Hello LP's it has been a long time since my last post, recently I have received the notice that I won a scholarship, so it is official I´m moving to Vancouver, BC.
I have a lot of things to know about the city, and how the living will be. I started searching for a good place to live in with my wife, of course I want to spend the less money I can in this area, knowing that Vancouver is a very expensive city, we would like save the most money we can.
Recently I called to an apartment which fits most of the things that we need for just 900 cad, and it's amazing, near to UBC which is the universty I will go.
The bad news, the apartment rate doesn't include wireless connection, I've been searching on internet and I saw a lot of companies, and I really don't know which ones are the most reliable, so if you can give me some tips, I will aprecciate it.
In the other hand, we need a cell phone provider, which one has the best cell phone plans?
Please think that we are new to the country, and our incomes are just for the basic stuff.
One last question!, Is it a good idea to bring our car?, some people who lived there tell us that in most of the cases we don't need it, is that true? please give me some tips!.
will only post graph now, but I will write about my month later
overall: beat regs, lost to fishs, got 1 coach session, some things makes sense now, connected the dots, discover that some people who play high suck, feeling confident, but not happy with how I perform, anon tables are rigged, tilted a bit, didnt play as much as I should, not going to gym as often as I should, my house is a mess and Im too lazy to clean, lunch is barbecue dinner cupnoodles, spent too much in things I dont need ( xbox one ), but I can feel the EVOLUTION!
Then it'd be perfectly acceptable for me to go on a massive bitch tirade about how microstakes is just a variance fest and how everyone just shoves over each other preflop and it's nearly impossible to have consistent wins because everyone's range is infinite.
But I like to think I'm more composed than that, so here's a video of Ronald McDonald murdering the fuck out of a bunch of people.
Edit: none of this is true. I just sucked real bad at time of posting. Suck less now and will suck even less in future ^^
Think About What the Author Will Readby failsafe, April 27
For the most part, I'd say we think recursively. If I do this, then my action will benefit me in some way. Perhaps the most important thing others teach me is what benefits me. Then to them I disclose questions in the form of answers. In return I receive answers.
"The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you are ashamed of, because words diminish them-words shrink things that seemed infinite inside your head to no more than living size when they come out. But it's more than that, isn't it? The most important things lie too close to where your secret heart is buried, like landmarks to the treasure chest your enemies would love to steal away. And you may make revelations that cost you dearly only to have people look at you in a funny way, not understanding what you've said at all, or why you thought it was so important that you almost cried while you were saying it. That's the worst, I think. When the secret stays locked up not for want of a teller but for want of an understanding ear." -"The Body," Stephen King
When I was a teenager, I had basically three interests:
1) Starcraft (ever since I was 12-13)
2) Poker (since I was 17)
3) MMA (since I was 14-15, trained first time when I was 16).
Anyway, after I quit playing Sc2 professionally, I quickly found myself missing some kind of competitive outlet. A new MMA gym had opened up near me like 2-3 months prior, and I'd been going on and off... but around July last year I decided to get a lot more serious.
I'd been out with an injury for like 1-2 months and at the time I was about 90kg, 180~ cm. So I started training 5 days a week, 3~ hours a day... And yesterday I had my first fight, weighing in at around 77 kg.
The event is hosted by Top FC which is Korea's second biggest MMA organization behind Road FC (who also has their own amateur divsion, called Central League I think), and uses the moniker "Top FC Khan Amateur League". This was its 4th iteration.
The rules are quite friendly:
- 2x 3 minute rounds
- Headgear, 14 oz gloves*, shinguards
- No heelhooks, no knees or elbows to the head but OK to the body.
Rest is the same as pro mma, but referees try to stop fights much faster if a submission is on, to avoid serious injuries in an amateur event.
* They told us last minute that from now on we'd be able to opt for MMA gloves if we wanted to but I dont think anyone did since it was a last minute change and everyone had been sparring with bigger gloves.
The gameplan
When I first came to this gym, I had a little bit of grappling skill, but my striking was HORRIBLE. I'm still not a really competent striker (but I'd say I'm one of the best 3 or so regular students in terms of ground grappling --- then there's obviously the coaches and a couple of higher level guys who are a bunch better too), but I've made improvements. My cardio is also excellent since I train for so long every day and I run in addition to that.
So to summarize: striking relatively poor, grappling relatively good, cardio good. I also don't have much power in my strikes, which I need to work on.
I've got really long arms and legs for my size, and since my most glaring weakness striking wise is exchanges in the pocket, the gameplan my coaches made for me was as follows:
- Stay on the outside, use a lot of circling, use your jab and kicks to maintain distance.
- When he closes, clinch!
Oh and I've got a bit of a tendency to be too timid when sparring, and walk back too much, so I've been trying to work on that, alongside a gameplan that can work around that.
https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.ne...05087806927_7183647215183333112_n.jpg The opponent
Before the fight I didn't know much about him, except that he's a striker. Oh and that he looks a lot like Reis :D
After the fight I talked to him tho and found out he's 32 (I thiiiiink, maybe 31? cant remember), been training for a similiar time to me (a little less in mma, but he's done some boxing before), and funnily enough the dude is friends with one of the guys that trains where I train (neither of us had any idea about this until we talked tho).
The Fight
The Aftermath
In case you want to watch the fight before you read this, I'll spoiler it. + Show Spoiler +
So I lost, but I'm actually pretty happy with how I did. Before the fight I wasnt at all sure if I would want to do this again, whereas now I'm 100% sure I do.
The biggest thing I take away from this is a newfound appreciation for gameplans - watching the fight back I can really tell where I followed the gameplan and did well, and where I strayed and did worse.
Here's some things that went right/wrong:
Right:
- Clinch was good, he didn't know how to shoulder out of the thai plum. I should have tried for it a bit more probably.
- I kept distance... decently, not as well as in practice but decently. Front kick worked well.
Wrong:
- My coach has been trying to get me to take smaller steps when I punch, and I think I fell back into stepping too far with my jab, and stranding my back leg a little.
- I completely forgot to even try the main takedown I practiced from the clinch :D Instead I went for a silly un-practiced trip.
- Didn't jab enough!
- I think I tensed my shoulders a bit, because my arms gassed really hard in round 2, which I've never had happen before.
- Forgot to slow down my breathing when on the outside.
- When backstepping I only single stepped too much! I actually worked hard on making sure I always 2 stepped when I was training since there's a huge difference between backstep-circle and backstep, backstep, circle.
- The first low kick I throw, you can see it lands really slow. It's because when I stepped forward for my jab, I didn't follow it with my right leg properly.
Things I learned:
- I've never trained in a ring before, our gym has a cage! In round 2 when we are at the ropes, and I'm defending the takedown... I kind of froze because I had no idea how much pressure I could put on the ropes without falling haha. Also arms were so tired.
- When you are on your back and wearing headgear, the nose-guard blocks your downward vision, I couldnt see his legs haha. I wanted to do a situp sweep but I couldn't tell where the fuck his legs were. I definitely didn't roll enough with headgear.
- Too compartmentalized sparring. Because my standup is weak, I think I did a bit too much pure striking sparring... I think this is maybe why my arms got so tired. Next time I'll work more full MMA sparring.
- Nutshots are very painful.
I'm also gonna add some muscle for next time, I've been cutting for a long time just to get rid of all the fat, now its time to build up a bit
Oh and I guess you could put lack of combination punching in there somewhere, but it was actually part of the gameplan to not do that, since it necessitates remaining in the pocket a bit and we wanted to avoid that as much as possible. But in terms of training its definitely on the to do list hehe
Ah and headmovement! It's something I definitely want to work a lot on. I only really used any headmovement once in the fight haha
Various other things:
- One guy broke or separated his knee, didnt see how it happened but he had to be carried out on a stretcher. Looked reallly painful
- One of my team mates (the guy just above me in the pic below) is a beast. He looks like he's asleep in there then BOOM cracking thunder, boom submission. So relaxed haha.
So I finally got my hud restored and started spectating PLO tables and saw people running around 45vpip on average all the way up to 90+ and told myself "this looks fucking profitable", and it is. I'm up a bunch of buyins at NL25 hoping to move up aggressively as long as I'm not just a fish on a heater. My average stats are usually 30/23 or so which I think is pretty decent for a PLO player, so I know my results arent just due to maniacal play. But all of that is beside the point, what's really great about PLO is how deep it builds your understanding of other poker fundamentals.
For starters I have graduated into deepstacked play. I used to be terrified of playing more than 200BB's deep and even quit playing live poker for the last 6 months because I couldnt stomach big pots. All that is gone now because in PLO you end up playing 300-400BB's deep pretty quick so you have to sack up and get used to it. Whats even better is that in PLO you want to play deep. It gets deep for a reason as any PLO player knows because it is a "drawing game" or so I've heard. Draws make for big pots.
The other thing I've learned is just how desirable and down right fun value betting can be. In NLHE I've always had a slight case of MUBS or "Monsters Under the Bed Syndrome", whereby I'm paranoid of every turn/river thinking my opponent has probably sucked out on me somehow. So I make big bets and actually feel relieved when people fold instead of call. Almost satisfied really, which probably has more to do with my ego than fear sometimes. I never tap the glass, but in my head I'm always thinking "fuck you you piece of shit fish". Now they're just like warm cuddle bears that I want to snuggle with and never let go https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/im...1b2k3e49lutOuWi2H-CAwq1YpIssmrgEJ6JTH
But in PLO I find myself riding on the edge of my seat begging for calls. Why? Because in PLO you often make big hands, which puts me at a high degree of confidence. When you're flopping sets and turning flushes every other hand it's hard not to get excited about a payday, which is great for boosting confidence with your value bets. So many hands in holdem revolve around single pair scenarios that it's hard to be thrilled about getting it allin with just top pair. But in PLO it's like "oh shit I haz a boat! PLZ PLZ PLZ CALL ME!!!" Wanting calls and playing deep is like the perfect recipe for success.
And finally, I have dropped my winstop nonsense. For awhile I would set arbitrary goals like "win $100 today" and then quit no matter what once I got there. The idea was to give me something to aim for to stay focused, and to have something to feel proud about and finish each session on a high note. I knew I was leaving money on the table but it didnt matter, my mindset was so poor that I just had to win something to feel good about the session at all. Besides being counter-intuitive to general poker strategy 101, it's absolute blasphemy in PLO. So now I enjoy grinding out long sessions until the fish run dry. I often find myself the last one at the table before I quit. As long as you're not minbuying I'll play.
Anyway I know Joeingram is on some sick 20 year hustle to populate the PLO crowd for his grandkids, but it really is a good game and quite enjoyable once you learn the ropes. It's funny looking back at how I just now learn things that the rest of you have preached for 5 years.
it was a bunch of thought experiments that go like ....
"If one could live forever and had infinite time would you study and attempt to learn about the world with urgency or enjoy each day. On one hand you have an eternity so why not take it easy and enjoy each day. "
First few episodes are crazy. Main character sleeps with 3 chicks - we see 6 titties bouncing.
One of the chicks is 16 he finds out later.
In second episode he gets drunk and fucks with a scientologist chick and then they both throw up in his ex-wifes home.
Talking about getting attention of the audience. Not that I'm complaining, seems pretty good. Im up to episode 5 i think now.
And he probably had sex with like 10 chicks. Duchovny really slutting himself out.
Anyway, recommend watching it if you havnt already. Lots tits, lots sluts, drugs, 16 year old trying to seduce 30 something guy.
What else could you want?!?
Anyone a member of / keen to start a microstakes group on Skype?
Looking to:
- Sweat each other. The more the merrier.
- Weigh in on session reviews.
- Discuss hands.
- Be active.
- Post cool videos / interesting hand discussions you find for discussion.
I play NL10 at PokerStars. I seem to be a decent winner so I think I'll be at NL25 soonish. I play 13,000+ hands a week and study vigorously.
Have you noticed the pattern with hole cards on bovada? If you're two tabling zone, at least, you will usually get the same pocket pair on both tables. You'll also see the same hand or one card off or one suit off the very next on the same table. Probably more than half the time this happens.
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