After checking out my friend Ric's blog, I had to get one going. I thought it was a great way to document my poker progress. I often sit around and think about the different hands I have played and like to think out loud. I figured this would be a good way to remember some of the challenges I have face and overcome. I know from my limited time playing poker that dealing with variance is a difficult thing. Learning to deal with having your money in with the best hand, only to lose over and over again is something that I still need to work on. I understand those things will happen and the inevitable downswings occur, even for the best players, but it still doesn't make it any easier to watch your bankroll shrink and you confidence in your game disappear.
But, I thought I would start this blog because I feel I have made a few strides in my poker playing where I could start to investigate whether I could support myself playing poker. While my confidence in the long term profitability of my game has risen, I am starting to question whether I can play enough sngs to make that happen. I need to get over this and this will be the first challenge I will document in my blog. I have tried to increase the number of sngs I have been playing, but with very mixed results. I find that I can play 100 in a week and then I just get burned out. So I dont seem to be able to keep the volume I play high enough...I dont know why. My only thought is because I do not like the swings that accompany playing a high volume of sngs. Therefore, I try to maximize my ROI which is limiting my ##s of sngs. I am currently 2-tabling because it allows me to play each bubble efficiently. I still take a push/fold strategy to the bubble, but I am still a bit tighter than a lot of players that push hard at the 10xBB threshold. So, by making $$/hr my priority means I will have to change my game. I am fearful because I have a profitable game and dont want to mess with it, but this style will not allow me to ever support myself...So, here we go...
Chronicling my progress from sng grinder to NL cash. I am starting at 50NL with a goal to be grinding the 200-400NL games. Anything above that is gravy. Check out my progress. I started with $300 bucks and come see if I flame out or if I am moving up the ranks!
1 comment:
I like that you are beginning to recognize your burnout level. My experience in life tells me to avoid burnout at all costs. It's one thing when you are working an hourly wage or salaried job, heck you paid the same no matter what your productivity (more or less). But when you are paid solely on productivity, the tendency of most is think, "hey, if I work more, I will produce more". Which, of course, seems logical. Experience has shown me over and over again, both in watching myself and others, that we all have a limit as to what we can do, and when we step beyond that limit our productiveness decreases dramitically. Our focus falls off and we start giving back what we've already made. Some examples.....When I drove a taxi I would make more money driving 5 days than driving six. I had a friend who maxed out at 4 days. I sold cars for a few years and saw many people pushed out of the business because they worked so many hours that they couldn't focus. I found my most profitable level to be around 50 hrs a week, and ended making more than guys working 80-90. I have a friend selling cars right now that is working part time (3 12 hours days is considered part time) and he has closing ratio of over 80% in business where 25% is considered phenominal. Car dealers over work their sales people and create an inefficient environment. This is normal, though, in an atmosphere that values productitvity. It makes no logical sense in pratice, but then burnt out managers are making the decisions.
As you know, this is what I experimented with recently and it seems to be working out (though it's really too early to know). I diversified my poker, took up SnG's while I normally play limit. I'm enjoying limit again and having fun with SnG's too.
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