WARNING!!! Going pro... If you don't like hard work then GTFO!!!

The Bad

Yes, you guessed it! It is more running bad!

For three days of play I have run 5 buy-ins under all-in EV (as well as some pretty bad instances of running into the better part of villains range in smaller pots).

But I don’t complain!

The Ugly

Of course you would like to see some graphs right!?

Pretty ugly right!?

(For those not used to seeing these graphs the yellow line shows how much money would have been won (or lost) if all-in pots went exactly to the EV each player has at the point of getting the money in.

The green line shows what was actually won or lost.)

So here you can see I lost 550 big blinds and if EV had been realised I would have only lost 50 big blinds. So 5 buy-ins.

It is standard. I have no problem with it at all. Just saying.

The Good

“What good can you find in that?” I hear you asking!?

Let me tell you…

On Friday I decided to dip my toes back into playing some 6 max.

As I have not played 6 max for 18 months and needed to get back into the feel of things I thought it would be good to play at NL10 rather than risk spewing money off finding my way again....

Almost all of the running bad in all-in EV was at NL10!!!!!!!

So I am only around $50 down in EV rather than if it had happened at NL50 or even worse at NL100!

If it had happened at NL100 I would be $500 down instead of just $50!!!

What a lucky boy I am!!!!

More Ugly

Take a look at these beauties…

Of course they are just bad beats but they are always fun!

And another...

Add in a couple of flips and you get the story. Standard (but painful) stuff.

As I say - I thank my lucky stars it was NL10 and not NL100.

Lessons Learned

I have said before that I do not get affected by bad variance and bad luck in poker. However, it was very noticeable to me while playing NL10 that I played a little less cautiously than usual.

I think I played nearer to “correct” than I might normally.

There may be a little lesson in here…

I play very under rolled in my opinion. I only have around 30 buy-ins for NL100 and it would definitely hurt me to lose $500 as I want this money to pay for my two holidays I have coming up in 2016.

Time To Think

I need to think hard for a while about what is in the near future for me.

Heads-up seems to be dying but luckily I do enjoy playing 6 max.

For now I am going to carry on playing some 6max on the side and probably play Zoom as I can jump in and out of the tables easier there.

I will keep records of heads up and 6 max separate so I can see how results go.

Lost 2.5lbs over the last week!

Quite bizarre as had two chinese take aways and one indian takeaway! Did zero cardio and only two work outs!

Looking forward to starting Wing Chun Kung Fu properly this week and hopefully I can move on in my 100 Push-up Challenge. I struggled with push ups again this week so have laid back a bit to rebuild - not sure what is going on as seem to be going backwards!

This week need to get back to working out more and running better at the tables.

Let’s go!

Chris.

(But great weight loss )

Poker

Sad to report that April 2016 was the first losing month of my $10,000 Journey

Results

Profit/loss = -$70
Hours played = 73.5
Hands played = 18229 (9525 @ 6max)

Graphs etc

All Formats Combined

Heads Up Only

6 Max Only

Summary

Overall I am, of course, disappointed to have my first losing month of this challenge.

I am bored of talking about running bad so other than saying you can see some variance in my recent posts and also losing out in all-in EV a little that is enough about that!

I think my table selection was a little weak at times at heads up.

I struggled at 6 max but also found some big leaks. I will pursue those immediately!

Plan For May

I noticed my biggest problem when playing poker is not being able to compute information quickly enough. This became very apparent when playing 6 max at too many tables!!!

I am going to make May the month where I try specifically to make better river decisions. This is the point in the hand where I get totally overwhelmed by information and make completely irrational decisions.

I am also going to get some 6 max coaching.

I do not want to divulge who I will be coached by but it is someone who coached me before for a couple of sessions and someone who I have chosen specifically for his preferred coaching methods (he prefers to review and make videos than do live stuff which I struggle with tremendously).

Bankroll

My bankroll is going to get decimated on June 4th as I have got to pay the balance on one of our holidays! I need to pay out $1320 which, unless I smash May, is going to rule me out of NL100 for a while.

Add that to the coaching costs and things are going to get a bit tight!!!

Biggest pots in April

I was surprised to see the two biggest pots won and lost were both at 6 max. That seems a bit crazy to me (maybe I duffed the filters up somehow!).

Biggest Loss

In hand I was not sure whether to 4bet or call QQ in MP v CO 3bet. I think in retrospect it is better to 4bet/call here but at NL10 I think calling does okay.

Never folding on that flop.

Biggest Win

I think I played this hand very badly. I should 3bet the preflop isolator for value as his range will be wide here. As it happens the result is the same but it wasn’t pretty!

Weight

This department went really well!

I lost 12.25 pounds in April (5.5kg) with no difficulty at all…

When I say “no difficulty at all” I was always disciplined with my breakfast and lunch and was also disciplined with my evening meals in the week. At the weekends I had takeaways galore and was not so well behaved. I also did not exercise enough!!!

Fitness

I am really struggling to move on with my 100 Push-up challenge.

I am doing the same workout over and over but I have reached a plateau. Hopefully soon I will burst onto the next stage!

Not done any jump rope for a while which is not good enough - I will get back on it!

Started training in Wing Chun Kung Fu this month and really looking forward to developing that.

Property

Added another property to the portfolio on the 31st March. Did not get much done on the property so far but it is all in motion so hopefully will be ready to advertise to let soon enough!

Conclusion

A great month for weight and martial arts, a rubbish month for push ups and poker!!!

May here I come!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good luck to all of you guys!

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Luck At Last!!!

Finally, after hours and hours of grinding, thinking that Lady Luck does not love me any more, she goes all weak on me and sends me some nice winning hands!

Patience is rewarded!

Results (3 days)

Profit/loss = +$357
Hands played = 2522
Hours played = 8.75

Graph (3 days)

(I won a stack at SkyPoker too which is very rare for me!)

$10,000 Journey Graph

Hooray!!! A new high point at last!!!

This is the first time I went to a new high since 13th March.

Hopefully I can “march” on from here and get the money flowing in again!

Total profit to date = +$3756

Winning Hands

As it has been so rare lately I think I should show you my 3 biggest pots won!

Hand 1 - 93 suited.

When I face a min 3bet I sit up and pay attention!

Some fish will do this with KK+ as they love to “be tricky” and often it is Ax and Kx.

I have no idea what they are doing to be honest but I do know that they will stack off light when we hit and they will give great odds to draw so I call with a super wide range.

He had not done much out the ordinary until this hand, was just a bit passive and folding too much.

As I say, I have no idea!!!

Hand 2 - AQ

Here I face a more standard 3bet but villain looks like a postflop monkey.

Plan is to hit and never fold or take Ace high to showdown as cheap as possible.

Hand 3 - 88

So the money is going in here anyway.

This was only 4th or 5th hand versus this guy and I won 20bb in one hand where I rivered 2 pair and cracked his AA.

He looked like a reg other than he did not auto top up his stack.

On the turn the only thing I want to do is make sure I get his stack.

There is no reason for me to jam as he looks like he wants to get the money in and the board is not likely to get killed.

I call his 3bet and let him bet the river for me.

Easy game!

(When you hit the nuts )

Summary

More of this please - the kids might get an ice cream on holiday if this continues!

In fact they might even get one each!!!

Have a good few days.

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Good luck, man! I'm following you for a while and like your approach very much! Just keep crushing!

Originally posted by Eatyourpeas

More of this please - the kids might get an ice cream on holiday if this continues!

In fact they might even get one each!!!

Haha.

Hi friends!

I have written a new article on my website 5 Steps To Happiness - How I Got Happy.

I hope you enjoy it and it helps you see how I am so happy in life!

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Hi Chris, thank you for all your nice articles.

I started with the programm and I am doing now step 4 Newbie.
Can you remember which affiliate you choose, or can you recommend me one?

What are steps 5, 6 and 7? If you still can remember.

Thank you very much for your help.

Hurrah!

Best week for some time!

Felt like I was printing money after the last couple of dry months!

Results

Profit = +$250
Hands played = 4530
Hours played = 15.25

Graphs

6 max only

HU Only

Combined 6max & HU

So that is my best week for a while. Best since week commencing 1st February and I thank variance for it - very much!!!

Biggest Pot Of The Week

I messed up on the river as I thought he jammed all in.

Luckily I got the rest of his stack within the next few hands.

$10,000 Journey Update

Thanks to the better week the graph looks like this…

The last few weeks has been a big test for me mentally but I am fairly convinced it is just normal variance.

The best thing out of it is I am getting better and better at handling it.

Weight

Stayed around the same weight this week - that is positive thinking parlance for “I put on a quarter of a pound”!!!!!!!!!

This weekend involved a 10 hour drinking session with my best mate with a fantastic Indian meal to follow. A huge barbeque. A Chinese takeaway.

I think that kind of explains the sudden upturn at the end of the graph!!!

Fitness

Did one push up workout and successfully completed the work out that I have been struggling with for a few weeks.

Will still repeat it at least once more before adding some more reps in.

Trained once in Wing Chun and also started doing some squats to increase leg strength and hopefully flexibility in the longer term.

Other Stuff

Finished writing an article for my website last week titled “5 Steps To Happiness - How I Got So Happy”. Link here.

Have a great week everybody and crush the tables!

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Poker

Last three days at the tables have been pretty unexciting and basically grinding!

Results (3 days)

Profit/loss = +$18
Hours played = 6
Hands played = 1422

Graphs

Day 1 was a bad day where I got involved in a dumb battle that nobody wins without luck!

It is like I go 40bb down through standard variance and then try to win it back against a guy where my edge is so minimal (if there at all) and in effect we are just paying rake to the poker site. Really bad of me to do this but sometimes after a long day I miss noticing things like this and just gently burn money away.

Second two days were better and managed to make it back with the help of Skypoker (which cannot be tracked) and $10 rake back from Pokerstars.

Grinding Zoom

I have got around 12,000 hands played of NL10 Zoom now. I aim to get grinding and get that to 20,000 and then send them to a coach for a detailed analysis and leak find.

My 6 max preflop game has totally gone so it is enough for me to try and get my preflop ranges sorted again and then play postflop somewhat similar to playing heads up play.

Getting into multiway pots again has been “interesting” and I need to brush up on that BIG TIME!

I am getting to know the player pool a little bit and it is noticeable how few real fish there are in there compared to a couple of years ago. Of course there are a lot of bad players (self included) in there and it should be easy to make money but just way way less total idiots!

Study

As I said I am going to get a review done by a coach - hopefully within the next few weeks.

I am currently trying to nail down some solid preflop ranges for 6 max - I have some ranges that were given by a highly respected high stakes player to work on. I need to stop folding to 3bet so much!

I am also looking through a couple of maths based books again. Although I am fairly sure that GTO and the like is not the way to go for most players of my ability, it is something I enjoy learning about.

And I am here to enjoy myself these days so let’s do it!!!

Other Stuff

Trained at two classes of Wing Chun this week already. Totally loving it and am having “I want to become an instructor” type thoughts!

Too much!!??

Have a fantastic weekend amigos!

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Hi amigos!

I have just published an article on my website.

I have a friend who was suffering with insomnia. In this article I explain what some of the mind based problems are with sleep trouble and give some ideas on how to overcome them.

Click here to read "Trouble Sleeping? Take Control And Fall Asleep easily"

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Congratz Chris with your won status-upgrade. Very nice. You really deserve it with your hard work and perseverance.

Were there any new insights from the analysis and leak find by the coach?

Originally posted by adelaar
Congratz Chris with your won status-upgrade. Very nice. You really deserve it with your hard work and perseverance.

Were there any new insights from the analysis and leak find by the coach?

Lolz, thanks! Tbh I don't even know what it means! I think access to some videos and learning materials but not too sure.

I have not sent the database to the coach yet. It is for 6 max and I currently only have around 14,000 hands in my DB since I started playing it again. When I get to 20k it is going in.

Thanks for nice comment.

Originally posted by Eatyourpeas

Lolz, thanks! Tbh I don't even know what it means! I think access to some videos and learning materials but not too sure.

Hey Chris,

Exactly right. You can view more advanced strategy and videos.

You can also attend more advanced live coachings.

Enjoy

Laz

Poker

At last I can feel an upswing is coming again!

A new profit high has been reached and I can see the next small target of $4000 profit on the near horizon!!!

Results (4 days)

Profit = + $58
Hours played = 7.33
Hands played = 1870

Graphs

6 Max Only

(Redline included for addicts)

HU Only

HU & 6 Max Combined

(Won £20ish at Skypoker)

Fun Match

This funster joined me at ipoker with 40bb and got a bit excited first hand... Until I flopped a set! But wait…. Oh…

The match lasted 10 hands, see the 3 most important/funny hands here…

$10,000 Journey Graph

Feels like the downswing (actually it was just break even stretch but let’s make it more interesting ) is over and things are going to motor on and upswing now to $4000 and more!

Positive Mental Attitude!!!!!!!!

Weight

Not very happy with this week… I put on 0.5 pounds!!!

Helen and I had a rare opportunity for a night out on Friday so a fantastic curry was devoured! Followed by traditional British fish & chips on Saturday and a fantastic Chinese take away on Sunday (double portions for me!).

That is a perfect example of how NOT to lose weight!!!

Still, the rest of the week was good and 0.5 pounds is not so bad right!?

Graph since started “weight watching”

Martial Arts

On Sunday I had a two hour meeting with the UK director of the Wing Chun organisation I have joined. I wanted to discuss the possibility of becoming a Wing Chun Instructor. It is definitely something I would “like” to do but from that meeting a million more questions have come up. We will meet again soon I hope!

General

I really want to do things to empower people.

Already I write in my blogs and on social media and hope to inspire people and help them to get more out of life.

My long term aim is to create a brand where people can come to me and/or my website and get instant help and motivation to make a better life for themselves.

Hopefully this is the start of something big. And I am not talking about just money here!!!

Have a great few days - I am away this weekend for a wedding, very excited!

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

This was a fantastic few days with nice money won at the tables and got back on track with my weight and fitness routine… Show me the money baby!!!

Poker

Let’s look at some money numbers, they speak mostly for themselves!!!

Results (3 days)

Profit = +$301
Hours played = 7.25
Hands played = 1491

I told you there was an upswing coming!

Graphs

6 Max Only

Heads Up Only

Combined Heads Up + 6 Max

Extra Money

The graphs don’t quite show the full money won...

I had got some money on Pokerking and Tiger Gaming which I was just about to withdraw as I could never get action there. Tiger Gaming had a table open at NL100 heads up so I joined it…

I won this big pot here which was a limped pot and he actually tank folded to my river raise but I also won another decent sized pot off him too!

Other Biggest Money Won

Hand #1

I have no idea what he is doing on the river. Well other then sending me his money that is!!!

Hand #2

Do you think his raise is a little thin here? At first I thought it was but now I think it is good (especially if he thinks I am a fish but it is quite possible he does not think at all!).

$10,000 Journey Graph

This is turning into a nice upswing again now and…

Blasted through the $4,000 profit barrier at last!!!

Summary Regarding Money

I am totally clear in my head here that I am now RUNNING GOOD! Lately I have seen both sides of variance.

Understanding variance is something all poker players should make a priority. Sometimes players try too hard to control things which are in the hands of lady luck rather than just trying to play the best that they can in as many spots as they can.

Very pleased with my attitude to this the last few days.

I lost 2.25 pounds in 3 days so am back on track.

I did this by eating healthily, getting the jump/skipping rope back out again, training twice in Wing chun, doing 60 squats and 30 push ups.

I am feeling the burn but LOVING IT!!!!

Conclusion

I am going away for the weekend for a wedding so not sure how much action I will get in over the next few days. I hope to get some hands in and I hope to keep printing money!!!

Have a great few days.

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

These last few days I had some (self inflicted) problems with getting any significant volume in.

We did, however, go to a fantastic wedding with some amazing people. Really good quality time for Helen and me together.

Wedding Selfie

(That is my wife, Helen, and me - just in case you thought it was the 30 year old bride and groom )

So over the 4 days I only managed to play 650 hands

Results (4 days)

Profit/loss = -$25
Hands played = 650
Hours played = 4.25

Graph (4 days)

HU & 6 Max Combined

Big Pots

Here are a couple of big pots I played lately. I wonder if anybody would play them differently (of course they would lol) - how would you play them???

Hand 1 - QQ

Here I make a standard 3 bet with QQ against a (probable) fish with a broken stack...

Do you play it the same? Do you prefer to bet out flop when the board has draws on like this? What is your preferred line (assuming no solid reads other than probably a fish)?

Hand 2 - A5cc

Here I face a min 3bet with A5 suited(I get excited when I get min 3bet)...

I call super wide versus min 3bets and then post flop I cut down my bluffing frequencies A LOT. Fish don’t fold often enough and once they have put that little bit extra into the pot already it gets harder to bluff them off. I don’t bluff flop much wider than open ended straight draw (OESD) or flush draw when checked to there.

On the flip side if I hit in a min 3bet pot I am calling down very wide - they just seem to go a bit bonkers.

In this hand he is going for the typical fish “I am going to trick you” line but unfortunately for him I am a lucky person!!!

$10,000 Journey

Still just above the $4,000 profit mark (at $4,001 to be exact!) and I feel really good at the tables. Much more relaxed than I used to be for some reason. I think the 6 max has helped me.

Weight

I am at 187.5 pounds now so I have lost over 1 stone (actual is 14.25 pounds = 6.5kg)!!!

I have been fluctuating around that mark for the last few days but considering all the wedding food, wine and beer I am very happy!

Another 10 pounds to hit my “target”!!!

Conclusion

Feeling good at the tables, weight is still coming off, fitness must work harder and if I am honest I am still feeling a bit rough after that great wedding!!!

Have a great few days my friends,

To your fantastic life,

Chris.

Puh and i thought it was your very own wedding! So by just scanning I'd already typed "congrats!"
Well, than take my congrats for the weight loss! I am on the other end, i am struggling to keep my weight UP. I lost another 1kg and am down to 83 :-(

Mini Update

Been sick few days this week and had funeral so not much activity!

Back in work but blogging will have to wait - will do full week update next week.

Nice hand just for the sake of it...

Keep. Moving. Forwards!!!

Have a great weekend amigos!

Chris.

Originally posted by SvenBe
Puh and i thought it was your very own wedding! So by just scanning I'd already typed "congrats!"
Well, than take my congrats for the weight loss! I am on the other end, i am struggling to keep my weight UP. I lost another 1kg and am down to 83

Lol, not mine amigo, I am 3.5 years into my sentence!!!

Sell your secret, make millions. Period.

Originally posted by Eatyourpeas
Sell your secret, make millions. Period.

Meet me Monday to Friday at 8:30 in the gym, i will tell you my secret there

Just got asked for graphs since started 10k Journey (aka since left CFP!)...

PT4 Graph

-----------------------------

HM2 Graph (PKR)

-----------------------------

Overall Profit Graph

-----------------------------

Not sure how much of the profit is from SkyPoker (cannot track there) but I have played around 10,000 hands there and I would estimate win rate of 10bb/100+ (it is one of my preferred sites now PKR has gone ) so $500 ish.

Rakeback is, of course, pathetic but must be some in there! Guess $500ish (but find that hard to believe so probably less). I am thinking SkyPoker likely higher and RB lower.

Have a great weekend amigos - I am on a stag party this afternoon (albeit I am predicting a "boring" one ).

Chris.