Burnt out and come back.

Hello everyone,

It’s been a rough week. I didn't have enough time to grind online (only had short sessions) as I was working on a project from work. On Thursday evening I managed to finish the project I was working on and also had very positive feedback (which is great). I came home and I was only thinking to start grinding to make up the volume I missed.

I turned on the computer and after a 5mins stare at the screen I realised how tired I was. I thought I would be fresh the next day but I wasn’t. I was also planning to go play a live tournament and cash during the weekend but I couldn’t leave home. I was exhausted.

On my previous post I was moaning a little that I can’t find enough decent games at the regular tables.

Adding the lack of volume, me being tired and not playing my A game I had a losing weekend. I was a mess, playing random tables, not thinking about poker but just clicking buttons. I had some moments of “clearance” and made some correct plays but overall I am not happy of my game during these days. On top of that HEM said that they fixed the hud problem with zoom poker but this didn’t applied on my computer. Lol

I spoke with the coach and he told me not to worry about the regular tables and that we will start working on zoom from now on, which is more fun. So I decided to drop down and play 10nl zoom as hud still doesn't work. This would only be until my next coaching session.  I am going to have to prepare and adjust my ranges for our next session too. I also emailed Hem support with my problem but their reply wasn't so helpful simply because they only told me to open hem first and then stars.

10NL zoom has been great so far, played without hud but it’s 10nl, it’s not that hard. I can easily add more volume, I save a lot of time not having to table select and also I feel people are more “creative” there ;)

So today, I opened stars to complete the summer mission. Have you seen the summer missions? I really love them. I have already cashed in one of the all in shootouts. I was reading a blog post and 1 tabling at 10nl zoom in order to win 3 hands at showdown. I wasn’t really paying attention until I checked if I had completed the mission and I saw the hud stats at the zoom table!!

This instantly made my day. I was really really happy about that. How great is that? I can grind again!! I feel so motivated! I can't believe this mood change in only 2 days. I have already start playing a decent amount of hands and I am pleased with the win rate/performance so far.I will finish my studying in ranges for zoom and play as much as possible. 

Also, EPT Barcelona just started and we will be able to watch some really good poker from the live stream at pokerstars tv.

Speaking of good poker I want to share with you one of my favourite videos. It is from the Big Game with Dani Stern vs Phil Hellmuth.

 I like all the lines that Dani Stern took in the hands and I believe he has played some really good poker there, taking full advantage of the situations. Sometimes I watch it as a warm up before a grinding session.  

I have so many things to do / follow up, all of them poker related but I am looking forward. I will keep you updated with my zoom “adventures”. 

PS. I might have missed the live tournament and the cash games during the weekend but I still managed to make a little profit out of it. I had a percentage on my friend on one of the side events. My friend finished 2nd (vwp!!) and this made up for what i have missed. 

Gl at the tables

"table selection"

Hi guys,

hope things go well with your grinding. I am still struggling to find more free time to play and the games to be good at the same time.
For instance, I had an hour spare this morning and without second thoughts I loaded stars and start looking for games.
Ermmm, yeh Monday morning, every recreational player was at their 9-5 jobs and only regs were at the tables. I did some hand review during that time but it is a bit annoying to want to play and know that you can play well and being unable to find a decent table.

That's my monthly graph so far. Volume wise it sucks i know. I am playing regular tables, and lately I find it difficult to open more than 4 good tables at the same time.

I have been told a couple of times that my table selection wasn't that great and I am trying more to find the best seats etc etc. If I am lucky enough I might find a table with 2 bad players(1 is always shorty), 1 unknown and 2 regs. Once the short stack losses their money and the other bad player double ups and leaves, the game breaks (instantly sometimes) and I have to start checking the lobby again and again to find new tables.

I might sound like I am complaining but I am not really. Just I don't like that my free time doesn't sync with the good games all the time.

On Friday I decided to play Zoom and I asked for some advice from a 25nl zoom reg. He gave me a couple of tips and bad players names that were playing at the time. I loaded 2 zoom tables and soon I found out that my HUD wasn't running. He said not to worry as I don't have stats from the zoom pool anyway. But honestly, I was feeling clueless. It was folding to my button and I couldn't check the blinds fold to steal stats and I was like "now what to do???"

I know that you have to have stars running as an admin to make HEM working for Zoom and I have already set that. I don't know why it wasn't working but I just decided to stay at my regular tables that I am more comfortable with. After all, I have stats on these players.

Mental..intrusion! 

 I want to make a reference to something that happened last week and it did really affect me. I had a conversation with a poker player (experienced but with "old school" thinking) about ev and how ev evens out in the long term. I don't want to get into details but we end up having a decent disagreement that day.

He managed to convince me that I am wrong ( when in fact I wasn't) simply because he was strongly supporting his opinion. And I went home feeling terrible and that I am a really bad player that I will always be losing. I spent that day searching math theories, messaging some math-wizards poker friends only to have them verifying that I was right.

I am only mentioning the above story because it is really important to find the right people to talk with (lesson learnt). I don't mind that I wasted a day to search and learn some math theories.  But I do mind that I didn't play poker that day and I do mind that I was feeling that all the effort that I have put in poker is not worth it. Everybody is not an expert in every topic so next time I ll find myself on a "similar spot" i will not get involved. Talking with the right people is as important as the table selection I mentioned before.

There's always a "but" and the good outcome of all that is that recently I have been introduced to some people that play the same stakes as me, we think quite alike and so far we have a very healthy discussion over hand histories and lines.

Sorry for the long post :) I have to run to bed as I have to be up early tomorrow.
Gl at the tables.

Trying to grind

Hello everyone,

I started witting a post yesterday but I was too tired to finish it.

Even though I finished the session in profit yesterday I was sooo unhappy of the way I played a hand. I opened JJ, get called from the BTN and sb squeezed. I decided to call, btn folds.
The guy cbets a 9high board and I kept saying to myself "i dont think he does that with 1010s, i am behind" and then I raise! He obv didn't do that with 1010 and I end up losing a stack.

I need to find something to do when I am making these bad plays. I am thinking maybe 50sit-ups for every hand I play bad.  xD

Flopzilla
On my previous post I wrote about Flopzilla and Notecaddy. I was thinking which one would be better to buy.
I finally bought Flopzilla. I love it! I think it is really really useful. Even though I am only using it for a few days now, it has been proven to be a nice tool. I use for every hand I am reviewing and trying to adjust what I have learned in my play.

Past week, in terms of poker was okayish.  Weekend was really good but the weekdays weren't that great. Most of the hands were unlucky. I have doubled up all the short stacks with every possible hand.
AK vs KQ  on an Ace high flop or AJ vs A10 aip. and the best of it was AK vs 106
I will play all day with this guy who shoves with 106 but losing in all of these spots is a little a bit annoying. I start getting a bit moody for losing all my all in/ flips and yesterday I was surprised when I won with AK vs QQ. I was like, how come??

The August just started and I already know I will not probably be able to put some volume online. I have to prepare some presentations for work and also next week I want to play a live tournament.
Have I said before that I don't like tournaments? So, in between the sessions and my reviews I will also have to prepare my slides. Not stressed at all about that but it is time consuming.

For those of you from the UK, I ll be playing the Goliath in Coventry. I ll probably end up grind the cash games all the weekend, if the games are good. Last year I remember that the majority of the cash players (that don't seem regs) were all tight and playing "scared money". Hopefully, they will loosen up a bit this year.

I will definitely post updates from that, there would be some interesting hands for discussion.  
gl at the tables :)