October Bankroll Challenge: Starting $500

[Ballerholic]

Going to try and progress the bankroll as much as possible this month while also focusing on some other goals. I've started many threads in the past, but I can't motivate myself to keep posting in long term threads. Pretty much anything that doesn't go towards income will be added to the bankroll. Will be playing poker (NLHE/PLO), sports betting, trading stocks/forex, and using work income to build roll.

Poker: Currently playing Pokerstars and some untracked sites. Graph so far today...

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Along with +$39 on untracked sites that is $75 profit for the day!

No sports betting or trading today, but hopefully some for tomorrow.


Current bankroll: $575

[Ballerholic]

Day 2 Review

Played a couple hours of poker and it went well. Won a tiny bit at NLHE and PLO, but didn't have much time to do any study. Tomorrow the study session will involve:

PLO: UTG opening ranges

NLHE: Bluffing and Value combos on the river

Also managed to receive rakeback that I never got from the past month for $56! Also decided to trade stocks today and unfortunately hit my stop loss for a very minimal $3. Only deposited $100 into the account as I'm trying to learn stock trading without losing everything. Unfortunately I had 9 stocks I wanted to take before the market opened, but was unable to because I was planning on seeing if there would be a gap. Unfortunately there was a gap so no trade for me, but the stocks still went where I predicted.

Also taking these sports bets for College Football:

- Oklahoma state -10
- Iowa +3.5
- Arkansas St. -7.5
- LSU/Utah St. O72
- Texas/West Virginia O59.5


Current Bankroll: $647

[BigOrange]

Good luck

[MrSink]

good luck . I will follow that.

what stakes ?

I d suggest to focus on PLO or NLH at once

[Ballerholic]

Day 3 Update


Poker

Might just stick to updating in the morning the following day since sometimes I'll be up playing at night. Anyway day was a very swingy one. I probably swung $100 over the day, but ended close to where the day started. PLO went pretty well and I'm still running really hot there. Played mostly NLHE yesterday and although I played pretty well, after a few hours I just began auto piloting and that's when I really started to bleed chips. I think I'm going to start playing shorter periods with less tables and more focus and then taking time away from the tables to analyze my hands by hopefully using Equilab or Flopzilla software. Especially since I'm only at the micros now I think studying is more important since it's probably more EV using my time to study and improve versus the $2 I might make for the hour.





Sports

Ended up taking the Over in the Rams/Seahawks game and also taking Seahawks -1.5. 1-1 for the night. Added a few more plays for this weekend in NCAAF.

Stocks

Shorted PM yesterday and longed Disney. Unfortunately lost money on both of those trades so now over the course of 4 trades I'm pretty much 0-4.


Current Bankroll: $640

[Ballerholic]

Day 4 Update

Our first brutal day so far this challenge. Ended up playing some 20 PLO and variance was just not on my side. So dropped a bit there. On the other side NLHE is going really well and plo is as well in general it just has more variance to it. I did not adhere to my strict requirements and so I'm going to go a little more strict.

- 1 hour play limit then break
- 1:1 play to study ratio
- Warmup Routine Mandatory (Physical exercise, Meditation, Play & Explain, Warmup on lower stake)
- Complete focus during grind (No videos or streams in background. Only 4-5 Tables when grinding)

I think if I can follow this my volume might drop, but my winrate will increase drastically and I'll become a much better player due to studying more.

Stock trading went well and I think I figured out what I was doing wrong. A lot of time ,due to after and pre market trading, the opening price will open higher or lower than the previous day creating a gap. So I've started just taking the stock I want right before it closes on the day to make sure I profit from the gap.

I also have a ton of sports bets for today. I won't post them since there are so many, but I'll post results tomorrow.


Current Bankroll: $600

[Ballerholic]

Good luck

Thanks!

good luck . I will follow that.

what stakes ?

I d suggest to focus on PLO or NLH at once

So playing between 5-20 NL/PLO. I agree it's usually better to stick to one overall, but the games are so good in PLO that I need to play them. The other side of it is that there aren't frequent PLO games running all the time so I can't just 100% focus on them.

[Ballerholic]

Day 5/6/7 Update


Took some time off of updating and poker at the moment. I've been staying at my GF's parent's house for the past week and unfortunately their family dog who is so cool just passed away. I've known that dog for 5 years now and it is the nicest and sweetest dog you'll ever meet. Anyway, we're all pretty sad here about it and just trying to get through. I never thought pet deaths would mean that much, but now that I've experienced it I understand.

Poker was very swingy. Up and down then up and down. Part of the reason is that I'm still playing some 20 NL/PLO when there are very good games. With how swingy PLO is my bankroll can go all over the place. But luckily we are at the highest point in the challenge so far. Going to continue grinding as much as I can and we'll see how we get on! Did a lot of study yesterday which was my main grinding day. Started off with a proper warmup to the day and then really got into studying. I don't think I hit the 1:1 ratio, but I got close. The games were just too good to pass up.

Sportsbetting went well over the weekend. Although I did terrible in College Football, the NFL saved me with a huge day. I also went 6-0 in the Pick 6 contest for 9th place I think.



Current Bankroll: $675

[Ballerholic]

Day 8 Update


Man oh man what a day! Poker went extremely well. I was just hitting everything yesterday and ran hot in some 20NL games. Also played extremely focused and trying some new stuff I've been studying lately which really helped. On top of that I received $100 from SBR for going 6-0 in the Pick 6 contest! So add that to the bankroll.

Made a few stock picks yesterday. Took UTX and HD so we'll see. I'm hoping they gap up today.


Current Bankroll: $954

[Ballerholic]

Day 9 Update

Let's F*cking Go! Doubled my bankroll in 8 days so far this month! Wow. I never thought that would be possible, if anything I was hoping I could get close to doubling it within 30 days. Now I've run well so that has helped a lot. But I will admit I've been taking my playing and studying very seriously. I don't play a single hand or session without doing a my pregame warm-up for the day. This along with only playing 4-5 tables at a time and really thinking decisions through is why I've been able to play well and be in a flow like state. Before doing these things I was never able to play more than an hour of poker. Now I can play 3-4 hours without realizing it.

There are some really good posts over on RunItOnce from high stake pros who explain in their threads why microstakes players are stuck at the micros. Basically if the games are pretty soft (overall) meaning that you can always find at least a few tables with some fish on them, they how come these players are stuck? Basically the conclusion is that it's more about planning and taking poker like a career day in and day out rather than just doing it as a hobby. For example, do a pregame routine, don't watch youtube videos on the side, play in only +ev games (don't reg battle), play 100% focused, and stop cashing out your bankroll. It makes sense too for any stake level. If you play 5NL and make $1/hr and play 20 hours a week. Well over the course of a year you now have $1,000. In 3 years you have $3,000 and can play higher stake games. So that's how I'm taking poker at the moment. Only playing in +ev games and doing it with 100% focus.

Have a lot of sports picks for this weekend so far. For tonight I've got Giants TT O10.5. Stocks UTX and HD were basically breakeven yesterday.


Current Bankroll: $1,000

[MrSink]

great . thank for update. hats off and keep up the good work

[Ballerholic]

great . thank for update. hats off and keep up the good work

Thanks sink I appreciate it! Do you play much poker?

[Ballerholic]

Day 10 Update

Well Well Well we have hit a little bump in the road. So I started off the day playing some PLO on Pokerstars. Everything was great, I was running hot and that game just felt to simple to me. Then after winning a bit I decided to jump onto my bread and butter poker site and play the 20 PLO games mixed with some 30 NL games. So the PLO games on this site are insane. The site is very small and only a few western countries have access to it, so naturally because of this the Fish to reg ratio is extremely high. Basically at these PLO games I'll be seated at the table and have about 4-5 guys who are playing a 80 VPIP average. Then most of these guys will just pot the flop with any remote value and other will call usually with any sort of value. So it's an amazing game, but due to the play style it is soooo swingy. There will be 4-5 calls pre, I pot pre with a good hand, they all call and then I brick the flop and they pot and get called. That happened so many times yesterday and then the times I got an Okish hand, I got stacked. I also got stacked AAxx vs AAxx all in pre. Now I've run pretty bad in this game since I started playing it a few games ago even though I'm up big. So I gave a little back to the fish yesterday, oh well. The old me would be dying inside knowing I lost 5-6 buyins yesterday, but the zen me doesn't care.


Was able to hit the Giants TT O10.5 last night! Also probably my most proud moment this week...for the first time my trading account is in the green! I started with $100, went down to about $93, and now it is around $100.99. Just going to ramble on a little more here...I figured out my biggest mistake over the first few days when I learned that the market day price tends to gap a lot. So I was able to understand that if I can't trade after or pre-market hours I'll just have to take the stock right before it closes on the day. Unfortunately as a non-professional trader this can be tough since I'm not always free to do that. The other day I tried to take a stock I like 2 hours before it closed on the day since I wouldn't be able to check my computer later on and stock actually lost money in those 2 hours. Now it went where I thought it would go the next day, but I could have saved myself a little bit if only I were able to wait until 10 minutes before closing.



Usually I place 90% of my sports picks based on winning cappers I have back tested through years on forums...but many aren't doing well this year in NCAAF and I think I found a few trends over the past few years that are profitable. So these are mostly my plays, with a couple plays from others I'm following...




Current Bankroll: $875

[Ballerholic]

Day 11 Update

Breakeven day poker wise. Played a lot of hours, but I think I ended up $1. Took a couple sports bets last night, Oregon and Miami. I find that when a ranked team is playing a non ranked team, and the non ranked team is a favourite to win the game. Take them ATS. It's a very strong trend if you'd like to backtest it. Anyway have a good few games lined up for today, might add some more after I do some study this weekend.

Trading went extremely well yesterday. I made $9 which is laughable, but keep in mind that I'm trading a $100 account and I'm now up to a 10% return in 11 days of trading. I usually don't like taking a trade on Friday and then having a weekend for the market to swing or gap, but I decided to try it out this weekend. I'm trading a small account and I'm not going to learn unless I try and make mistakes. I could do it with play money, but I don't find that as motivating which I think many professionals would agree. So I have one position open which is a sell on Home Depot (HD).

Current Bankroll: $895

[MrSink]

Thanks sink I appreciate it! Do you play much poker?

yes , full time pro for almost 10 years now. Not cash player though. Sit and goes back in the days , now spin and goes . Stars EU almost exclusively

[snapperman2]

Baller, I hope that you are tracking your NLHE, PLO, sports betting and stock trading results separately. You might be good at one or two of these things and bad at the rest, so you need to track them separately to know what you're good at, so you can do more of it.

[Ballerholic]

yes , full time pro for almost 10 years now. Not cash player though. Sit and goes back in the days , now spin and goes . Stars EU almost exclusively

Hey that's awesome! Tried spins for a bit. Couldn't hack them, but I have a few poker friends who play them non stop with a stable. How are you finding them?

Baller, I hope that you are tracking your NLHE, PLO, sports betting and stock trading results separately. You might be good at one or two of these things and bad at the rest, so you need to track them separately to know what you're good at, so you can do more of it.

Yea good call snapper. I am tracking sports and trading entirely on their own. Poker and sports are mixed as I'm using some of the poker sites to place my sports bets. I'm down on sports so far this year so I'm up a decent amount on poker so far. But yea I should probably track them a little better on their own.

[Ballerholic]

Day 12/13/14

I didn't have much time to update over past few days. Had to take a trip up to Dublin to sort some stuff out with my GF so no time to do much and just enjoyed the weekend. Anyway, did some sports betting and trading just no poker, but I did get a little rakeback for poker. Bankroll climbing back up slowly, but surely. I'm applying for jobs at the moment so that I will not have to use my bankroll towards living.

Sports have gone pretty well recently. Was around -17 units at my lowest point this month and now I'm currently around -8 units.



No trading markets over the weekend. Markets opened yesterday and I just sold HD so we'll see how that goes.

Current Bankroll: $915

[peacebyinches]

Rooting for ya man, keep it up and remind yourself to stay focused!

[Ballerholic]

Rooting for ya man, keep it up and remind yourself to stay focused!

Thanks I appreciate it peace! Yea staying focused is actually the toughest aspect of playing imo. The discipline to go through daily warmup and then play 4+ hours without youtube video playing or twitch stream in background especially when getting crushed can be tough.

[Ballerholic]

Day 15

Only played a little bit of poker yesterday. I had an interview for a job in the morning which took up a good portion of the day. I played for a little once I got back, but then I just chilled with my GF for the rest of the day. Also had a massive headache so desperately needed some sleep. Good news is that I did get the job! Nothing special, but it's something to do in the meantime while I try and build this bankroll.

I'd like to lay a few thoughts out here about jobs. So I was born and raised in Chicago, USA and moved over to Ireland when I was 20. So I knew about all the job opportunities in the USA and the expected pay. Also I came from a thriving economy with amazing infrastructure. Once I came out here I immediately realized it was a little different. Ireland and almost all countries are going to be much poorer than the United States. As I'm looking up jobs I'm seeing the possibility to make $25/hr in the US with only a High School Diploma. Where over here graduates and even masters graduates start out on $20,000 a year. Mind you, the living expenses might be slightly less here, but in some areas such as Dublin the cost is much higher than the USA. So overall this leads to a environment where salaries might top out at $50k-$60k over here. Now those are really good jobs over here. While I know in the USA people are starting on that after graduating. Overall the pay is just less here for the same number of years of experience and education levels for the most part. Therefore, I think I have a huge incentive to try and really increase my earnings through other incomes such as poker, sports betting, trading/investing.

Let's say you work very hard in your profession and end up topping at about $60k a year over here working 50 hour weeks. Well after tax that's going to be about $40,000 take home for the year. Now let's say in comparison for fun somebody had a minimum job making around $22,00 a year and taking home $20,000. You'd want to come up with $20,000 through poker/sports/trading to be on par with the first person (There is no tax on these in Ireland and trading can be tax free here). Now that's not easy, but it is 100% achievable and likely if you put hard work in. Also the sky is pretty much the limit with earning potential here and seems like a more lucrative option than trying to move up the corporate ladder when there really isn't much farther to go. My hourly at live poker here in Ireland is around $45/hour and take out positive variance it's at least $20. Basically what I'm trying to say here is that these "investments" in other areas on income would provide a much happier lifestyle and have a much higher earning potential and therefore should be taken very seriously.

Anyway apologies for the rant. I'd love to hear opinions on this. The poker I played yesterday did not go too well. Ended up down a little as well as losing a little trading.

Current Bankroll: $875

[Ballerholic]

Day 16

Played a lot of poker yesterday, only playing PLO. Games were very good as always. I'm thinking about moving my poker bankroll primarily over to pokerstars. Basically I find the software just so much easier to grind with and the hud is really nice to have. Also, I'm hoping to eventually do a CFP or staking deal once I reach around 50 PLO/NL. If anything it will make the thread better so that I can post more graphs since I won't be playing untracked sites anymore. Also study will significantly improve with the ability to check my database and go over hands with others.



Trading did not go well. Ended up losing most of profits yesterday and just have a 1% ROI right now (which is still amazing) over 16 days of trading. Currently have a sell on AAPL so we'll see how that goes.

Taking a few sports bets for the weekend. I love to take the same games as winning cappers, but I won't post their plays here since that's kind of unfair to them. But, I'll post my own NCAAF plays...

- Oklahoma (waiting on line)
- Washington (waiting on line)
- Oklahoma St. (waiting on line)
- Utah -14
- Penn St. -9

Current Bankroll: $890

[MrSink]

Hey that's awesome! Tried spins for a bit. Couldn't hack them, but I have a few poker friends who play them non stop with a stable. How are you finding them?

pretty enjoyable grind . you can play very short session , action is 24/7 , you can adjust stakes easilly , variance is quite high so you need to be deeply stacked but I like it

definetely it is an option to play in the stable or a player pool to reduce variance.

Also, I'm hoping to eventually do a CFP or staking deal once I reach around 50 PLO/NL

what kind of deals are you looking into ?

GL in next week

[Ballerholic]

pretty enjoyable grind . you can play very short session , action is 24/7 , you can adjust stakes easilly , variance is quite high so you need to be deeply stacked but I like it

definetely it is an option to play in the stable or a player pool to reduce variance.




what kind of deals are you looking into ?

GL in next week

That's so cool you play spins. What stakes and site do you play? I've only played about a hundred spins and some of the sickest variance I've ever seen. I can't recall exactly, but is it 300 BIs you need for solid bankroll management?

At the moment I know of a few NLHE CFPs, BitB cash probably will be the one I pursue. I know these require a ton of study and playing so there will be very little time for PLO. Unfortunately, here are really no public PLO CFP programs to join so I'll have to just try and find somebody willing to give me a chance.

Thanks Sink, GL to you too! I think it would be really cool if you started a blog here!

[Ballerholic]

Day 17

Well D-day has occurred. PLO variance is insane! I played really good PLO yesterday on some very soft tables. Unfortunately, the cards just didn't go my way. 10 Buyins Under EV yesterday over 1.2k hands:



Some fun hands:

https://www.boomplayer.com/31756131_CF1FE3D7CB

https://www.boomplayer.com/31756207_4B0F0402A9

https://www.boomplayer.com/31756216_7DDC50560D

https://www.boomplayer.com/31757160_3CB4256C4F

Month so far for PLO:



So still winning at 14.6 evbb/100 which I think is 100% achievable at this stake and I'd even say higher is possible. Either way the stake is beatable and that's all that matters. Just need to put in volume and then the move up to 10 PLO will happen in no time.

Took a sell trade on Microsoft and Intel last night. Will monitor how it goes today. Currently up 0.84% in my trading account so far this month.


Current Bankroll: $832

[Ballerholic]

Day 18

A another losing day. Just negative variance. Play some PLO and NLHE, but only on stars. The software is just so much better than any other site and it's nice having hud stats. I'm still not sure what strategy to use because I feel not playing on other sites might be hurting my profit.



Trading went very well. Up about $6, but I forgot to close the trades out and now I can't close them until Monday...I'm really hoping there won't be a huge gap.

Big sports day ahead, GL all!


Current Bankroll: $813

[MrSink]

That's so cool you play spins. What stakes and site do you play? I've only played about a hundred spins and some of the sickest variance I've ever seen. I can't recall exactly, but is it 300 BIs you need for solid bankroll management?

At the moment I know of a few NLHE CFPs, BitB cash probably will be the one I pursue. I know these require a ton of study and playing so there will be very little time for PLO. Unfortunately, here are really no public PLO CFP programs to join so I'll have to just try and find somebody willing to give me a chance.

Thanks Sink, GL to you too! I think it would be really cool if you started a blog here!

I play on Pokerstars . Stakes 30$+ . Bankroll Managment is really skill dependent . IF you are making good ROI ( 60 chips per game or so ) then variance would not be that bad. IF you are making slightly over breakeven then variance will be sick. But as a rule of thumb 200 should be enough . Never had bigger swing then 80 buy ins .

Cannot say anythink about those deals or recommend any as I am not familiar with cash games and surroundings. For sure , I strongly advise to work with someone, at least one partner to review and analyse or a group of players . Back in the day I just wrote to someone very solid on the tables . Not sure how it works these days , plenty of development sites , stables etc .

Haha thanks . Blogging is not my think though . I will show up here regularly. GL

[Ballerholic]

I play on Pokerstars . Stakes 30$+ . Bankroll Managment is really skill dependent . IF you are making good ROI ( 60 chips per game or so ) then variance would not be that bad. IF you are making slightly over breakeven then variance will be sick. But as a rule of thumb 200 should be enough . Never had bigger swing then 80 buy ins .

Cannot say anythink about those deals or recommend any as I am not familiar with cash games and surroundings. For sure , I strongly advise to work with someone, at least one partner to review and analyse or a group of players . Back in the day I just wrote to someone very solid on the tables . Not sure how it works these days , plenty of development sites , stables etc .

Haha thanks . Blogging is not my think though . I will show up here regularly. GL

Oh wow so you're a really good player then! A few of my poker friends play spins, the highest I think plays $60s mainly so I know a little about the games. Yea I'm thinking of joining BitB CFP. I've talked to the guys a few times and they play 200NL up to 1kNL. Very good guys, I just need to show actual proof of playing hands at a certain stake since most of my play has generally been on untracked sites. But I'll be depositing some cash into my bankroll over the next few weeks and start playing 25-50NL soon.

Being a really good player, how do you find the SBR poker tournaments?

[Ballerholic]

Day 19

Very busy day yesterday, but still managed to put in some volume. Played some 5NL cash and the games were very soft. I'll be at 10NL soon enough, but just trying to run through the stakes on my way to 50NL. Checkout this hand:

https://www.boomplayer.com/31768713_70D40879BA

I don't really know if this is a bad play on my part. I was trying to fold out everything that wasn't Kx+. There are so many draws on this turn in my range and so I have to overbet sets and 2 pairs in order to balance out. So I think it makes sense in theory, I just don't understand his call with 77. If this was high stakes I could understand, but I thought a 5NL player would fold.



Also bet on some sports and make .5 units.

Current Bankroll: $830

[MrSink]

Oh wow so you're a really good player then! A few of my poker friends play spins, the highest I think plays $60s mainly so I know a little about the games. Yea I'm thinking of joining BitB CFP. I've talked to the guys a few times and they play 200NL up to 1kNL. Very good guys, I just need to show actual proof of playing hands at a certain stake since most of my play has generally been on untracked sites. But I'll be depositing some cash into my bankroll over the next few weeks and start playing 25-50NL soon.

Being a really good player, how do you find the SBR poker tournaments?

I do not see any value playing those. Prize pools are super low , to qualify to masters tournament you need to play regularly in those dailies.

[sweep]

yes , full time pro for almost 10 years now. Not cash player though. Sit and goes back in the days , now spin and goes . Stars EU almost exclusively

If you dont mind can dive into what your strategy(s) is for Spin n' Goes? If more comfortable feel free to PM me, thanks

(Dont worry, im on Stars exclusively in New Jersey so we shall never meet on the tables )

[Ballerholic]

Day 20

Poker did not go well at all yesterday. Ran under ev, but sports betting did. 5-2 on NFL Sunday and cannot wait for the NBA to start!


Current Bankroll: $816

[MrSink]

If you dont mind can dive into what your strategy(s) is for Spin n' Goes? If more comfortable feel free to PM me, thanks

(Dont worry, im on Stars exclusively in New Jersey so we shall never meet on the tables )

thats not possible to write it in the single post . strategy is too complex.
I got 300 charts with preflop scenarios , different positions and stack depths . then you got adjustments vs different type of opponnets
then I created decision tree for core strategy postflop. then you got main adjustments vs different frequencies there

cannot share that though . spent just countless hours on that

[MrSink]

my few advices would be :
- play 100% hands from hu sb as a default ; cbet almost always
- defend hu bb like 75-80% vs MR
- btn 35% open , and solid gameplan
- isolate BBvSB in 3way as you are in position
- cut SB v BB in 3way as you are out of position

simple few tips

[sweep]