[Closed] Peak performance poker with TLN

i seriously hope that the guy is reading this. ♦

♦

i rly am a big cycling fan btw, prolly actually the sport i follow the most actively. I ve watched all TdF since 1997. I was a fan of Jan Ullrich, as a child I rly hated Armstrong coz he alw seemed so incredibly bigheaded + he alw had by far the best team, which had the most money, the best riders (both for TTT and climbs) and best technology (read that till the new alloy got to other teams and the min weight by rule was put into place they had by almost 500g lighter bikes!).. Ullrich was always left alone in the mountains vs a train of USpostals-discovery channels w Armstrong the last to strike. It felt so unfair, and ofc from the individual standpoint it is- however what cycling noob-fans dont realize is that cycling is absolutely a TEAM SPORT in the first place. Esp in 2003 when Ullrich was w Bianchi, i am sure he d have won by a LOT if the teams were swapped. Omg, i even remember the times after few of the penultimate HC climbs, when Ullrich had to himself go to the cars for water fail.. Anyway, I followed almost all stages till 2006, later w Rasmussen and Landis i kinda lost interest and just followed a bit more sporadically. When Lance came back, I rly was shocked and actually started to like him from then on and cheer for him coz I like all the fighters and ppl who just go against the critics/crowds. But yea, he was a bit too old already. Contador clearly the best now, seems like there wont be much of a competition for few years now..

just today the 21yo undoubtedly the biggest prodigy of the whole world's cycling won his first Tour - 5stage Tour of Sardinia. He not only won the overall, but dominated completely by taking down 3 of the 5 stages ♦ SICK! All details for those who like cycling: Giro di Sardegna ; The race was moderately hilly, he also won 2 undulating stages where the likes of Cunego, Scarponi or his teamleader Nibali would have been clearly awaited to take it down. Then he also outsprinted Petachii, Belletti or Ferrari in the completely flat rundown finish.

This kid is simply amazing! After day 2 even Nibali was working for him and the whole team was defending all of his yerseys ♦ (he won 3: overall, best rider till 25, and best sprinter)

Btw, this is just a beginning of the 2nd season of him a pro! And already last year he won 2 stages in Paris-Nice, 2 in Tour of California and 1 in Romandie - in Par-Nic and Cal he also won the points green yerseys, even though he is not a natural type of a sprinter at all. He comes from a mountain biking history and actually was junior world champ in it, that explains why he is rly good in the mountains also.

Ppl in Slovakia don't acutally recognize him that much but to me he is downright the best sportsman in the country! Nobody rly had such successes in such young age, he is easily on a track to overcome succeses of Merckx or even Armstrong if he keeps it going.

Yay! just wanted to say I am so happy for him. And in a week we have Paris-Nice starting when he is going to be starting as a team leader, hope he can rly pull out some fight for the GC, stage win(s) seems like almost an obligation now ♦

For some reason this blog has given me motivation to start running for long distance, so I have decided from 2morrow to start going for long runs 3 x a week, so i will start of first week run 4km, and increase 1km every week

The only problem I can think of is that running for long distance burns muscle from what i've heard , so I am afraid I might lose muscle mass which isnt good cause I wanna be muscular.

I am starting 2 see a very strong relation between long distance running and poker mindset, I am realising to succeed in poker you must be able to go through the same mental suffering that you go through as a long distance runner, pushing yourself further and further and never quitting. This is why i've decided to start running Also including I will be in great shape.

i watched tdf live once. a good few years ago it came through uk and i was on the rail like a pro getting drunk

im in, i come to bratislava to pokerflat. i prefer just 2 people living there.
if the mountain doesnt want to come to mohamed, mohamed has to do it

i stay in cambodia until 6th march, then my villa rent is over and im thinking what to do next(thailand/end of march APT in phillipines/pokerflat BA i have return flight on 15th april, but maybe i can return sooner, depends.

recent poker standings - grinding NL200 and 400 with supesafe roll, and excited to moving up to highstakes once again, thats why i need your competitive enviroment.
real life - i do gym 4 times week/ used to play squash, football, badminton, swimming occasionally, no smoker, no heavy drinker

P.S. double posted for sure old/new blog

Originally posted by TheLastNail
♦
i rly am a big cycling fan btw, prolly actually the sport i follow the most actively.

im quoting tln to underline his statement:

sms July 19 2009, 13:31
shortly before first rl meeting of tt and tln in komarno.

come quickli! i wont open u during the final climb!♦ Lance ftw!

cycling >>>> meeting tt live a true fan
never deleted that message. just pure epicness

I like your style sir!

We should hire a motorhome this July and travel through France following the TdF. In the evening we can grind with low amounts of good local French wine

@Zemammuth: hey man! that's awesome that u re starting to run too. Will try to post some health/diet orientated points later on in the blog, I will be training now quite hard for the halfmarathon, so there will be updates, I have to discuss few things w Travis first. And abt the mindset: absolutely spot on, so many similarities between poker and endurance sports. The mind and body are ofc so closely connected, the suffering and overcoming of pain/ going through bad patches.. Well abt the muscles, I dont like the white-fibred muscles anymore anyway.. I was going for an active bodybuilder carreer till the age of 16. (i was working out for almost 3 y till then, had 96kg w very low fat, just after turning 16, was starting to work w a personal trainer.. but yea, the moment i had to decide if i want to do it very seriously or not, I chose school. I stopped taking creatine, pure aminoacids and no longer any other protein rich diet, just coffee and very little sleep coz i was studying at the time a LOT. -> i lost 18kg (almost all muscles) in 3months! White fiber muscles are superunstable and esp when u re used to being on creatine all the time, I actually rly felt that I was just overweighted, for normal life it's just a total waste. Ofc u ll never get such volumes w the redfibres, but who cares.. I personally think swimming is the abs best for forming a "sexy" body.. but running will help u burn ur body fat rly rly quick. I ve run for 3months ~3x/week each time ~10km and lost 6kg and 5cm in waist -those who know me- i was slim even before. However, if u "look" slim u still most prolly have a lot of bodyfat esp on ur abs and butt (its more rounded-if u start running distances a lot it flattens out considerably) which u dont realize that much till u dont have it. I am very close to having a perfect 6pack and i can feel the lower 2 too ♦ 8pack till the summer ftw! .. anyway, i just feel amazing, i never have to sleep more than 6.5h these days and i am able to put so much energy into everything i do.. well, more abt all suplements and otehr things later..

@Joenaes & Toby: let's do the Tour yea! srsly, let s go and camp on Alpe d'Huez for few days so that we can get some nice places for cheering up.. Damn, if Sagan is on the team this year I might think of some Sagan-cheerup Dididevil for those unfamiliar:

@LooserSR: hey Andrej, ako sa dari? Pocestovali ste uz vsetko naplanovane? Uz sa mi ozvali 4 dalsi, ale myslim, ze by som ta uprednostil, tiez sa mi viac paci idea byt skor 2ja. Teraz tu fungujem nad ocakavania dobre aj sam, takze kludne to zvladnem aj dlhsiu dobu, nemusis si davat skorsiu letenku kvoli prave tomuto, uz som sa viacmenej rozhodol, ze este take 2 tyzdne sem nikoho nepustim :P, budem ta kontaktovat ako prveho tolko ti mozem slubit, z tych inych zaujemcov tych chalanov moc nepoznam osobne, takze "konkurz" si tym padom vyhral . Marec naozaj ostane asi otvoreny, aj kvoli tomu, ze Ivan tu este ma par veci, ktore by si mal prijst zobrat a je teraz (vraj) chory a este nejaky cas nepride. Dam vediet o updatoch.

@TT: ♦ sir, i remember, what a gross moment, u ringing down and Contador and Schleck attacking on Armstrong.. fml!!! ♦ btw: i am such a noob, i didnt even know there was kartracing in Komarno.. just was there 3weeks ago 1st time.. damn, could have raced at least. hope u enjoyed the strolles w the mosquitos ♦ snap! how awkward i was actually, so unbelievalbe that u came to visit me at that point. How much did i change since then, boy oh, boy.. rly. A LOT. (still not a brutal life shark, nowhere near the class of urs, but it's getting ever so closer - hope we ll rly enjoy the party actually, i have it scheduled now, it's fix, i thought i might give 1 tourney a shot, but no, i miss some monkeymoves already too sorely ♦ )

overall week summary: I have played a bit over 30h, I have analysed quite some, ~ 10h (excluding when i coach which is actually also fairly analysis orientated) , basically carried out all my other nonpoker goals, poker a bit of a fail, as expected didnt make the planned 21k hands :(, but still not that bad for the first week after a longer break. Overall I averaged a B level of my game. Esp on 2k i played C, so i tried to limit it before i can move into the "zone" hopefully next month.

70% of it is NL600 which i am actually totally devastating, rest 1k, and just 400hands on 2k (i lost there - the obv abrubt downs, esp just before 10k hands- and then i said:ok, lets play some 600 for a while .. back to rocksolid up, but ok.. i must aknowledge i was hitting insanely in that stretch, i hit the nuts on 5-6 flops in abt 1h, few of which were total setups in my favor, other were that ppl leveled themselves too much (which i would have done also in their spot-coz it seemed like i was just sickly trying to abuse them by going a lot over the top w agression )

I rly dont have the confidence yet fully back, esp deep on 1k and 2k. I rly FEAR losing 2k+ in few seconds. Rly weird actually considering my overall roll and my analytical power, it's kinda just a too big of a number for me even tho i dont rly think abt it being sth in a material world at all. I just rly dont have enough playing exp (!!!) coz i play so little all the time. I just need to play day in, day out, be there w 5k on the tables, stay there and dont avoid it so much. (like now: when i get 250bb+ deep w sb good having direct position on me (i dont consider too many ppl "good" tho), i just leave without even thinking abt staying- that's sth i ve alw done and i am abs sure its shortrun the best option, however longrun..hmm.. But u know, I am forcing it: today for the 2nd time in my life I was sitting and remaining w 5k+ on the NL2k tab, even tho Nano and 1 other guy were covering me and i rly didn't feel comfortable. Overall, I am way way off my game on NL2k still.

Anyway, but 2 things are positive: I know it (and I also strongly think which other ppl on my tables know it- therefore I can outlevel them-happened) and I also got back to not just being motivated abt doing sth abt it, but actually acting. The next month should deffo bring a ton of action.

plans for next week tomoro after i come back from wellness.. so much looking forw for 1-2days of rest now.

Love your updates man, seems like you are really improving in rl a lot, as well as with poker!.

I will be back from PI the 6th of July, didnt buy my plane ticket back yet so I'm in for some TdF

Originally posted by TheLastNail
@LooserSR: hey Andrej, ako sa dari? Pocestovali ste uz vsetko naplanovane? Uz sa mi ozvali 4 dalsi, ale myslim, ze by som ta uprednostil, tiez sa mi viac paci idea byt skor 2ja. Teraz tu fungujem nad ocakavania dobre aj sam, takze kludne to zvladnem aj dlhsiu dobu, nemusis si davat skorsiu letenku kvoli prave tomuto, uz som sa viacmenej rozhodol, ze este take 2 tyzdne sem nikoho nepustim :P, budem ta kontaktovat ako prveho tolko ti mozem slubit, z tych inych zaujemcov tych chalanov moc nepoznam osobne, takze "konkurz" si tym padom vyhral . Marec naozaj ostane asi otvoreny, aj kvoli tomu, ze Ivan tu este ma par veci, ktore by si mal prijst zobrat a je teraz (vraj) chory a este nejaky cas nepride. Dam vediet o updatoch.

dari sa fajn, thajsko/kambodza je vynikajuce miesto kde sa da prezimovat, teplo, more, lacno, pekne a pritulne baby este chcem ist na filipiny a mozno singapur ak to casovo vyjde.
vcera som konecne docital tvoj stary blog, poslednych 20 stran, uz dlho som to mal medzi favorites ale nikdy som sa k tomu nedostal akosi... velmi zaujimave citanie
tak potom to vyzera, ze ten 15. april je idealny pre nas oboch, by som doletel, rovno si doniesol veci k tebe na byt. plus doviezol z nitry asi aj teplejsie veci a hlavne projektor a repraky, konecne bude zase po 9 mesiacoch home cinema, kedze do barcelony sa mi to nechcelo trepat ♠_biggrin:

GL getting to your A game soon and crushing NL2000 !

Great blog just like the last one, just need to make a post so it's easier to find.

One thing I wonder, how do you deal with switching between your own limits when you play them yourself and coaching people at lower limits? Gameflow and skill must be quite different I guess. Is it just a matter of "leveling down" when you coach? I'm really curious.

Do you still lift weights aswell then? I was thinking of my training schedule to be go for long run, and then do one main lift, for example;

monday: Run 4km, then do bench press

Tue: Run 4km, deadlifts,

Wed run 4km, squats

and basically increase 1km each week so I can improve stamina and hopefully i will be able to run 10 km no problem ♦

I think once I can run 10km no probs, I will focus on doing it at faster time rather than inc distance, however i might go one day a week for longer distance, and another for beating my time.

The main lift is to keep the muscles strong so I don't end up losing muscle, generally I think I have a good amount of muscle mass naturally without lifting weights, so I think it would be really hard for me to loose muscle in general.

wow, sick weekly graph How much can you grind yearly with your A-game?

Awesome blog! Lots of wisdom in it.

♠_thumbsup:

@flat decision: so for all those who applied: U will surely understand that since I only know LooserSR personally (and he is a Slovak), he has to be my preferance. I also thought more abt details, and totally agree that being 3 ppl would be too many already - it's rly gay that sb would not have his own room.

@LooserSR: napisem ti potom na skype. koniec Aprila vyzera ok, i ked mam tam par akcii, ktore to mozno posunu az na 1.5.

@Joenaes: let me know for sure! I am srsly in if any Slovak gets to the race, and seems like if its not Sagan then at least Peter Velits, who could be even a co-leader in HTC coz of last years 3rd overall in Vuelta.

@Wryzeth: hey, welcome to the blog. For the lims distinguishing: It's purely experience, I am already quite of an experienced, both player and a coach, I would believe I have a very good feel for the game at all lims across from NL200-2k. However, I didn't coach much on 100 and lower, so my guess is that my understanding for the flows in there would not be so good.

@ZeMammuth: yea, ofc I lift, but mostly just more reps (10-12) and lower weight. Don't rly want to build excessive bodybuild. Primarily want to have endurance, explosiveness and ofc feeling healthy (i cannot rly overpush coz my joints are rly in a bad shape as mentioned before)

@Cornie: hmm.. thx. I think I should make 500k+ esp if i continue being motivated like I am now and avoid some major downswings. more abt this lower..

@Gabinr1: alright hope u get inspired, as well as all other ppl.

So I took 3 days off (had a wonderful time of various activities, esp social and some sports), before I played in Slovak Main Event NL champ on Thu. (550€ BI event) - I played my absolute A+ game (although there were like 2 missteps: I "misclicked" and instead of raising PF to 150 in the 1st level i raised to 1050 ♦ (nobody took adv tho) as well as I didnt see that opponent had a better hand and I showed a losing hand- w/e..) I was totally carddead (1 hand won altogether on sd; best Ax i had for 4h was A8s, best pair JJ (won a small pot-the only one on sd, F:Axx) and 88- with which i was finally eliminated with against A5s (terrible call on his part coz of positions and stack depth of ppl involved- not rly interested in describing in details) + got sucked out big 2x and was out in what was the 6th level I believe.

Hmm.. I was somewhat relieved I was out coz I have a visit here still (Opal finally came) and I wouldn't rly pass for a good host playing an MTT for 3days.. This exp tho just definitely reinforces my plan of concentrating on online poker, coz I just abs detaste vulgar emotional ppl on the tabs as well as the cigarette smoke, which is ofc forbidden in the playing area but I still felt so much smoke coming from somewhere else in the casino. I will deffo play WPT Slovakia, and I will try to get to at least 2-3 other bigger tourneys during next few months, but if i dont cash in any of them I very well might as well just stop playing live tourneys till the end of the year and rather concentrate on building a bankroll online.

Alright, now what we are doing with Travis this week is "Goal setting". And a rly specific one. I must acknowledge it has been a big mistake in my pro carreer sofar that I ve never rly set SPECIFIC goals. A goal like: "I want to improve and move up" or "I want to be one of the best" is a mere dream without having that decomposed into a lot of smaller steps of action u can take to actually seriously do sth abt it.

It would be for hours to go into details, I thought abt everything a lot, as well as for the first time in abt 2 years I counted up all my BR online. I had just +-20k estimate, which actually turned out to be also off ♦. Anyway, the good thing here is: I have a decent roll. The question I got asked and is kinda the most relevant concerning shot taking was:

What is the most u can afford losing in 1 session and not be depressed abt it if u know u played good? my current best estimate: 20k (my worst losing day sofar is just over -10k and I didnt get to know it, before i checked individual days at the end of the month)

What is the most u can afford losing in a streak and not be depressed abt it if u know u played good? ... 30k (maybe 40k, but yea, I am not sure abt when i ll start checking the results.. it depends how much of it is due to sb else being bad and me unlucky- if i get sickly unluck, as i was getting, than 30k feels worse than if i lose 40k on just setups i cannot feel that ppl who got the money from me dont deserve it.

Now based on these answers we should workout a specific plan for me to shoot high lims. As I ve mentioned before, there is rly just 1 way to go for me in poker, since I cannot be forcing myself into 100khands/month freakstyle anymore and that is: play the best, get to know the thinking of the best, think like the best and eventually become the best. I will get the most ready i can before ofc. Then the numbers will keep on changing drastically..

here is a SPECIFIC guideline for now, esp shortterm (and till the end of the year)

my goal is to be starting playing nosebleeds by the end of the year, 1 of the other big goals is to play Isildur HU in specific. I want to be a reg on 5k, 10k and shoot NL20k. The thinking is this: Before i can shoot NL20k i need to be ok with at least a 100k session loss in my mind. So i need the proper bankroll (wont mention the exact no. for a good amoutn of reasons, but i have it in my mind) and also the experiences ofc.

steps to take me to NL20k shooting by the end of the year:

1, play NL2k a lot (the diff in skill betw NL2k and NL20k is close to nonexisting according to all the current available info i have abt the higher lims, also: comparing the playerpool, the diff betw NL2k and NL1k is certainly a LOT bigger than the diff betw NL20k and NL2k)

before some serious shots on NL5k i have to:

play at least 20k more NL2k hands (since the traffic is low i cannot expect to play rly too many more, its more abt the understanding part and getting used to the sizing of bets well, since i wont care much abt 10stacks loss on 2k, the only thing i need to remove from my mindset is too much of a respect for other acknowledged plrs. (the first thing i ll do next monday is analyse Nano for at least 2h..)
watch and analyse entirely at least 20vids of NL2k-5k and make all the corresponding notes i can get from them
analyse 100 hands of NL1k+ deeply (1hand= ~1h)
make notes abt at least PF ranges on the 20most common players on NL5k
it would be good to expand my BR by at least ~150k, coz that would highly probably shift my session stop loss limit more tow 30k, which is deffo quite an important factor, since the variance in these games is huge obv.

The last is not an obligation tho, I will shoot NL5k with 20k stoploss anyway (unless i go on a rapid downer). Altogether, all that above is in betw 200-250h of analysis. Since i already know my limits in this. I know i cannot do more than 12h/week (i start hating poker at 15h+), so that seems like exactly 4months.

I know, I wanted to shoot it sooner, but I also know it would be just an ego-thing that way. This way it's the planned way. I know for good that I ll be so confident if i carry out all the above, that nothing but myself and luck can stop me. I will abs not fear even if the table at the time was 5 Isildurs and me coz I know it's pretty much impossible to do more than I would have done prior to it.

So: 1.7.2011 I am shooting NL5k. (also: if i for any reason fear the table at the time- i will also just play it. That is what Travis told me to do. Play whoever u fear coz u know in your heart that u ve done everything u could and it won't be better, u just need to destroy ur own internal blocks and see that U RE ACTUALLY GOOD!!! (and other ppl fear u as much as u fear them)

From 1.7.2011 everything is open and all highly depends on how i will run. Also the no. of hours put in will be subject to changes. But the general outline is this:

shoot NL10k on 1.9. w the mindest of not caring abt 50k loss in 1 session
shoot NL20k on 1.12. w the mindset of not caring abt 100k loss in 1 session

the minor steps to achieve those will be determined on 1.7 /1.9. respectively

Now i am off to make as much money as i can till 1.7. (200k+ is deffo the goal) and carry out the rest as well.

Ah, almost forgot: yea, i ve officially challenged the only sponsored Slovak pro, Dag Palovic for a HU match for 20k hands offering him my 30k to his 10k as a bonus for the winner. It's in all slovak poker portals already, he can choose the limit: NL1k or 2k. If he accepts I will update on that, but think it's fairly unlikely he will. I will challenge Czech republic if he doesn't.

the official link

wow i don't really know what to say. you're just a sicko, i dream

Thanks for your reply!

Fantastic post...excellent plan, nice goal-setting, looks like everything is sorted.

and other ppl fear u as much as u fear them

You can't emphasize this enough, people often fear respected and acknowledged players but don't even understand that it's the same the other way around.

It's the same in sports, if a great football player that is "crushing his limit" (like 30 goals in a good competition) in his current club transfers to a better club (like, Villa to Barcelona), people will definitely take him serious in the team and that's purely a mindset thing. Respect others but don't underestimate yourself, if you show confidence and stay calm they will see you as a regular in minutes. ♠_cool:

you're a beast. lol this is like some UFC or WWE shit, you call someone out for a fight, on the tables ofc.

good luck, dout you'll need too much of it

I hope he accepts the challenge, although I'm more than 90 percent sure he won't.

Hope the guy accepts and loses