Royal Flush : Chapter One - From Plankton to a Fish

Hi nutural,

This looks it's going to be well worth following!

Good luck in the challenge! :gl:,
VS

Last hours after starting the post I'm running on the amazing -60bb/100 on around 1k hands.
Yes sample is tiny and at least half of it is ..... (drum rollll) you've guessed it "Royal Flushes".

Overall though since I have started in August, poker after many years and cash for the first time "seriously" I'm very grateful so far.
Hands : 7,780 @ 10.8bb/100 and more or less running on +/- EV
Starting Bankroll : 100.00$
Profit / Loss : 16.86$
"Rakeback" : 1.75$ (not sure if i should be counting them in , it's two 0.5$ cash money, and a won Spin 3x)
Current Bankroll : 118.61$
Target Bankroll : 500.00$

What I found working so far :
1 - Full focus : no youtube videos, not even poker, no tv series. Just music or stand up comedy that I know though - not new stuff.
2 - Less tables : I started with 1 table of Zoom only and since I saw I have idle time while still marking fellow fishes then I went to 2 tables and that's it for now.
3 - "Play on a clock" : try to have a scheduled approach if possible. For example I have 10 , 20 minutes to play and I focus on that. I think I don't have the mental stamina yet to have a session as long as it goes -> that is when the Royal flushes are coming. And you are trying to "come back" probably.

Next thing to work on :
a) experiment with a warm up routine. Check 2-3 top losing hands first, maybe when done hand evaluation forum. we will see. For the begining I think lost hands will work better as a wake up call

Originally posted by nutural
Last hours after starting the post I'm running on the amazing -60bb/100 on around 1k hands.
Yes sample is tiny and at least half of it is ..... (drum rollll) you've guessed it "Royal Flushes".

half ??? :f_biggrin:
try 80%! wow. It's amazing how blind-sighted you are in the heat of the moment.

First of all good luck with the grind !

So you said you will start the challenge from 100$ but in your 2nd post you already add the profit from 6k hands that you play previously + 1k hand that you played in the first day ?

Shorterm Goals (Monthly)
* Play 3,000 per month : Joke to most, but first baby steps (0 / 3000 hands)
* Study Pokertracker ( 0 / 4 hrs )

I think is a good idea to use as a Goal hours/month and not a specific number of hands. Cause you might play 1 table most of the time, but maybe you feel like playing 2 or 3. And playing zoom that means a huge diference in volume and maybe sometimes you will be behind with the number the hands you have as a gool and you open more tables just to achieve that number even tho openning more tables can hurt your winrate.

Have a nice day !

Originally posted by nutural
What I found working so far :
1 - Full focus : no youtube videos, not even poker, no tv series. Just music or stand up comedy that I know though - not new stuff.
2 - Less tables : I started with 1 table of Zoom only and since I saw I have idle time while still marking fellow fishes then I went to 2 tables and that's it for now.
3 - "Play on a clock" : try to have a scheduled approach if possible. For example I have 10 , 20 minutes to play and I focus on that. I think I don't have the mental stamina yet to have a session as long as it goes -> that is when the Royal flushes are coming. And you are trying to "come back" probably.

Next thing to work on :
a) experiment with a warm up routine. Check 2-3 top losing hands first, maybe when done hand evaluation forum. we will see. For the begining I think lost hands will work better as a wake up call ♦

I like that approach. I used to play in dead silence, but since I have music when streaming, I've become used to having music.
I have to be careful though -- sometimes the music takes the focus.

Hello AgapieGheorghe! Loved your past blogs. They have been a great inspiration and push to give it a try.

Originally posted by AgapieGheorghe

So you said you will start the challenge from 100$ but in your 2nd post you already add the profit from 6k hands that you play previously + 1k hand that you played in the first day ?

I think you are right but got excited by the coincidence of me starting to play again after so much time and the Bankroll challenge that I assume it would be ok, but maybe it was a bad idea ♦

Originally posted by AgapieGheorghe

Shorterm Goals (Monthly)
* Play 3,000 per month : Joke to most, but first baby steps (0 / 3000 hands)
* Study Pokertracker ( 0 / 4 hrs )

I think is a good idea to use as a Goal hours/month and not a specific number of hands. Cause you might play 1 table most of the time, but maybe you feel like playing 2 or 3. And playing zoom that means a huge diference in volume and maybe sometimes you will be behind with the number the hands you have as a gool and you open more tables just to achieve that number even tho openning more tables can hurt your winrate.

What do you mean by Study Pokertracker ? The software or your stats and your hands ?

Regarding the time slot vs number of hands it makes a lot of sense, since I'm trying already to timebox my sessions. the Target was based on the fact that I wanted to play approx 20 min a day X 1.5 tables (starting from 1 and going to 2) X 250 hands / hr / table X 25 days a month so reach approx the 3k hands target. But I can try the timebox version since I'm doing it anyway to avoid mental fatigue and Bad Habits autopilot.

Regarding study in the beginning I want a few hours on the functionality. Used to have holdemanager so want I want to check out all this great new features I see , but not dig deeper, just understand what is outthere. Same for making my own HUD.
At the moment intentionally I leave a very basic HUD because I want to focus on my ABC lines and then make a more specialised analysis.
I keep in mind the villain profile and having my blind steal % a bit wider than what I used to , and CBeting a bit more from what I used to. But also I try not to change too many things in one go so they become a habit of mine.
Moreoever, I used to and will also spend some time going through all lost hands above 40bb to start with.

Trying out to upload some pictures to get comments around stats and tendencies.
* Next target to upload a hand for review *

Thank you in advance!!! :f_drink::f_drink::f_drink::f_drink:

Hey again You have to post the total stats, the last line that should be under all of that, cause i see for ex Vpip per position but i don't see it overall. Also you need to add some more relevant stats ( AF stats are kinda old school ).

I have one Video Here on how you can make a report ( if you dont know already ) in Pokertracker4.
And i have a Video Here on how to add more stats to a report.
Also I uploaded a Filter here if you just want to import this one, has almost all the stats that you need to do a database review.

Originally posted by AgapieGheorghe
Hey again You have to post the total stats, the last line that should be under all of that, cause i see for ex Vpip per position but i don't see it overall. Also you need to add some more relevant stats ( AF stats are kinda old school ).

I have one Video Here on how you can make a report ( if you dont know already ) in Pokertracker4.
And i have a Video Here on how to add more stats to a report.
Also I uploaded a Filter here if you just want to import this one, has almost all the stats that you need to do a database review.

You have just saved me some of those 4 pokertracker study hours !!!

Will definitely look them up

Cheers !

Originally posted by VorpalF2F

I like that approach. I used to play in dead silence, but since I have music when streaming, I've become used to having music.
I have to be careful though -- sometimes the music takes the focus.

there must be room in the music industry for concentration music or classical music but with some cool vocalists one the deep back ground singing " Overfold on the turn 3bet - it's never a bluff, never a bluff, neverrrrrrrr......" and stuff like that. :f_tongue::f_ugly::f_ugly::f_tongue:

Originally posted by nutural
there must be room in the music industry for concentration music or classical music but with some cool vocalists one the deep back ground singing " Overfold on the turn 3bet - it's never a bluff, never a bluff, neverrrrrrrr......" and stuff like that. :f_tongue::f_ugly::f_ugly::f_tongue:

Maybe I should record some

Week 1 in Bankroll Building Challenge 2021
So I'm following AgapieGheorghe's suggestion and I start the counter from the day of the Blog .

Vibe :

Things I liked
- Volume, I played much more sessions that I have expected
- Resilience, the ability to bounce back from the valley of bad play and "Royal Flushing"
- bb mode versus money, makes me respect the game more versus "this is peanuts, he does not have Ax here, let's see!"
- Study, really studied carefully Confidant's material , with single focus on them, not multitasking a million stuff. Getting the hang of it.
- After session journaling helps . I like the routine
- Hand analysis. Didn't do much. Only 5 till now but 70% of the $$$ lost was avoidable. And that is a conservative estimation including "honest" mistakes. Very motivating to help me realise what winrate I could achieve and keep them "warm" to avoid doing them again and again.
- Surprised how many similar stories I've read in the blogs. wow! :f_drink:

Things to Fix
- Royal Flushing - how easy it was to fall back to this old nasty habit. :f_cry:
- Spend a bit more time on setting up and learn pokertracker's way of working
- experiment with a pre-game routine
- upload more hands for analysis and feedback

Let's get it going

Did an analysis on my Top 15 losing hands (regardless of year played, so thank god these are old - I hope I have fixed this now)
Results were that in 3 / 15 I played ok-ish and I most probably could not have moved away from it (for my skill level that is).
In the other 12/15 there are horrible moves that put a whale sign on my avatar.

Conservatively (!!!) 65% of lost amount could have been saved If I was not doing my thing i.e. calling huge 3bets on the turn or :f_biggrin::f_biggrin::f_biggrin: 4betting them !!!
If you put in to perspective how many hands you need with a 10-15 bb/100 winrate to equalise that (7.500 - 11.000 hands ) , then you have your motive to stop the BS.

So excluding the Royal Flushes (RF) where I know I shouldn't do, let's look at what I actually could do :

Rationale : small Blind looks a normal player with 18/18 stats and 100% Fold to 3bet, but in small small
PRE : This is why I made it so small , to keep him in. But am I actually just giving him the right odds to call wide ?
OTF : Trying to still increase the pot and to get floated keeping most of his range in. Better to go bigger? 50%?
OTT : Disregard my "RF", do you normally call the 2.8x raise on turn and evaluate on river depending on card and sizing but you are more or less out, or you know you are beat and you comfortably fold there and then?

Excluding a huge whale, what profile / stats player will temp you to at least call the turn?

PokerStars - $0.02 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

BTN: 122 BB
SB: 217.5 BB
Hero (BB): 103.5 BB
UTG: 113.5 BB
MP: 152 BB
CO: 124 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has Q♥ Q♣

fold, fold, fold, fold, SB raises to 3 BB, Hero raises to 5.5 BB, SB calls 2.5 BB

Flop: (11 BB, 2 players) 4♥ T♠ T♦
SB checks, Hero bets 3 BB, SB calls 3 BB

Turn: (17 BB, 2 players) 6♥
SB checks, Hero bets 10 BB, SB raises to 28.5 BB, Hero raises to 95 BB and is all-in, SB calls 66.5 BB

River: (207 BB, 2 players) 6♣

Hey, i love the img from the first week report post