2. ENJOY YOUR STUDY PROCESS

Hey guys:)

Everyone loves to play a game (if we arent currently on downswing), but generally speaking, its much easier for most of us to motivate to play compared with studying. However, I think its wrong, because if we really love this game, we should enjoy the process of studying at least equally than we enjoy grinding. Why this is so important?

First and foremost, without studying you cant really become a poker pro since at some point you will just stagnate and get crushed by other players who are just taking it more seriously. However, it doesnt mean that you should study, because someone told you that you become a better player.. this might work for certain time, but in the long term, you will just suck due to lack of motivation. So what should we do?

Let me mention the advice posted by DNegs98

Also something that I've done that I would really recommend is to change your goal from winning money to getting better at poker, when the goal of your session is to really think about and analyse your decisions and improve the process by which you make them then you can tune out the results especially because you will start to understand the spots where you have a really strong understanding of how to play them and where your villains are making mistakes so you can see where your win rate materialises from.

So for me, it means that I am totally changing goals, and only thing which matters is that if I learn something.. regardless of how many mistakes I have made or if I was running hot/cold.. Dont get me wrong, I am still working on this mindset, but esp after yesterday hand review, I really saw a decent amount of potential coming from this paradigm. I literally went through 15 marked hands and 10 of them were mistakes (3 were almost blunders) and I was really confident during all the process and totally enjoy the feeling when I found a mistake and was able to navigate from there..

What should be your takeaway? Well, I think it starts with just constantly remembering yourself whats your main goal and on which aspects you wanna focus. Just integrating those things into your subconscious to the point where you will clearly see more benefit in focusing on getting better instead of win the current session or make no mistake. (while studying and playing as well)

Hope it helps:)
Dont hesitate to comment if you agree/disagree or have any suggestions!

3. MINDSET BOOST

Hello!

Today, I will again quote what I have read on this forum and it really resonated with me. It was written by poker coach on RIO Patrick Cronin:

I feel like this is a weird disclaimer for a poker training site, but remember that your identity and value as a human is not tied to your success in poker. When I am able to remind myself of this it makes it a lot easier for me to deal with what can be very soul crushing downswings.

This is especially important during tough times when things are going wrong, we are on downswing.. then we face a choice whether we allow this situation to have an impact on our overall mood and well-being or not. I believe that by constantly reminding that "between stimulus and reaction there is a choice" (Viktor E. Frankl) we might become better at recognizing whenever the situation like this appear (not only related to poker) and choose the proper action.

Not only reminding, but also doing habits outside of poker such as meditation is definitely really helpful and may basically faster the process of becoming more balanced person:)

Hope, that at least some of you find it helpful:)

Will be back tomorrow!

4. CURRENT RESULTS AND FUTURE PLANS

Hey guys, today I wanna share with you my current results from this year, plus set some goals for the next month.

So, here we go, winamax graph (Feb-Jun)

Pokerstars graph (Jun-Oct):

As you can see I didnt play that many hours though, it was due to my school till June. However, now I am taking poker more seriously, since I have got a "gap-year" as a try to become a poker pro:)

This month was the first time I was playing at nl50, so even if the results arent as good as they are at lower stakes, I am happy that I sort of stayed there. However, I feel that the pool is getting me into more tough spots, like they are aware of what are the general exploits, so if I am applying pressure to those lines, they often take a counter attack (talking about 25% regs at the pool).

My future plans: try to establish at nl50 (maybe put a good sample size at nl25 to gain more confidence:)). So, for the next month, its gonna be at least 100h of playing and 50 hours of studying.
I had the same goal for this month, results are so far:
- studying 53.7/50 hours;
- playing 70.83/100h

So the conclusion is that, I should probably pay more attention to play enough (while not forgetting that I am mostly learning by studying). Therefore I would like to next month focus rather on weekly goals. So I will be aiming for 25h and 12h playing and studying.

Just wonder if I just hit a hot run on nl16/25 or a bad run at nl50, or are those stakes so different in terms of difficulty? Who knows, but its not something I wanna focus on, I believe that by good preparation (HH review, exercise, meditation, cold shower..) I will be able to crush even nl50:)

Note: I prob play like 10k hands more nl25 6max on gg poker during the wsop event...

5. HOW DO WE WIN

Heyy:)

Hope you are doing well!

Today, I would like to go into more complex topic in a nutshell with potential follow ups and maybe even some discussion if you are interested..

Everyone knows that most poker players are losers in the long run. However, given this fact most of us on this forum are stubborn enough that we think that we are special, unique and can be the exception/outlier. We are so obstinate but at the same point we are disposing with a decent amount of self-trust in our capabilities which is usually -EV (talking from a more broad perspective). Saying that if we would choose a random guy who is trying to be a poker pro, we are better off saying him: "Man, move on, dont waste your time since most of you wont be successful in this industry"
So why we are still here? Talking ourselves the narratives that we are better than the others.. that we understand something that nobody else does, yeah, thats true for everyone, but how does it guarantee you the success? Because we see the light, we are dreaming that one day... we will work hard and will get there..
What I would I like to point out is that only certain subset of you will achieve in poker achievements and goals which you are dreaming of, incl. myself. However, my main focus isnt to become the number 1 in the world, to show the world how much money I have earned or whatever else it might be... I am here to show the world that even if I fail, I succeed Might sound weird, but if I learn something new, I am moving forward and thats my goal, thats my win. I dont care if you win XY thousands money in poker by playing if you havent learned anything new. Yeah, for you, it might be a win, but not for me, I am here to learn.. my life vision is to become a better more smarter person who is living a life which might inspire others in a positive way
I am not saying that winning in poker isnt important.. it is for sure, but for me, its more important to learn something new and move forward, because lets imagine that you quit with poker (it might be now, 5/10/15/20 years later). How you wanna look like? Do you like the perspective of you being more rich, but with a sort of poor perspective of life and not knowing much at all.. or having less money, no real tangible successes in poker which you can show the world.. but being more well-balanced person with a healthy mindset focused on learning..
Everyday we face many choices, this one is of the most important, everyday you might decide to go one way or another, you have got so much freedom that you can experiment trying so many paradigms, because at the end of the day, nobody cares except of ourselves..

I think its enough for today, I like talking about this topic in depth, soo feel free to comment:)

Good night!

6. IMPROVING MY MENTAL GAME

Hey again!
Hope you are doing well:)

Back after break, I was pretty much playing and studying a lot..
I have also started to read the mental game of poker by J.Tendler.

Here are some key adjustments which I have started to implement:

1. Switch to task-oriented thinking instead of results-oriented. That said, before every single session, I am gonna choose one task I wanna focus on (making rational decisions, table selection, my overall control etc).

2. After every single session, just assess my overall confidence, flow, control and rationality in a scale of 0-10. If the number is gonna be below 7, I am forced to also write a reason why I think its that low.

3. Evening routine - I have set the certain time (10pm) after which I wont be using my phone/laptop anymore. Its mainly because I want to go to sleep every day at appr. the same time and this just not allow me to procrastinate till late night. Just having the idea in mind that I wanna start and finish the day with myself, not with devices.. because then I think I am sometimes even losing control (staying awake for too long even if I planned to go to sleep earlier). I hope this fix will work, we will see, I promise I will try to do my best!

Hope you find some value in it:)

No doubt in my mind that you will crush anything you do Mato. Good luck and I will keep up with your progress here.

7.MONTHLY RESULTS

Hey guys, its time.. time to show you how I was doing this month what I have learned and where I think my potential leaks are.

Okay so, here we go:

First of all, I have to say that this month in terms of results had been by far the most successful in my career.
Yeah for sure there is some variance, but still the winrate is pretty lucrative (at nl25z).

Switching to zoom tables*
In the end of the month I decided to switch from full ring towards zoom tables. I sort of cant believe that I was able to adapt with so far astronomical winrate.. thought I would be struggling at least at the beginning since I am not used to play zoom.
However, I believe the switch is really important, because I am just dealing with much tougher spots and as many good players already mentioned, full ring poker isnt the future of poker..
Surprisingly, I am still playing roughly 250hand/hour while grinding 2 zoom tables.. I think its mainly due to my higher vpip/pfr, but also the fact that I wanna think about most of my decisions (using System2) and once my time bank goes down, I am instantly sitting out at next big blind and open new zoom table with full time bank, since I feel like with more time, I am able to make more precise decision - so that my winrate, but even confidence is higher and therefore I am not tilting that often as well.

What I also found pretty important is that I have started to evaluate after every single session my game quality and my emotional control on a scale of 0-10 and the average from 12 ssn for me is 8,75 and 8,67 respectively.

The main lesson I have learned this month is that with a clear mind and good mental state (which I am trying to achieve by evaluating the quality of the ssn, but also meditation, exercise, nutrition..) I am able to play my A-game.. and even if I know that I am still making plenty of mistakes, whats the most important is that I am aware of that, I know my A-game doesnt mean I am no longer making any mistakes. Knowing that I did my best, knowing that I am in the right mental state, that I have studied a lot and its time to show to the pool, but still knowing how much I dont know, so there are gonna be spots where I might be wrong/unsure and thats fine as long as it doesnt have any impact on your current mental state.
That was probably my biggest takeaway and I feel like if I can master this and play my A-Game with the right mental state of mind, my winrate is gonna be even higher, but I will also feel more happy at the end of the day, even though I lose few BI knowing that I did my best, so its +ev in terms of money, but also in terms of life ev which is also extremely important.

Where was my biggest leaks?*
Honestly, I dont know :D
I would say that not being organized when it comes to studying poker. Since its so complex game, I often forget about the importance of continuity and having a good system which would help me to learn more efficiently. So for the next month, I will try to define what are the areas I wanna work on and then just work mostly on them.. because yeah I am gonna mark xy hands and then while doing HH review one is from 3bpt as an aggressor OOP, another is SRP as a caller, another is a preflop question etc etc.
Therefore this month or at least week I would like to focus on SRP as a caller.

Summary: I planned to play 100h and study 50h. As you can see I managed to play only 77.17h and study about 60h. I believe transitioning to zoom tables I can increase the playtime since I no longer need to be table selecting.

For december: its 90h of playing and 40h of studying due to Holidays..
Gotta continue crushing nl25z, it would be incredible if I could manage to be at least 20bb/100 winner over decent sample size.

Thanks for reading!

Dont hesitate to leave a comment/suggestion or whatever else:)

8. UNDERSTANDING THE VARIANCE

Hey friends,

Back after week, currently you can find me pretty often at nl50z on pokerstars, moved there after crushing nl25z with a smaller sample size . I hope I can be also winner at those stakes, because I feel like they are some pretty solid regs which are for sure better than me, but on the other hand I feel like its a really small subset of the overall pool and still lot of bad regs, and recreational players.

However, whats usually a rule of thumb is that the higher you play, the tougher the games are, and therefore your winrate is gonna be lower. What does that mean in reality? Basically that you are going to have more downswings for a longer time. Its how the variance works.

This is something really important for all guys who would at some point reach this threshold, and I think at certain stage of our career all of us actually does. You cant beat 2/5+ online for 20bb/100. (unless you play on some crazy apps). That said, its crucial to understand once we start to have 10,20,30bi downswings (and even more) that its just okay and it doesnt necessarily mean that we are playing bad poker.. Its tough when we arent used to deal with those kind of things, trust me. I have moved from full ring to zoom tables, when the standard deviation is much higher, I feel like I was playing for stacks every single session..

Anyway, here are some numbers if our true winrate at nl50z is 5bb/100 (which is actually really great, bc your winrate before the rake consideration is 14bb/100 which is incredible for those stakes and if you are there, your poker knowledge is very solid!)

This picture tells us, that there is some 5.7% chance that we might be losing after 100k hands! Thats actually a decent sample size.
On the other hand, for less than 5% risk of ruin, we need only 30bi. So we can actually take a shot with 30bi and be actually pretty safe (but still be careful).

Just look at the probability of hitting 50bi downswing - 4%. This is something esp. important for micro grinders who could be winning like 10bb/100+ (and having lower StDev). Here are some steps which you might take to prevent from being crushed by the variance

1. Knowing that it might actually happen, so that it wont hit you that hard.
2. Prepare your bankroll and stick with some rules such as moving down after losing x bi (or %) of your roll.
3. Set up your mind on focusing on playing your A-Game no matter the results. If you know that in the next session you might lose couple of bi why does it surprise you? Why does it affect your emotion state? You know its real, so just accept it, look at your session as an endurance race, its just x hands from 100k or even million
   If you quit the session, it isnt the end, you just hit the pause button for a while. Then you come back tomorrow and hit the play button.. you are doing this your whole poker career, you play only one long race and how far you can actually get, depends on the quality of your races which have no relations with the actual result of one session.

That said, its all about our focus and being in the right mental state. Why would you focus on short-term results? Checking after few hundreds/thousands hands how are my results? (unless you are taking a shot and cant afford to lose more than X amount of bi)
Imo, its totally self-destructive, because what might happen?

1. You are winning so far, okay it might boost your confidence a bit (but you are confident enough if your focus is to study and then play your best A-game)
2. You are breakeven after smaller sample - well, it prob wont affect you that much, maybe you would think that you want to improve something
3. You are losing - this is the main issue; you might start thinking: what am I doing wrong? Oh, I made few mistakes, so that I am a loser right now.. Your confidence level is getting lower, so that you might be no longer able to play your A-Game, or you might make a change even if your game was solid.
   Dont get me wrong with the 3. point, sometimes your strategy is no longer working and therefore we need to change something, but if you are beating previous stakes for 5bb/100 or higher, you shouldnt be worse than a breakeven player on the next llimit

Hope at least some of you find it helpful, and dont hesitate to leave a comment, question, critique, whatever:)

See yea

Just read through your entire journal and you are doing a great job of posting updates and seem to be focusing on the right things with long term vision, learning process, making sure you are making the most +EV decisions and not focused on actual results of the session, & managing your bankroll well for climbing up stakes.

I think aggressive BRM is important because who cares what your win rate is at 2NL, 5NL, 10NL, 50NL etc? In reality you will be able to win enough money most of the time with rake back + whatever your win rate is to move up to the next level before you actually realize your true win rate. Sauce made a video on this where it can take millions of hands before you realize your true win rate, then there are so many variables with game getting tougher, that even over 5,000,000 hands you won't know your true win rate from this year to next year. I encourage you to use aggressive BRM whether it's using 30 bi for the next level and drop down if you lose 10 or using 20 bi and drop down if you lose 5. Just keep managing your money and you will get to a level you want to be at eventually whether it's 500z or 1KNL.

As I read through your blog, I noticed you would mention that short term doesn't matter, but seem to pay some attention to the monthly results, which don't really matter either. That is just a mental mindset that can be a leak and cause unnecessary stress or boost ego a little too high as well.

Chris Primer fellow Rio mindset coach makes some good videos about focusing on one thing, similar to how you mentioned J. Tendler and having a task for the daily session. You are taking a lot of the right steps from what I read in your post, but I wouldn't stress yourself out with taking on too much at once. This is where Chris Primer a long with Eliot Roe say a lot of people fail. They are trying to learn GTO and study X amount hours, play Y amount of hours, sleep 8 hours, eat healthy, exercise, madidate, read books, spend time with family and friends, etc. You are going to overload your plate so much that eventually you are going to fail. However, when you fall, make sure you fall forward so you can see what you are landing on.

Really excellent blog overall so far. Would encourage you to possible share some strategy or some of your biggest pots that you have questions about. Also in the beginning you mentioned eating healthy and exercise, but no other updates after that. Not to add too much to your plate, but having strength goals, fat loss goals, no fast food etc goals can be pretty motivating as well. The energy you get from running or working out in the morning can really help with your session focus.

Jnandez I forgot what podcast it was, but he talked about how he loved the game and was playing like 80 hours a week and streaming some times over 100 hours a week etc Smoking cigarettes' during his sessions, where one day he just broke down and started crying because of how much pressure he was putting on himself. Thought you might Enjoy some of these podcast since you are focused a lot on mental game and long run performance for years to come.

Best of luck! Also David Goggins on youtube can help if your into intense motivation.

9. EXERCISE, (nutrition)

Hey grinders,

Today I would like to talk how I deal with exercising + (nutrition) some relations with my poker mindset and overall happiness.

First and foremost I would start at the end. How do you wanna look like at the end of your life? Are you okay with being fat, having diabetes, often feel sick, and at the end probably even live a shorter more complicated life? On the other hand, you might be fit even at your 50,60yrs, feeling much younger, less often being sick and essentially decreasing the odds of getting cancer! Again, all its our choice.

Since my vision is to inspire others, my choice is pretty obvious. Definitely not looking how difficult is going to be, I meant when we are talking about such important things as nutrition, exercise, sleeping there should be no excuse such as difficulty.

Soo, this is theory, but how does it actually look like in practice?
I found really important to have strong habits. For instance every single morning after I wake up, I do exercise, after that I have a cold shower followed by meditation and writing down few things I am grateful for and things I would like to do today (intentions).
This is actually something I highly recommend to everyone (not only poker players). Just wake up, do some exercise (it might be just few minutes) and then have a cold shower. I promise, with this "hack" you will safe a ton of time, because the vast majority of people are sort of tired in the morning and sometimes it takes even hours to totally wake up. Cold shower will do it for you immediately:)

Regarding specific exercise, I do some sort of mix, mostly videos by Pamela Reif (currently 30min a day) mixing with weights. She has got also weekly plans which are nice for keeping yourself accountable.

Another hack, which I have started to use recently is to create a group with our really good friends. Then write there everyday what you have done today and what you want to exercise tomorrow. It works pretty well, because its much easier to lie to ourselves, our minds are really great in doing that haha:) whereas lying to others its not that easy (esp. when we are talking about stuff like why dont you exercise today? you really didnt have free 45minutes from 1440 minutes which the day is offering us?)

That was about morning routine though, but we also shouldnt forget about evenings. For me, really works to do some sort of self-reflection, what I did wrong, how can I learn from that (this is in general, not even poker stuff) and what are my intentions for tomorrow? After that I try to find few things I am grateful for, to boost my humility and not let my ego to run over me. Overall, trying not to use my devices at least one hour before I go to sleep.

Why do I regard it as so important? Because if you can master mornings and evenings, the rest would be much easier, trust me. Then you will usually find yourself pretty satisfied at the beginning of the day, but at the end as well.. just imagine how it would be.. so hope you can see the importance right now:)

In the next post, I am gonna write more about the nutrition, some personal experience, when I made the crucial shift and how does it affect my mental game at the tables..

Hope, you find some value in this post!

Will be back soon,
stay safe:)

Another hack, which I have started to use recently is to create a group with our really good friends. Then write there everyday what you have done today and what you want to exercise tomorrow. It works pretty well, because its much easier to lie to ourselves, our minds are really great in doing that haha:) whereas lying to others its not that easy

It would be awesome to do something similar here to make us accountable.
We can make a shared Google sheet and fil it every day

10. EXTREME HAPPINESS

Hey guys! Today I would like to share with you my yesterday experience and feelings which I had at the end of the day..

First of all, I would say that I am talking about the best day in my month so far! Trust me, when I say this, its really wow, since I am enjoying most of my days a lot:))

Okay, to get to the point, besides of exercising and cold shower, I also had a voice call with my poker study buddies which was nice.. but still nothing that special. In the afternoon, I was swimming in the cold water with my friend and yeah 4 degrees are 4 degrees :D its tough and my mood after that was even better.. but again, I have days like this 2 times a week or so. However, after that I had a 90 minutes presentation (in a non-profit organization where I volunteer) for couple of students from secondary school (who are participating in that organization). Most of them were like 15-16yrs old and my topic was how to crush the day? Basically I was talking about some tips from my experience (such as morning/evening routine; how much time do we spend on devices/benefits of being outside and just walking; trying and trying things, only this way we can figure out if it really works for us; simplifications for the life.. dont overcomplicate, start with one thing/habit and slowly adding another one... )
Just a little bit of background, we knew each other, since I was the camp animator few times like a year ago where most of them were.
Anyway, its been really nice talking to younger guys some stuff from my own experience how to feel better at the end of the day, but also asking them about their opinion.. However, what was the 2 major things which stand out in my mind the most:
1. When at the end I asked whats the one thing they took from today workshop and they said something which really seemed like I could possibly help them to feel better at the end of the day to some manner.
2. After the workshop I said if anyone wants to stay and talk to me about whatever they want, I am here for you. We ended up talking like 2.5hours more. (sometimes about the topic, but for the most part just random funky talks)

I also received two feedbacks (without asking for that) when guys were saying it was really perfect, finally some workshop where someone was talking from his own experience, I am really motivated right now to start practice at least some of your mentioned tips...

I have to admit, that after almost 2hours of presenting and then 2.5h of just talking I was really tired..(+cold water+studying..) but I was so so happy.. I went to bed and falling to sleep with thoughts in mind that today I possibly helped someone to be more satisfied at the end of the day.. and trust me, its something indescribable. (at least for me)

Okay, thats all from the yesterday.. I mean, I live for those days.. do whatever makes you happy, life is too short, so exploit every single opportunity, its more than worth it!!:))

Sorry, for not following up, I promised the next post is gonna be about nutrition, but I really felt like I wanna share this experience with you.
Next post will be about nutrition for 100% :D

11. NUTRITION AND WHY AM I A VEGETARIAN?

Hey everyone, hope you're all enjoying Christmas times!

Today I'd like to look at why I think nutrition is a crucial aspect in poker, but also in our life.

My short story: I was like most kids loved sugar, always when I had a choice, I opted for a sweat meal. My breakfast was either cereals with milk or toast with chocolate.. that was all about it lot of similar low quality food with so much sugar in there.. not talking about sweetened drinks such as fanta, Coca-Cola etc etc.
However, when I was 16yrs old (so it's 4yrs from now), good friend of mine told me that people are eating so many unhealthy stuff and why is it so dangerous.. he was talking like 2 hours and it really resonated with me, you know it was like the AHA moment for me. I'm usually the type of person who is capable of making huge changes in a really short period of time. So I almost immediately started to eat less sugar and more healthy stuff, in addition I spend 1h+ a day on reading articles about the nutrition, what's healthy and what's really dangerous for our body for a 3 months in a row. Yeah, I was really obsessed about it at that time.
Sometimes I wish I would have known this before.. but don't get me wrong, this is a bit biased thinking, because everyone is ready at different stage of their lives to accept that they're all doing it wrong (it also depends on things we're talking about). I can imagine myself in my 12-13s to just laugh if someone would like to teach me about nutrition and why eating so much sugar isn't healthy.. Sure, it also depends how is it being told, but still you have to be mentally prepared and usually it can not be done if we aren't ready to accept at any stage of our life that we might be doing it wrong... Guys, this is so important!

Why I believe that proper nutrition is almost a necessity?
Well, as some of you might know, I really like to start with the end. How do you wanna look like in 10,20,30yrs? You can imagine yourself in a scenario when you just don't care what you eat.. basically by doing that, you're literally increasing the chance of getting cancer (also many other diseases). If someone wants a data proof, I recommend google scholar, I bet you'll find there plenty of them. However, it's not only about increasing the chance of getting almost any disease, it's also about having full energy during the day. Now it comes to the importance related with poker, you really want to be fully energized.. by eating unhealthy stuff (usually those have high glicemic index) you'll get even more energy, however, only for small amount of time. After that your energy level goes down really quickly. In poker words, it means that you might be able to play 1 ssn perfectly (A+ Game) and another ones with really low energy (C Game). I think we could be here for weeks talking about downsides of unhealthy eating... The first step is to be aware of the consequences and from there re-evaluate it on your own

If you're already avoiding junk food and have the knowledge about it, you're probably better than 80% of people (imo even more).
Let's look what does it mean to eat healthy?

This is another broad topic, I'll try to keep it brief and simple. I'd say nowadays, it's been more and more popular (except of U.S.��) many advertisements with bio products, wholegrain etc etc. There are so many resources, so that sometimes it's kinda hard to recognize whom to trust (one time I might also write about this).
To simplify it: the less modified the product is, the more I'm inclined to buy it. That said, always prefer to buy from local sellers as much food as possible. Ideally those with low glycemic index (more wholegrain foods, vegetables, fruits etc), because I really like to have stable energy levels, esp. while I'm playing a session (but even during my study or life besides poker)
Another benefit is that once you start to eat more healthy products, you're inevitably going to feel better as a human. No one can argue until you try it:)

Is that picture actually unhealthy?
Well, even if it might look like an unhealthy conventional breakfast, surprisingly it's not. Because there's white yoghurt with bananas, cacao powder (unsweetened), cinnamon and walnuts.

Btw as I already mentioned at the beginning of this post, I'm a vegetarian! However, it has nothing to do with my healthy lifestyle. It's mainly due to environmental reasons. It's been more than 2 years from a date when I decided to stop eating meat. Actually I'm not a strict vegetarian, so sometimes (like once in 3months) I eat a bit of meat.. Don't get me wrong I still love burgers, steaks.. just environment is a higher priority.

Sorry for such a long post, I was actually trying to keep it brief.. but I could have my own website on this topic.. (who knows maybe one day..)

Anyway, hope you find some value in there

Coming soon: summary of this year + plans for a next year 2021

Stay safe!:)

Actually the picture isnt mine, I stole it from the internet, I really apologize, I made two photos of my meals, one white Yoghurt with bananas, cacao.. and other couscous with pesto, tofu, egg, tomatoes, rocket and olive oil, you can find it here, for some reason I was unable to post it here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EJnygAJd-OSmZfPwHbljWNXM-uZvZDixlG8RxGaSs/edit?usp=sharing

it can not be done if we aren't ready to accept at any stage of our
life that we might be doing it wrong... Guys, this is so important!

Very important as you said! Also as Dan Self said a lot of these diets have their own merits and almost all of them work short term. Long term I think each diet has it's own issues with decreasing your metabolism being low calorie, increasing your cholesterol with too much fats / protein, too much processed foods with high sugar leading to diabetes etc etc. Moderation is always key and each person is going to be different. Some times these junk foods can be ok when eaten early enough in the day where you are active enough to work them out later, however eating this stuff late at night before bed can be a disaster, speaking from experience. That is why one of my main goals 2021 is not to eat past 8pm to 8am. I find a mid day salad a nice pick me up to boost my energy level.

Good luck on the new year!

12. SUMMARY of 2020 + NEW YEAR RESOLUTION

Hey everyone,

Hope you have started the New Year with enough energy, motivation and curiosity!

In this post, I would like to sum up last year 2020, what I have learned, what could I improve and some crucial parts of the year in my life. I will also mention my plans for this year. So let's dive into it:)

First of all, I want to say that I am really grateful for the opportunity to be part of this life (in 2020).
Last year has been really critical for me in terms of my life journey. I graduated from secondary school and was facing a decision whether I wanna continue to study and go to uni or go to work, or just try to make it as a poker pro. Now, you already know that I chose the last option and I am definitely not regretting it. But that wasn't the only life changing thing..

At the beginning of 2020, I met a nice girl... I was investing a lot of time in our relationship as well as in school at that time (was January). You can imagine that my poker volume went drastically down. Few months after, the Corona crisis has started to expand. I was no longer attending school, but we started to have online lessons, basically everything was online. Everything has some merits, in this case, I am happy that I was able to find a ton of value in it and I started to work on my daily plans and time management. At that time I already knew that it would last at least for a few months. I have started to write a diary, where I was writing my intentions for a given day + few things I am grateful for. This was helping me a ton, besides the relationship w my girlfriend and my close friends.

Another positive aspect of the corona situation was that I started to ride a bike on a regular basis. It was really an amazing feeling to ride in such an empty town (and I am living in the capital city right :D). In the meantime, our final exams from school have been cancelled. I was really happy about it at that time, because I have thought that I would need to learn a lot of useless stuff. This happened at the end of April.

Few weeks after that, I went on a bike trip with one of my best friends. We wanted to meet our other very close friend after 2 months. We were aiming for 100km. It should be tough, but great at the same time. However, during our journey, we were in the forest and there was a solid downhill. I was so happy that finally I can relax for a while. You can imagine the feeling once you spot a downhill after like 35km of the ride. Unfortunately, the downhill was so bumpy that I wanted to rather just stop, but my brakes weren't able to make it due to my current speed and bumpy route. So I fell off the bike and eeeeh, it sucked, I made like 3 somersaults and ended up with a broken hand. The biggest downside for me was that I haven't made 100km. We actually met our friend who was forced to take 40km more :D but we have seen each other!:)
Btw luckily me, since I didn't have a helmet and I fell out on my arm.. so it could end up really really worse..

At the end of May (still with a broken hand) I have started to practice walks on a regular basis. This is probably the #1 takeaway from 2020. It is so relaxing, so that I can think about whatever I want and basically change the environment. In addition, it is really healthy (fresh air, movement..)
Besides that I started to have more time for poker, but given the fact that I wasn't playing that much last months and at the end of 2019 I was playing some live poker, I decided to play microstakes to just gain confidence and get in the zone.

However, at the end of July, my relationship with my gf suddenly broke up. It was not my intention.. I don't want to talk much about it, but basically I didn't have a choice.. I was really shocked at that time, because our relationship was absolutely better than the average with really few quarrels. Anyway, it's life and I had to accept it.
Summer cottage with my closest friends (with no alcohol!) helped me a ton to refresh. But the thing which helped me the most was the day after it happened, I wrote like 10 things for which I am grateful for. So that I kind of remembered myself that what I still have and not what I lost This habit I would say is #2 takeaway from 2020 - the dairy of gratitude

Back to poker, I sort of decided to take a break from playing even though I felt okay-ish, I knew its still not 100%, therefore I was mainly studying and being okay with not playing for now. This period lasted for like 2 weeks. After that, I started playing again and it was great. Knowing that I intentionally took a break, boosted my confidence a bit which was really important at that time. I think I hit an upswing which was also great, so that I quickly moved from NL16 to NL25.
That was actually the time when I was deciding to either go to uni or go all-in on poker. Since I have had a feeling inside me, telling me that I am not done yet. I have found it really fulfilling and have seen no reason to not try this gamble :D I mean, I can go to uni next year if I fail or if I wont find it satisfying or for whatever reason. My parents were supporting me in both directions (another thing I am really grateful for:))

In the meantime, I got accepted to a 3year leadership program focused mainly on self-development (Nexteria). I have thought it might be a great way to balance my poker life with learning some soft skills and social interaction. It has started in September and so far I have found a lot of value in there (1.Community, 2. The quality of courses/workshops - made by top speakers/lectors in my country).

Okaay, those were few highlights from 2020. Sometimes I felt like being on a rollercoaster, but overall I have to say that I enjoyed it. In life, everyone has some upswings and downswings. The first step is to recognize where we are currently at, the awareness is really crucial in any aspect of our lives. For life downswings, I found really valuable to have strong habits (such as exercise, cold shower, mediation, fixed bedtime, diary of gratitude, walks..), because if anything happens we don't need to go from zero. Our bottom line is then much higher and I think by constantly pushing this bottom line up and up (slowly adding more and more healthy habits) we can make a great preparation for almost any life changing situation.

New year resolution

For the next year 2021, I would like to set 2 goals/rules

1. Always be on time

WHAT?
Basically on every single meeting (online or offline) arrive on time.

WHY?
Because my personal data shows that on average, I have a delay for like 5minutes. Like in 80%+ meetings I am coming late.

HOW?
I will try to fake the original time of the meeting 10 sooner. So lets say, if the meeting is going to start at 2:30, for me it starts at 2:20. So far, it works pretty well!

2. Morning and Evening routine

WHAT?
Every single morning, the first thing I am gonna do is to smile, open the window and exercise (+ cold shower). In the evening, 1h before I go to sleep, I won't be using any devices anymore. My latest bed time is midnight, so it means that devices are allowed till 11pm.

WHY? Because I found myself last year that if I am not following any kind of rules, its so easy to stay awake late at night and personally, my well being sucks as well. Generally speaking, I was less satisfied when I was falling asleep after midnight.

HOW?
I will set an alarm at 10:45pm to let me know that if I am still on devices, I have got the last 15 minutes.. it's some sort of reminder to not forget.

Alright, that's all for now, I hope it wasn't too boring, if yes, then just let me know, every feedback is more than appreciated
This post was a bit longer than usual, but it's once per year, so I think it's sort of needed.

Anyway, for the next one, it will be more poker-related with one little surprise;)
So stay tuned!

Thanks for reading:)

Just read through your blog and very nice stuff bro! can relate to a ton of things you mentioned and also inspired me to improve on some aspects I was lacking in life.
Also, you mentioned you played a ton of chess in previous years right? Maybe we can schedule a game or two some time :)

13. EXTREME WORK ETHIC

Hey everyone,

Today as I promised, the topic is going to be more poker related and definitely shorter than few posts before.

As I already mentioned at 1.INTRODUCTION I am currently on "gap year" so after finishing secondary school, I decided not to go to uni (even though I was accepted on best uni in maths in my country) and try to make it as a poker pro.
That said, when if not during these times, is time to put the hardest work possible? Sometimes I am forgetting that this is the special opportunity where I can go all-in on poker. I doubt that there are going to be many times in my life where I will be able to say the same (no matter the industry).

Currently I switched to gg (after forced to play w aurora..), playing nl50 reg tables (figured that rush and cash on nl50 is even more reg-heavy than nl50z on pokerstars). Anyway will post my results from dec-jan at the end of this month.

To keep myself accountable, for this kind of hard work, its always great to set some goals. So, from this day to the end of the month, I would like to aim for 100 and 50 hours of playing/studying. However, I will be satisfied even w 85 and 35h. But you always want to have big goals, because essentially the achievement is going to be also big:)

Last, but not least, I really dont want to just blindly go ahead and study whatever I feel like atm. Currently working on playing 3b pots OOP as an aggressor (OTF). Recently was working on flop strategy in SRP as an aggressor so should keep in mind that as well.

Anyway, thats all for today, last time I mentioned a little surprise.. unfortunately, its still in process, but stay tuned, should be done in the next post.

Gl, at the tables!

14. JOINING A STABLE!?

Hello hello again!

Today as I promised, I'll share with you the little surprise, I was mentioning last time.

In the middle of December, I decided to apply for BrPC (Brazilian Poker Crew). Recently I got accepted so that the contract is on the table.
I still do have some time to think about it, but for the most part I'm really excited and see nothing which would stop me from joining this stable.
There are few major reasons why I think it's a +ev decision:
1. Clear path created by someone who's already been through the process.
2. Great community (Important to notice that BrPC is being here for no more than 2 years, therefore the company is much smaller which can result in closer relationships with each other that can last forever)
3. Successful students, so far I haven't seen losing players after the 18 months period
4. Full staking, you're not gonna play with your own money

If you have any other opinion, feel free to share, it's more than appreciated

Btw since I'm going to join the stable, I probably won't have time for posting to this journal somewhat often.
However, I'd like to share my feelings and thoughts after some time of being there.

Hope you enjoyed it and let's crush the tables!

Hello,

So I officially joined BrPC, starting on 1st of February.

What is going to happen with my journal?

Well, I will probably try to keep you guys updated with my feelings after some period as well as share some results (if possible).
So basically I will be trying to share with you how such a journey of a student of BrPC may look like:)

It is gonna be fun.. :D

See ya

Hey guys!

1st update from BrPC.

So after more than 2 weeks since joining BrPC I have to say that I am really satisfied. Of course, its hard to say something objective after such a short period of time =)

The biggest benefit despite all the amazing and valuable materials I would say is the community, basically the feeling that you are not alone, surrounded by great poker players, this is something which is driving my work ethic a lot. I also never felt like I can ask questions and just get responses by proven winners.

On the other hand I am still not fully realizing that I am going to dedicate following 18 months to hard poker work. However, I am so far really enjoying it, I would say after 3 years of playing poker, this is the first time I found myself playing/studying in a calm state of mind.

I would also like to keep remembering myself the vision of 1M hands. So that if I lose couple of buy ins, it really doesnt matter. Basically dont care about results (at least for now), just maximally focus my intention to what is really important - implementing the blueprint strategy and discovering my biggest leaks as well as mapping the population at nl50z.

Btw 1 lost BI in 1M hands = -0.01bb/100

I agree, knowing that you are getting feedback from proven winners must be one the best parts of joining a stable.
If you dont mind me asking, what are you doing to map the population at 50z? This is exactly what I'm trying to do using range wizard. Would be interested to hear your process.

Gl

actually saw you at 50z haha

Get a quick spewy station tag on me. Lol.

Yer its a bit different from what im doing. I'm trying to do an mda on 50z to identify a counter strategy and any obvious exploits. But hopefully be playing 100z before its finished. Ha

Hey crushers!

Yesterday I did have a decent upswing (~7bi). Sounds cool, right? Yeah, I wont lie, at first glance, it felt great, amazing you know that feeling for sure.

However, I am actually trying not to give it too much weight, because the amount of emotions involved in such an upswing is similar to the amount while I am on downswing and that can be quite destructive. That said, I want to focus primarily on making good decisions, because thats the only thing I can control. Results arent under my control (at least not the short-term ones). I could have made same decisions in a session and lose or win 2,5,10 buy ins, thats how the variance works.

From that, I want to really pay attention to not give many emotions to a winning/losing session. So my goal for the next post is: trying to spot every single time I feel good/bad during or after the ssn based on results

Cheers

Nice results. Yer, short term variance is hard to ignore even when we know that its not significant.

Tried a shout out to a slovakian reg. Wasnt sure if it was you. There was only 2 in the 50z pool and the other was tagged as a fish. Lol

Gl with the journey. Look forward to some updates.

15. Building my Identity

Hey my friends!

Today I would like to write a bit about my identity and why only knowing about the variance is not enough in order to avoid emotional-based decisions.

Okay so first of all: Whatever you gonna do in life, if you are not mentally stable in the first place, you wont be able to achieve your personal maximum. In other words, you wont reach your full potential which is quite sick, isnt it?
In poker words: if you know that variance is there and you may experiment long periods of downswing, thats definitely gonna help you, however, the problem is still not over in most cases. The reason being is our ego. This is something super strong and its usually happening in our sub-conscious, so its really hard for us to realize that. Our ego works in a way of satisfactions from demands, so it always wants to reach some achievements, because it thinks that once we get there, we will be satisfied/happy (whatever you call it). Whats actually happening in reality is that, we see the picture created by our ego system and every time we arent moving towards our goal, guess what happens? Our mind (driven by ego) evaluates that as a failure, which will immediately translates to our overall mood and feelings.
So, the main problem is that we are not able to be making only steps which are leading towards our goals. From that, it doesnt really make sense to build anything on our short-term results, because its not under our control. However, this is not enough to avoid tilting and uncontrolled emotional responses.

The ego is still there and if after somewhat longish period of time you havent achieved what you (your ego system) wanted, you will feel miserable. This is something which creates pressure on us in short-term period, because the long-term results are products of the short-term ones. Another problem with this mostly sub-concious egosystem is that once you achieve what you want (crushing micro/low/mid/high stakes, owning a villa, power etc) you will feel satisfied, however, only for limited period of time! Sooner or later, your levels of happiness and satisfaction goes down and you will be in the similar position than you were before. So for instance, you can be working hard 1,2,5,10 years (in pain, depressions but with the vision that one day you will be there) in order to achieve what you really wanted. Afterwards you are there, enjoying the situation for like few days weeks or in rarely cases even months. However, after that, you are almost in a same situation as you were before - your mind (driven by ego) is hungry for another achievement and wont be satisfied/happy unless you will get there.
Hope you see where the problem is coming from, you can actually stop reading here and try to figure it out on your own;)

The biggest issue is how our mind operates. Ofc its a powerful tool, but it has some downsides. Just imagine how often you use your mind on a daily basis. Then think about how often do you actually use it intentionally. This is probably the crucial part why I really recommend to everyone to start to be an observer of your mind. It brings you another dimension where every time your mind will generate some thoughts, ideas.. you wont be that detached to that, because you are observing that at the same time. You will be no longer blindly defending your opinion, just to hold a truth.
My mind sometimes go crazy, create spewy ideas/scenarios, think about the past/future, but once you realize whats going on, you will get rid of all no sense patterns. They wont exist once you raise awareness over them. Based on that, I am always trying to not identify my mind.
That said, I really wanted to build my identity on something which is under my control and at the same time I can also identify with that. I found something which by increasing, I am also boosting all other areas in my life - so I am building my identity on a level of self-awareness.

What does that mean in practice? It usually means that my focus is primarily on how wakeful I actually am. Trying to observe which patterns my mind typically use in annoying situations and dont judge myself for any kind of pattern which I spotted, because that would inevitably means that I am identifying with my mind. Whats really cool about this approach is that, whatever happens its not gonna have any impact on you, because you are just focusing on your self-awareness- thats your job, nothing else:)

Alright, should be more than enough even though, I could imagine writing about this topic for hours.
Hope you get some value out of there!
Appreciate any discussion, comments or suggestions:)

Cheers

What about your journey with BrPC?

Okay so first of all: Whatever you gonna do in life, if you are not mentally stable in the first place, you wont be able to achieve your personal maximum. In other words, you wont reach your full potential which is quite sick, isn't it?

You should tell this to David Goggins.

Also I brought up your Journal to some people just yesterday. Was curious how your BrPC is going as HeavyMask pointed out.

Aweomse blog. Really enjoy the long form posts. Looking forward to the update!

Hey everyone

So it's been around 40 days since I joined BrPC.
First of all, it's going to be really subjective and biased, but at the same also honest.
Before diving into that, just wanna say that I'm sort of an exceptional case mainly due to my age (being only 20yrs old, youngest guy there:), because my overall approach even before joining BrPC was to make it as a poker pro (skipped university). So if you see you're basically going All In on poker, such an opportunity like this seems to be kinda amazing.

That said, I joined the BrPC with such a mindset of a player who is really hungry for success, who trust their methodology. This is really important when you're joining any stable, because you'll avoid some self-sabotaging esp. when you're at the table, playing a ssn, it kinda determinates your level of confidence. Not only that, also your overall attitude towards the stable. I think this is specially important when joining BrPC or Poker Detox (cause their style is highly explo).

Time for the first graph, just nl50 on stars:

Yeah, so far so good. Continuing with that mood, I think really big benefit which is sometimes hard to realize is the amount of support you're getting and the feeling that whatever doubts you have, you can ask and get really decent answer. Moreover, the reason why many people stuck, it's not because they're bad, but because the direction they took is not worth it. Well, I can't say that BrPC is the best way, but for now, I feel like when I'm going wrong which esp. at early stage of our poker carriers happen pretty often, I get corrected by the ones whose already been through that cycle. So comparing studies on my own, I feel like at that time, many things I was just trying to figure out on my own and spending too much time in certain areas which weren't really worth it.

Another aspect which I'm not sure you can really find even in other stables is the community.
1. It's Brazilian Crew - maybe you already know, but those guys are so friendly, energetic and funky that it creates a nice place for building good relationships and having a lot of fun (even outside of poker)
2. It's still a small stable - which means that the relationships are more personal and the value of the community is even higher.

Of course, there are some cons as always. So far the biggest one for me is the amount of time which I need to dedicate for poker than I would sometimes like to. This may not be a disadvantage for everyone, but with my habits and interests- enough sleep, exercise, meditation, swimming (in a cold water), family-time, time for myself, for my friends etc and also I'm attending leadership academy program.. sometimes I feel a bit overwhelmed. It's like almost everything I do I perceive as really valuable, but now I have to cut a little bit. However, I should be really careful with cutting those activities and do it in a rational/intentional way.
For instance: if I skip one time a week family dinner, for the next week I need to make sure that I won't skip that again and rather skip a call with my friends or so. Just to always keep some balance between everything I'm gonna do.

At the end, I'd just add that I'm quite happy with writing these words and also that you guys are interested in. Obviously there's no magic pill, so something which works for me doesn't have to work for you and vice versa.
Just a final thought, I really feel like I can hit big in poker (maybe just biased by results or whatever), but given my age and awareness over the pool I'm currently in, I have a vision of becoming one of the best ones in this industry!
Lets continue crushing!

before joining BrPC was to make it as a poker pro (skipped university). So if you see you're basically going All In on poker, such an opportunity like this seems to be kinda amazing.

I think Saulo should market his company around this. Not advising skipping college but just in terms of an analogy. The profits BrPC makes from the 18 month stake is like paying for your college tuition and setting up your future career.

As HeavyMask pointed out would also like to see what kind of schedule you are keeping. I assume based on the number of hands and win rate these are regular tables? Are you going to stay focused on regular tables or do you want to play more zoom? I think zoom might help you get a lot of hands in and maybe free up some time for family and other priorities. Pokerstars is four tables max? Would be great if you can avoid zoom and actually play 8-12 regular tables instead.

What is the study routine with BrPC like?
-Community study?
-Individual study?
-Here is the blue print - go study?
-Individual coaching?
What are your grinding hours?
What point in time do you think they will advise you to take shots at 100NL?

Best of luck on your Journey. Off to a great start!

Sick start mate! Glad it is going well. Always curious how the CFPs work so I hope you can answer some of RunItTw1ce questions!

17. ANSWERING YOUR QUESTIONS

Hey guys, in this post, I am only gonna focus on question posted by you guys above. So lets do it!

Tell me about your schedule, how much time do you spend on poker in general?

Tbh, I am not tracking my study time, but our requirement for reg tables is 35k hands, so it is about 110h since I am currently playing only on stars. Having 2h of coaching a week + my individual study which might be 10h a week, it might be around 160h a month. Like a full-time job with the exception that I do that whenever I want and I am really passionate about it:)
Not having any strict schedule for times I study/play, but for the most part my studies are in the morning and grinding hours are afternoon/evenings simply because games are better. However, its mainly because I am not a strict/schedule person, I really enjoy doing things, because I want, not because I have to and having set times for my activities I love to do attracts the have to paradigm...

Also, you said it's a small stable, but when you look at your site, there are many photos of the players. Maybe it's just all the players they have and had...

HeavyMask Yeah, those players are the ones who are currently in the stable. There are few exceptions of guys who didnt want to be published and the guys who joined recently (incl.myself).

I assume based on the number of hands and win rate these are regular tables?

RunItTw1ce
Well, since it was my first month, I was playing less tables to fully focus on integrating our blueprint strategy correctly. So its 18k zoom and 14k are reg tables.

Are you going to stay focused on regular tables or do you want to play more zoom?

I will probably play what my coaches says is going to be best for me since they are more experienced than I am. Both has some pros and cons.

Pokerstars is four tables max? Would be great if you can avoid zoom
and actually play 8-12 regular tables instead.

Yeah, four table max.. kind of sucks, esp. if I want potentially play some high stakes. Dont have answered this question yet, cause there are some country restrictions going on, so that I can play only at stars or gg atm. But if a situation like this occur, I think I might have enough money to decide to go to other country where I could be able to play more sites.

What is the study routine with BrPC like?
-Community study?
-Individual study?
-Here is the blue print - go study?

We have 2 coachings per week, one live session and one coaching session with like 4 more guys.
Also have channel for streaming/studying, so far I used that few times and I think its really cool, because everyone there wants to improve, get better. Only issue is that some guys are speaking only in portugese, so you know :D
Regarding the blueprint: yeah, from the beginning its more about self-study, but if guys have any questions/doubts, they can ask on our discord server. I would say like first week or so, its about getting familiar with their methodology, but after then its kinda up to you whether you want to study with someone or in your own. You can still ask questions and get responses by other players and our coaches.

-Individual coaching? What are your grinding hours?

I think 1on1 coaching is from tier Elite - 500nl+, but there is also reward called player of the month which is for every Tier and then you get free coaching 1on1 with Saulo or Zinhao.
Grinding hours as I mentioned, are mostly afternoons/evenings and Friday-Sunday. Sometimes I actually wonder whether the poker ev gained by playing those hours is worth it compared to decreasing life ev a little bit. Because no one wants to hang out on Wednesday morning or so :D However, its a bit easier to sacrifice the life ev during the corona crisis I would say.

What point in time do you think they will advise you to take shots at 100NL

:)) Few days ago, I got permission to play nl100! So yeah, really happy about it and hope its just a beginning of this journey!

Lets continue crushing guys!
Cheers

Following your Journal from the beginning. Very interesting an motivating read.
Congrets to your BrPC signing, thats huge and well deserved. I will try going for this in
the future as well.
See you at the 100z tables, I´m sure you´re going to crush!
Cheers

Hey crushers!

Just a quick info before the month summary:

I am really happy and grateful at the same time to be in the Tier 2! Its really cool feeling after only 2 months in the team to move up to the next tier :))

I also started to play at nl100 as I mentioned (never playing those stakes online before), so you can imagine a bit of a stress.. however, I am running really hot and its for sure going to be the best month in my life in terms of winnings.

In addition, I feel really great overall, already did one study ssn with my new team mates and it went really nice as well!

However, besides poker I am spending some time on volunteering stuff, so combined with poker and all my other habits sometimes it can get really tough. Anyway, I am really motivated to study, to play basically to live!

So lets continue crushing!

MONTHLY UPDATE

Hey guys, another great month in BrPC is over!
I have to say that this month in terms of results was so far the best in my life!

I was feeling great overall, really motivated to study, to grind and to talk to other guys in the team! I started to play mostly evenings from 7pm till midnight (gonna reflect the grinding time at late hours, bc tables are good, but its not that healthy at the same time..)

Brief summary for this month:

• First time in my life I took a shot at nl100 online!

• I was moved up to Tier 2!

• I started to see a tangible improvement in my game and its really amazing feeling!

• I wasnt studying as much, so gonna dive deeper into certain spots this month as well as do some study ssn with my team mates:)

• feel so excited in the moment due to the results.. still remembering myself that I am only 20yrs old and this just a beginning of this big journey of becoming one of the best poker player in the world!!

Nice results, Matostar! Could you please roughly explain how staking works? Is it like u are gonna play on their accounts or they will send you 10-20BI upfront? How often do u split profit(based on actual profit or EV)?

TWITCH STREAMING

Hey guys,

Maybe some of you have noticed, but for the ones that did not, BrPC has started doing twitch streams every Monday (at 9pm). First one was with Saulo and Zinhao reviewing their hands from 25/50, then 500z and 200z live play with other coaches. Its kinda cool since its like a free coaching..
However, for the next Monday, Zinhao is going to talk with BrPC members that moved up this month (incl.myself:)). Soo its going to be a big opportunity where you can directly ask those BrPC members or even Zinhao anything you want! It will be 12/04 (Mon) starting at 9pm CET!

Happy to see you there:)

https://www.twitch.tv/brpokercrew

Btw I am gonna answer your question soon:)

Before and after joining BrPC what do you think the biggest change in your game has been? Do you have any stats you can share for before / after for comparison?
RunItTw1ce

Well, the biggest change is that before I joined BrPC I was just playing a guessing game, didnt really understand from which part of the game tree I am generating ev. Now, I clearly see that those are the hotspots where my ev is coming from.. and in some tough spots I just know that even if I dont know whats the best decision, I dont care, because the ev difference is so tiny.. So I would say that, I am focusing on things which matters.. like the Paret principle...
I was also so pussy and had many misconceptions that the pool is operating in some way.. just based on nothing.. literally, I was playing exploitative poker before seeing the data.

I'm also curious on some of the details. Not sure how flexible the contracts are, if only cashing out after 18 months? If each it's total profit 50/50 after 18 months? Or as you move up or BR gets big if you are allowed to cash out certain amount every couple months. I know Saulo said he is not going to let his students suffer from not being able to pay bills, so I assume it's some what flexible and based on communication rather than a concrete contract. Also curious what happens if you lack volume for the month, if you are signed for playing 35k hands+ a month, what happens when you only achieve 20k hands? Do you need to make up the 15k hands in the future?

Well, its way more flexible.. you have the option to cash out every single month the part of your split, in addition you can ask for some advance money in case you have got some unexpected advances.. which is kinda cool, I mean it actually makes sense from their perspective to be quite open and willing to help even more.. to show that, they arent here only for making money.
Well you can take some days off if you arent able to reach the minimum threshold..
simingforever
You are asked to withdraw all the money you have before you start playing and then they will deposit your account with their money. Basically you are not going to play with our money at any time, only with theirs.

And guys, hope to see at least some of you today!!:))

Hey Martin! Nice thread! You look a really dedicated and consistent guy!
Keep the good work!

GL to us on BRPC :D

Moving to NL200!

Hey guys!

Few days ago I got a permission to play NL200! I feel really good about it, realizing that 2 months ago I was playing NL50 and less than year ago I was playing basically microstakes!

Unfortunately, I started to feel that at NL200 on stars, its getting more reg-heavy and I will be probably forced to adjust my grinding hours a bit..

Anyway, it has nothing to do with my work ethic, I am ready to work even harder, focusing on spots where most of my ev is generating and go from there!

Monthly graph is coming soon!
Cheers guys:)

Hey guys

I think this is super important and I am really gonna try to pay more attention to that.

I am talking about changing my mindset from winning money to getting better at poker (setting a goal, defining steps needed for achieving that goal and then at the end look back and analyze what worked and what did not)
Because I have to admit that recently, I started to put more pressure on myself esp. at times where results werent satisfiable. So from there, I realized that this isnt a healthy perspective, therefore I would really like to try to shift that mindset towards learning.
Every study hour or session played is mainly for the sake of getting better. It doesnt matter how much I won/lost. The key question to ask myself is: "what I have learned?"
Starting to integrate this perspective, knowing its going to take some time, but the upside is almost infinite imo.

Will make a quick reflection of that at the end of the month along with the month summary!

Cheers guys:)

Get inspired also by Daniel N. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXGUL4zWrk4&t=903s
5:00-9:00 he is talking about very similar stuff.

Hey friends!:)

This month was again pretty exceptional for me, mainly because I started playing nl200 - stakes I never played before online! I am super excited about it, since I am only 20yrs old and like a year ago, I was basically playing microstakes!

In terms of my performance, this month wasnt as good as it could be esp. at the end of the month when I was kinda chasing hours - hopefully following month I will be able to play on 2 sites (at least).
My study was a bit messy, it wasnt that structured, so for the next month I will try to focus on SBvBTN 3BP PFR OOP, specifically improving my play with value hands. Another aspect which I would like to focus is to improve my theory fundamentals - just putting my hands into gto wizard and go through the biggest ev losses. Lastly, I would like to more focus on "how much ev my hand has"? Basically trying to integrate this into my thinking process, because I think I was neglecting this important part of the game tree..
I was also a bit neglecting some tier studies, so for the next month I would like to do some sweat ssn with my tier mates.

Results wise its been pretty swingy, but I really dont want to pay too much attention to current results. More important is for me to improve my game in mentioned areas and become a better player.

Last but not least, I would like to reschedule my schedule, and start playing mornings 6am-11am CET which means that I will go to sleep at like 9pm and wake up at 5-5:30am. Its going to be pretty challenging, but see a lot of benefit in there so why not to try. After one week, I will look back and see how it goes.

This month

Overall

Making mistakes while studying

this is something I honestly was pretty avoiding.. usually when I was drilling certain spot and made a blunder, I wanted to skip it and go to the next one asap to prove myself that I can still get it right -- to feel the feeling of satisfaction. I mean, I am not saying I always did it like this, but it used to suck a lot to slow down and explore what leaded me to such a mistake or if there is any correction needed in my thinking process.
However, you can see how unhealthy and destructive that mindset is.
Therefore I will really try to pay attention to the mindset I am currently in. The reason is pretty simple (I guess I mentioned it in some previous posts as well), if I can get conscious about my current mindset, its almost impossible to still stay in the wrong mindset.
Ideally, I would like to achieve a state of mind when I am basically hungry for mistakes. Thanks to mistakes, I am able to get better (if I spot and learn from them), so there is no benefit for me in perceiving it as some sort of weakness. Its just because I want to get an immediate reward, however, I need to remind myself that my identity and satisfaction isnt dependent on immediate rewards or anything like this.

So yeah, this is something I definitely need to work on a bit more especially if I plan to succeed in poker.

I will appreciate any thoughts/advice:)

Cheers

Hi,

I am not sure if this applies here, but a way to prevent from going over the things that you "can/do know" and work instead on the things that you have difficulties with is by using the spaced repetition approach. You can use a software like Anki for example and create flashcards. It is free on your PC and free if you have an android phone.
"Spaced repetition is an evidence-based learning technique that is usually performed with flashcards. Newly introduced and more difficult flashcards are shown more frequently, while older and less difficult flashcards are shown less frequently in order to exploit the psychological spacing effect. The use of spaced repetition has been proven to increase rate of learning" from Wikipedia.
I used this system for my hunting license and my university degree. It is very helpful in my mind if you don't overload the cards. You can find plenty of instructions on youtube on how to setup ankicards. In general I think it is a great tool to memorize stuff --> preflop ranges, flop x leads to action y. Try to keep it simple. For example: I am memorizing 3bet ranges from different positions right now and I can see that I stumble over the same cards on a daily basis. These cards have too much information (full range from a certain position). For me it is much easier to memorize something like: Which Pocket Pairs do you 3bet 100% from the BTN vs EP for example. This will extend your deck, but going through 50-100 cards a day doesn't take very long. The act of creating might take longer though :)
Since I have no subscription to stuff like GTOwizard or LucidGTO I always wonder if they have this system integrated in their trainers. It is not very effective if you constantly repeat the stuff you know. It will make you go superficially through your deck.
When I practice, I also dislike just saying the answer, but instead prefer to write it down. We are all different but learning only visually is not effective for me.

And if you want to learn a language, there are hundreds of decks available on Anki. So, I think it's great :)
Also, read this, it's a summary of a book that has been recommended here. Peak.
https://www.samuelthomasdavies.com/book-summaries/psychology/peak/

Hope this helps.

Updates ?

Update? Interested to hear how its going? What are you doing to learn the content quickly,? How have you found the strategies etc?

BIG UPDATE

Yo yo, what's up RIO!

It's been almost 5 months since I posted here. However, I'm back with the update on how my journey in BrPC goes. 

I really feel that I'm much better player than I was before joining the stable. I understand way way more exploitative stuff backed up with a lot of theory knowledge. I also have realized that there are so many spots I have almost no clue about and thats fine as long as I keep constantly working on it. Overall, it's a great feeling when you can clearly see your improvements over period of time. In my case, it's also supported by results which is even better.
Last time, I was writing about taking shots and establishing at nl200, today I can happily share with you my graph from those stakes, but more importantly --- I'm already taking shots at nl500!*

I really like to remind myself that I was just a year ago not beating even nl50. Compared to now, when I'm basically playing against guys like Teunuss (Rio elite coach). So yeah, it's like living my dream and I really hope it's just a beginning of my career. I'll try to do everything what is in my capabilities to crush even nl500 and then jump into the highstakes action.I know I need to study really hard to compete at this high level, however, I'm more motivated than ever before. Let's keep crushing!

NL200

NL500 so far

Overall

That's amazing bro congratulations and gl at 500

My hands vs some GOATs: TUTI88, TheWakko, oSpiel888..

Whats up guys, I am sure you have heard of those guys already.. I mean its pretty cool feeling to play vs those guys.. few months ago I had in mind a paradigm that was basically saying: "guys like this are playing a stakes where they just play super gto or at least at those stakes you have to know a lot of theory so that I need to study hard for a long time to get there and its not achievable yet."
Well, apparently its possible and it doesnt need to take damn long time :D they are all human beings, making mistakes, learning, exploring new stuff etc.

Mistake by TheWakko? - his hand is almost a pure check OTT and solver likes to use overbet only. But if you bet the turn, you have to fire the river.

GTO Play by TUTI! - he knows HU... turn x-raise with 54o is only a thing if you hold a diamond.. for sure Tuti knows that. I should bluff the river mostly, thought that I have more showdown value and underestimated the fact that those xraises with low pairs are also a thing.

oSpiel888 is bluffing me?! - Do not make these calls unless you are playing 500z :D Just joking, you should fold anyway, because its just a -EV call xD On this board, I can get away with calling only Kx and folding the rest. But I really wanted to call:))

Those were probably the biggest names I have played against some hands. But also played few hands against guys like: Dejanlc357, MunEZ_StaRR, Jugi#6, zazano... and yeah its a good feeling to have also guys like this at the table, because not only that I can learn from them, but also I can clearly see that they are not gto machines.. and are making mistakes too:)

Next post where I will review this month incl. my results at nl500 coming soon! I hope in the following days.

Thanks for reading:)

OCTOBER REVIEW

So first of all, I have 2 exciting news:
1. I received an award - Player of the Month!
2. I got moved up to Tier Elite!

I am really glad and grateful for it. In tier elite, we are getting lessons from the founders- Already did have few with both of them Saulo and Zinhao and it has been really valuable.

This month as a whole was pretty unique to me, as I was playing mostly the stake I have never been playing before (NL500).
Regarding my game, I would say I mostly play pretty solid game. There were few times where I think I played more tables than I should.. even if the tables were relatively good, I was losing a lot concentration that results in not playing a-game. I imagine playing 1-2 more reg tables than I typically do just because tables are good is okay. However, I need to set this threshold in advance. For the next month, I would like to play max 6 reg tables or 4r + 1z or 2r + 2z.

I also set to myself a new goal - get to highstakes (nl1k) - that means for me couple of things:

• put a decent sample at nl500 (and try to avoid playing nl200z)
• get better at technical part - study consistently
• be mentally/physically prepared - meditation 2times a day, cold shower every morning, lot of sports, healthy eating, reading books, enough socialization with my friends

Last but not least, I observed that sometimes during a session I am focused too much on the outcome/profit instead of the game and my thought process. This is one of the key factors that will determinate my long term journey - my attitude towards poker while I play. As a poker player, I will spend most of my hours just playing. So its almost crucial to focus on the right things while I am playing.
So since part of my life vision is to getting better at whatever I do, poker is no exception. I just love the game with all the aspects. Trying to come up with the highest ev play in every hand is just so exciting as well as experimenting with new ideas and getting real time feedback on it. I can not imagine any other work that would offer me anything similar than this.

That said, I am super grateful for being a poker player and therefore from the next month, I will really try to in every single session focus exclusively on my game - just thinking through every decision and trying to come up with the best possible play. Outcomes are not under my control, so I do not care as long as I focus on playing my best. I also do not care about money for now. Because even if I win/ lose few k$, I will not be a different person.. It will not affect my core values and who am I.. so why should I care then?:)

October results

NL500+

Since joining BrPC - Feb2021

Congratulations! I respect your attitude toward poker so much.

Recently I switched playing zoom to mainly reg tables. And I am bit struggling with session schedule/taking breaks at reg tables. Sit out at reg tables for a break made me think as if I burned money lol.
So could you tell me your session/break schedule if you have a specific one? :)

Is joining BrPC worth it?

What's up guys, in this post I'll briefly discuss my whether joining BrPC is worth it or not

As most of you guys might know, I've joined this stable and I've been there for 9 months which is exactly half of the contract.
From what I can say so far, it's been the best decision I could have made. I mean, I obviously don't know how would my journey look like if I wouldn't have joined this stable.. but one thing I know for sure - since I joined this stable I've started to moving up through stakes as fast as I never did before. You can just see that from my graphs. (I'm trying to be totally transparent)

There's nothing to hide here. Yeah, they are keeping ~50% of my profits, but without this investment I wouldn't be playing nl500 right now = I'd earn even less even if I would have kept 100% of my profits (that's my assumption based on my results before joining BrPC)

Also in general, I really like the concept of investing to myself. In poker it's joining a stable or hiring a Coach or buying some videos/softwares.
In other parts, it can be physical health - exercising, healthy eating etc; mental health - regular mediation, walks, good sleep etc.
That's what I'm doing right now, consciously trying to get better, become stronger, more confident.. at whatever I do.

Before I joined the BrPC I had many thoughts in my head thinking about how much money I could be possibly losing if I give someone 50% of my profit . It still sometimes occurs to me - that I think from a very biased perspective - how much money I'll lose at a given moment. But that's only a small part of the equation. I'm totally forgetting about the long term perspective of an investment. However, the need of achieving everything right now is so strong that it many times lead to a -EV decision. Mainly because our ego is really hungry for an immediate reward/satisfaction. That's why it sucks so much when we are on a downswing.. (but that's another topic)

Anyway, I promised to keep this short, so I will stop it here. There's a lot more to write actually - if you are interested in knowing more about some pros/cons on BrPC either ask it here or send me a private message and I'll be glad to answer any questions:)

If you are about to apply to BrPC, it would be great if you could mention my nick (MatoStar) in the reference section, thank you:))

Beast! Setting yourself up to join Tirelli and Tomanari with this insane rise from 50nl to 1knl in less than 12 months \o/ Rooting for your continued development mate, and looking forward to meeting you in person next week. LFG!!

"How do I play AK vs a cold 4bet in a given formation?" and I dont know if I should call, fold, or 5bet shove then I won't end up playing that day until I figure out the answer. Wanting to play "perfect" and not make mistakes has greatly hurt my volume this year.

I think this is one of the biggest mental game leaks I see in low stakes players these days. Poker is a (hyper complex) game of frequencies and often times in these spots where there is a lot of doubt it's because either option makes sense and is used at some frequency in equilibrium. The guys that are able to surrender to the fact that they are going to make mistakes on one side of the equation and at the same time do consistent, deliberate work to limit the amount of mistakes made to a minimum will rise to the top.

MatoStar is this you at 18min mark in Gary's training video?

Hey guys,

Gonna be doing my first stream on 200z pokerstars in less than an hour on BrPC twitch!!

https://www.twitch.tv/brpokercrew

See ya there:)

Whats up guys,

Before one huge update, I am gonna do another twitch stream!!

Starting today at 8pm CET :)

See you here: https://www.twitch.tv/brpokercrew

HUGE UPDATE#1

Whats up guys! Its been almost 5 months since I made my last update about my journey and I have to say that a lot of big things changed over time.

First, the most important one is that I decided to move from Slovakia to Brazil for 4 months! At the end of November of last year, I went to Brazil for the BSOP series + to meet my friends from BrPC and well, I also managed to find a girlfriend :D Thats basically the main reason why I am there rn:)
It is actually something very big as I never was out of my country for such a long time. Also there are lot of challenging things connected to living alone such as managing your day, building your habits/routine etc. Basically I have got 24 hours a day and need to decide what to do in every hour.

In terms of stakes playing, unfortunately, I have not managed to put a decent sample size at 500 as at the end of last year I was travelling to Brazil and back, then having Christmas holidays + spending some time with my family and in January I was trying spend some time with my friends and already dealing with stuff connected to my trip to Brazil (I went there at the beginning of February).
That said, when I was playing it was mostly the stake I am the most comfortable with - 200z but still I have to say that I am very glad to have such an impressive results there.

These days, I am actually quite established here in Brazil, trying to balance poker life, my own self-development + spending some time on calls with my family and friends as well as being here in Brazil with my gf. Definitely not easy, but I am learning a lot on this journey. Since I already built up pretty good routine, I am trying to play exclusively NL500. My goal is to put there around 100-200k hands with having at least 3bb/100 and from there consider taking a shots at 1k (also depends how much trust Saulo and Zinhao are going to have in me)

I also started to stream on BrPC twitch! So far had 2 streams, and one more is coming next month. I was really enjoying sharing my knowledge to people. (Might consider doing some coachings as well in the near future).

I am gonna keep this update very brief, but you can definitely expect a follow up in the next days/weeks!

Results:

Since joining BrPC Feb2020

NL500,NL600

BIG NEWS

Whats up guys I just want to share with you 2 amazing news!

• In BrPC, I was moved up to Tier Deluxe!

• I started taking shots at 1k!

Gonna post some graphs with my overall thoughts soon:)

Inspired by Demondoink decided to create an IG account just for poker!

I think this way I can get closer to more of you guys and share more of my journey.

I swear, this is just a beginning guys, playing 1k and being 21yrs old, does not feel that bad haha.
Lets see how far we can make it!

Drop me a follow, if you want to be part of this journey;)
Instagram

This was a great read. Your growth mindset and process-oriented approach is super inspiring, and something to strive toward. Flawless results(!), I'm curious how you're studying?

Followed on Insta. Best of luck at 1k!

Insane to see your journey here Mato, it's really a guide on how to succeed in poker by making the right choices to give yourself the best chances of succeeding. Update more please =D

hey :) Any update?

Heyyyy, I am back with a huge update!!!

My journey in BrPC has come to an end

I already decided on where my next steps will go;)
Gonna post an update very soon!

What's up guys

So my BrPC contract has come to an end!

I have so many feelings and thoughts going through my head right now.

I'd like to start with looking back on the situation before I joined BrPC - 18 months ago:
I made a big decision to skip university while most of my school mates went to a one. I decided to take a different approach and try to play one year full-time poker. It was a pretty big risk, but I was having a lot of mental support from my family and friends. At that time I was moving up to nl25, barely making few hundreds euros per month. Few months after I started taking shots at nl50. Shortly after I applied to BrPC and got accepted!

Now, I'd like to happily share where I am after 18 months playing for BrPC.

• Moved up from Tier 3 to Tier Deluxe
• Moved up from NL50 to NL1k
• got way better at understanding theory (never used a solver before I joined)
• got super stable blueprint of how to maximally exploit recreational players
• I can quite easily make a living by playing poker

On top of that I travelled to Brazil where I found my girlfriend. These days I'm spending in Brazil around 40% of my time and the rest in Slovakia. All these trips I'm paying by myself. Since I used to live with my parents, it's been also a huge jump to start live and travel independently.

I have to say that all of that wouldn't be possible without being a part of BrPC!!! I am super grateful for being a part of this well prospering team and would definitely recommend to anyone at lower stakes who wants to speed up his poker career and move up in stakes more quick.
This way I would also like to say big thank you to the 2 guys that started almost from scratch 3 years ago and has built something huge that is allowing players struggling at lower stakes make a huge shortcut to mid to highstakes. Thank you so much for doing this hard work sauloCosta10 & zinhao for a little over 3 years from now and for the opportunity to boost my poker career in a way I would not even think of before joining!

What's next?

One story ends, another one starts: By this day I'm leaving BrPC and becoming a player of NachosPoker!!!
It was very far from being an easy decision, but basically I got a very lucrative offer from Patrick Freenachos founder of NachosPoker,
Hungry to get back to tables after a 1 month break. I'm very excited to start annoying regs at 1k again and hopefully pretty soon move up even higher:)

Graph:

18 months in BrPC

MatoStar i respect the honesty in that answer. i think one of the main issues of getting staked is that you are unable to build up your own roll as you have to give away x% of your winnings. you might have the skill to beat 1k or whatever, but if you don't have the roll to support playing these stakes then it's a bit of an issue.

now obviously you have to work out if potentially improving at a much faster rate, but giving away x% of your winning's is better than playing on your own roll, but perhaps improving more slowly. i am not sure what is better, but as someone who has never been staked i would usually recommend that people try to play by themselves first. then if they reach a plateau and can't seem to get any better or move up, then perhaps it's a good time to go for staking.

people should remember though that sometimes your ego will want you to get staked so you can play higher stakes. lets say someone wants to play 200nl and is currently playing 100nl, if you have to give away 50% of your winnings then it's literally no better to play higher stakes. you would be much better just hiring a decent coach and studying a bunch either by yourself, or with some friends.

ultimately how you perform, and what you achieve in poker is down to you and you only. two people can have the exact same coach(es) and have completely different results. no coach, piece of software etc is going to get you results. they can help you along in your journey, but unless the player is willing to put in the time, effort etc then the results will always be disappointing.

Demondoink, everytime lol

There is no "give away" in coaching or staking. This ain't charity. Players pay for a service. Such service may be good or bad depending on the company. But its always a comercial transaction where the goal is for both parties to benefit.

Perhaps you don't do it intentionally, but I've seen that phrase repeated many times over the years, not only from you but others as well. And words have meaning. When you phrase it like that you expose your prejudice and bias, as if the player is making a financial move to his detriment.

That isn't at all the case. Paying for a staking deal doesn't make you win less than what you would on your own; it makes you win more, out of your share alone. The whole "cant build your roll on staking" is nonsense. You make more money on staking than without it, so if anything playing on your makes you build your roll slower.

To prove that I know what Im talking about, Im willing to make the following offer to any low to midstakes player reading this thread:

Sign a contract with my company and, if you don't make more money than you would on your own out of your share, we will pay you back our profits until your EV is met.

Example: You are 100nl grinder that makes 30 thousand dollars a year. If you can prove to us that this is your true average EV right now, and if you are successfuly approved in your selection process, then if you end up getting 25k/year on your contract (for example you made 50k on a 50/50 split), we will pay you back 5k.

In other words, its impossible for you to make less money than what you would on your own.

Some people may say "hmm but I what I made recently isnt a perfect indicative of what I would make in the near future on my own. I could improve and move up". Thats not at all a guarantee. People can make less than what they made recently, they may have troubles moving up, all sorts of things can happen. That said, if you are capable of convincing me you would multiply your EV by some factor in the next 18 months (average contract length with my company), I will be pleased to guarantee that multiplier for you as well.

Staking - with the right people - is the best alternative for anyone that is not playing 1k+. Financially and everything else. Its just not even close and I can prove it, its not my personal opinion.

Of course, maybe making more money and improving your knowledge at a much faster rate, connecting with people to leverage motivation and networking, having financial stability in the sense that you can withdraw your roll and use it for something else, having access to psychologists and other forms of support, is still not enough to justify a commitment to some people. Some people just want to be by themselves, not have the obligation to report results, attend to coachings, and other stuff that is required to sign a deal like that. Nothing wrong with that choice.

But it isnt and wont ever be about money

I wouldn't want a coach to be so emotional and argumentative about every little detail of random examples being given.

Also out of the 200 players you signed, 20 of them as you said 10%, would prefer private coaching is still a pretty high amount of people. Then there are other players switching stables from yours to Nachos. What does that mean?

Lastly going from $30k or $90k that you guys are using as an example is also influenced by part of the contract. A lot of players not under contract are going to struggle with volume. I am not seeing players actually 3x their WR in BB/100 on any of these stables, but rather 3x their income based on grinding 30-40 hours a week instead of 10-20 hours a week.

Lastly I think wizard is still a fairly new product to people. I think coaching or stables in general are going to struggle going forward when someone can pay a small portion of that for wizard to train and get better.

If someone has a bankroll to play under and doesn't need the staking, but only needs coaching. Does the amount of education from the stable actually provide $30k+ worth of knowledge? Maybe more students can come forward and share their experience with the company and put this debate to bed.

I would want to see what level the student was on when they joined? What was their BB/100. What level the student is on when they leave the company and what is their BB/100. What was their annual income before and after. Just provide the data and there wouldn't be any arguments. From an outside perspective people are only seeing graphs and results from 5 students or so out of 200.

emsterdad

Once again the troll talks and contributes nothing. Maybe you can join BrPC and then we might be able to have an intelligent conversation. I'm not going to have another back and forth with a 4NL player though.

A 100nl reg that makes 30k a year (45k in 18 months) can chose to join my company. In 18 months he is likely to make at least 135k. He walks out with 67.5k, liquid.

Receipts please! sauloCosta10

Don't get me wrong either. I think staking companies are good for those who haven't been able to be resourceful or have a break through themselves.

sadly emsterdad you have all the time in the world to write on this forum, since you have stagnated at 25nl for last 12 yrs. You wont be making any money anytime soon.
On to the topic, I do think runittwice is making some valid points on the cost of the coaching and whether or not its worth it. Another point that I dont understand about CFP's unless the coaches are en route to retiring, is why would they sacrifice the EV and time to coach others when they can move up and grind the highest stakes for way higher profit? We've never seen Kanu make any courses during his prime, but only released his content at the tail end of his career, just to milk a few bucks more. Furthermore, I am convinced that in order to remain competent at the highest level, full dedication is required for players( which is essentially the coaches of CFP). Demondoink for one is perfect example of someone who ive followed throughout the years that was a lone wolf and climbs the stakes slowly, and was a testamant that it can be done by oneself. Obviously, Im not here to bash or make any claims of CFP being bad, but just giving my .02 that theres multiple ways to skin a cat.

Demondoink I would honestly be surprised if the avg student is clearing $60k. A lot of the graphs are only around $5k profit and some are actually losing graphs. I could definitely see the stables still making some where around a million on a year though, so I agree the business side is going to make more. Just wanted to put the student WR in perspective. That is why I brought up Matostar as being one of their best students and making around $80k. From my past convos with Saulo a lot of students are only playing 50NL or 100NL, so they won't get very close to $60k. That is why I asked Saulo for Receipts when he said a player making $30k a year can make $135k a year or something. I have only seen 1-2 students from Nacho's stable do anything similar to that.

Wow, interesting reading guys.
In the meantime I missed 2 flights from Brazil btw :D but fortunately right now I'm already in Slovakia:)

Few things I feel like should be mentioned:

1. I think that players that never experienced being in a stable, can't precisely evaluate the real value of it.
   Here you were talking about coaching and staking a lot. But for me honestly, one of the biggest things was to see MDA - this one is obviously super hardly measurable, but I'll try to explain a bit:
   Imagine a player like me just taking shots at nl50 and being sort of new in poker that wants to become a pro. At this level I imagine you will have roll to play 100nl at best in most cases. Before I joined a stable, I was putting a lot of energy on:
2. looking for good poker communities, creating a lot of discord groups for strategies and stuff
3. finding the best videos to watch/ coach that resonate with me
4. being really unsure in a lot of game tree nodes
5. how to manage my roll- divide between investing into coaching/solver/my poker and life roll

Now, I joined a stable and I got all those "issues" solved for me. I was able to spend all the saved energy on something else. Especially the one with blueprint and seeing MDA. It simplifies 95% of my game tree I'd say. I stopped doubting about every spot and it brings way more mental peace to face a river bet and knowing what to do with my bluffcatchers.
In my opinion, seeing the data, knowing how people play and understand the why behind that is just something one can't put value. Another thing that I see super important is the maximum exploits against recreational players. We make out of them the most money and once you know how to maximally exploit them, you are essentially gonna make more money.

Another thing with hiring a private coach:
- you need to spend energy to find a one
- he might not be the best suit so after some time, you might be forced to change him (ofc that might happen in a stable too where you can't go anywhere, but you've got plenty of other materials as well, included 100+ of recorded classes).

There was something mentioned about BrPC not posting 600k hand graphs. As far as I saw, they post every single month on Instagram a graph from all the players showing the net profit. Something about exaggerating: well, every CFP is more incentivized to share results of the best performing players rather than worse. So I think it wouldn't be transparent if those companies only share that. However, once they start to share results of all players combined, I'd say then it becomes very reliable.

About my case: Honestly I made 80k pre-rakeback, I haven't calculated how much it was after though.

I think the topic discussed might not have a simple answer, however, I think there are arguments that might be a bit too biased on both sides.
In my case, I was new at NL50 and in 18 months:

• I moved up to 1k
• I made trips to Brazil and become living independently (I'd never made trip to Brazil without them having a team meeting)
• yes, I found a girlfriend there so I'm a bit biased here haha
• I found here great friends and made a very nice connections in a poker community
• I was exposed to all the MDA stuff
• I was being guided - I wasn't spending times on topics that were too complex or not as important based on coaches opinion
• it was harder to fall into super anxiety from loneliness and just grinding all day long, without any socialization
• I got an opportunity to be on twitch streams and popularize myself for potentially doing some private coachings
• I started to play more hands ( before contract I played like 15k a month or even less)
• I learned how to study with solvers

Also when people are playing with their life roll, they can't take shots as aggressively which essentially means moving up in stakes a bit slowly.

Another thing that I haven't seen mentioned: almost all CFPs afaik offer also deals without staking. In this case, you can get even more profit once you have the roll.

Also it's way different on what stakes are you playing. If you are already established reg at 1k+, you might expect a contract close to 75 or even 80%. Honestly, I might be more inclined on playing on your own in this case if you have the roll (but then you can get maybe even 85/15 and more classes as you will be one of the best in the stable).
However, the thing is when you are a player that is at NL25-NL50. You haven't turned pro yet, but you aren't that far. In my opinion joining a CFP is gonna make you turn a pro and make your dream come true more often than hiring a private coach (from this post it should be almost clear why)

Anyway guys I'm not anymore part of BrPC and so I'm having close to 0 incentive to promote them in any way. I'm just trying to write down my opinion.
To be honest though, I feel like people who have a very strong opinion to prefer private classes over CFP would be probably just better off sticking to that.

Btw I wasn't mentioning PokerDetox as an initial question from RunitTwice was to compare Biitb, Nachos and BrPC. Although I have some opinion about Detox too:))

HodorIsKing I agree with a lot of Nick Howard's teachings and use them often when I am grinding. I don't have any personal experience with BitB, but everything I hear about it has been great. I am not sure how I would rank the CFP's but BitB seems to be the #1 CFP from everything I have heard. I don't think they do staking and they recruit like 200NL+ winning players. If you make it to 200NL+ or have access to some American sites higher chance of getting into the stable. Maybe someone with BItB experience like Psek can chime in as I believe he is still one of BitB coaches?

HodorIsKing im in Nachos and can say its pretty impressive how much goes into improving players. But we don't just have lines for exploiting fish, we jave lines that exploit mistakes regs are making as well as guidance on how to apply a more solid gto strategy as well.
From a coaching vs cfp point of view (obviously im a bit biased) i like that there is clear guidelines to follow etc that ive never really been given from coaching. The amount of time patrick and other coaches have spent in the lab to create this content is ridiculous and iwpuld never be able to commit this much time to my own study whilst getting in any volume. Whereas now i have a better idea of where the pool is reasonably balanced and therefore what areas to focus my study on.

Genuine question :
By how much do you think a serious, dedicated player at NL50 / NL100 (winning let's say 5bb/100) could improve his winrate by :
- studying by himself 50 hours of high quality content videos
- studying the same 50 hours with a good coach (maybe 25 hours coaching and 25 hours personal follow up study) ?

Looking for a very rough guestimate :-)

Do you still schedule study time or hands review time when you already are beating pretty high stakes and your main problem is the bankroll?

Hey, Mato. I am currently in a somewhat similar situation to where you were before you joined a CFP. I am stagnating at 50NL over a big sample (currently 200k hands). I believe that 50NL is the stake where the competition intensifies. I do not see regulars making big postflop mistakes that were prevalent at 10NL-25NL. It seems, to me at least, that it is difficult to move up without having access to MDA blueprints which are used by CFPs. I do not know which spots are underbluffed, overbluffed or overfolded by the population I'm playing against, and I believe that joining a CFP would help me understand those spots which are currently costing me the most EV. A solver also won't tell me about which spots are underbluffed, overbluffed etc by the pool, which makes CFP blueprints even more attractive to me. I am not saying it's impossible to move up the stakes without using an MDA blueprint, but it seems to me at least that it's significantly more difficult without it.

As far as I can see, MDA is rarely discussed or utilised in videos on RIO. I suspect this is because the information is simply so valuable that pros who have access it would prefer to keep the information a secret, only to be revealed to their private students or students in their CFPs. Would you say that the coaching you received in BrPC helped you significantly more than any of the video content you watched on RIO? Without wanting to put words into your mouth, I get the impression that most people who have transitioned from training sites such as RIO into CFP stables such as BrPC, would say that the coaching and material they have access to in their CFP is infinitely more helpful compared to content on traditional training sites such as RIO. I am sorry if that ruffles the feathers of anyone on RIO, but that is my impression. Most people who join CFPs, as you did, don't seem to regret their decision at all. Many of them consider it to be the best decision they have made in their poker careers.

Hey Guys,

Coming here with some quick updates after long time:)

2022 in a nutshell

POKERWISE:

• I was starting to play 500 and later on also 1k
• I moved from BrPC to Nachos
• I did some twitch streams for BrPC
• I played very little hands since I left BrPC

LIFEWISE:

• I spent around 6 months in Brazil (3 trips throughout the year)
• I travelled a lot (Morocco, Mallorca, London, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Malta)
• I was at the very beginning of the relationship with my Brazillian girlfriend

I got this interesting question from a Nachos player:

What leaks did you find out you had and improved in the previous year?
How do you plan to improve further?

Here is my answer:

Leaks that I found and improved/still working on:

1. I started to work with Jared Tandler -
he helped to realize that I'm scared of making mistakes.. due to several stuff from the
childhood. He basically helped me to connects these two and help me to see how they translate into poker too.
I was seeing a big part in poker to get financially independent and prove (mostly to my dad) that I'm being successful - as through childhood I felt like having enough money means a good life, this I got from my dad.
Hence, I'm also struggling with being too detached by opinion by others about me, getting this affirmation by having enough money became such a huge desire. Suddenly I started to see life and people through how much they earn and subconsciously judging them.
This came to an end once I realize how much I value myself in the first place. I'm already complete. I don't need to be the best person in whatever area, or get affirmation about anything from others.
There's another aspect of it which is the closest people around me, would never judge me based on how much money I make, or how famous am I. They're around me because of the person that I am, it doesn't matter if I play NL2 or NL40k. I realize my dad isn't probably the same. I didn't choose my parents and if he sees me through success/money, the one suffering the most is him at the end. It doesn't make sense for me to take that personally and suffer from that, because it's not part of my values, it has nothing to do with who I am.
I mentioned this as first since it was the biggest relief for me- having this freedom behind playing, not being afraid of mistakes.. being the same person, holding the same values before and after the session. It simply has been having the biggest impact on my well-being (and most likely on my future EV too).

2. Realizing that I'm already at a very high level

This one sounds a bit silly, but honestly guys in 2021 I was playing NL25, 50. (My sample together there was probably less than 100k hands). In one 18 months contract for BrPC, I was suddenly playing with guys like demondoink, TUTI88, mynameiscarl, TheWakko... playing the 500z and being one of the better players there.
At the beginning of 2021 I was seeing 500z as top regs battling there (and would never imagine myself getting there that soon).

I started to get a feeling whenever I made a bigger mistake that those 500, 1k stars regs has been around for so long and I'm just a GTO noob that is punting at the table (this has been my TP behind it).

However, after I got a few DB reviews by Saulo and Zinhao and doing a live session as well resulting in them saying my level is at a very high level, leaking in a very few areas that aren't that significant. This literally started to give me the feeling that there are probably no huge holes in my game (which was the opposite of what I was thinking about).
Doing couple of twitch streams, getting a positive feedback from guys and most recently joining Nachos and getting a very good feedback on my game from Patrick as well.

Basically what it does is that it brings me way more confidence to the tables, way less unhealthy doubts to my creative moves or big loses. It also gives me a stronger resilience to downswings as I simply trust myself more.

In my case, however, I joined another CFP solely because of the staking. I simply do not have roll to play 1k by my own.

I think this makes sense assuming you have a bigger percentage of your profits coming in as a winning player. Other wise I would just ask why not have a 100% of your self at 1-2 levels lower where you are rolled.

why players who join the stable at NL25,NL50 having almost the same poker knowledge can vary so much. In 2-3 years one battling at 2k,5k+ and the other one struggling at NL200? Assuming both profiles invest similar amount of time.
zinhao sauloCosta10 Freenachos what differentiate those guys? I assume you all were in the group of moving to highstakes super quickly and you also see a lot of guys that can but also can not make it.

I would chime in here as a player "who has not made it." And the most important thing is consistency. Consistency with efficient studying. Consistency with putting in the hours every day. Then of course having a strong support group of winning players who understand the game tree that you can bounce ideas off of and study with. A lot of players like myself get stuck on range bets on the flop or being polarized on the turn with equity driven bluffs, but then they get to the river and see their best draws are giving up and they are only left with value. They were missing those future bluffs (air) on the turn. We (players who haven't made it) get stuck on we are winning in soft pools and simply haven't grasped the entire picture of a complete strategy that you need to move up stakes and compete in tougher pools. Whenever we shot take it goes poorly because we have gotten away with playing face up in soft pools so long. Have to start over with a blank canvass and forget what you think you know and be open minded to what these coaches are teaching you. Being under contract forces you to treat it more like a job which helps with volume. A lot of players suffer from lack of volume because they give themselves a choice to play or not. If everyone makes a contract for themselves they are able to stick it, we would see a lot more success.

Bigger update

Hey guys, after a long time posting some big update, gonna talk a bit about how it is going now basically since the beginning of the year + how am I doing with my pre-set yearly goals.

First of all, I have to say I am very glad I found a site where I can play 500 and 1k consistently. I really enjoy playing times that are lets say normal for a human being to work. So not having to wake up at 4, or playing until 3am type of stuff. Yes, you guessed right, the site is GG.

Volume*
Overall, until today I have played 115k hands. The number is not ideal/what I wanted to have at this point. However, considering me taking 2 long trips to Brazil, being more than 1 month away just for travelling + couple of small trips gets me back to the reality. This leads me to adjust my yearly goal of playing 500k hands. For now, I would say 400k hands would be very challenging and I will be personally very glad if I could achieve that. (again, no hard pressuring here, if I end up playing 350k hands, so be it).

Results*
The initial, just for fun goal was 100k for this year. As you can see from the graph, with the rakeback, it should be around 47k$. I am actually feeling pretty good about it, tho the sample is quite small and I dont want to put much weight on that. From my feeling, I would say at 500, I am able to squeeze 8bb/100 and at 1k probably 6bb/100 (after rakeback when playing on top of my limits). Results after smaller sample are indicating, that instead of the 7bb avg staked winrate potential, I am getting like 5bb (3bb+ 2 for rakeback). What does that mean? I am not always playing my best, not always table selecting as good as well. What I am gonna do about it to try to reach my full potential?

Improvement window*
First of all, I am regularly after most sessions making a re-evaluation of how I am playing. This year I am averaging: 8,3/10 both for Tactical Performance and my Mental Game. Which gives me a good feedback that there is still a bunch to improve. Below I will write the most common things that I could do better and were occurring in my reviews.
Regarding table selection, I made a good progress by having a big TV. Since I am in Brazil rn, I want to buy a big monitor for times I am in Slovakia as well. I also want to keep opened 1k tables even if I am already playing enough. Simply cause, there might be a whale jumpin, so I can switch that for the other table that is very likely worse.

"No distractions, no opening Discord, phone...""
"I need enough sleep, otherwise I wont be fully energized""
"Not counting my balance (Its a bit tough one, as I cant really hide it)""
"Just focusing on playing my best""
"Not taking loses personal, some players will owe me and thats normal""
"If I want to bring my Top A-Game, I have to purely focus on making the best decisions possible in every spot""
"There is no point in thinking about how much money have I won or lost in the moment""
"Keep in mind the jackpot fee over 30bbs""
"Full concentration from the first to the last hand""
"Bring more mindfulness to the session, more awareness of my thoughts, emotional state""
"Train how to use statname better""
"Revise best sizings OTR - wasting time on that in game prevents me from coming up with other ideas""
"Dont be scared of anyone""
"More awareness, esp. in moments where I am about to slip to my B/C-Game""

2023 graph

By stakes

Graphs and updates

Hey man I am a private coaching student of Freenachos, he mentioned your name in a call the other day, so I thought I would check out your blog!

Great stuff.

Hey guys,

A bit of reflecting on the summer time

I literally played 25h total in these last 2 months.
Did some coachings, Masterclasses, a bit of studies, but for the most part I was spending time with bunch of friends, family + finding new apartment, monitor, setup etc.

Now, I already settled up a bit, tho still not having the place with my best friend.. however, I want to start playing again even if I might eventually move out very soon. The thing is that, in 45 days from now I will go to Brazil for 3 weeks out of which most days will be a vacation time with my gf as she will end her long studies (hopefully with a happy end of getting accepted to the uni of Bologna). Not ideal in terms of my poker career, but I chose it and I want to accept the way it is. Probably will set some 1h a day of studies regardless.

Anyway, these last 2 months I maybe took a bit more chill than needed, but at the same time it is the only time I can see some friends (the ones that are studying abroad) + I am still 22 and there is simply no need to rush anything here in poker. I can be very successful nosebleed crusher with or without taking it very chill for 2 months. Will keep that in mind tho for the next 45 days (my flight to Brazil) and will skip some nice to have activities and putting poker on the first place.

Results-wise its so far so good, but again the total volume this year is 160k hands, which is very low amount and the variance can still play a big role. Tho, the results are looking quite promising in the highest rake environment.

In terms of my contract in Nachos, I still got around 150k hands to play, but I would definitely like to reach that by the end of this year. After that, I will re-evaluate, but for now I keep all the options open. Gonna make a separate post about that once I get closer to the end of my contract.

This year Graph

By stakes

*My C rake attributed ~ rakeback

Free coaching giveaway

Hey everyone,

Gonna choose a one person to give a free coaching session. All you gotta do is to like this post, and I will randomly pick one of you at the end of this week.
The duration will be 1hour, but the guys that already had classes with me, know that we finish when the student does not have any more questions:)

Doing coaching has been something I was enjoying quite a lot lately in the CFP and would eventually like to continue with that as well. Since, I decided to officially leave Nachos Poker I am not in the team anymore so I am no longer a coach there obviously. (I will also update you guys on that one as well, post some results, probably later this week)
Also I can finally say that I do accept students on 1on1 coachings which is actually something I am very excited about as I used to get a lot of messages guys asking me for that, and I simply had to refuse due to being under contract. I will also probably offer the most affordable price (for the first students) given the stakes and results I am having.

Talk to you soon guys,
Cheers

Poker Career Update

Yo guys coming with the promised update. I officially ended my contract in Nachos Poker after a little over 1 year. I have to say that I am feeling a little bit weird after all, as I was being guided just until now from NL25 to 1k and then after those almost 3yrs of guidance and support, coachings etc. suddenly I am alone on all of that! What I mean by that is, when I have a hand I am not sure I played well, I posted on discord or ask on 1on1 session and I knew feedback is coming. There has been a also a ton of MDA coming out every here and then, so I sort of always got the latest data for the pool I was playing in. If I lost 5-10k in one day, I still had on my mind, that those money arent mine so it wasnt creating this type of pressure. However, now its all different and I am actually excited for this period! (tho, having a little respect:D).

My plans as for now to get this experience as I think I can grow the most right now by trying to play by myself as its definitely not super comfort zone. I need to consider my bankroll, so to be honest with you guys, I got some 60-80bi life roll for NL500 which I think I will play at the beginning. I am feeling very confident at this stake on GG and so far I had great success there as well. I will for sure consider joining another CFP, (all of them are possible) but as for now I dont feel the need to do so.

The main focus now is going to be on getting used to playing with my own money, building a roll so that I can mix it up with 1k soon and then basically see from there. Since this last year I wasnt playing as much as I would like to (mostly due to travelling a lot, investing a lot of time into my relationships with my close friends and girlfriend), I am putting poker as a top priority for now. I imagine by playing by myself, I got a little more time as well for playing as reading discord channel can be also sometimes time consuming.
Besides planning to play a lot, I am also very excited to keep coaching as well. Got a very good feedback so far from the classes I was doing in Nachos and was really good doing that too.

Despite not playing much this year, I am fine with my current results in the highest rake environment.

Thank you for sharing your poker journey, Martin! It's inspiring to hear about your dedication and passion for the game........

Free coaching winner

The winner of the free coaching session is:

https://gyazo.com/0a4c2adf2a9ccdb21d26c9def8bbf1ff

Congratulation bro! Please hit me a message so that we can schedule the time:)

For the rest of you guys that are still interested in free coaching with me, I will do another giveaway on my instagram (matostar14) next week.

Amazing! I've sent you a message.

Bro, you scored that free coaching session like a boss. Hit 'em up, and soak in that knowledge!

Hi Mato,

Thanks again for the coaching session. I gained a better understanding of the game and strategy I can bring to the tables. Your coaching style is very nice and you explained good reasoning for different playing styles that was easy to follow.

Good luck with your journey, I will keep an eye on your blog!

How are you doing? Any update?