January 2013 Update - I am currently not taking on any new students until at least February 2012 due to time constraints. If you have any questions, need to be pointed in the right direction or absolutely need to use me for coaching and no other coaches appeal to you, shoot me an email (rypac13@husng.com) or message me on AIM (HUSNGcom) or Skype (ryanryan1313). Thank you.
Heads Up Coaching With RyPac13
Story
Hello, I am Ryan, the founder of husng.com. In January 2007, a friend transferred me $150 dollars to play with. I quickly dropped over a third of it in the $5 regular speed husngs on PokerStars. Since then I have worked my way up without redepositing into the "high" page on Stars, regularly beating the $110+5 level and playing as high as $550+20.
I always strive to make logical decisions in the game and while I don't play a very high volume, I have found various ways to manage and deal with the tilt and frustration associated with poker, particularly heads up poker.
My mind is always open to new changes, theories and adjustments in the game and I regularly talk to dozens of successful high stakes heads up players from around the world, giving me a well rounded and balanced view of the game.
On a personal note, I am 25 years old and reside in Chicago.
Coaching Information and Methods
My goal is to efficiently analyze your play and offer you logical adjustments to improve your game and turn you into a profitable or more profitable player. I have several ways that I do this and while I like to recommend certain programs and areas of study on a player by player basis, here are some general examples of how I start coaching with new students:
Low Stakes Players
Due to a lower budget on average and a higher amount of weaknesses that are more easily corrected, I push my lower stakes heads up sng students to start off with a hand history review, usually just one game at first. A hand history review has the advantage of being cost effective for the student, but also allows me to quickly identify and give advice on issues a student is having trouble with. I recommend starting with a small amount (usually one hand history) so that there is a minimal amount of repetitiveness in the reviews. Students often can understand the advice I am giving after one or two examples in the hand history and if they properly study and work on it they can eliminate those weaknesses very quickly. If you start out with five hand history reviews, you may see a lot of the same problems being addressed, especially very common spots that you can improve on (a very general example would be limping against a player that folds to a lot of raises out of position).
Hand histories work as follows: The student selects a hand history, unedited, from one of their games (If you don't automatically save hand histories to your computer from the poker room and cannot find any in HoldemManager or do not have HoldemManager, you can email the site to receive your full hand histories). The student then sends the hand history to my email, either attached in .txt format or simply pasted into the email text. The student then pays for the review (email me the payment options that work best for you and I can usually make it work out). I then review the hand history, usually within 2-3 days of receiving it, and send it back fully reviewed, with comments under each relevant hand. *Note: Hands with large pots are not only reviewed. Something as simple as folding Q2o on the button may be talked about, even if it is the correct play. It's important to sometimes highlight not just why a decision was less than best, but why the best decision was correct.
Mid Stakes Winners, $100-220 Buyin Struggling Players
For these students, it is sometimes preferable to start with an option besides a hand history review. While I do recommend hand history reviews for players of all stakes and success levels, if you have a higher budget and want to focus on a very specific section of your game, single hand reviews, theory sessions, leakfinders or sweat sessions may be preferable to a hand history review (though a well selected hand history can still suffice for this topic).
Single hand reviews are similar to posting hands on poker forums. You send me a hand and I fully analyze it. If you have reads or notes on your opponent, those are taken into consideration and mentioned, when relevant, why they are important to the hand in question. Without reads, you'll get the "readless" analysis on the hand as well as a few changes in your approach to the hand if you were up against a common opponent type (for example a loose player in the low stakes, which is common).
Heads up SNG leakfinders are similar to the videos found on this site that are labeled "leakfinder." You will need to record your screen using a free recording program such as camstudio, send me the silently recorded video of your game(s) and I will record myself viewing it and adding commentary. This allows me to see not only your "real time" decision making, but also your opponent's timing and the general pace of the match.
Sweat sessions are simply myself railing you as you play a normal session. Most of the time we discuss hands after you make a decision and talk heavily about the opponent you are playing and the adjustments you need to make to fully exploit this player.
High Stakes Players or Successful Players From Non Heads Up SNG Game Types
I recommend these prospective students to email me prior to coaching and usually discuss their needs on Skype or AIM before I agree to coach them. I may recommend holding off on coaching or even recommend a higher stakes coach for some of these players, depending on their specific skill level and goals.
Players transitioning into heads up sng often have very specific skill sets that they need to work on. For example, heads up cash players I've found are generally very strong players 50-75bb deep, but are much less skilled in the 10-30bb areas. Therefore, we'll often end up working on end game type strategies, particularly the same kind of skills that one would need to play the super turbo heads up sngs on Full Tilt (0-25bb structure).
Players coming from games that usually sit over 6 players at the table may need more hand selection and aggression oriented advice. Whatever the case, we can tailor coaching to suit your needs.
My Statistics
For specific level by level statistics, you can sharkscope me under RyPac13 on PokerStars.
My $110+5 turbo speed heads up sng stats are as follows:
Most of that sample size includes playing two tables at once. To compare this to professionals at this level, 9% is the highest lifetime ROI that I have seen from a single table player with at least 1,000 games played.
Rates
Sweat/Theory Session - $80 per hour
Hand History Review (according to number of hands in a single, unedited hand history)
0-30 hands - $20
31-40 hands - $25
41-60 hands - $35
61-80 hands - $45
81-100 hands - $60
101+ hands - Email*
*Hand histories over 100 hands often include a very slow structure (pokerstars no blind increase or regular speed, full tilt deep stack) but sometimes are not ideal hand histories due to the very passive nature of the match that can often result in 100+ hand histories. For that reason, and the variety of hands a single hand history may contain when it has over 100 hands in it, I prefer to discuss these on an individual basis. You can expect the same type of rates (adjusted for a larger amount of hands) as I charge for shorter hand histories.
Leakfinder Video (personal, non published) - $80 for up to 20 minutes of single table, silent recorded video (usually works out to 3+ minutes of leakfinder video per 1 minute of recorded silent video you send me (roughly 60-90 minutes if you send me a 20 minute video). Email for two table leakfinder rates or for unique situations.
Leakfinder Video (posted on husng.com) - $50 for up to 20 minutes of single table, silent recorded video.
Bulk Discount Rates - For experienced and highly dedicated students we may be able to work out a bulk discount rate. However, with a higher rate of problems happening with coaches that use bulk discounts (and a large % of coaches in the poker world do offer this), I prefer to use an alternative solution for both myself and students regarding discounts.
If you're a regular student of mine, you may receive a free hand history after receiving and paying for a specific amount of hand histories prior to the free one.
For example, instead of a 20% discount on 10 hand history reviews paid up front (at $20 each that would be $200 regular price and $160 discount) I may just make the 10th HH review free (and if a 20% discount were the target it could represent a $40 value review). That way, and specifically for lower stakes students, the student is not tying up money for a longer time period and I don't have to worry about holding your money and perhaps refunding or sending back part of the bulk payment if the student cashes out all their money, quits poker or loses their money in other games/higher stakes. The solution offers you the same discount you would receive if you had paid up front, but without having to pay all the money up front, feel forced to get HH reviews faster than the ideal pace for you and without any awkward situations if you stop needing heads up sng coaching.
For coaching inquires you may email me at rypac13 [at] husng [dot] com.
Testimonials
"I am a successful mid stakes hu cash player who was transitioning into the 220 husng games, after struggling initially I did some coaching with Ryan and have improved my husng tremendously since then, particularly on the areas of the mid to end game"
-Bosoxx34, duecescracked cash coach
"Ryan and I have discussed strategy since we were both grinding the low stake levels of husngs. He has quickly become one of the top poker minds in the husng community. He is highly proficient in the difficult task of taking advanced husng concepts and explaining them in lehman's terms. I would recommend Ryan as a coach to anyone looking to improve their husng game."
-Greg "HokieGreg Hu" Tiller, professional poker player
Student Results
I've coached over 100 students in the last 18 months. Success varies from student to student, but a very high % of students that stay with the game, play regularly and work to improve (meaning focused play, not out of control lifestyles and very emotional decision making at the tables) experience positive results.
Time length on results do vary. Many students report success and comfort improvements after just one or two hand history reviews or other coaching sessions. Reviews of my coaching can be found in some of the forums on husng.com or on the 2p2 poker forums (My coaching old coaching thread on 2p2 can be found here and my active coaching thread on 2p2 can be found here).
Written Work
I regularly post on the 2p2 HuNL forum under the handle "ChicagoRy." I've outlined a few threads I created or participated heavily in below, to help give you an idea about how I think about the game (Note: some of this information was written well over a year ago and may not completely apply to today's games. The 25-50 article in particular has some points that need to be updated. The limping player article and min bettor article should be fairly consistently relevant. If you have any questions about any of those articles or strategy posting that I've done, feel free to email me):
25-50 Blind Level Play
Dealing with Limping Players and How to Play Against a Min Bettor