MatoStar

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.

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.

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

Cool blog, nice discussions! Definitely an inspiration for me seeing someone at the same age playing few stakes higher:)

Gl gl buddy!

Hey man, how are you doing?:)

How are they responding to your low volume?

In NachosPoker there is no volume requirement. Other CFPs work differently, I would say Nachos is having the biggest % of non full-time players.

Don't you have to maintain something like 120hrs a month or like 36k hands a month? Is there less pressure on 1KNL players to put in volume compared to 200NL players? Also I thought contracts were supposed to be 600-650k hands?

Yeah, so I can play pretty much as many hours as I want. Typically contracts are for that length as you said. The one I got from Patrick was simply too good to refuse. It is 350k hands for the entire contract, that is why I switched to Nachos fwiw. I would have quite likely stayed in Meta/BrPC if not getting the offer to be fair.

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

Hey bro, thanks for the kind words:)

As far as the GG bum-hunting goes, I honestly do not know if there are some special tricks, heard some stories of the winning players getting banned as well and apparently it is just something we gotta accept. I honestly think it is a combination of both high winrate and aggressive bum-hunting.

Comparing to other sites, it is hard to say since I played most of my volume on stars. However, I do have a bit of experience with other sites like ACR, iPoker and Chico. Nowadays, for playing 500+ one has to mix many sites which I didnt particularly enjoy and quite often play specific time zones to get the tables in, that is why I am sticking to GG for now.
For one playing below 500, iPoker, Chico, Stars, bodog seems to be all very solid options and quite often one can play only 1 site and get 4+ good tables.

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

Sorry for the late response RunItTw1ce

Why join another CFP if coaches are you telling you that you have very few leaks?

Good question. Though, this you can use for any type of coaching and question whether it is worth the money or not.
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.
Why is that? Hah, this topic has been already discussed on my blog a lot. But for me personally, I just 2 years ago started to take shots at NL50, before that my only "income" was coming from playing part-time microstakes.
So I am still in the process of building my roll as I steadily keep moving up in stakes, which means that I need more and more roll to be able to play unstaked. Obviously playing unstaked = more money for me. Well, there is also another aspect:

If my current bankroll is 0 atm and I expect myself to win 125k/year, assuming my winrate at 1k is 3.5bb/100 and I play 30k hands a month. In case I want to take shots at 2k after this year, I have essentially 62bis which I think it is definitely not healthy considering it is my entire life roll.
In a next year scenario making 250k/year mostly on 2k, I will get to 50bis for 5k which is again ridiculously low. This also assumes that I have no expenses whatsoever during the year (tho, I say I am starting from 0, so those expenses can be similar-ish to the current amount that I have).
So it basically does not matter whether its 2k,5k or some low stakes, the principle is the same. The more money involved, the more mental it gets obviously :D

Ideal scenario would be to have saved some money from the previous job or something, but come on guys I discovered poker when I was 17, that was my part-time and I was starting literally from 0. Went through NL2 all the way up till NL1k. The staking is simply allowing me to climb all the stakes faster than I would ever be able to do by myself. This is the most important I think, very aggressive shot-taking, way sooner, after smaller sample sizes, without hurting my financial situation by any means.

In BrPC (MetaGame), I got this great opportunity from my coaches (Special credits for #Lukasz) who once they saw my work, how I am thinking combined with the results they were moving me up ultra aggressively. This was basically the main reason why I sky-rocketed from NL50 to NL1k in a year. The support, especially when you are newer to the game/ playing lower stakes is crucial. None of these training sites are gonna give you this.
There is also something to be said, that no every player can make a lot of move ups in such a short time window. In every stable, you will find super hard crushers, but also guys that stagnate for months or even years. This seems very interesting to me:

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 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.

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

Hi ShardbearerMohg sorry for the late answer, I wasn't visiting rio for a while.
To your question, first of all, I haven't played 50nl+ non-staked. (With a small exception of 50z).
Ofc it's possible to move up in stakes alone as well as with a stable. For those stakes 50-200nl I see it as a very nice shortcut how one can very smoothly become a pro from playing recreationaly by joining a CFP that uses MDA. Since many players won't be able to make a living playing nl25, while most players are able to do so playing nl200.

In terms of coaching quality, I wouldn't necessarily say in a CFP they are better. You can see that Patrick, Saulo, Max, Steve. All those guys coach for a stable and for RIO too. I'd say what's different though, is how organized are specific classes in a stable. While on RIO quite often topics aren't following each other and you need to find for yourself the best order in which you want to watch them. (I'd say it's not ideal today watch a class about x-raising rivers, and another how to exploit fishes.).
As you mentioned the MDA and classes around it, that's the biggest difference probably offering infinite amount of value (for ones who haven't seen that before).

I have a pretty strong opinion - I think players who want to move up in stakes as fast as possible, joining a CFP focusing also on MDA is the best option.

HodorIsKing

I actually find that most of the tough postflop spots I get into are
against regulars.

Right, however, its nice to be aware of the fact that those spots arent generating nearly as much EV as the ones you might even consider "easy" vs recreationals.

I am curious if these blueprints tell you how to exploit regulars.

Yes, they do. When I am talking about blueprint and 95% of the game-tree (especially at stakes lower than 1k, I mean both against regs & recs. Once you know where they overfold, overbluff... you can adjust accordingly in any spot where such a deviation occurs.
You start to have more awareness what part of the range are they actually folding and you may realize yourself that you used to do the same. Exploits always starts from GTO. They deviate from optimal. You gotta know what is optimal in order to spot their deviation in game.
Blueprint might tell you: "Call all 0ev bluffcatchers in this node" How do you know which ones are those? You gotta study GTO.
With bluffs its the same story. Many of our bluffs are just being indifferent between betting and checking. Unless you know which ones are those, you cant properly apply the best exploitative strategy. Or bluffing everything that has <-1bb in betting line or <1bb in the checking line. How do you know which hands have less than 1bb in ev? You already know the answer guys:)
By getting smartly better at GTO, your chance of properly exploiting both regs and recs is naturally increasing.

HodorIsKing

First things first:

I have done some research into each CFP and Poker Detox is the one
which appeals to me the most.

In my opinion in order to get somewhat precise opinion you have to be part of the company for some time, or have a pretty long and open conversation with some players of the company.
Here is why: Owners of BrPC, Nachos, Detox, BitB... they will share with the publicity the best things they can offer. Ofc, its mostly going to be true, but it is just a very small part of the equation. No CFP will tell you about stuff they are leaking and need to improve at, they will not share opinion of players that are not as satisfied. They wont share opinion of guys that are sort of ok-ish with that. They share the ones that are dreaming with that, ideally performing the best.
If you cant join the company to get an opinion, I would recommend to you reach out on private to some players from CFPs you are deciding to join.

I've been really impressed with Nick Howard's content on RIO and his
courses that he used to sell publicly

Some of his content on RIO is undoubtedly awesome. Honestly his approach resonated with me the most and was driving at my very beginnings. Credits to him for being the first one out there and started with all the MDA approach.
Anyway, his public content either or RIO or YouTube is like 5 years old. So I think honestly and seeing the latest data, I can claim that some of his content is being already outdated.

What is your opinion on Detox?

I will try to drive my answer with my value - honesty.

Before BrPC, I applied to Detox - got rejected. Thanks to Nick, I totally changed my view on the game, thanks to his youtube videos mostly. It really resonated with me, not only his MDA approach, but also his view on non-poker related topics. (actually thanks to my previous coach, that showed me Nick free content).
So, I never been inside the company but have few friends there so I can speak only from this point of view.
First of all they main site is bovada/ignition. So they spend a lot of effort to maximize their winrate on this site while neglecting the minority of players that simply cant play on this site. It makes a lot of sense as they player base is from US/Canada. However, you will struggle to find those players playing known pools at 500+.

From highstakes, they run a Detox Elite - sort of like an elite group where you need to pay 100k to enter (could be paid in installments) and you are getting private classes from the top coaches in PD, including Nick (if Im not mistaken). I think you can read this publicly somewhere in their instagram or site.
This one is up to every one of you to decide if its worth it or not. Again, I would say the best approach would be to reach out to few guys that are already inside of this and try to talk to them.
Only thing I can say is that my friend from Detox, had a choice to join this elite group and he decided to join BrPC instead. He is playing 500-2k.
Another example worth mentioning: shortly before I joined BrPC, friend of mine joined Detox. We were playing the same stakes. After some time I was playing him a lot in the 200z stars pool. Honestly, I think I was ahead of him in most hands we played against each other. These days, he is 100-200nl player (he is not from US/Canada).
Ofc, it is far from being objective. But I dont have anything else to use as an example. Thats all I got so far.

Final words:

I would strongly consider PokerDetox if you have access to bovada/ignition/bodog.

I would strongly consider BrPC if you dont have access to bovada/ignition

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:))

What is the incentive to join another CFP after accomplishing everything you have done over the last 18 months?

Cool question my friend:)

Okay so, the main reason I am joining any CFP is simply that I think its a +EV choice for me. I am not having a bankroll to play comfortably 1k (and maybe not even 500 on multiple sites).

How would you compare the CFP from BrPC, NachosPoker, and BitB?

Honestly, I only have the experience with BrPC. But from what I have heard, BrPC and Nachos are rivals as they are both focusing on MDA and playing exploitative strategies. BitB is rather GTO oriented and does not offer staking - thats why I wasnt interested. Although, in the future I would consider them as well.
Also BitB has been here for the longest time, BrPC exists for 3yrs and a few months and Nachos for around half of that if I recall correctly.
In Nachos you have guys from Europe+States and in BrPC is mostly Brazilians + couple of guys from Europe. So for guys from Brazil is BrPC way better imo. For Europeans might be a good positive that Nachos guys are taking regular trips there and hanging out on big tournaments as well.
All in all, all 3 companies seems to be a really good choice to me. If someone would ask me which one he should go, my answer for now would be BrPC. Simply because I know how great job they are doing and how much value they are offering. After my contract in NachosPoker I might say something else, who knows:)
I am really curious about how it will be!

Will keep you guys updated!

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

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!

Do not have too much experience in this pool, but from my impression ACR blitz on 200 was too weak reg heavy - probably just grinding for the leaderboard.

Depends what are your goals, but you saying a challenge... what about playing better site with more fishes and then move up faster to nl500,1k,2k...? I doubt you will experience lack of challenges on such a journey;)
Talking from my own experience:)

Another way to challenge you, would be: hmmm, so you are looking for a challenge, to climb high mountain? Well, then just go ahead and reg battle great regs at your limit! Or play a zoom pool with more capable regs (most of the ACR blitz one, did not put me in too many tough spots).

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

Do you think the first 50k hands at 500NL was just a learning curve?
Last 50k hands are rather consistent after taking what looks like some
20 buy-in swings.

Its impossible to know. Obviously as time goes by I am getting better and probably having higher winrate. On 500, most of them are reg tables. The 500z pool is not worth it to play when my intention is to move to 1k as soon as possible.
But could be the fact that I was playing almost exclusively stars at the beginning - so in order to get more volume I was playing way more against regs only which is for sure having a big impact on my overall winrate as well as increased standard deviation.

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:)

Blockquote My open range vs him is very tight, something like 25% (please tell me if it's too tight and why)

This is the type of mistake that I used to do when I was playing lower stake. Since most of the players are playing tighter than they should, when someone was playing looser/aggressive, I immediately started to adjust thinking he is too aggro/loose etc. The truth, however, is that 3b frequency BvB is around 18% (in theory) and in a sim with no limps, NL50 rake, he should fold 47.5%. So from your stats I would claim that he might be playing gto-ish here. So I am gonna open my standard RFI range (around 43%).

My focus here was not to balance the c/push line but rather to overbluff as in my experience people don't except a bluffing range here and massively overfold (as he did). The blocker i mention is the A for the improbable fullhosue.

Naah. If you trust enough your experience, okay then go for it. But I would be very careful with those claims, cause you need to have very strong evidence in order to be sure that what you said its actually true. Even if so, then I would start attacking lines where people have wide ranges and lot of possible bluffs.
Another important fact when it comes to exploiting is that, you are trying to maximize your winrate, and EV in general which does not necessarily means a highest EV play at any given moment. This is a little bit advanced, but you seem like someone who likes to exploit other people, so I am gonna dive into that.

Imagine he calls you down here (could have the nuts or whatever). Do you think you can run this bluff again vs him? I really doubt that. So when you think you have a clear exploit on people, try to do it in a way that they do not immediately realize that they got exploited. (unless you are playing on anonymous site, which I doubt you do as you provided a decent sample on Villain). In this case it would mean turning most of the mixed strategies bluff-raises into pure ones.
If you play in a huge pool, you can probably dont give a shit about that. But once you plan on moving up through stakes, the pool is going to get smaller and smaller, and having constant edge over your opponents can just bring way more EV (I was experimenting with that all the way from NL50 to NL500)

He appears to be competent and will probably understand how well protected your range is with the hands I mentioned above.

I think this is a very assumptive statement. For 2 main reasons.

First of all, we are playing NL25. Yes he has a reggish stats, maybe a bit on aggro side, but that does not make him competent in any way.
Second of all, his river sizing this one is probably even more important. Competent player would understand that re-opening in position on the river for less than 1/2 is 99% not a thing in theory.

Agree with x/calling the river though.

Okay, I did not intend to post at first, but there are some things that are important to be said here:

1. What is your overall flop strategy? You did not mention anything in your post. I am asking that because this bigger sizing does not make sense to use here. Especially when there is 5 and 4 + flush draw. Those cards connect very well with the BB range + there are many runouts 3,6,7,8 flushes where he is going to have big amount of nutted hands. Therefore we prefer to bet just 1/3, but only like around 30% of the time. In general, there are not many boards BvB, where you like to size up, so at these stakes I would not mind using just 1/3 or check as a simplification.

2. Your bet + sizing OTF does not accomplish much. All pairs are gonna call you with few exceptions and most of his folding range is coming from Axo, Kxo - exactly the type of hands you block.

3. Turn is a flush completing card. There is something to mention when you play BvB after you cbet flop, most flush completing cards are going to give the BB an advantage as he has more suited combos in his preflop range. Therefore we are going to have very high checking frequency with you correctly pointed out - smaller sizings. However, after you big bet flop, in BvB you typically have very few A-highs as those hands are appearing to be very strong to be turn into a bluff when ranges are so wide, while he is going to have decent amount of them as he is going to fold Kxo, Qxo but still needs to call something in order to not massively overfold. Also a small note A and J are of spades, which means there are more flushes available on the lower cards - so he has more of them and we should be more passive. If it would be something like 4s5sJc, 9s, now we could be a little bit more aggressive, as his 42s,43s,53s,52s etc flush advantage is heavily blocked by the cards on the board while we still have a lot of AsXs,KsXs.

4.

In theory i should defend >50% and my bluffing range OTT should be a similar % depending on my river sizing on various runouts, thus i call

Yes, you should defend more than 50% but you are going to have less bluffs than that. Remember, the smaller you bet, the less bluffs you are going to have, because the better price you are giving him to call. If you would bet exactly pot, then the bluff:value ratio would be around 1 (could be a bit higher as your bluffs has got some equity).

But I would not put my focus too much on those type of things and rather focus on what your range wants to do? On every single street basically, so that you can get more coherent process and avoid this type of nonsense plays.

River I bluff this hand as i think his sets and 2pairs aren't strong enough to raise the turn, and i have a blocker too, so he has mostly flush or bluff.

Okay so now you are saying that he has mostly flush or bluff and after that you mentioned that you are having good blockers. What blockers are you having to a flush?

My turn calling range has some sets and 2pairs tho, so i can easily represent them.

Yes, you are going to have some value raises, BUT. You probably have in your range other AKo combos maybe some AQo as well, some J5s, 54s, maybe even KsJx, QsQx,KsKx. All of those hands are either same "good" bluffs or even better. Can you count how many combos of value hands you do have here? No need to do the calculation to see that you have actually way more possible bluffs to choose from. So using the argument that you have the nuts to raise with in this scenario is not really ideal. I would rather see here a thought process: what are my best bluffs here? The ones that block his bet/calls and unblock his bet folds. But I would not focus too much here, on balancing my b-brc-xr line and rather as I mentioned earlier focus on coherent street by street process.

Hope it was not too offensive, my intention was to just help you to see also other perspective:)

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

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

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:)

Do not have the RIO subscription. But yes, from the first 2mins I saw myself at those tables. Also remember few hands vs Gary. Might post them too later on.

Also I was not posting for a bit longer as there are big changes in my life.
Gonna post an update soon!