My Story

My name is Ryan and I am a part time husng player.  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 23 years old, own and operate my own business in the spring to fall months and enjoy hobbies such as brewing beer and golfing.  I reside in the city of Chicago and I live with my girlfriend of 4 years.

Coaching Informaton 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, generally speaking this is my main method of coaching:

I like to start with a handful of hand history reviews.  This can be as little as a single hand history review or as many as a dozen.  This really depends on your skill level and the types of hand histories that you send me.  I prefer students send in hand histories where they frequently run into hands that they are not sure about.  However, unlike many other coaches, I find that sending in hand histories in which the student feels he/she played "perfectly" are also very valuable.  This is mainly because not only are you going to struggle with situations that you do not understand, but you will also struggle in situations that you think you are correctly playing in when in fact you are applying the wrong logic to the hand or opponent in question.

After reviewing the first batch of hand histories, I send them back to the student with full, detailed commentary on a hand by hand basis.  I also will add a summary of my thoughts at the end of the hand history when needed.

I like students to then go over my reviews at their own pace and send me any questions about anything that they did not understand (this is at no additional cost).

Once they fully understand the comments from my reviews, I prefer students go out and play some games, applying the concepts from the reviews.

After they've played a certain amount of games (this can range from 20 games to 200 games, depending on the player), I like to repeat the HH review process again.

It varies greatly from player to player, but after some time of repeating this process we usually come to a point where the player's fundamentals in the game are becoming very strong.  At this point I like to work on some hour long sessions where I watch the player play games and listen to their thought process on every single hand of the match.  I can also see some things that don't show up in hand histories, mainly timing tells from both the student and a recognition of the timing tells given off by the opponent. 

I've also on occasion gone into other areas of coaching with students.  Some of these methods include, but are not limited to, student versus coach sessions, students listening to my thoughts as I play a game (similar to a video but they can ask questions in real time or have me play specific buyin levels on specific sites or even play against a specific player).  I've also had group coaching sessions with multiple students at one time as well as "guest" coaching sessions where myself and a husng pro work with student(s).

My Statistics

For specific level by level statistics, you can sharkscope me under RyPac13 on PokerStars.

With 100% accuracy (Tourney Manager stats I have), over my last 1,626 110+5 turbos I have made $12,602.50 for a 6.7% ROI.

1,524 of those games are doing two tables at one time.  Comparatively speaking, the highest ROI of any player in the 110s on Pokerstars with a significant sample size is 10% and the player in question single tables.

Rates

Sweat Session - $80 per hour

Hand History Reviews - $25 dollars per HH (up to 50 hands) $40 dollars per HH (50-99 hands)

Bulk Discount Rates - email for pricing and availability

For coaching inquires you may email me here.

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 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 will update these periodically.  In all cases, I will never publish a student's name without their explicit permission.

Example Student A - This is a stakee really, but I've reviewed HHs for him, individual hands and I've especially talked a lot of strategy over the months with him.

The stake started in April and just finished recently. The player is a part time player who is enrolled in college full time. We are currently working out a second staking arrangement.

Here are his stats prior to our stake:

1,525 $0 $25 4% $573

Here are his stats from our staking arrangement:

381 $1 $25 7% $509

Example Student B - I reviewed a handful of HHs for this student in February of 2008.  Here are his results prior to our reviews (filtered for husngs):

2,882 $0 $5 4% $670

Here are his results from February until now (last updated in December of 2008):

793 $1 $9 9% $668

I've also coached several players who have gone on and had great success in other forms of poker, including heads up cash and 6 max cash.

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 fully apply to today's games.  If you have any questions about anything I have written in the past, feel free to email me about it):

25-50 Blind Level Play

Dealing with Limping Players and How to Play Against a Min Bettor