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Andreas Fröhli: I'm generally not very good at losing
A few days ago, we watched you in the Wolf Millionaire tournament, where you finished in seventh place (for CHF 24,150). What were your feelings right after the tournament?
"It's quite disappointing. I think I played pretty well, from the first day to the last one. I'm not 100 percent satisfied, of course, and I'll definitely go through some more spots. But the last hand, for example, I thought was also well played for the most part. I didn't have many opportunities to make decisions other than the ones I did, sometimes it was between all-in and min-raise. I'm especially sorry about the two key hands that I lost. In the last 13 hands with 5bb, I lost AJ against AT. If I had won that hand, I think I would have had a pretty good chance to win the whole tournament. In the last thirteen hands I subsequently ran into AQ with KJ. After that I was pretty much card dead and couldn't make much of it. Still in the last twelve players I experienced a 3-bet bluff with KTs, I discarded KQs, it was hard to find a 4-bet jam then. I could have done it, but I felt like I didn't have an edge on that field on the last two tables. Those were the 3-4 hands that were the turning points in my opinion. But overall, I'm happy with the way I played."
The aforementioned 3-bet bluff starts at 3:16:00
How did you find the structure of this tournament?
"The tournament had a really cool structure, when you play four days it can't even be bad. The last two days people played pretty tight so we were very shallow and it was pretty challenging. Most of the time with 25-30 blinds or more you get to the flop, now it was more about preflop play. Unfortunately I didn't see as many flops, but that's okay."
Let's move on to you and your poker career. I'm sure a lot of people in the DACH space know you, but our readers might not. What can you tell us about yourself?
"It depends on what you're interested in. I'm 35 years old and I've been playing poker since 2013. Ever since I was a kid, I've been into different games. Growing up I played cards with my grandparents, and I didn't start playing poker until I was about 20. I got into it by accident when I was in Australia. I was trying to improve my English there and I wanted to learn languages, I eventually completed that study successfully. In retrospect, it may not have been the best decision, but that's easy to say now. Maybe I shouldn't have spent 4.5 years studying and I should have gone straight into poker. At the time, I didn't have the confidence to do it. When I was already playing as a teacher, I was pretty sure I knew how to be successful in poker. In 2017 I started playing full out and the first year I lost about a third of my bankroll, which was pretty bad, but every year since then until now has been a winning year."
Do you also play online?
"I played mostly online until 2023, but then it started to get monotonous for me. So I started travelling and getting to know different countries."
When you're playing tournaments do you find time for tourism?
"Sometimes yes, I like to hike. If there are good trails somewhere nearby, I like to try it. I'm not so interested in museums and galleries, more in nature."
Besides tournaments, do you have a routine that you follow to stay in shape?
"I try to exercise regularly and eat well. I think when you play for long hours, food is a very important factor."
And what do you follow regarding food?
"I also consult a nutritionist so I know what to eat and when to eat it. I try to time it, although it's clear that sometimes it's not optimal. But it's simple, I don't eat any added sugars, I don't smoke or drink. I eat things that are not overly processed, vegetables, meat. I grew up on a farm, so I like meat."
I know you do quite a bit of coaching as well. Tell me a little bit about that.
"I coach about 35 players, most in Pot Limit Omaha and about five in Hold'em. But now I've started playing more Hold'em again, so maybe I'll start coaching more of that as well, but mostly recreational players. I think there are better Holdem coaches than me for the pros. I've played millions of hands in PLO, so I coach a lot of people in that, but especially cash game. I coach people individually, explaining concepts, how PLO works, what to focus on and how to maximize wins. But it's more of a side activity, I focus more on the game."
When you're coaching beginners, are there any things that you think are important when someone wants to start taking poker more seriously?
"For beginners, I've also made some videos on PLO, I have my youtube channel. There I explain the basics, my thoughts on poker and general principles. There are a lot of important skills in poker that are not technical. Like never playing for all your money - bankroll management is very important and in my opinion also very underrated. And it's actually at the core of my teaching and one of my strengths. In the last 6 years I have never played beyond my means. It's something that was instilled in me by my parents, maybe sometimes too much so. Maybe I could try a bigger tournament and succeed, but I still have plenty of time for that."
How do you cope with losing? What are you going to do now? Are you going to give yourself some time and then analyze?
"I've gotten pretty good at that over the years. Generally I'm not very good at losing. On the table maybe people don't see it, that's where I try not to let it affect my game. But after a loss I still feel some anger and disappointment and my strategy is not to fight it violently and feel it out. I don't think it's the best idea to forcefully suppress it. When I'm online sometimes I hit something at home, of course I don't do that when I'm playing live (laughs). I think you can still play well when you're angry. It doesn't eliminate the strategy so much. At least for me. When I play bad, it's mainly because I don't know how to play better. If I don't know how it works in specific spots, chances are I haven't studied enough. But anger doesn't affect me that much, in my opinion."
What hobbies do you have outside of poker? How do you like to relax?
"I've been playing a lot of chess lately, trying to learn and get better at it. It's something I like to do after poker sessions if I'm not too tired. It's not gambling. For me personally, poker is still gambling, even though there's a lot of skill in it. But variance always affects a person emotionally. Even chess can make a person emotional when you lose or play badly. But it's a different game and I enjoy going from one to the other. Otherwise, I like sports, working out, traveling, meeting new people. I also like to learn languages and I like wellness, spa. I do it once a week or so, treat myself to a day when I'm not really doing anything else, and that gives me the energy to keep playing."
Which languages do you speak?
"Mother tongue German, English I'm trying French. It's not as good as my English, but I'm trying and learning."
What are your next plans, maybe some poker dreams?
"I'm trying to work my way up to bigger limits and I'm slowly getting there. This tournament obviously helped, I won 24k. I'm going to the WSOP again this year, so I'll see what I can achieve there, how I feel. Last year I really enjoyed it there, I played a lot of PLO tournaments, I want to try again this year. I want to play the higher limits and see how it goes, then I can re-evaluate a lot of things and see if I can do anything differently. Maybe after the summer I'll decide to focus more on learning, coaching is very important to me, I don't want to stop doing that. And I think it helps when a person achieves something in their field. As far as coaching is concerned, people trust you more then that you are competent. I have poker skills that I can teach people and that's what I want to do."
What makes you a good teacher?
"I know that the relationship between teacher and student is very important, so I try to have good relationships with everyone I teach. Clearly, people don't always get along character-wise. And besides, I think it shows in me that I'm really interested in poker, and I take what I teach seriously. So I think competence still comes first when it comes to that."
Thanks for the interview Andreas, and wishing you much continued success!