Giving poker a try... [HU SNG inside]

Hey Stefan,

I think it takes a lot of courage, motivation to really dedicate yourself to poker. Especially when you used to work everyday and didn't have to play to provide for rent/food/family etc...

Collin also has a blog/staking thread with us!

Team Moshman SNG, MTT, and Cash Staking

Collin Moshman Blog

Don't forget to attend coaching either: http://www.pokerstrategy.com/coaching/

What matters is your mindset, You want to do this then you'll succeed! Wish you best of luck at the tables and let us know if we can help you with anything!

Ingrid

Hi Ingrid,

Thanks for your support. Most people would call me crazy for doing this but I think I owe it to myself to give it a try. I don't like 9-5 jobs and I have 9-5+a lot of overtime jobs.

Started the way pretty well yesterday. I didn't got the results I was hoping for, but still managed to get all the volume I was aiming for so that's good.

Stats from Monday

From HEM:

Tourneys: 50
ROI%: 3.5%
ITM: 54%
Winnings: $12.34
Time Played: 6.2 hours
$/hr: $1.99

For today my plan is again play at least 50 matches, (re)watch a SNG HU video (TwiceT Goes Emirates - Part 1) and read a couple more chapters from Collin's book.

I'm now going back to work

Hey Fanegreu,

Great writing skills sir. Have subscribed to your blog and looking forward to your progress as a pro sng player

HU turbo's are really soft, from what I have experienced people don't 3bet really light, so I wouldn't clal too many 3bets in position as preserving chips for extra fold equity when you decide to start 3bet shoving when the blinds get bigger is super important.

Gl and run like Camelz3391!

Originally posted by pleno1
Gl and run like Camelz3391!

who is this by the way: Hi im a sun runner

Originally posted by IngridN

Originally posted by pleno1
Gl and run like Camelz3391!

who is this by the way: Hi im a sun runner

I've seen his blog, he's out of this world

@Patrick - thanks for the encouragement, at the moment I am part of the weaker group of players at HU SNG but trying to fix that asap. By the way, good luck with your current NO HUD challenge

Yesterday was not a very good day for me. Although I managed to play 57 games, what I failed to do was to keep the same concentration on every single one of them. So, my graph at the end of the day looked something like this:

I think my main problem is that I don't take any game separately and I don't reset myself at the beginning of each match vs different opp. I've noticed a lot of times that I just take the dynamic of a match into the second one even if it's a different opponent. I will have to see how I can deal with that.

Stats from Tuesday

From HEM:

Tourneys: 57
ROI%: - 9.2%
ITM: 47.4%
Winnings: -$36.66
Time Played: 7.2 hours
$/hr: -$5.07

For today, I don't have a plan on how much to play, I would still like to get around 50 in but it's my birthday and phone already started to ring. I will probably gave up playing until night comes if I'm frequently interrupted and go for studying more. I will also go out with my gf in the evening so, yeah, I will see what I can do in terms of playing.

I had some funny hands from yesterday that I wanted to post, but I can't find them at the moment. So, that's all for now, just finished my coffee and I will start the grind.

GL to everyone,
Stefan

Happy birthday then and run golden!

Thanks for the cake Ingrid :). I actually ran golden yesterday, but as expected, did not get so much volume in. Still, better to run good than bad imo.

Although didn't played that much, stats from yesterday are below...

Tourneys: 21
ROI%: 36.9%
ITM: 71.4%
Winnings: $54.30
Time Played: 3.6 hours
$/hr: $14.94

...I did manage to read more and since I'm giving this a try for a living at the moment I jumped to the "career play" chapter in Collin's book. It's funny how a simple advice about pace setting your match (slowing it down in this case), specially after a bad call or a bad beat can really help you with your tilt control.

Target for today is now to get at least 50 tourneys in, probably a bit more as I would still like to have an average of at least 50/day at the end of the month.

Now back to work

Cheers,
Stefan

weee! glad to hear! hope you had a good birthday too! shiiiip it!

Hi guys,

It's funny how when you're doing something that you hate it always seems like Friday never comes and you wake up on Wednesday mornings trying to get to work and think to yourself "omg it should be Friday already". At least this is what used to happen to me.

Now that I'm staying at home and playing/studying poker everyday I am a bit sad that the week is almost gone and don't have that much time for playing... this should be a good sign

I had a fantastic day yesterday, run very good on overall, still made some mistakes that I hate but I did manage to get in the most volume of this week and also to show the most profit in a day since the start of this project.

Stats from Thursday

From HEM:

Tourneys: 61
ROI%: 25.7%
ITM: 65.6%
Winnings: $109.80
Time Played: 8.2 hours
$/hr: $13.34

So, a pretty good day overall, hope that I will manage to keep my composure and not do anything crazy today.

I got my last paycheck from my old job this morning and I do want to deposit the rest of my first deposit sum on Pokerstars, as I started with only GBP200 I still can deposit 190 and take that bonus but I do have a question for people that know more about Stars bonus and may read this. I know that I have some restriction on withdrawing money before I clear all my bonus. Do you know what that is, cause I didn't find anything relevant yet. I mean assume that by the end of December I've cleared 150 from my 390 bonus can I withdraw them or a part of them? Or can I withdraw the profit at least?

If you have the answer for me please let me know.

Thanks and good luck!

Hello everybody,

It's Saturday already and I have some plans for a homegame at a friend's house in the afternoon and then drinks/party with my gf and other friends in the evening. That being said, not sure how much and if I am going to play today at all. I would probably have time to get in 10 tourneys or so but honestly I'm not sure if I want to play such a low number...

Yesterday my run-good continued (although it kinda switched to the end of the day) and I did manage to win 15 games in a row at some point - I'm pretty sure this a record for me.

Stats from Friday
From HEM:

Tourneys: 61
ROI%: 19.34%
ITM: 62.3%
Winnings: $82.96
Time Played: 6.9 hours
$/hr: $12.08

Everything went pretty good for me during this week and I surely hope I can take my good run through the weekend as well

Happy weekend and run golden :)

Originally posted by IngridN
Happy weekend and run golden :)

Thanks Ingrid, I'll try to run as good as possible today, happy weekend to you as well.

As expected I didn't play that much yesterday and also ran bad in the homegame but I'm already up very early today to try and put in as much volume as possible by the end of the week.

Stats from Friday

Tourneys: 10
ROI%: 15.00%
ITM: 60.0%
Winnings: $10.52
Time Played: 1.2 hours
$/hr: $8.53

For today I plan to get as many games in as possible until the Liverpool - man city game at 4pm cause if Liverpool loses it might tilt me more than a lucky fish.

Hey Stefan,

Nice writing skills sir, what job did you resign from by the way?

Nice to see the poker is going well, seem to be consistently winning which is rare for a MTT player. When I play I have 5 losing days then 1 big winning day, what do you think your secret is behind the regular cashes? If it is playing tight do you think this has a negative effect of the chances of you getting a top 3 score where most of the money in MTT's is.

Thanks
Patrick

p.s I want bday cake

Hello boys and girls

My first week on playing poker for a living is now over and I will post a summary about it soon.

But first, just to update you about yesterday, it was a decent day - I started going down 4+ buy-ins after around 20 tourneys but manage to finish 3+ buy-ins at the end of the day, after 50 tourneys. Really happy with the volume I have put in on a Sunday day, not s happy with my focus on the game on this particular day but I will have to see how I can improve that. My biggest problem so far is that I need to be alone when I'm playing poker. It helps me focus a lot on the game and also it enables me to speak to myself (if I need to) and explaining my thought process out-loud versus some players as it really helps me taking right decisions. I'm leaving with my girlfriend in a studio here in London so it's pretty hard to get the ideal poker conditions when she's around, although she's very supportive an let me do my stuff.

Hopefully in the near future we will be able to move to a bigger flat as I'm confident that the more space I get the more improvement I can make to my game.

Enough about that for now, I just want to post the stats from yesterday

Stats from Sunday

Tourneys: 50
ROI%: 7.4%
ITM: 56.0%
Winnings: $25.76
Time Played: 6.8 hours
$/hr: $3.80

And I will be back with an update about the previous week and short term goals.

Originally posted by pleno1
Hey Stefan,

Nice writing skills sir, what job did you resign from by the way?

Nice to see the poker is going well, seem to be consistently winning which is rare for a MTT player. When I play I have 5 losing days then 1 big winning day, what do you think your secret is behind the regular cashes? If it is playing tight do you think this has a negative effect of the chances of you getting a top 3 score where most of the money in MTT's is.

Thanks
Patrick

p.s I want bday cake

Hi Patrick,

Sorry about this, I'm new at this blogging thing and it doesn't seem that I clearly specify the game that I play. I'm currently focusing on HU turbo SNG so you can see now why my graph/stats looks that way. I don't think I would consider MTTs for a living, not in the near future though, as I don't have any savings available and have to withdraw money from poker almost every month. I like HU SNGs as you can basically play as much as you like and take as many breaks as you like during the day.

About the job, I was working for 5 years in the Market Research industry, for my first 2 years as a scriptwriter and my last 3 years as a Project Manager. If you are not familiar with the industry you might consider it interesting or something but trust me, it's not :). Imagine having a desk job in a 500+ employes company with a lot of stress/pressure/unpaid overtime and very few satisfactions.

Unfortunately though, if poker doesn't work out I might have to go back to the same crap or take it from the start in another field but that would mean a substantial salary drop for a regular job. But that's another discussion, really depends on what kind of job it is. I imagine I would enjoy working for pokerstrategy for example:). Enough about this though, I'm really confident that is only up to me to make it as a poker player so I will just focus on this for now. ♠_biggrin:

Cheers,
Stefan

and btw: cake was gone in a second

I am quite familiar with the market analysis and research sector yes! ♠_biggrin: ♠_biggrin:

Made me my first smile of the day.

HU ftw btw.

Thanks
Patrick

Originally posted by pleno1
I am quite familiar with the market analysis and research sector yes! ♠_biggrin: ♠_biggrin:

Patrick is a market analyst at PokerStrategy.com so I'm guessing you two have a lot in common

Originally posted by IngridN

Originally posted by pleno1
I am quite familiar with the market analysis and research sector yes! ♠_biggrin: ♠_biggrin:

Patrick is a market analyst at PokerStrategy.com so I'm guessing you two have a lot in common

He he, it seems that we have. There was actually a job for a market anlayst trainee or something similar advertised until recently on pokerstrategy.com and I was thinking of applying myself at some point in the previous months so yes it looks like we have many things in common. ♠_biggrin:

Originally posted by fanegreu

Originally posted by IngridN

Originally posted by pleno1
I am quite familiar with the market analysis and research sector yes! ♠_biggrin: ♠_biggrin:

Patrick is a market analyst at PokerStrategy.com so I'm guessing you two have a lot in common

He he, it seems that we have. There was actually a job for a market anlayst trainee or something similar advertised until recently on pokerstrategy.com and I was thinking of applying myself at some point in the previous months so yes it looks like we have many things in common. ♠_biggrin:

yepp, that was exactly the job which would have been next Patrick well, keep an eye on job section and don't miss another chance!