FlorinCJK

was wondering if you're still playing online or moved over to live games. nice blog, looking forward to reading more stories about the live scene and home games. GL

great post !
maybe this year you'll run over EV haha. GL

good idea! I need to buy myself a nice watch :)

Okay wrapping up 2021 , time has fly very fast and I have not updated this thread for almost 2months… reading a lot of other threads , but being very lazy when it comes to updating my own.
Last few months have been pretty bad pokerwise, got crushed again at 400-600nl and suffered a 40bi+ downswing.It did affect me a bit coming back everyday at the tables and getting beat after beat.My last downswing of this magnitude was back in 2019 and at that time it felt way worse than it feels now… don’t get me wrong, it’s still difficult, but it’s way better now.
Still need to improve a bunch and shot take again cause it’s way more fun than staying at the same stake, we need to challenge ourselves and push beyond our limits.
I wanted to be a winner at 400-600nl and take 2 holidays abroad but it did not happen.
Going forward there is a bunch of stuff that need to change.Want to start journaling again and write down my toughts and ideas, reflect on poker related but also life related stuff.Most importantly I want to put my mental health first and start living & enjoying life.
Looking back at 2021
*not enough time put into poker
*too much screen time without being efficient
*not enough studying hours
*too many days playing without taking day off and energy levels dropping
How can I fix these things that bother me?
Study more and have a clear path, add more sites, move more & eat a healthy diet and for the love of God, take days off !

graph in $$

graph in bbs

by stakes

tracker is not 100% accurate as run it twice only records first run out
with rb the total amount is 44259$
wish you all the best in coming year
let's crush 2022 :)

Barkin the legend ! GL

Is it really smart to play 2knl vs regs only ( assuming Borach00 is reg ) , can see the logic behind thinking that one of the regs is the "spot". Unless one of the players/regs is really bad , I don't see how you can achive a good win rate and justify the huge variance that reg battle comes with.

I like your point of view while getting slapped in face by mother variance
no doubt there is a lot more to learn & improve and I have no doubt you can make it at higher stakes as long as you put in the effort and make the necessary sacrifices.
bonne chance :D

Last few days we're brutal and it's just a reminder of how hard and taxing it can be on your mindset.Right now I feel ok, but this ok feeling turns into sadness when look at my 400nl+ graph.I feel like variance has a big part , but this should still push me intro studying more and taking another shot at higher stakes.Need to drop down to 100-200nl , recoop my loses and spend more time on improving my mindset.

400nl

200nl

All 3 fighter have Trevor as a coach.Rose played mind games vs Zhang when she did not want to touch gloves, she was also affected a lot by being on "enemy" territory and people boooing her.Usman did the same against Gilbert Burns, did you see the expression on his face? he was shocked and already affected.It's nice to see that even these monsters deal with their own demons and all have mindset issues :)

I hope Usman and Gaethje win :D
Zhang has a huge potential to be a massive star in China , but Rose's footwork and technique is just to good. can't wait for this card

any chance you're playing under the screen name "unicornius" on some apps?

Poker
I had a very productive month in September.During the summer poker was not the main priority and my average number of hours played per month was 75.Last month I made a bet with other poker players where everybody writes down a goal and put 250$ at stake and in case you don't achive the goal, you have to pay.It was very challenging and it forced me to always play even if it was lower stakes, I wanted to succeed.Obviously this meant less studying hours and more days of playing.. still trying to take more days off and play more in working days.
Even tho my graph does not show it, had 10.5k month :D
where 7-7.5k came from winnings (tracker misses some hands) and 2.5-3k in RB

Life/Goals
Still want to go somewhere on holliday this winter, but it's gonna be a challenge with all these covid regulations & restrictions.
Would like to go back to Egypt as we enjoyed it a lot last time.I am from Eastern Europe , any suggestions?

I have 2-3months still to achive the 500nl winner goal
so far I am losing 10-15bi , but still enough time to get out the hole :)
need to remind myself that we cannot control variance, but still a nice goal to have

Been lurking around the forum, reading other blogs but slacking when it comes to making a new post 😊
Summer was great, been a lot more outside trying to decompress and relax.This affected the number of hours I put in, average of 75h per month ( June,July,August).. can’t say I feel guilty as it’s important to enjoy time off and not always think about poker.
Me and my girlfriend had a nice vacation close to home as we had limited options since both of us did not take the vaccin.So we went to Sunny Beach-Bulgaria ( there we’re a lot of romanians, I would say around 40-50% ) , the weather was nice and we enjoyed being in vacation, no worries and just relaxation.We we’re lucky that we found a great restaurant where we had dinner 4/5 nights and the food was great, prices we’re low compared to the service they offered.It’s called Flora Bar & Grill so if anybody is nearby, check it out ! you won’t regret it.

At the beginning of the year I had these 2 goals
Have 2 vacations in 2021
We are planning to go for Egypt this year because we went there before and really enjoyed it.Asia is a strong option too, but the distance and flight duration is too much.

The other goals was to be a winner at 500nl
This starts to slip away and it’s gonna be a challenge to achive it.
My 200nl graph looks like this

400nl+

It sucks when you’re running bad at higher stakes.I still have enough time to turn it around, but I’m done playing “catch up”. Trying to fix my graph and become a winner is forcing me to play more, put more volume in and not take days off.This is not a great idea for the long run ! Luckly I’ve had a mindset session and this opened up my eyes, it showed me how much I need to improve my mindset if I want to be successful at higher stakes.
Anyways, a lot of players we’re asking me via private message if they can play where I do.Previously I could not offer access , but now I became an agent and can offer good and competitive deals.For more details PM

Knowing I have some technical and in game leaks that need to be fixed, my mind always tries to bring me back to lower stakes as that's my "comfort zone" and I'm used to the swings.Obv with more hours put into study and improving overall , the more confidence you get and the better you will perform long term.. I need to get to work :)
As for your question: stay away ! there are no easy games here :D

I guess it depends a lot on the player pool and how much you exploit.
guerilla poker has a course where you can learn more things about redline and how to improve that ( have not watch the course myself , but other people talk about it )

Time flies so fast and my last update was one month ago, always aiming to update this blog more, post some fun hands , but I never stick to the plan.It's summer and I struggle to be consistent and put volume in and now there is another problem, wich is a good problem to have.I've managed to beat 200nl, but was still not confident enough to shot take higher, until I talk to another poker player who I now consider my friend. He told me " your win rate is great, move up already !" so I did :))
Need to work more on the landing , but until then I'm gonna mix 200-600nl to get enough action while trying to improve my game and eliminate my leaks.

200nl graph

April-June

stakes

I'm surprised you chosed to switch games. Played some live games where it was NLHE and for every orbit there was one hand of omaha. The fun players loved it and almost everybody on the table had no clue how to play lol.
I guess you are aware of the sick variance involved in PLO , considering you are older now with family and resposabilities, do you think it's a good idea to start learning a new game and face bigger variance even tho there will be edge against fun players?

thx for following
I still remember those days. my plan was to grind as much as possible thinking my win rate is good and games will be softer than ever. It only lasted one week as not being able to leave the house and only focusing on poker is very hard. Sure, it's easier for guys who are in their 20's .. they can play all day and neglect sleep but for us old dudes it's much harder. Maybe people realise now how cruel is to keep animals in cages... at least that's how I felt.
the world is much bigger than our small world ( poker ) and I'm much happier now that things are "going back to normal".
My plan for the beginning of the year was to take 2 hollidays but we shall see what the future holds..
btw where are you from?

thx for the kind words :)
my trip is nothing compared to the one you are going to take
it's gonna be a long one but I'm sure it will be full of amazing views and something you can remember
P.S your dog will hate it =)

400/600nl is very close :D unless mr. variance keeps it away from me

thanks ! when I get asked how many cb sizes do you use on the flop, my reply is : 5 of course ! :))

What’s up guys?
Time flies so fast and it’s unreal to think that over one month has passed and I have not updated the blog.
I continued to grind but as you know, the hours and poker lifestyle ( combined with lockdowns ) started to affect my mental health. Could notice that my energy levels and my desire to keep playing day after day has started to decline dramatically. April was a decent month in terms of hands and hours played while this month ( May ) I’ve took a lot of breaks and there was no consistency . The total hours for this month are under 60h but I’m not gonna feel guilty or judge myself as I def needed it.
Went on a trip/hiking with my gf and some friends in order to relax and keep me away from the computer.I enjoyed it but it was much,much harder that anticipated. My knee bothered me on the way down and could also feel some pain the next days, but maybe this is bc I spend a lot of time sitting down and not being as active as I was a few years ago.

Going to start posting my results every quarter in order to try and detach myself from the results.

you have shown that through a lot of work and perseverance, you can climb the stakes.
such qualities are hard to find nowadays, gl !

It's crazy how variance and running bad starts to affect our decisions. I can relate to this, when running bad I'm either dropping down stakes or taking more passive lines. The 2nd one is not great as giving up on +EV spots long term will have impact on earnings.
Was looking at an old video where you we're grinding 50nl and now you're close to playing 1k wow ! GL

Time has passed so quickly, it’s almost the end of April and I have not updated my results for the month of March.
Had some period of times when I was very productive, studying, reviewing hands, but in the last few days I just played and forgot about the study routine.I still struggle to take days off , but feel like I’ve improved a bit and will continue to optimize this area.
Results we’re not great for March, I’ve ran very bad at 200nl (or maybe I’m just a fish :D ) and decided to drop down and recover.It was a bit disappointing to be honest because the beginning of the year was so promising and 500nl seemed so closed.Well, I’m not prepared and still have a lot of leaks to fix so this means I need to play less and study more.
I’m gonna post some fun hands just to make this blog more entertaining and also going to post the quarterly results. Stay tunned

month graphh

best image hosting

200nl

agree completely ! it's very hard to take days off since there so few options nowadays, it really feels like wasting time/ procrastination :D

March is not going that great when it comes to poker, but I'm still positive about other areas.I've listened to a bunch of podcast about mindset and poker, one thing that remained stuck in my brain is: you cannot let the results from the poker table impact your whole life. Imagine having a crazy month where variance is not on your side and you continue to lose day after day.How would you deal with this situation? If you are living your life based on how you are running at poker, then you are going to be in a very dark place.We cannot control variance and we should not spend any energy on trying to do so.Channel that energy into things we can control: showing up, morning routine, study routine, diet , sleep etc

I need to change my approach because the way I'm doing it right now, it will lead to burn out.Ten days or even two weeks go by without taking days off and if on day one my energy levels are high, by the 7th day I start to feel tired, no motivation, it's very hard to put sessions in.Poker is so demanding and it's absolutely necessary to take days off.Without too much surprise, my hours started to decline from the 7th day forward and I felt so frustrated knowing I'm not putting up crazy hours at the tables but feeling so damn tired.Many other poker players feel guilty once they start taking days off and this happens to me aswell. It's hard nowdays when everywhere there are restrictions and lockdowns, fewer activities to chose from and being close to the computer: let's see how the lobby is ... and we all know what happens after 😄

After talking to a few poker friends, decided to change my ineffective approach.Going forward I'm gonna try to play only 5 days - 1 study - 1 off.
vamoooooooosssss 😄

February was a cool month.The discomfort I felt when sitting at 200nl has vanished and I'm very proud how my mindset is working right now. Even when things did not go so well, had the discipline to drop down to 100nl again.It's never a shame to drop down and reset your mind, play stakes you know 100% that you're beating.

Thinking about switching sites or finding other places to play because my volume suffers a lot.Can only put a few hours in the morning before the games fade away.Don't know if it's wise to move back to jokerstars as they burned me and a bunch of other regs who we're supernova or elite.Would still like to stick to the morning grind as I get a bit more of life EV but my sleep kind of suffers.

Study routine. Not proud of the work I put in the last month, feel like this could be improved.Was thinking about changing things a bit, playing 3 days and study 1 day so I learn more things, get better at the game and not get burned out.This is really important if you are playing for a longer time, it's always fun to learn and get better.

you have an interesting life & poker story. tbh I'm surprised you're able to still find time for this amazing game all this while having a family.
best of luck !

Wanted to start the blog at the beginning of the year, but was busy with poker, study and real life stuff.

January was insane ! still cannot belive it when looking at the graph 😊 While I had other 5-6k months previously , it still awesome to achive this in 2021.Obv this happens once in a blue moon and realistically should expect 20-30bi per month if variance is on my side.

Now I’m trying to make 200nl my main stake and only add 100nl tables if there is not enough action.Tbh this was a bit scary and could feel myself being in an uncomfortable situation.My comfort zone was and maybe still is 100nl for the last 2-3 years and the brain started to find all sort of reasons to stay there.Call me crazy but I’ve started to use cold shower as a method of overcoming discomfort.Will write more about this in the next update

january graph

stakes

thank you , will try my best :)