Costa Blanca grinder 2025

January 1, 2025

Hello 2+2 community

Happy new year!

The poker story

It tickled me and I had to write about it. This is a story that started more than twenty years ago when I started to play poker for the first time. I was hooked from the first hand, it started with a home game, then it evolved in playing online and much more. At first I was losing but I wanted to win badly and started buying books and later took a coach to learn how to win at poker. In the second year I became profitable and never had a losing year since then. But I am and still am a small/mid stakes player, because I have always done this alongside a busy job. But nevertheless I played millions of hands online and I still love the game so much.

I have also been able to make a lot of poker dreams come true, I have been to Las Vegas multiple times and played WSOP tournaments, I played an EPT main event and made the final table of an Unibet Open Tournament. And during all these events I could meet and play with alot of my poker idols. Unlike celebrities in other sectors, you can just bump into poker players of all stakes at big events and just talk to them. Not one I spoke to was unfriendly or didn't make time for a chat, I spoke with Ben "Spraggy" Spragg, Lex Veldhuis, Daniel Negreanu, Adrian Mateos, Phil Helmuth, Julien Sitbon, Davidi Kitai, Jason Mercier, Kenny Hallaert, Brad Owen, Phil Ivey and many others! Great memories!

The real life story

Around the time that I discovered poker I also found out about the FIRE movement (Financially independent retire early). At that time in my thirties, I made a career in the corporate world and had a management position at a relatively young age. Since I traveled a lot for work I didn't feel the need to go on vacation much, unless it was to play poker abroad.
So during the years I could save a lot and my FIRE dream took shape. I decided a long time ago that I wanted to live under the sun when retiring, so in 2021 during the corona crisis I bought a second house in the south of Spain. The past four years we used the house as a holiday home, we visit like four or five times a year. The weather is great here and there are four casinos nearby where I can play daily tournaments with a low buy-in. Paradise!
At the age of fifty I reached my personal FIRE goals but I decided to work for a few years more. We are now two years later and this year I decided to have fun for the rest of my life so I sold my house in northern Europe and quit my job. As of the second of January I live in Spain permanently.

The future

You only live once, so do as many things you enjoy and make you happy. I always loved my job, but the main reason I worked hard is to reach FIRE as soon as possible. At a younger age I already made my mind up that I am not gonna work until I die. As of now I am gonna focus on the things that I like the most in life such as playing live poker, reading, investing, hiking and writing blog posts.

Poker goals

Playing live poker as much as possible, there are tournaments every day so you can choose which days you wanna play. On the weekends there are higher buy-ins with slower structures. So that’s where I want to lay the focus on.

Play 200 live tournaments with an average buy-in of 200€
Share some key hands i play and discuss them over here
Become a better player everyday
Starting bankroll 40k

I don’t need poker profits for living expenses, so my first goal is to be profitable and enjoy what I'm doing. My second goal is to learn Spanish while playing poker.

Other goals

I set myself 10 daily life goals, I'm gonna track them, not aiming for 100% but they are just reminders for myself.

Don’t smoke cigarettes
Walk 10k steps a day
2 hour poker study
1 hour of reading
1 hour of reviewing my investments
30 minutes of studying Spanish
Sleep minimum 8 hours
Blog every day
Drink no alcohol
Lose weight

Notes to end

English is not my main language so excuse me for spelling errors
I searched on Google for poker blogs and the first that popped up was 2+2, so that’s why I'm gonna start the blog here.
I know there are some tax considerations in Spain for poker winnings, but like I said I'm not in it to make a living off poker, I'm here for the lifestyle and the good climate. I have a gestor (financial advisor) here in Spain, so he takes care of that, you may deduct your buyins and then pay taxes on the profit (If you make profit ofc).
I’m not only gonna write about poker but also about the mental game, my real life goals, the Spanish lifestyle, the weather, books that i read, investing and a lot of other interesting topics.

If you have questions or if you just want to say hello, please leave a message below!

I wish you all the best for 2025, speak to you soon!

Start 01/01/2025
Bankroll: 40000€
Average Buy in: 0
Final tables: 0
ITM%: 0%