What do your notes look like on your play?

I have been playing poker pretty regularly since the summer and have been playing online since about October. I have studied a few books, and have a decent mind for math, and have turned a nice profit playing mostly at the NL $25 Cash Games on PP.

Many of the posts talk about taking detailed notes about your play to find holes in your game. I think this lack of proper notes is itself a hole in my game. My notes currently consist of how long I played and how much money I lost or made.

Any suggestions?

What exactly should I be writing down?

Should I use Poker Tracker and analyze every single hand? This seems a bit tedious.

Look forward to the feedback.

I play in a small room so i can remember how most players play so my notes usually are pretty useless, like "fish monger" "douchebag" "not a "douchebag" or sometimes i'll compare them to this incredibly horrible player who has given me alot of money like "worse than miken" or "slightly better than miken".

If you want to take it seriously though just develop a code, important things to note are of course, good or bad, whether they chase draws, caller, aggro, passive, tight, slow player. Just make up abbreviations and put them down, and then write something down that will make you laugh when you see it next.

I meant more along the lines of note on your own play rather than notes on other players. I think I have the note on other players down, I am trying to improve my game through some sort of analysis. I am unsure of where to begin.

PokerTracker is free for the first 1,000 hands. Give it a try and see if you like it. Get it through the FTR affiliate link: PokerTracker

for opponents i use a system for betting and calling behavior

For betting behavior i have 3 to -3, 3 being very aggressive, -3 being very passive, 0 being an even mix.

Calling behavior is pretty much the same, 3 being very loose in what they will call with and -3 meaning they will fold everything but the nuts.

i also like to remember how they play draws, whether they slow play, etc.

For myself, i play live games, but if i were you i would right down the hand #s of key hands and use poker tracker to analyze later.

Originally Posted by rob6597

PokerTracker is free for the first 1,000 hands. Give it a try and see if you like it. Get it through the FTR affiliate link: PokerTracker

I dl'd this yesterday and It is the coolest. Not only does it keep crazy stats on you it does the same for everyone you play with. Hopefully I can make enough money before my free 1000 hands runs out so I can buy this bad-boy. I expect this software to greatly improve my game. So check it out fer sure.

How do you use the stats that Poker Tracker gives you to improve your game? Do you have an example?

I can look at numbers for days but they don't always help me by themselves.