Road to $100,000 playing $10 $20 live
Hi all,
Journaling my road to $100, 000 here.
29 years old, been playing recreationally for over 10 years but recently I’ve started taking the game very seriously. I’m only focusing on cash games for now.
I first stepped into a casino in Amsterdam in 2022, where I won an insane 1034.5 bb in 22.5 hours played (2€/2€).
Took a hiatus before visiting Macau twice in Apr / May 2024. One trip I won 687.5bb in 48.1 hours played (50/100 HKD). Didn’t track my winnings in the other trip, but results were similar.
Started playing at my local casino in Dec 2024, clocked 66.3 hours so far with 816.4 bbs won (mostly $10/$20 and some $5/$10).
My goal for this year is to reach 500 hours in my local casino playing $10/$20, and maintain a win rate of >10bb/h.
I know I’m on a crazy heater but I’m hoping to show my true win rate is at least 10bb/h. Unfortunately I have a full time job so I can’t commit that much time to poker, mostly weekends only. I do try to study consistently everyday at least.
Will be posting updates here regularly. Wish me luck! 😄
6 Replies
*** Mid April Update ***
Total Hours
111.0
Total Win/Loss ($)
$12, 607.50
Total Win/Loss (bb)
861.4
Hourly Rate
$113.55
BB/h
7.76
I've only played 111 hours so far - not quite on track to hit my goal 500 hours this year!
Also on a little bit of a downswing 😅 winrate has dropped significantly. Gotta pump those numbers up to hit 10BB/h again 😄
*** End June Update ***
Total Hours
225.0
Total Win/Loss ($)
$27, 095.00
Total Win/Loss (bb)
1, 925.5
Hourly Rate
$120.44
BB/h
8.56
I actually broke-even for quite a bit after my previous post and even had a bit of a downswing in early June (around the 150-190 hour mark). One crazy session I remember getting aces back to back and losing my stack in both hands, all-in on flop and preflop.
Had a pretty huge upswing in the second half of June, but not quite averaging 10bb/h yet.
Glad with my progress with volume too! Will aim to average at least 45 hours per month for the rest of the year.
*** Early Sep Update ***
Full graph:
Breakdown by month:
Breakdown by stake:
Huge sunrun in Jun/Jul (+$28, 735 in 9 winning sessions in a row! 🤯) followed by a big downswing in Aug. The variance is insane.
Funny how loss aversion works - don't remember much details from my upswing but painful moments from my downswing are still stuck in my head, including:
- losing $10k in just 3 sessions (though this was nothing compared to my previous winning streak)
- $10/$20 game with a $2000 stack, AQo vs AA SBvBU all in preflop, hit a straight and doubled up preflop. Next orbit, lost my entire $4000 stack AA vs top set JJ.
3rd quarter of the year, so far I've been putting in good hours and my winrate is hovering at 7.5bb/h. Sep's been looking good so far, hopefully riding this momentum to the end of 2025!
*** Early Jan Update ***
Happy New Year!
Good News: 500 hours hit!
Bad News: HUGE drop in winrate because of my downswing in the past 3 months.
I'm actually losing overall in $5/$10 which is pretty insance because the players there are much weaker! Really goes to show how big of a role variance plays in this game. My true winrates are probably way off this due to the small sample size, going to continue playing my best and studying and improving as much as I can.
No concrete goals for 2026 yet - just going to continue grinding till Feb, and then I'll take a few months off to study and consolidate my strategy.
Great job hitting the volume goal!!
Thank you 😃
