-)

August 7 recap.

Summary: Started the session late, after a good long night's sleep, a walk, forum posts, relaxing and thinking.

Decided to just continue with NL5 Zoom, one table. In the start, I had a weird feeling of not having played poker for ages and being scared of the opponents (see post above), but it quickly subsided after I made that post.

Results were not good, I quickly got behind 1 bin, and ended up 2 bins down, mainly due to 2-3 spew hands (see below) in a total of 1220 hands.

But, everything else was great! What I tried to figure out in each hand was something like :

1) How hard does this flop hit my range and villain's likely range? (Do I need to be overall aggressive or defensive here.)

2) How would I play various parts of my range here (how is villain likely to play his hands)?

3) How does my hand fit into this?

I got into a super focused, analytical mode, by far the most concentrated I have been since taking up poker again. I also felt very fresh, and I was pretty unconcerned by results, just enjoying this truly being in the zone. And I felt like a pro due to my way of thinking.

Some more concrete themes were betting the river, and generally betting or raising for protecting ranges when suitable, and figuring out if hands were indeed suitable for aggressive play or bluff-catching or giving up or whatever, or if I should rather pick other hands from my range in a given spot. While I probably made many mistakes and am just a novice in this, it felt great to have some kind of sophisticated approach to decision making, also making poker more enjoyable.

Towards midnight, I realized I would not break even and got blues due to this. But I think this is mainly blues due to being tired and not having results to show for my efforts.

Overall: Result bad (2 bins down), but everything else very good.

Mental state: Very good, see above.

Gameplay:

Physical state: Right arm was better than for many days, stomach was slightly uncomfortable. Was fresh throughout the session.

Other notes:

Hands: I spewed in 2-3 hands, 2 were clear spew where I confused myself, 1 was maybe spew, maybe not.

Hand 1:

I have Qd2d in BB and calls SB raise.

Flop: 5h Ah 2s
Pot 0.30.

Villain c-bets half pot, I raise smallishly (maybe ok), villain 3-bets very smallish, I call with the intention to bluff turn (probably this Q2 with practically no draws was not a good hand for this).

Turn: 5s
Pot 1.9.

Villain checks, I bet 1.26, villain calls.

River: 3s
Pot 4.42 (villain has 2.79 left).

Villain checks, I check as well.

Hand 2:

I have 7c7s in SB, raises, BB 3-bets, I call.

Flop: 8h 5s 9d
Pot: 0.9

I check, Villain c-bets half pot, I raise 70%. (I figured that this gutshot was a fine checkraising candidate in what I perceived to be a flop that smashed my range compared to villain's range.) Villain calls.

Turn: Kc
Pot: 4.26

I shove, villain calls.

Hand 3:

Essentially, I had TT UTG, flop is AT4 rainbow in a 4-way pot, flop checks around.

Turn is another ace (completing the rainbow), I bet small, gets called from SB.

River is a 9.

SB bets 60%, I raise 50% with the clear intention to fold to a shove. Villain shoves, I call anyway. I guess I was kinda curious to see if my read was correct.

You're moving too fast, I can't keep up with your posts ♦

Nah, just kidding. Keep it up!

I've read the first few posts of your blog now, and it's really interesting. You make some good, interesting points that might be worth looking at for me as well.

Will continue reading later today.

Also, fingers crossed you'll get Bronze status soon!

Nitty fold?

Stats on Villain is 15/15, with 3-bet of 4.8 in 62 hands, and sound positional stats.

BTN: $5.07 (101.4 bb)
SB: $5.68 (113.6 bb)
BB: $9.79 (195.8 bb)
UTG: $6.73 (134.6 bb)
Hero (MP): $12.19 (243.8 bb)
CO: $6.22 (124.4 bb)

Preflop: Hero is MP with K♠ K♦
UTG folds, Hero raises to $0.13, 3 folds, BB raises to $0.42, Hero calls $0.29

Flop: ($0.86) J♣ Q♥ 2♠ (2 players)
BB bets $0.60, Hero calls $0.60

Turn: ($2.06) 6♥ (2 players)
BB bets $1.46, Hero folds

Don't really think you can read too much into positional stats after just 62 hands.

I think it's a pretty nitty fold, yeah. He can certainly still have hands like AQ/KQ that you still beat, or even an AK that he decides to barrel. I'd probably call the turn again and re-evaluate on the river.

That said, of course he easily could have AA/QQ/JJ as well so I can see why you'd fold, and it's probably pretty close.

Adjusting by mimicking rather than exploiting + the implicit group collusion trapping of would-be exploiter.

Recently, I have been thinking about this phenomenon:

1) We have a certain style, let's say, a quite nitty style, for instance.
2) We are unsure if we are "GTO".
3) We notice a villain with a much more aggressive style and end up in some pots with him.
4) Then, rather than sticking to our own style, or explicitly trying to exploit his style, we adjust by only mimicking his style when we are in pots against him.

The point would be that we are unsure whether our own or his style is more "GTO correct". So, rather than figuring out if we should attempt to exploit his style, we simply mimic his style so that we are at least "break even" against him.

I suspect that this is in practice what is going on a lot. People adjust, but only defensively by mimicking, because it is too difficult to figure out if there is an even better way to adjust.

The up-side of this is that if the villain doesn't realize what we are doing, we may end up exploiting him anyway!

An example:

We have a 6-max table of 5 super nitty players. They open narrowly and they are pretty honest post flop. If there are several/big bets in a pot, it's very likely to be because of a strong hand, and people will fold to each other then, "trusting" each other.

Now comes along the Super Aggro Monkey Pro, SAMP. He licks his lips at the sight of this nitty ABC table, sits down, ready to steal a zillion pots and monies with lots of bluffs.

However, while the 5 nitty players are indeed nitty, they are not unobservant. They quickly realize what SAMP is attempting to do. And now they adjust by simply mimicking his style whenever they are in pots against him (but only then). When he check-raises, they re-raise him with air or draws, they value-bet thin, etc. etc.

SAMP doesn't realize what the nits are doing ("they only play this way when they have it"), and he ends up eventually folding a lot of his expensive bluffs (when he could have re-bluffed), and lose a lot of monies.

Essentially, the nits ended up trapping SAMP. They didn't do it by believing that their nitty style was inherently better than SAMP's style, instead they simply mimicked his style when up against him.

For the nits, it's a no-loss approach. As long as they all "agree" to be nits against each other, they are break even. And they are also at least break even against SAMP.

The point is that they don't have to worry too much about whether their nitty style is "GTO incorrect" as long as the environment plays with the same style and as long as they are alert to any deviations from the norm.

How might SAMP have approached the situation instead?

I am not sure, but one idea is to make it less transparent that you are deviating from the norm. If the nits fold 80% to 3-bets, then rather than 3-bet any two cards, just 3-bet slightly more frequently than the other nits.

The question is whether you want to "force" them to adjust (hoping they won't be able to do it properly, say, you can outplay them once they begin to call 3-bets wider against you or 4-bet you), of if you would rather "go under the radar" and just exploit them once in a while without them noticing or being sure about it.

An example from my Zoom play is SB vs. BB. Some people fold BB far too often, but that may simply be because the usual SB villain doesn't steal often enough. However, they may notice that I steal more than the norm and then play back at me more loosely, without ME noticing.

I sense that some people do this (when they tank a bit before playing their BB), and hence I generally won't steal with ATC just because BB has a high fold percentage. Instead, I can just stick to what I believe is a "correct" steal range, and that should be enough to exploit them once in a while. The advantage of this is that I don't "force" them to adjust correctly against me so that we gravitate towards a BE equilibrium. The disadvantage is of course that I may miss some profitable steal opportunities.

Originally posted by TinoLaan
Don't really think you can read too much into positional stats after just 62 hands.

I think it's a pretty nitty fold, yeah. He can certainly still have hands like AQ/KQ that you still beat, or even an AK that he decides to barrel. I'd probably call the turn again and re-evaluate on the river.

That said, of course he easily could have AA/QQ/JJ as well so I can see why you'd fold, and it's probably pretty close.

Yes, those are my thoughts also. Probably KK is something like the top (or bottom) of my bluff catching/value calling range here. Villain may be trying to barrel me off PPs (with AK) or off draws (with AQ).

The main issue for me here were the deep stacks and his big bet sizes. I got the sense that he was looking to stack me off of protect his AA.

Another thing I am wondering about is how I would play JJ or QQ here. Probably I would raise turn? Or maybe raise turn with QQ and call with JJ (or vice versa). I can't figure out the impact of the second heart coming on turn + QJ on board.

Essentially, I decided I couldn't call any river bet, and that there were many cards I wouldn't like to see on the river. If villain then barrels his made draws + air on river, I fold, while if he checks his strong (but scared) hands, I can only check back and will mostly lose anyway. Of course villain doesn't know my hand and style and can't bluff indiscriminately on river (or turn).

The hand reminds me of your QQ set hand where you ran into a KK set. There is this effect of:

If villain has AA, he knows I don't (and I didn't 4-bet preflop anyway).
If villain has QQ, he knows I don't.
If villain has JJ, he knows I don't.

I have thought a lot about how this impacts situations and how to balance ranges, but I find it difficult to figure out any good answers.

Thoughts about flop situation in 3-bet hand.

I am SB, Villain is BTN, I 3-bet preflop, BTN calls. Stacks are about 200BB.

BTN: $11.02 (220.4 bb)
Hero (SB): $12.21 (244.2 bb)
BB: $5.21 (104.2 bb)
UTG: $4.81 (96.2 bb)
MP: $2.50 (50 bb)
CO: $10.01 (200.2 bb)

Preflop: Hero is SB with A♠ K♠
3 folds, BTN raises to $0.15, Hero raises to $0.50, BB folds, BTN calls $0.35

Flop: ($1.05) 3♥ 5♠ 8♣ (2 players)

About Villain: He is 24/21 in 30 hands, 3-bet 25% (so 1/4 hands), positional stats 0/0/50/25/50.

1) I think above info about villain is enough to deduce that he is quite likely to be a reg that will call my 3-bet wide with all sorts of speculative hands and also some simply weakish hands.

2) My 3-bet range is quite strong, essentially:

- PPs
- Strong off-suited broadways
- Suited broadways
- Axs

3) The flop doesn't hit villain's range very well if we assume that his range is wide with hands like Q8s or K9s or whatever. He has:

- a very small fraction of sets
- a fraction of straight draws (but no combo draws or draws with already one pair)
- a small fraction of PPs
- a few vulnerable one pair hands with no good draws
- a few strong (that is, mostly undominated) overcards
- Practically no 2-pair hands
- quite a bit of air

4) The flop is "undangerous" for my range? Not sure what to say or conclude right away. But Villain doesn't have many strong draws, combo-like hands (drawing for straights or two pairs or flush) or random two-pairs in his range (or other strong made hands).

5) From 3 and 4, I conclude that I am overall justified in being aggressive, my range being still the stronger one.

6) Fastplay or slowplay? Let's look at my range:

- Strong PPs are good against anything but a very small fraction of villain's range.

- Medium PPs are mostly good here, but I may look to fast-play for value or protection against his random overcards.

- My strong overcards can end up dominating some of his overcards if we see turn and river. On the other hand, they may like to fold out villain's equity sooner rather than later, not giving vilain free cards to improve random hands, or to realize his equity with weak one-pair type of hands.

- My suited overcards like KT suited are similar to many hands in villain's range, except generally a bit stronger.

- My Axs hands are not too happy about the flop, but they may still be ahead of a big part of villain's range.

Essentially, it looks like what I have to decide for many of my weaker hands is whether I should be unworried about villain improving (I may also improve), or if I should try to fold out villain's "random" equity right away.

7) How often can villain float here? I don't think he can float very often because he has so few good hands in this spot.

So.... To decide what to do. Some options:

1) C-bet 100% of my range 1/2 pot.
2) C-bet 100% of my range 2/3 pot.
3) C-bet 100% of my range 1/3 pot.
4) C-bet some, check-raise some, check-fold some, maybe check-call some (but I think I should be overall aggressive, so I don't think I like check-call too much).

For my AKs hand:

1) Check-fold is out of the question, it is ahead of so much of Villain's range.
2) C-bet or check-raise?
3) If we bet, gets called, do we bet turn unimproved? What other hands would we generally two-barrel with?
4) If we bet, gets called, and check turn, what do we do if villain bets? Do we have any bet flop and then check/call or check/raise hands in our range?
5) If we check flop, and villain checks behind, do we bet unimproved turn (or check improved turn)? What other hands in our range would we play like this?

To conclude.... I can't figure out any confident answers to the above. But I think the above initial analysis is relevant for when beginning to construct answers about what to do with different parts of our range.

How to do the missing part of the analysis? Either build experience and gradually adjust towards what seems like good play, and/or open up CREV and fiddle around with that. + get input from poker friends and coaches.

August 8 recap.

Summary: Started the session late again. Problem was pain in right shoulder and right arm and right hand/thumb, so decided to give it some rest before deciding whether to play.

In the end decided to just continue with NL5 Zoom, one table, like the day before, and ended up playing 901 hands . Things seemed pretty uneventful, but I had good focus/concentration and worked on my thinking/decision making, playing very slowly. So I was happy about that, but annoyed/concerned about my arm.

In the end I won some pots, the biggest one with AA in BB. UTG had opened, there were 3 callers, I took some time adjusting my squeeze so I couldn't be mined, once done UTG insta-shipped 150BB deep.

Overall: Result good (3.5 bins up), concentration/play good, annoyed about right arm.

Mental state: Concentration good, mood bad due to arm.

Gameplay:

Physical state: Pain in right shoulder, upper for-arm, right thumb backside. Could be partly because of bad sleep (shoulder).

Other notes:

1) I reviewed 50 of the 102 flops today (the day after) by thinking them all over again as if I played them again. Posted a couple of hands above.

2) Read Phil Galfond's Well on 2+2 again, + some stuff on his blog:

http://www.philgalfond.com/

Some notes:

- I like his analytical way of thinking.
- I like that he knows when he is uncertain about thing.
- He also mentions how HUNL experience is very useful for 6-max NL.
- He mentions how it is impossible to turn off feelings, but that it is better to get aware of them, accept them, and then adjust.
- It was interesting to read his essay about Isildur.

3) The NL5 Zoom seemed to get quite fishy at 8pm-10pm. Signs: Weird stack sizes and me having no stats on more players than usual. Also, lots of Brazilian players, perhaps they are new players due to the Ronaldo commercial

Hands:

August 9 recap.

Summary: Spent a good deal of time on session review of yesterday + some posting here before playing.

Ended up playing 912 hands of NL5 Zoom, 1.25 bins up. I played from 8pm - 12pm. Overall environment was very fishy, I guess Friday night thing.

Unfortunately, I was in an annoyed, grumpy mood and never managed to concentrate well. I was quite reckless at times, sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.

Things that tilted me:

1) Failed 3-barrel bluff in start of session against crazy Ivan, see below.
2) Lucky fish hitting trips with garbage hands etc. It shouldn't tilt me, but it did.
3) My arm pain. I ended up playing purely with left hand.
4) Wasting so much of Tino's and my time getting me bronze status here.

Overall: Result so-so (1.25 bins up, but field was very fishy), concentration/play not good (too reckless, failed to think well), annoyed about right arm.

Mental state: Annoyed and grumpy, unconcentrated, but not tired.

Gameplay:

Physical state: Pain was not so bad as yesterday.

Other notes:

1) Playing level on Friday night is very fishy.

2) It is always difficult to settle on good bluffing frequencies. One idea I was thinking of during the session was to decide on something like "one 3-barrel bluff for every N hands", and then pick what seems like a good spot for it, and then no more. If I decide to try this method, probably I should also decide to be more reluctant to do it in the start of a session, to minimize the risk of getting tilted if I fail.

Hands: Spew in beginning of session. I had no stats on Villain, except he was from Russia.

BTN: $6.96 (139.2 bb)
SB: $6.09 (121.8 bb)
BB: $4.93 (98.6 bb)
Hero (UTG): $5 (100 bb)
MP: $3.42 (68.4 bb)
CO: $5.09 (101.8 bb)

Preflop: Hero is UTG with K♦ Q♥
Hero raises to $0.13, 2 folds, BTN calls $0.13, 2 folds

Flop: ($0.33) 3♣ 9♦ 9♠ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets $0.20, Hero raises to $0.70, BTN calls $0.50

Turn: ($1.73) J♥ (2 players)
Hero bets $1.20, BTN calls $1.20

River: ($4.13) 4♣ (2 players)
Hero bets $2.97 and is all-in, BTN calls $2.97

I think it is part of Russian culture not to want to be seen as a coward. I like Russians, btw.

August 10 recap.

Summary: Was running terri-bad, but also spewed one stack on an obvious mistake (bluffing all-in over a cold 4-bet by a 71/1 guy).

Mental state:

Gameplay:

Physical state: Not so bad

Other notes: Having a very bad (result and gameplay) the day after (while writing this) and not in mood to analyze or comment much, but more interested in finding mental balance calmly.

Hands: