Thomas Tiroch(TwiceT)

TwiceT joins PokerVIP!

Heyho Boys & Girls! TwiceT is in tha house :)            

Who am I? T ... Twice T!

 I consider myself a life enjoying person, who (inspired by KingJulien XIII) likes to do crazy monkeystyle shit. However, I am also a hard working entrepreneur and venture capitalist as well as a dedicated poker professional.

Poker

 I love the game. While doing an internship in Dublin, Ireland during the summer of 2007, a friend linked me to some "online Poker strategy articles". Didn't take me all that long to realize there are really people out there who make money consistently playing a fun card game. With the help of my mentor Ash05 I started reading during my work hours and started playing micros after the numerous party nights. I didn't get much sleep in Dublin, but it was a great experience. Back in Vienna I continued my studies and my Job. However, after some intensive months of learning basic and advanced SNG concepts, I made more money with playing SNGs than with my job in January 2007. Hence, I quit my Job and focused on University and Poker.    

I was into both a lot, basically didn't do anything else during those days than studying and grinding. I have been pretty dedicated throughout my whole poker career. The single most important skill I developed over time is probably being self-aware and self-critical to the highest degree. I started playing SNGs and MTTs, switched over to NLHE CG (first FR, then SH and a lot of HU) and after a while found out that there is quite some money to be made in a crazy game called PLO. I played all stakes up to 25/50 online and live, sometimes even higher live and also played afew 5k and 10k live Trnys. I consider PLO HU my strongest game relative to the competition, simple because it requires the highest level of a professional mindset. While it's probably possible to be a winning NLHE FR grinder without a very strong mindset, it won't be possible with PLO HU. Why? Just play the game for 10k hands and you'll understand what I'm talking about :P :D Plomahahhaa, is crazy but I love it!   

I am also writing a Poker Book with cool Math Prof from UK. During the course of the book, I try my best to get our Professor from NL10 to NL100 and help him to beat the games. Its mostly structured as a discussion and we hope to help a few players improve their games. Our target audience will mostly be low and mid stakes NLHE SH players and we are putting a special focus on Rush/Zoom poker. I hope the book will be finished by the end of 2012, quite some work I can tell you!

(serious TT is serious)

Business

I love the business world and the infinite options it offers. After finishing University in 2009 (Master degree in Int. Business Management) I focused on various business ventures and investments. The idea was to make money playing poker and invest it in startups and work on own crazy projects in different industries. By today, I am pretty diversified and have several companies in different countries in Europe running and most projects look very promising. Some of those ventures are high risk, some are low risk. Some are crazy and innovative, some are boring and focusing on steady-eddy cash in flow. While a bit of capital and big cojones are important in order to get things done, having the right team is of crucial significance. From my experience the success of any product or service is heavily dependent on having a great team. I try as much as I can to focus on my business partners and to create products/services that benefit the customers as much as possible. I dont mind sacrificing short term profits for long term sustainability. The skills I developed in Poker are definitely helpful for my business endeavours. Especially my level-headedness even in the most stressful of times is key for me, otherwise I would probably go crazy since there is always action with so many projects running simultaneously. Ofc I wanna make money, but foremost having own companies and being part of business projects is a great creative endeavour (which is fulfilling in itself) without limitations. Gotta love it :) Common sense says you have to focus on one thing in the beginning, become very good at it and then diversify. My line is a bit different as I am diversified from the beginning. My approach might be wrong, but still I like it that way and I have such great teams around me, that make it possible. And even if – worst case – I go busto with all companies (quite unlikely, but who knows :D), I am sure I will find ways to keep moving forward. It’s not about how hard you can hit, it's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward, that’s how winning is done (true story, (c) Rocky)

I see two main threats and weaknesses to my strategy: 1) I focus on too many projects. Even though I have really great teams around me, I might not have enough experience and resources to handle it well enough. Rather building one multi million dollar business than 9 small ones who struggle to survive ... but then again, besides KingJulien I believe in Pinky&Brain's attitude. Their goal is to rule the world, my goal is to reach business world domination one day with my own venture capital fund (hopefully being able to only focus on companies that generate lifeEV for the ppl on our planet and not destroying value for the benefit of profit only). 2) I focus too much on "making it big" and sometimes forget that the ultimate goal in life is not necessarily making things bigger and bigger. Sometimes a small business is actually worth more net value than a big one, but the value is hidden because it doesn't show in the balance sheet. These days I’m restructuring a little bit and trying to build a massive venture capital company to be rdy for future business sickness :D

I do believe that Poker taught me a lot, probably got me to develop crucial skills for the future success of my business and private life. More than any school or any university can ever teach imho. One day you will read about my venture capital fund in Fortune500 and say “lol I know this fkn bastard!”

Let me finish the business part with one parable...

  I think this should make many of us smile who went to business school and approach things the "max$EV" way.

"A few years ago, a very rich businessman decides to take a vacation to a small tropical island in the South Pacific. He has worked hard all his life and has decided that now is the time to enjoy the fruits of his labor. He is excited about visiting the island because he’s heard that there is incredible fishing there. He loved fishing as a young boy, but hasn’t gone in years because he has been so busy working to save for his retirement.

So on the first day, he has his breakfast and heads to the beach. It’s around 9:30 am. There he spots a fisherman coming in with a large bucket full of fish!

"How long did you fish for?" he asks. The fisherman looks at the businessman with a wide grin across his face and explains that the fishes for about three hours every day. The businessman then asks him why he returned so quickly.

"Don’t worry", says the fisherman, "There’s still plenty of fish out there."

Dumbfounded, the businessman asks the fisherman why he didn’t continue catching more fish. The fisherman patiently explains that what he caught is all he needs. "I’ll spend the rest of the day playing with my family, talking with my friends and maybe drinking a little wine. After that I’ll relax on the beach.”

Now the rich businessman figures he needs to teach this peasant fisherman a thing or two. So he explains to him that he should stay out all day and catch more fish. Then he could save up the extra money he makes and buy and even bigger boats to catch even more fish. The he could keep reinvesting his profits in even more boats and hire many other fisherman to work for him. If he works really hard, in 20 or 30 years he’ll be a very rich man indeed.

The businessman feels pleased that he’s helped teach this simple fellow how to become rich. Then the fisherman looks at the businessman with a puzzled look on his face and asks what he’ll do after he becomes very rich.

The businessman responds quickly "You can spend time with your family, talk with your friends, and maybe drink a little wine. Or you could just relax on the beach."

Lemur Life: I love living.

Those of you who follow me for the last years, know that my personal slogan has always been "I like to move it move it". Inspired by KingJulien I like to move it move it on the dancefloor, on my poker tables and in the business world. I have been blogging and coaching for many years and am very glad to be part of the young and dynamic PokerVIP crew from now on. You can expect regular updates, a lot of trash and business talk and sometimes even some poker content. Don't get me wrong in the beginning. You might think I’m not serious enough because you won't see EV calculations here or theory heavy instructional videos. However, I can ensure you guys that I don't do anything else all day than trying to become better in everything I do. I am obsessed in improving and having fun on my way. In the end, it's all about balance. I personally cannot achieve balance if I take Poker, one of my companies or private problems too serious. That doesn't mean I am not serious about what I do though :) Partying and travelling a lot is also a key strategic concept for my strategy. Those who joined me somewhere around the world for a party (Vegas, Bangkok, Vienna ... ) know what I am talking about. If anybody of you is planning on visiting Vienna btw, let me know and we crush my home-club. We get some special VIP treatment there :D

If anybody of you get by Vienna and wanna challenge me in Golf/Badminton/Tennis … sidebets, just let me know and bring some moniiiez :)

A few pics/vids :D

My baller Penthouse view: 

TT drives TT: 

Power/Control/Accuracy, Kicking it 250+ with my Callaway FT9 <3 :

PokerVIP. What Am I Doing Here?

What am I going to do at PokerVIP? I am going to produce NLHE and PLO Coaching Videos, blog regularly (this is the first blog post btw :P) and also offer private coaching sessions.

Videos:

I have recorded around 150 strategy videos over the last years for another training site. I was always trying to keep them edutaining and to find a balance between serious and trash talk. There are definitely better poker players out there but nonetheless I should be able to help many of you guys in the future. There are probably not many coaches who have more experience in coaching so many different gametypes publicly and privately.

Private Coaching:

I mainly coach HU-SNG, PLO and NLHE Cashgames (HU/SH/FR) & you can book my coaching services here. I would consider PLO HU my main/best game atm. However, I played hundreds of thousands of hands in all game formats and I feel skilled and experienced enough to coach those. I usually like to mix live sweat sessions, video reviews, HEM/PT hand and stats analysis as well as discussions about general concepts or students’ questions about anything. I recently also started playing a lot more live (especially 25/50 PLO) in Vienna, so in case anybody visits our great city and needs some live-play coaching, that would be possible as well :) 

For some steady-eddy graphs, please check the footer of this page.

Blog:

My last blog was pretty famous (bit less than 500k views) and I enjoyed blogging a lot. It has always been a mix of my Poker/University/Travelling/Business Lifestyle over the last years. I hope this blog will be entertaining and informative for many of you (though not much Uni stuff to expect since I already finished my MA) Looking forward to getting to know many new faces here on my new blogging/coaching homebase at PokerVIP :)

Good Luck!