The purpose of this thread is to keep me accountable for making a run at winning a bracelet at the 2019 WSOPE while documenting my journey. No, I'm not an elite player. But I'm an on again off again grinder with pretty good results when I study and play a lot. Yes, I realize this is quite a reach goal. But it gets me out of bed in the morning, makes me a better player, and is a capstone goal for the rest of my year. It motivates me to stay healthy in all areas -- physically, emotionally, socially, spiritually, financially and in my business. I know if I win in these areas I will be in a strong position to play at my peak in October.

Brief Poker and Life Background
-Began playing as a serious rec back in college around 2002, 2003, mainly live limit hold'em cash. Highlights of that period were winning $2,500 in a 10/20 lhe game, and winning a re-buy tournament at the old Aviation Club in Paris, turning 30 euros into about 3,500-- good money for a poor college kid

-Around '06 the lhe games dried up in my market and I didn't put that much effort into learning NLH theory. Played some NLH but got into bad spots with one pairs a lot, didn't understand stack size adjustments, bet sizng theory, etc. Even so I was competitive in the local live 1/2 and 1/3 games due to having good general hold'em knowledge. Still just played sporadically and basically quit for a few years until 2012

-In 2012 I I read Arnold Snyder's Poker Tournament Formula Book and fortunately final tabled my first live tournament back, a regional WPT event. Then read HOH and joined training sites. Made a few min cashes and decent scores, playing 3 or 4 regional tournament stops each year. Highlight of this period, around 2014 or so, was turning a satellite entry into a final table bubble of a ~$1,500 main event for about $6,000. I then got busy with work and life and still just played in fits and starts.

-In 2015 I played about 250 hours of live cash, winning about $5K that year. Also, I played a little bit online and the highlight was a second place of a $30 tournament for a $3K score. From 2016 through 2018 I also had pretty good years playing part time. Won a $400 tournament in Vegas during WSOP for about $15k, made some other live final tables and decent cashes, and profited about $2k playing online MTTs over a 100k hand sample. Basically my MO was to study a bunch (training videos, push/fold/3bet jam spots, a little private coaching, etc.) and then play low to mid stakes online for practice and to get a bunch of hands to review and analyse on Flopzilla

-This year I've put in about 200 hours of study, and, over about a 6 week period, played 16k hands on ACR. The online roll started at $25, peaked at $1,000 and is now around $500 or $600. I know it's a small sample but I'm pretty happy with my bb/100. Here's a database screenshot of hands played this year:

I also just finished playing a live series in Australia where I made back to back final tables in $550 and $350AUD 130ish runner tournaments, bubble a 750 6-max tournament in 12th place with pretty good money up top, and bricked the ~$1,000 main event.

Currently I have an online based business that is basically on auto-pilot, with a few weeks of intense effort required each year and some occasional focused marketing and customer service work. I'm living and slow traveling Southeast Asia until October when I'm going to Prague for the WSOPE.

Gameplan for Rest of Year
Play online 2 to 3 days a week and study about 2 days a week with an increase in study time the couple weeks leading up to live events. I'm playing a live APPT tournament series in the Philippines at the end of July/early August which I'd obviously like to bink. Then I'll take a week or so off to go to enjoy the nice beaches. After the time off I'll work hard on the online business for a couple weeks. From there I'll do intense study and grind sessions leading up to WSOPE. Definitely playing 3 preliminary events and working hard to get into the main event:

350e Opening event

1,100e Mini-Main Event

10,350 Main Event (satellite in and/or buy in through own funds + selling shares)

550 Colossus

Ideally, win a bracelet and a lot of cash :), then take off of poker until 2020.

Gameplan until July 25

Volume Goal: play 80 hours or more (2-3 days a week)

Study Goal: study at least 12 hours, doing a lot of software drills and deep hand review analysis

Personal Goal: workout at least 4x/ week

-Be in great playing shape for the APT which begins on July 26