Omaha rollercoaster

I enjoy this reply, provokes some thoughts. About freedom, autonomy, spontaneity, etc.

I think most poker players think like you. I used to as well. Afterall, most of us got into poker for "freedom", we didn't want a boss, we wanted to work whenever, no schedule. Obviously I can be exaggerating here but in general, "freedom" and "spontaneity" seem to be one of the biggest values of poker players whenever you ask them about their values. At the same time, most poker players want "easy money". **** challenge, let's make money vs fish who make tons of mistakes. All regs can give us a challenge so let's not "battle".

But how much freedom and spontaneity do we really have, if we only seem to play when a game is "soft"? If we only quit a table when the recreational players finally leave, how much freedom is that really? Or even if we have a schedule, however we force ourselves to grind every night until 4AM in the morning, sacrificing our health because that's when the games are "softest"?

Another point is, how much does this actually matter? At highstakes, sure. Maybe if you are playing 50/100 and higher, the amount of money can be so big and lifechanging, and maybe the fish play so rarely that I can understand it feeling quite hard to leave the tables if a fish is playing then. But at midstakes, I see a lot of people saying the same thing. They sacrifice their sleep, and healthy habits to keep playing in a soft game at midstakes, or they won't play a game because there's no soft tables. The truth is though at midstakes, all the games are soft... Pretty much at least. I mean games don't really run without at least 1 fish at the tables, and even the regs have plenty of leaks. In a lot of ways if a midstakes or lowstakes player tells me this stuff, I think it is an excuse. Why do I say this? Because I used to make these excuses too, and I'm sure I still do too. The past 2 weeks I barely grinded, my excuse was I made a lot of money in crypto and wanted to focus on that, on the surface it seems like a reasonable excuse, but if I'm honest with myself, I probably could have played a bit more poker than I did. I was the typical reg who would stay up until 7AM in the morning to play in "softer games", sacrificing my health and life satisfaction. It was very unhealthy and that's one of the reasons I "quit" poker for over a year. Then I decided to change the way I approached the game and I realized all this time in my poker career, I was making excuses. No matter the time of day, unless you are playing nosebleeds, games run and there is money to be made. Maybe it is less than at other times depending on the day or particular session, but I stopped accepting these excuses. And as a result, the volume is more consistent, and the life satisfaction is much higher, and my mental and physical health are much better. It's a much better long term approach.

There's several other benefits to simply "being organized, and living by more of a schedule". I chose this schedule, it's how I want to live my life. This is an ideal scenario for me. I live by my own rules. This is freedom to me. Maybe freedom is the wrong word, perhaps autonomy is a better word. I truly work when I want, take breaks when I want, etc. I have 2 days off grinding each week, I have one day I want to dedicate more to studying, and only 4 days of grinding really. I don't understand how people can say my schedule looks "hard or like hell" lol. Another benefit is if you have certain times you always play at, for example if I always play happy hours in the morning or whatever, other regs who don't want to "battle" you, might notice you always play at that time and simply avoid playing you at that time. There's a lot of psychological warfare in poker, not just in poker strategy, but even on a much deeper level even at the level of game selection.

I decided to quit making excuses, to quit ending a session just because there's no more "soft tables", to quit continuing to grind if I'm tilted and want to grind back my money, to quit to stay at a table even if a whale is there. Because chances are that the game will be there again tomorrow, or the day after. It takes building confidence, and shifting your mindset, but I found I was simply making excuses before, and now, excuses don't exist, only resistance, and resistance is to be overcome. I quit looking at poker as a way to make money fast, but rather as a way to make money slowly, like a normal (high-income) job. Poker isn't a job where you can get paid passively, we aren't entrepreneurs or investors who can make money passively, we trade our time for money, we aren't on the "fastlane" as MJ DeMarco would put it, even at nosebleeds, we are not on the fastlane, we are simply in the top income brackets. And I realized that. I realized that I wouldn't make more money from poker than I would from investments such as crypto throughout the course of my life.

This realization also took a lot of pressure off me. I don't need to make money every session I play. I don't need to look at poker as a get rich quick scheme, I don't even need to look at it like a job, rather as something I enjoy and something to allow me to keep growing, intellectually, spiritually, mentally. Because now I know, I can make a bit of money consistently, enough to pay the bills, and as long as I can invest or find other ways to make money, then I will end up making more money from these endeavours. Poker is a great "job", it pays more than most 9 to 5's. The only jobs that have potential to pay more are being superstars in athletics, entertainment, getting an absolute top 1% position in big business/law/healthcare, or being an entrepreneur (and of these only entrepreneurs are on the fast-lane, as they can make money passively). However realizing that no matter what, I would always be in the slowlane for as long as I play poker gave me a sense of peace (until I include fastlane activities, such as investing).

Learning about personal finance is one of my big goals for now and the upcoming year(s). I have a long list of books I'd like to read on the topic. My personal finance habits are pretty bad. I spend too much, I don't save enough, I don't invest enough. I mean most people are the same as me. But everyone can become rich, no one needs to make a lot of money to become rich. A low/midstakes player can become a millionaire if they know how to invest and build their wealth. At the same time, making a lot of money doesn't automatically make you wealthy if you spend it all. I've learnt all these things the hard way already.

Yeah, anyways, not even sure how I ended up talking about some of these topics lol. Kinda off topic from the original thoughts on freedom/autonomy and a bunch of rambling... Well I like to ramble. I hope I got my point accross and people reading could understand my thought process and argument here.

Main points were:

• Autonomy not Freedom/Spontaneity is one of my core values. (other values of mine are intelligence, curiosity, health, accountability and control)
  

• Poker is a slowlane path to wealth, although it can still be "high-income". Despite this, if you have good control of personal finances, and know how to invest and perhaps find other avenues of building wealth, there's no reason anybody cannot get rich through a slowlane job such as poker (or most jobs in the world).
  

• Unless I was playing nosebleeds, I wouldn't sacrifice my "schedule" which grants happiness and autonomy. And even then, IDK if I would sacrifice the schedule, tbh if I "HAD" to sacrifice the schedule for nosebleeds, I don't think I'd want to be a nosebleed player at all. Doesn't seem like trade-off I'd be willing to accept, or one that could possibly fit in my life now that I got a fiance and will probably have children in the future.
  

Personally my mental and physical health is very important to me and i wouldnt play until morning hours no matter who is at the tables.

If i normally go to sleep around 12, i would squeeze in another 2h max. Im fine at the moment, but i have had serious sleep issues, so good sleep hygiene is vital.
I would also not break a promise or not show up somewhere important in order to keep playing.

But skipping dinner or some trivial task is no big deal.
I dont let the action dictate my life, but i also like to do what makes most sense.

I do this myself often too. I agree, no reason not to skip dinner or lunch.

As I said, I don't follow that schedule to a T. Just an idea of what a perfect day looks like. I like having a general idea of what a good productive day looks like, but am very open to changing things in the schedule as long as it is nothing too extreme and aligns with the way I want to live my life.

I'm not a "robot", and it's funny when people look at the schedule I post here and assume I follow it exactly like that, or that I even try lol. That's not how schedule's work. At least not for me or most people I know who use one work with it.

Maybe people are perfectionists and think, "if I say I will do something, I have to do it", but that isn't how I look at life at all, and I'm far from a perfectionist who will follow exactly what I say, and if I don't then fill myself with guilt and punish myself. I allow myself to fail, to not meet expectations, to not follow exactly the plan I set out. I'm nothing close to a robot, and that is important for people who read this to realize lol if I come away that way, it isn't the intention. In many ways, I live life as if I had no schedule. Most of these activities on the schedule are simply habits by now. I don't start or quit sessions at "exactly this or that time", it's simply how it generally goes based on how I feel comfortable and years of doing this. The schedule is simply a very general and vague idea of what a good productive day looks like, nothing more, nothing less, and at the same time, how days actually play out in reality are nothing like that. I often grind more or less, I often eat at different times, some days I fast. The only thing which is almost always consistent and that I actually stick to almost religiously is my sleep schedule although again it's not like I force myself to do that, it's simply when I feel tired and awake. For example today I woke up at 5 naturally without an alarm. Basically everything else though, it changes from day to day, however in general, this is how my days generally look vaguely but it's simply based on habit and routine, and not because I'm forcing myself to do anything.

Going to try getting into the habit of posting some hands each Monday here.

H1: Not too much strategically interesting on my side, played perfectly fine. But this guy seemed to be a reg, and I guess he really doesn't know how to play cash drop spots 😃
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $248.36 (124.2 bb)
SB: $76.00 (38 bb)
BB: $200.00 (100 bb)
UTG: $191.70 (95.9 bb)
Hero (MP): $301.50 (150.8 bb)
CO: $182.50 (91.3 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $23.00) Hero has J♦ K♦ 7♦ J♥
fold, Hero calls $2.00, fold, BTN raises to $29.00, SB calls $28.00, fold, Hero calls $27.00

Flop: ($109.00, 3 players) 7♥ K♣ 2♦
SB checks, Hero checks, BTN bets $109.00, fold, Hero raises to $272.50 and is all-in, BTN calls $110.36 and is all-in

Turn: ($547.72, 2 players) 9♦

River: ($547.72, 2 players) J♠

Results: $547.72 pot ($6.00 rake)
Final Board: 7♥ K♣ 2♦ 9♦ J♠

Hero shows J♦ K♦ 7♦ J♥: (Three of a Kind, Jacks)
(Pre 44%, Flop 85%, Turn 90%)

BTN shows 6♦ Q♥ 5♠ Q♣: (One Pair, Queens)
(Pre 56%, Flop 15%, Turn 10%)

Hero wins $538.72
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

H2:
I quite like this line. SB was some aggro fish with over a 23% 3B so I did consider 4b. Anyways, A flop check doesn't mean too much, he could still have slowplayed AA here like a lot of fish will love to do, but he can also just completely miss or have some medium SDV type of hand. On the turn I improve to a flush draw and I feel like jamming is the best play. We can't fold with our redraw, and at the same time shoving can actually fold out BU of a hand such as A6 or even AQ sometimes if he thinks we have "standard" ranges. SB's 3b range should be very AA/AQ heavy, my reshove range should be hands like mine but also AQ+ basically, so even AQ or A6 are in tough spots on BU shoes, so isolating ourselves vs SB's wider than GTO ranges seems ideal.
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi (7 max) - Omaha Hi - 7 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

CO: $42.20 (21.1 bb)
BTN: $750.39 (375.2 bb)
SB: $245.48 (122.7 bb)
BB: $251.00 (125.5 bb)
UTG: $200.00 (100 bb)
UTG+1: $200.00 (100 bb)
Hero (MP): $233.18 (116.6 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has K♣ A♥ 4♥ 5♣
2 folds, Hero raises to $7.00, fold, BTN calls $7.00, SB raises to $30.00, fold, Hero calls $23.00, BTN calls $23.00

Flop: ($92.00, 3 players) Q♣ A♦ 5♠
SB checks, Hero checks, BTN checks

Turn: ($92.00, 3 players) 6♣
SB bets $69.00, Hero raises to $203.18 and is all-in, fold, SB calls $134.18

River: ($498.36, 2 players) A♠

Results: $498.36 pot ($4.00 rake)
Final Board: Q♣ A♦ 5♠ 6♣ A♠

Hero shows K♣ A♥ 4♥ 5♣: (Full House, Aces full of Fives)
(Pre 55%, Flop 79%, Turn 85%)

SB shows T♣ 8♥ 9♠ J♣: (One Pair, Aces)
(Pre 45%, Flop 21%, Turn 15%)

Hero wins $492.36
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

H3: 4b bluffing against a wide 3bettor and flopping top 2 always feels nice when it's a Flop where a lot of hands will do good against AA but not so great against our bluff 4b range such as his

[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $229.75 (114.9 bb)
Hero (SB): $212.80 (106.4 bb)
BB: $480.64 (240.3 bb)
UTG: $435.78 (217.9 bb)
MP: $362.23 (181.1 bb)
CO: $431.95 (216 bb)

Hero posts SB $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has 6♣ A♦ J♣ 8♦
fold, MP raises to $5.00, CO raises to $18.00, fold, Hero raises to $61.00, 2 folds, CO calls $43.00

Flop: ($129.00, 2 players) 3♥ J♠ 8♣
Hero bets $129.00, CO raises to $370.95 and is all-in, Hero calls $22.80 and is all-in

Turn: ($432.60, 2 players) 2♥

River: ($432.60, 2 players) 3♣

Players agreed to run it twice.

Turn #2: ($432.60, 2 players) 4♣

River #2: ($432.60, 2 players) 7♠

Results: $432.60 pot
Final Board: 3♥ J♠ 8♣ 2♥ 3♣ 4♣ 7♠

CO shows 6♦ 4♦ 9♠ 8♠: (Two Pair, Eights and Threes)
Board #1 : (Pre 38%, Flop 13%, Turn 10%)
(Two Pair, Eights and Fours)
Board #2 : (Pre 39%, Flop 14%, Turn 5%)

Hero shows 6♣ A♦ J♣ 8♦: (Two Pair, Jacks and Eights)
Board #1 : (Pre 62%, Flop 87%, Turn 90%)
(Two Pair, Jacks and Eights)
Board #2 : (Pre 61%, Flop 86%, Turn 95%)

Hero wins $211.80
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

H4:
Interesting hand against a guy who had 20+% 3b this session. Given stack depths I can't XR gii on the flop. Obviously on turn, I expect him to slowplay a portion of his fullhouses, but given he has a wide 3b range he has less of these. On the river, well, he can do this with AA, KK and 6x, maybe QQ. Probably one of my better bluffcatchers here unblocking a bunch of random middling hands in his 3b range.

[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $542.99 (271.5 bb)
SB: $315.44 (157.7 bb)
BB: $209.95 (105 bb)
UTG: $143.99 (72 bb)
MP: $602.05 (301 bb)
Hero (CO): $319.61 (159.8 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has A♥ K♦ 4♦ 2♥
2 folds, Hero raises to $7.00, BTN raises to $24.00, 2 folds, Hero calls $17.00

Flop: ($51.00, 2 players) 6♣ 4♠ A♣
Hero checks, BTN bets $24.00, Hero calls $24.00

Turn: ($99.00, 2 players) 6♠
Hero checks, BTN checks

River: ($99.00, 2 players) 6♦
Hero checks, BTN bets $99.00, Hero calls $99.00

Results: $297.00 pot ($6.00 rake)
Final Board: 6♣ 4♠ A♣ 6♠ 6♦

BTN shows T♣ A♦ K♠ K♥: (Full House, Sixes full of Kings)
(Pre 63%, Flop 28%, Turn 54%)

Hero shows A♥ K♦ 4♦ 2♥: (Three of a Kind, Sixes)
(Pre 37%, Flop 72%, Turn 46%)

BTN wins $288.00
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

H5: Well, probably one of the most obvious bluffing spots here trying to fold him both on the turn and river off basically exactly what he has. Sometimes I think exploitatively I should just give up if guys just never fold.
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $176.60 (88.3 bb)
SB: $208.00 (104 bb)
BB: $304.55 (152.3 bb)
UTG: $327.65 (163.8 bb)
Hero (MP): $234.55 (117.3 bb)
CO: $621.75 (310.9 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has A♣ 7♠ J♠ T♦
UTG raises to $4.00, Hero calls $4.00, 4 folds

Flop: ($11.00, 2 players) Q♣ 8♣ J♥
UTG bets $10.78, Hero calls $10.78

Turn: ($32.56, 2 players) 8♥
UTG checks, Hero bets $16.28, UTG calls $16.28

River: ($65.12, 2 players) 2♣
UTG checks, Hero bets $65.12, UTG calls $65.12

Results: $195.36 pot ($6.00 rake)
Final Board: Q♣ 8♣ J♥ 8♥ 2♣

Hero shows A♣ 7♠ J♠ T♦: (Two Pair, Jacks and Eights)
(Pre 54%, Flop 33%, Turn 40%)

UTG shows J♣ T♣ 2♦ A♠: (Flush, Queen High)
(Pre 46%, Flop 67%, Turn 60%)

UTG wins $186.36
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

Last week's graph:

Month so far:

Peace!

November summary

Rakeback calculations:
October Rakeback:
BBJ = $837.24
GGcare = $138.69
Fish Buffet = $1511.65
Leaderboards = $1530
Total = $4053.58

November 2024: GG PLO200 and PLO500 -
Hands played: 26061
Hours played: 50
Hands per Hour: 521.22
Hours studied: ??? Prolly about 50
Hours worked: ??? Prolly about 100
Net Won: $2340.22
Net won + RB: 6393.8
Net Won $/hour: $128
EV: $3349.04
EV+RB: $7402.62
EV $/hour: $148
YTD: $69976

Had a bit of action on stars but took money out from there now, won't be playing on stars anymore for now.

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

Volume was pretty trash this month in general. Few reasons:
1. Coming back from holiday at the end of October got me all out of routine, in addition, daylight savings time switched the happy hours on GG by 1 hour and I saw a lack of action.
2. Honestly, in the morning when I normally grind, I found a lack of action in general, sometimes there was just 2 or 3 tables running accross both PLO200 and PLO500, and when there's so little action I kinda don't even want to sit down. So boring, maybe a mental leak IDK.
3. Due to these factors I decided to switch to mainly grinding Rush n Cash last week. A whole new change in player pool and even format to some extent means I feel much more comfortable starting by taking things slow, paying more attention, reviewing more hands and paying more attention to player tendencies and identifying the different regs and their leaks.
4. I took like almost 2 weeks off poker to basically "research and study cryptos" as that has been doing so good. Already took a few profits from cryptos, and cemented my buying and selling strategies. Don't want to spend too much time on it for now. But during that 2 week period, I was really spending like 8+ hours a day on crypto lol. However now I feel like there isn't much more for me to do, as I'm not day-trading.
5. All of this together basically meant I was struggling to come back into a good healthy routine. Although finally now, I think I'm getting back into it.

December is festive season. Probably going to be some softer games and I'll be looking to have a good month volume wise.

Got family visiting and I'll be hosting the christmas celebrations, in addition, my fiance's mother is having surgery and will have to sleep in our apartment for like 10 days or something. So we'll see how much volume I put in in December. But I'd be happy if I could grind every morning during happy hours and then the rest of the days kinda just see what's on the plan.

A lot of guys ITT post comments whenever I post a schedule saying it looks crazy and whatever. Well, this is how it looks in reality 😃

Just so you guys get the point, the mornings are literally the only thing I care about (and even that, I will grind shorter or longer or at different times, etc). I simply find I have the most energy, focus and willpower in the morning and at least each morning I can get the confidence to grind. And if I do that, then I consider it a good successful day, however on days when I feel like it and I have time, I will gladly grind more, although this doesn't happen as often as I'd like.

Anyways, so far I'm enjoying the RnC grind. It's been fun and honestly I think it can be beatable pre-RB, which means post-RB can make higher $/hour than reg tables, perhaps even PLO500 considering that there's not always so much action on PLO500. Will have to keep grinding and gathering my sample, but now that I've got my feet wet, I'm enjoying the grind and am going to commit myself to playing RnC200 and adding a few tables of PLO500 whenever the games seem good.

I'll probably never be trying to win the leaderboards in RnC, that'd require 12+ hours grinding in general. However on some occasional days, maybe I'll try grind 8-10 hours if it seems worth it. I did some calculations of 4-tabling RnC:
4-tabling: = 700h/hour (especially if we play some reg tables on the side it's a bit higher)

How much can I get from the leaderboards and RB?

These calculations do not factor BBJ or GGcare cheers or other random promos.

Happy hours: Everyday as a minimum
1 hour = 3400 points = p50-36 = $30-$50 = $40
2 hours = 6800 points = p30-16 = $50-150 = $100

Normal hours:
1 hour = 2250 points
2 hours = 4500 points

If we play: This assumes we play a full 2 hours of happy hour!
3 hours = 9050 points = p5-13 = $90-$150 = $120
4 hours = 11,300 points = p20-9 = $120-$200 = $160
5 hours = 13,550 points = p15-8 = $150-$220 = $185
6 hours = 15,800 points = p10-6 = $200-$260 = $230

No longer very consistent earnings rate:
7 hours = 18,050 points = p8-3 = $220-$540 (highly dependent on how many other regs are grinding) = $300
8 hours = 20,300 points = p6-3 = $260-$540 (highly dependent on how many other regs are grinding) = $350
9 hours = 22,550 points = p6-3 = $260-$540 (highly dependent on how many other regs are grinding) $400
10 hours = 24,800 points = p6-2 = $260-$650 (highly dependent on how many other regs are grinding) $450

How much money from fish buffet?
Roughly $45/hour depends on other factors like how many reg tables I play too, PVI changes, etc.

$/day and $/hour from Rakeback
1 hour HH grind = $40+$45 = $85
$85/hour
6.1bb/100

2 hour HH grind = $100+$90 = $190
$95/hour
6.7bb/100

3 hours with HH = $120+$135 = $255
$85/hour
6.1bb/100

4 hours with HH = $160+$180 = $340
$85/hour
6.1bb/100

5 hours with HH = $185+$225 = $410
$82/hour
5.9bb/100

6 hours with HH = $230+$2700 = $500
$83.33/hour
5.9bb/100

Anything less than 6 hours of play will always yield to around $85/hour. Which is great and consistent!

After 6 hours of play, we should really check the leaderboards and lobby. And we should check which regs are grinding. If a lot of leaderboard regs are grinding, then we should take the rest of the day off.

Look below to see how EV changes depending on lobby.

---
How about when we go for the leaderboards?

18,050 points
7 hours with HH low end = $220+$315 = $535
$76.5/hour
5.5bb/100

7 hours with HH average = $300+$315 = $615
$88/hour

7 hours with HH high end = $500+$315 = $815
$116.5/hour

................................................................

20,300 points
8 hours with HH low end = $260+$360 = $620
$77.5/hour
5.5bb/100

8 hours with HH average = $350+$360 = $710
$89/hour
6.3bb/100

8 hours with HH high end = $500+$360 = $860
$107.5/hour
7.7bb/100

.....................................................................

22,550 points
9 hours with HH low end = $260+$405 = $655
$73/hour
5.4bb/100

9 hours with HH average = $400+$405 = $805
$89.5/hour
6.3bb/100

9 hours with HH high end = $540+$405 = $945
$105/hour
7.6bb/100

...........................................................................

24,800 point
10 hours with HH low end = $260+$450 = $710
$71/hour

10 hours with HH average = $450+$450 = $900
$90/hour
6.4bb/100

10 hours with HH high end = $650+$450 = $1100
$110/hour
7.8bb/100

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

At the start of 2024 I made similar calculations for reg tables PLO200 over here: https://share.evernote.com/note/a0f742ac...

Basically rakeback from RnC can be way higher and as I said potentially I can make more $/hour than at PLO500 even. I feel like I just realized that for me personally, as someone who can play a lot of tables and hands/hour at a high quality and who doesn't particularly love to table select, it makes more sense to focus on RnC for now (until I can play 1k+ basically). Maybe if I took the approach of some regs playing only like 2 RnC tables or max 4-6 reg tables, then this'd be different and I could listen to all these guys saying reg tables are softer and you can earn way higher bb/100 there (yeah well can you earn higher $/hour? is the real question imo) etc.

We'll have to see how things pan out, a lot depends on how beatable RnC actually is, but so far, I'm +EV. Anyways, pretty boring month and lacking volume. Hopefully December I can turn it up a notch.

Weekly update, things went quite well.

For December it looks like GG have reduced leaderboard prizes everywhere, which isn't too surprising. Hopefully the other christmas promotions will sort of make up for it.

Couple hands from the week, couldn't find anything too interesting:

Well it's always nice to flop the nuts and get lead into:
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $198.49 (99.2 bb)
SB: $243.85 (121.9 bb)
BB: $182.81 (91.4 bb)
UTG: $207.25 (103.6 bb)
MP: $230.77 (115.4 bb)
Hero (CO): $420.29 (210.1 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has A♦ K♦ 7♣ K♥
fold, MP raises to $7.00, Hero raises to $24.00, fold, SB calls $23.00, fold, MP calls $17.00

Flop: ($74.00, 3 players) J♦ K♣ J♣
SB bets $37.00, fold, Hero calls $37.00

Turn: ($148.00, 2 players) 6♥
SB bets $148.00, Hero raises to $296.00, SB calls $34.85 and is all-in

River: ($513.70, 2 players) K♠

Players agreed to run it twice.

River #2: ($513.70, 2 players) T♦

Results: $513.70 pot
Final Board: J♦ K♣ J♣ 6♥ K♠ T♦

Hero shows A♦ K♦ 7♣ K♥: (Four of a Kind, Kings)
Board #1 : (Pre 55%, Flop 95%, Turn 98%)
(Full House, Kings full of Jacks)
Board #2 : (Pre 51%, Flop 95%, Turn 97%)

SB shows 5♠ J♠ T♣ 4♣: (Three of a Kind, Jacks)
Board #1 : (Pre 45%, Flop 5%, Turn 3%)
(Full House, Jacks full of Tens)
Board #2 : (Pre 49%, Flop 5%, Turn 3%)

Hero wins $252.35
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

When you decide to go ham with no blockers
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $191.00 (95.5 bb)
SB: $339.50 (169.8 bb)
BB: $588.07 (294 bb)
UTG: $147.09 (73.5 bb)
MP: $69.47 (34.7 bb)
Hero (CO): $200.00 (100 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has 4♣ 5♦ 6♦ K♣
fold, MP raises to $7.00, Hero calls $7.00, 3 folds

Flop: ($17.00, 2 players) Q♣ 8♠ T♠
MP checks, Hero bets $5.61, MP calls $5.61

Turn: ($28.22, 2 players) 9♠
MP checks, Hero bets $14.11, MP calls $14.11

River: ($56.44, 2 players) J♣
MP checks, Hero bets $56.44, MP calls $42.75 and is all-in

Results: $141.94 pot ($6.00 rake)
Final Board: Q♣ 8♠ T♠ 9♠ J♣

Hero shows 4♣ 5♦ 6♦ K♣: (High Card, King)
(Pre 38%, Flop 17%, Turn 0%)

MP shows A♦ K♠ 5♠ 9♦: (Flush, King High)
(Pre 62%, Flop 83%, Turn 100%)

MP wins $132.94
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

big stacks today, lotssa fun

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

Why do I blog?

Sometimes people ask me, and sometimes I wonder myself, why do I have a public blog?

It seems -EV. I share my winrate, I share my thoughts on the player pool, I share some of my strategy. I might attract some other regs to play on GG in my pool, or maybe some regs will pay more attention to me and look into strategies to exploit me. What is the point of this blog?

I had to ask myself this too. From a purely logical perspective it doesn't make much sense. But it is more than this. Life EV and happiness EV also matters, as well as "motivational EV".

I enjoy writing, it's a form of creativity and I might not be some Pablo Picasso or Stephen King but lemme get some creativity outta me dawg!

Writing is a way for me to just let my thoughts out. Honestly I'm not talking too much strat in here, nothing I feel like regs can start massively exploiting me with, and I'm not super paranoid about that anyways. Mainly I use this just to share results, how I feel, mindset and mental game notes, the ups and downs of being a poker pro in the world of Omaha. Writing all of these things down, keeps me more on track, gives me some accountability, allows me to know what I need to work on.

In addition, I still have no idea what I want to do in the future in poker. I know I want to keep playing poker, but there's so many options out there that I haven't decided yet.

Once I reach PLO2k I have so many options.
- Do I want to keep playing only on GG? This may mean I want to expand to 5C and 6C? This may mean I want to start streaming or become an influencer so I can try to join those private exclusive games. Having a bit of a blog now can only help with that for the future?
- Do I want to start coaching? Well firstly, I don't believe I can be a good coach without crushing the games myself at 2k+. But no harm in starting to blog now in case I want to gain some exposure for the future.
- Do I want to play on multiple sites, live or private games? Blogging can help get me in touch with some people who may want some action from me on their sites or private clubs.

Overall I just don't see too many downsides, it's also a good way to prove my credibility and reputation, which matters a lot, in case something unforeseen things may happen in the future. Through this blog I've already gotten a couple of study buddies and people to talk PLO with. Humans are still social creatures, even us online poker pros, a bit of social exposure is good.

Perhaps in the future I'll start a youtube vlog series or something, it seems like it could get more exposure in today's digital age. But right now I'm pretty happy just blogging a bit on 2+2.

Dec Week 1
Big fat swings!!!

Month so far:

Still got this coming in tomorrow:

Funnily enough I'm no longer running over EV this year. Well it was nice to run $10k above EV or so at one point, but I guess that can't last forever. Hopefully after several months of running under EV this trend can reverse a bit 😀

Couple hands of big pots.
Well sometimes I bluff 250+bb away:
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $271.34 (135.7 bb)
SB: $303.93 (152 bb)
BB: $1,150.40 (575.2 bb)
UTG: $273.00 (136.5 bb)
Hero (MP): $850.17 (425.1 bb)
CO: $236.15 (118.1 bb)

SB posts $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $3.00) Hero has 8♣ K♠ T♥ J♥
fold, Hero raises to $7.00, 3 folds, BB raises to $22.00, Hero calls $15.00

Flop: ($45.00, 2 players) Q♠ Q♥ J♠
BB bets $14.85, Hero raises to $39.51, BB calls $24.66

Turn: ($124.02, 2 players) T♠
BB checks, Hero bets $124.02, BB calls $124.02

River: ($372.06, 2 players) 6♦
BB checks, Hero bets $372.06, BB calls $372.06

Results: $1,116.18 pot ($6.00 rake)
Final Board: Q♠ Q♥ J♠ T♠ 6♦

Hero shows 8♣ K♠ T♥ J♥: (Two Pair, Queens and Jacks)
(Pre 37%, Flop 1%, Turn 0%)

BB shows Q♣ T♦ A♣ J♦: (Full House, Queens full of Jacks)
(Pre 63%, Flop 99%, Turn 100%)

BB wins $1,107.18
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

And sometimes I have it:
[converted_hand][hand_history]GG Poker - $2 PL Hi FAST (6 max) - Omaha Hi - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $108.10 (54.1 bb)
Hero (SB): $408.06 (204 bb)
BB: $205.09 (102.5 bb)
UTG: $177.19 (88.6 bb)
MP: $821.95 (411 bb)
CO: $378.70 (189.4 bb)

Hero posts SB $1.00, BB posts $2.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $23.00) Hero has A♥ 4♦ K♣ K♦
fold, MP calls $2.00, fold, BTN calls $2.00, Hero raises to $30.00, fold, MP calls $28.00, fold

Flop: ($84.00, 2 players) 7♠ 7♣ K♠
Hero bets $16.80, MP calls $16.80

Turn: ($117.60, 2 players) J♠
Hero bets $82.32, MP calls $82.32

River: ($282.24, 2 players) Q♥
Hero bets $278.94 and is all-in, MP calls $278.94

Results: $840.12 pot ($6.00 rake)
Final Board: 7♠ 7♣ K♠ J♠ Q♥

Hero shows A♥ 4♦ K♣ K♦: (Full House, Kings full of Sevens)
(Pre 63%, Flop 100%, Turn 100%)

MP shows T♥ 2♠ A♠ J♦: (Flush, Ace High)
(Pre 37%, Flop 0%, Turn 0%)

Hero wins $831.12
[/hand_history][/converted_hand]

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

Overall volume has been quite good. Game quality was depending a lot on if I stuck to my schedule or not.

When I wake up and grind in the morning, my game quality is top notch, in that flow state, alpha and theta brain waves doing all that good stuff.

In the afternoon I tend to study and grinding after a study session is just not a great idea. Brain is already fried from learning a bunch of new information and I shouldn't grind just because "I can". I need to be able to unlock the flow state when grinding. Lots of the money I lost was simply due to some spazzy stuff happening in the afternoon or autopiloting as my brain just can't function fully after a long period of study.

Looking to stick to the schedule more from now, and not randomly grind outside my A-game hours and see how things develop from here.

Changing things up a bit and gonna grind as soon as I wake up instead of having some intricate morning routine. Take advantage of the full flow state, think this video nailed the idea that morning routines are BS and grinding as soon as you wake up is great for A-game/flowstate/

Will be going for 4 hours a day every morning unless there's some exceptional circumstances, and other than that just focus on study/relax after in the afternoon.

Hey, absolutely great blog. Enjoyed reading your longer history in poker. I also hope to move up stakes in PLO 4, 5 and 6. All the best and GL in 2025

One question: How do you get drivehud to track GG games? I need tracking for hand reviews for PLO 4, 5 and 6 card. Drivehud claims to not track GG games. Thanks in advance

thanks,

You have to import the hands from your pokertracker manually onto your PC somewhere then from there manually import them again into your tracker (this works the same for all trackers with GG).

GL to you too!

Some real talk.

Youre obviously a great player and i think you shouldnt have BE stretches/swings like this.

If you want to challenge yourself or impress strangers, then continue to play in gg which has the toughest games.

If you want to make money play elsewhere.

GL!

+1 **** GG get on a real american site and print

Yeah if you have other options to play I I have no idea why you would want to support a site like GG. It really is about time mid/low stakes guys like us organize a mass boycott. Tough to do though because most low stakes players are just at a weird level of simply not understanding they are being ****ed over or not caring about it. It’s like the OP continuously states, GG is “easy” in terms of there always being games running so for a lot of grinders it is the easy/lazy option. Definitely a weird paradox though, as I find myself laughing at the guys still trying to grind GG so kind of grateful for them mostly wasting their time on the site but on the other hand don’t like to see GG being supported because they want to kill the poker dream.

thanks for the comments guys.

I've received many comments already to move off GG, I'm very well aware it almost certainly isn't the most profitable site to play on if my sole goal is to make money. And I've explained many times why I don't move off GG.

It's not only the "comfort" though. It's also the fact that right now, I'm keeping most of my money in crypto and I view crypto as the way I will focus on making money for now and at least the next few months. No matter how much I win (or lose) in poker, right now it seems like crypto is much more of a sure thing than poker for building wealth quickly. This is why a large portion of my net worth currently (and hence bankroll I'd be able to use on poker and spread accross sites) is in crypto. Well right now I'm not using crypto to create life changing wealth, but rather using it to build a bigger bankroll for my poker career. I'm hoping that in a few months or at least before the end of 2025 I can take my money out of crypto and spread it accross more sites, maybe play some 1k. And in the next crypto cycles probably I will use crypto more as a vehicle to build life changing wealth.

Unless I was playing nosebleeds, this would remain the case that crypto is making more money for me than poker at least in a more guaranteed way, (and if I was playing nosebleeds, I'd simply put more money into crypto so that it'd still end up making more money than poker). This is why I don't want to spread my roll across multiple sites right now, since I like to keep big rolls on the sites I play on as it is inconvenient to constantly move money back and forth on sites.

So I understand the comments, and mostly agree. But right now is not the time for me to move off GG or add other sites. However this is certainly in the plans for 2025 once I take most of my money out of crypto I plan on adding some other sites and focus more on poker to make money.

For now, I'm simply grinding on GG and viewing it as a great way to get in good reps and good practice and build my mental game. And I'm quite enjoying it tbh, despite this downswing, which when looking at variance calculators is well within the realm of possibility.

Appreciate the comments though 😀

Short term poker seems a lot more sure thing than crypto. I wouldnt want to bet substantial amount of networth what will happen in the market in 1-2 years.

Few friends who gotten wealthy from crypto use an opposite strategy.
They are also good at poker, so they fund their crypto bags (long term holdings) with poker winnings.

don't disagree. And absolutely agree, make money from poker to be able to fund crypto, and dont put too much of net worth into crypto, which is what I'm doing ultimately. I'm just not super rich enough to spread money around everywhere in crypto+multiple different poker sites. I like to keep $10k+ on GG and would want similar amounts on any other site I play, also 6 months living expenses in cash emergency fund/bank which can also be used as emergency BR (I spend $5k+ each month), rest into crypto rn (i want the crypto portion of my net worth to be as big as it can be rn, but you can imagine it isnt a substantial part of my net worth rn given what ive just written), i take money out of crypto sometimes to fund the other 2 parts, such as this month. Soon will start taking profits and in less than a year want to be 100% out of crypto.

It depends on the situation and many variables. Obviously I've spent substantial amounts of time thinking about this and my best course of action. If my only goal was to make money from poker I would not play only on GG.

Either way, currently I'm unwilling to take money off of GG to put into other sites. In the future, circumstances will change and that won't be the case. Very pleased with my current situation tbh.

Rewards programs are like crack cocaine. OP is going have a difficult time walking away from his beluga whale - hammerhead shark level fish smorgasbord he took so much time and effort to reach. They hook you coming and going.

You do you.
There are multiple ways to do things, just showing a different pov.

Previous post has good point about vip programs.
There are still sites out there who offer weekly 30-50% cash rb with no bells and whistles.

I've left good rewards programs before. I used to be Red Diamond on Winamax in 2018/2019 and left it to play stars spins.

Then in 2020 I had the exclusive challenge on stars and quit it to take time off poker. It's all documented in this blog. But rewards programs are just a small slice of a pie when it comes to making decisions about where to play. I genuinely always enjoyed playing the world's largest and most competitive sites.

Hey, nice blog. Keep on grinding.

What do you mean with calculate EV correctly. Can you name one or more examples please.

Thank you.

I noticed HM3 calculates 3way (or multiway in general) all ins different/wrong, while drivehud does it correct. Which resulted in my EV being a bit different on drivehud than HM3.

Month isn't over yet, but regardless of how it ends, I'll be more than pleased and think it's a good time to write a quick monthly update/summary. So let's start a monthly summary now. And when 2025 starts I'll write a new post for the 2024 wrap-up and 2025 plans.

December update: Comeback king

December 2024: My most proud month in my poker career

I'd like to start this blog post by saying this month has been my most proud month in poker. Not because of my results, my results were quite terrible compared to usual. But rather, because of how I handled the adversity.

I have never in my poker career suffered such a quick and devastating downswing. I started the month off winning $3k in the first few days, but in like what, 2 weeks my net won for the month went down to like -$14k. This is an 85 BI downswing at PLO 200 mostly at RnC, and even including rakeback we can say I lost around 50+ buy-ins.

While it certainly didn't feel great, I cannot be more pleased with how I handled it, and the amazing comeback I put on. I went from +$4k to -$10k back to robusto (all including RB) within a month. What a month lol.

In the past, I would've felt very depressed, felt feelings of hopelessness, felt like quitting poker. Perhaps I would have took a long break to play videogames, or gone binge drinking, or smoke a lot of weed for a week. I only felt these negative feelings for a few hours at most. Instead I stuck to my built-in habits and routines, I kept grinding every morning at least a couple hours, even during the festive season of Christmas I put in a bit of work everyday. Consistency and discipline paved the way for me this month and while the first half of December was terrible results wise, as Christmas came around things began to change and it turns out I got some nice gifts from the poker Santa Claus.

Even in the midst of the downswing I felt surprisingly cool, surprisingly confident and relaxed. I reviewed my hands, and saw, I didn't play much worse than I usually would, no huge blunders. I looked at variance calculators and saw, this is well within the realm of possibility for someone winning 5bb/100, sure it's a bottom 1% run but it should still be happening once every million hands or so. I looked at my results for the past year and I realized even with this downswing, I'm one of the biggest winners on PLO200 this year, at least on GG. All of this gave me confidence to keep going. Unfortunately, it seems like the poker space is filled with more negativity than positivity. When I make a positive post or have good results, nothing much seems to happen in this blog, people are quiet. When things go poorly, that's when the doubters come in this blog it seems. I faced demeaning and discrediting comments in this blog, advising me to hop off GG, but I stayed positive and kept doing me. These negative comments actually only serve to fuel my fire. And what do you know? By the end of the month, I got everything I lost back.

I suffered my fastest downswing, my bankroll took a hit, I had to take money out of crypto to fund my GG balance. I moved back to reg tables, I played a bit of PLO100 for the first time in like a year. And funnily enough, I always felt calm and confident. This month, I realized, I made huge strides in my mental game. My mental toughness has achieved a new level, one which it hadn't been close to in the past. Having a month like this, and it not completely affecting my entire life, and me still being able to stay positive and confident, it really shows I've made huge strides in my mental game and mental toughness. And I am so ready for whatever else the future holds for me. I'm so happy and proud of myself, to have gone through this brutal stretch, unscathed, stronger than before.

I feel like, if I can get through this, basically the worst variance that the poker gods could throw at me, then I can get through anything. And I'm so so excited for the future.

Will do a yearly wrap-up later.
Peace!

Congrats on making it through this tough time; GG! I had a similar downswing not to long ago but
happy it happened, a lot of good lessons learned, bankroll management being number
one 😀

TY, BRM is indeed important!

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

Maximizing the most vs whales

A mistake a lot of players make is to focus too much on theory. Focus too much on making the GTO play and not trying to think through a hand exploitatively and get the maximum vs the recreational players. In reality, recreational players will make up a huge portion of our profits. Especially on a high rake site such as GG, where the regs are basically splashing money around all trying to lose the minimum to the rake, where the money comes from will be the fish.

Here's a big hand, not so interesting on the surface, but one where we allow the recreational to make the most mistakes.

SB is a reg, and the fish coldcalls the 3b from the BB. We are more than 200bb deep with the whale. Preflop we can consider folding in a GTO environment being triple suited, but being so deep with a whale we have to make the call. In this image below we see that GTO would be folding 100bb deep following this preflop action.

SB decides to CB here, which already indicates some strength. It's a flop that doesn't exactly smash SB's 3b range and he definitely cannot CB range here. BB flats, we can expect him to have a bunch of overpairs and draws, mainly flush draws. The likelihood of him having trips or better is quite low, not because they aren't in his range, but because on such a vulnerable board, he is likely to raise the vast majority of his trips and better here.

I can't really replicate a GTO scenario in PLOtrainer and don't think it's so useful in monker. But here we see that if BB squeezed and CB, BU is highly incentivized to slowplay his nuts:

The truth is though, we have many reasons to raise.
1. We face a CB from the SB reg (indicating strength again) on a board where he should know not to CB 100% of range.
2. the whale flats so we actually need some protection even holding an A and K (their most likely overpairs)
3. We want to bloat the pot and be able to play for stacks vs the whale.
4. Vs 2 we want to raise more than vs 1

The fact is, I am raising my nuts here way more than I should when a whale is involved because it is more likely I can win a lot of money that way than by calling and hoping SB keeps bluffing or valuebetting thin (assuming he doesn't improve to a better hand than mine). My raise sizing is quite small, because I want to keep the BB in with as many hands as possible, we want him to continue basically all those flush draws or overpairs we mentioned he could have earlier.

The SB player gets out of the way, maybe he had a decent hand, when I raise here with a fish involved he should probably fold some more hands than GTO as my raising range is stronger than GTO, not saying I don't have bluffs, I'm probably just underbluffing here specifically.

BB calls and we see a 9 OTT, bringing in a BDFD to show 2 flush draws now. We aren't afraid of so much except for 99, we expect most of his 5x to have raised at some point on the flop. So when he donks like 25% of the pot we are quite thrilled, and a lot of people here may want to flat, allow him to hit his draw or give him the opportunity to do something silly on the river. Instead I opt to go for a click here. There are no rivers we are afraid of really and if he hits some magic 2 outer OTR then so be it, but I still opt to go for a tiny raise because I think that's the best way to make money. It gives him the opportunity to reraise, it gives him the opportunity to keep chasing draws (a lot of which should fold even to this tiny raise), and just because I take away his "initiative" it doesn't actually mean a fish will never donk into you as you are about to see.

He calls our tiny raise OTT and on the river, which is quite amazing for us since he never has AA (we basically only lose to 99 at this point), he decides to punt his stack off anyways. Our raise didn't stop him from river punting, and probably OTR I would be happy to call a lot lighter than with the hand I actually had here.

The point of this post was:
Against a recreational player, who has no idea what GTO means, don't play GTO and think what is the best decision now, to make the most possible money? In this scenario I explained why I think my line made the most money against this particular player. Nothing revolutionary here, just felt like posting a hand.