Resetting my Poker life?

Alright, this is my first step to recovery from my poker ailment I am faced with and I know FTR can help. Let me explain:

This is probably the first of many walls (hopefully the severity of which decreases) I will hit in my career.

In the past month I have lost $175 dollars to deposits on Stars to try and build up a BR on that site to play in the Gauntlet with. I have also lost about $150 on my Full Tilt BR, not including my withdrawals. I am now down to about $200 in my total BR, 30 on stars 170 on Tilt. I started this whole thing with a $50 dollar deposit on Tilt.

As you can see, my BR, had I not had those losses, would be around $525. I think this shows I'm capable of solid poker. What I am asking, is how can I reset my poker game? How can I get back to the fundamentals to get out of this rut? I feel every hand I play that I'm running into a brick wall the last few weeks. Hell, I lost quads over quads today, it was disgusting. I want to get better, I want to start making enough from poker to actually spend some of my earnings (the goal for 2006 is to win >10K and by a new car ((one that works!)) with the winnings). Help me get back to basics guys?

$200 is fine. Choose a site and consolidate. Find the bonuses and rakeback. Have you whored Casino on Net Black Jack? That could ad another $200. When you have a roll that size whoring and rake are vital.

Yes, CON, then whore star and planet, $400 right there... Sry saw u on AIM and missed you.

Do cameo appearances and pretend to be Val Kilmer too.

Then I'd set up Rakeback at Bodog or Party.

-Bonuses - find as many as possible

-post some troublesome hand histories here, and we'll help you find your leaks...

-Take a break. A week with NO poker. Read, Read, Read while on break, you'll come back fresh and with a passion

-make your own long list of notes, on why it's important to be aggressive, why it's important to be aware of your position, switching gears, practicing good table selection. Once you get on a roll it's extremely easy to forget the basics, and develop "Fancy Play Syndrome", or get over-confident. But if you write it all out yourself, it'll stick in your head a little longer. Re-read and modify what you wrote often.

FYI - that's what worked for me, after taking two trips around the Noob Circle of Death and almost blowing a $700 roll twice.

Variance happens.

...well that and you just might not be very g00t at polka.

This thread comes to mind :?

http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/...hlight=#190876

I think variance is a word used much too often here @ FTR. Instead of saying: "it must have been variance," many should be saying: "I played poorly tonight."

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Originally Posted by BankItPayette

I think variance is a word used much too often here @ FTR. Instead of saying: "it must have been variance," many should be saying: "I played poorly tonight."

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Except that the part about poker that screws with peoples heads so much that they play so terrible is that short-term results and quality of play are so disjoint.

I've had many days where I've been off my game, got in lots of money with the worst of it and walked away a pretty big winner.

I'm thinking about writing out the poker philosophy i've developed so far, just so that I can reinforce what I know and have learned so far. And I do think I'll do some reading (or rereading) over Christmas break. Reading books on the mental side of golf always help me for a while, and I know I've played some great poker after reading some of sklansky's books, so I think that's one way to reset my poker game.

As for the previous post of mine marked in this article. I still try and play when I feel I can win and quit when I can't, It's just I've had a lot of those quitting sessions lately, My time is a little constrained. I don't have my own computer and can't play in my own environment. In fact, I've noticed I play better when I can hear the cards be dealt and the bets and raises as opposed to having to play without sound like i have lately. I think environment has thrown me off a bit, but also playing on an inconsistent basis has probably hurt me as well. Hopefully over break, I can get things straight and start making a comeback playing some solid poker.

Thanks guys, any more comments? keep em comin....


Also, I know my 2006 goal is a high one, but I've always shot for high goals. To make 10K in a year I need to make just under $28 dollars a day, I think this can be done. Does this goal seem unreasonable? Let me know.

10K in a year is pretty realistic actually, if you take advantage of bonuses, rakeback, and practice good BR management. I've been playing for about 9 months now and have made about 9K total, and that's after a couple agonizing months of building up and dropping back down. But my real question to you is, after you make 10K, are you just gonna take it all out and buy your car? Then what? Start all over again? Quit playing all together? Once you get up to 1-2 NL, I doubt you'll want to drop back down to the chump-change tables. It's a tough balancing act trying to cash-out some and build a BR at the same time. I should know, cause I've probably spent too much of my roll on other stuff instead of just continuously moving up.

I was thinking that if I earn 10 K next year I will give 1K to my dad cause I owe him and 1K to my mom for what I owe her and then use a chunk of what I got to put a down payment on a car. I'd prolly keep the BR aroun 4-5 K, that way I can continue to earn enough to pay for the car and insurance withough haveing to start from scratch again.

I never use sounds or multicolored decks or anything that isn't standard at all the sites if possible. You don't want to get dependant on those things because even tiny nuisances can affect your game. This isn't going to solve anything major - just responding to what you mentioned as far as environment.

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Except that the part about poker that screws with peoples heads so much that they play so terrible is that short-term results and quality of play are so disjoint.

I've had many days where I've been off my game, got in lots of money with the worst of it and walked away a pretty big winner.

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Too close to the truth.
Their are a few things we have to accept, and ive such a bad run recently.
1. At times, you will play bad poker and lose. Face that and try to change it
2. 10%ers all happen on the same day. So ak breaks kk and kk breaks aa all in one session.
3. Varience and suckouts are not nice. Dumping a lot in a few days hurts bad. But remember varience isnt always to blame, see 1 and 2.
4. Your game may be too edgy and means u swing a lot. This is very applicable to my game. Sometimes i am far too aggressive and it makes me swingy. I win big but sometimes i lose a lot and have to realise im running bad/being too aggressive. I dont know a solution to this.
5. You may just suck and been goot for a bit and now your not getting huge hands anymore.
6. The short term swing when u dump the last weeks profit can be nasty. But over a year u can make 10k so think how much 300 is of that. Not a lot.

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Originally Posted by fade177

I was thinking that if I earn 10 K next year I will give 1K to my dad cause I owe him and 1K to my mom for what I owe her and then use a chunk of what I got to put a down payment on a car. I'd prolly keep the BR aroun 4-5 K, that way I can continue to earn enough to pay for the car and insurance withough haveing to start from scratch again.

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counting your chickens?

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Originally Posted by Miffed22001

4. Your game may be too edgy and means u swing a lot. This is very applicable to my game. Sometimes i am far too aggressive and it makes me swingy. I win big but sometimes i lose a lot and have to realise im running bad/being too aggressive. I dont know a solution to this.

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Since adapting sTAgg style, I noticed that my swings went up, but so did my win-rate. I have a lot of days where I run terrible and am only down a 1 or 2 buy-ins or even break-evenish. Very rarely do I tank really bad. It's the result of rolling the dice more often and picking up lots of little pots.

Not counting my chickens, just a lot of details for my plans. I'm very specific when i challenge myself

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Originally Posted by Triptan3s

Then I'd set up Rakeback at Bodog or Party.

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Rakeback at Party... interesting... explain please?

lol
dont open that up again.....

Sometimes you have to get worse to get better. Perhaps you've simply plateaud at your stage of developement? From personal experience I've been in similar situations where things go horribly wrong for a period of time and than one day it simply sinks in and I've hit a new zenith.

I understand the frustration in poker though since while you're going through it you watch your BR eroding. However don't pay too much attention to it for although the BR is indicative of your results it is not neccissarily so of your play.

If your BR starts consuming your thoughts it's time to step away because you've stoped playing poker and are now playing your BR.

Once a week I look at my largest losing hands for the week and study them. I figure out what went wrong. I lost a $650 pot Sunday night and it really sent me on tilt. However, after studying the hand, I put all my money in it on the turn with a perfect read and a 9:1 advantage. Other hands I've lost, I didn't represent my hand properly or pay enough attention and put my money in with the worst of it and lost. The point is, reviewing that weekly allows me to patch my holes weekly. I honestly feel I am in the positive developing point of my poker life as of late because of this. I have identified many of my weaknesses by doing this on a weekly basis.

Also, I don't post many HH's up here often but I do often do an email thread with my poker buddies on hands where we will send out a hand, everyone will look at it without results posted and analyze it. Getting input from my friends who I highly respect as players seems to benefit me more than getting input from players I don't know.

With $200, I would be playing 4 table .10 NL. Any level I'm playing at I want at minimal 20 buyins at 80% of max. $200 would put me at that level.

Out of curiosity, when you had your full BR, what level were you playing at? Do you follow BR management with discipline or no?

After spending a ton of time reading Demi's posts and talking to him on IRC and other forums around the web, I decided to take a stab at playing micro stakes under a BR model. I did it for a month and I promised myself that if I busted, I would not reload for another month and no more B&M. I was going to cut myself off of poker if I couldn't even handle one month under a disciplined BR model. Well, I did it and I found that when I play within my limits a bad beat or a losing session didn't bother me nearly as much as when I was playing outside my limits. That directly effected my game on other tables greatly. If one table was down, it didn't really bother me at all. I had the BR to support a down swing, thats okay.

Give playing .10NL on FT a try. Take advantage of their reload bonus (just withdraw and reload - I think they did it for Dec too). Use a disciplined BR model. When you get to around $400, consider moving to $.25NL (this is assuming you play NL, not Limit).

Everyone has different BR models they use, mine looks like this -> The absolute minimum I'll play a level at requires me to have 16 buy-ins @ 80% of Max though I preffer and generally wait until I have 20. Around 40 buyins is when I consider moving up a level as it puts me right at my ideal point for the next level. This works for me, find something that works for you.

Best of luck on the rebuild, we've all been there.

Just to update everyone, I've found new life. I no longer feel strained into tight play and my game has found a new level to play at. A little help from Ripp has given me some insight into Lagging. I know not to go crazy with it, but it is extremely effective. I've doubled my BR in just over a week playing .10/.25 level. I'm at just over $400 on Full Tilt now and still have $96 to work off of my bonus. I've finished 10th in a tourney recently out of 242, i got knocked out heads up KK vs. JJ, and he flopped quad Jacks. I go to a table and now i'm the one being sworn at for playing 86s and stuff like that. The game is fun, not just because of the success but because of the new levels I can play at. I can play tight when need be, but Lagg is so effective against low level players who kinda have a clue what they are doing.... Thanks guys, I'll keep postin, I'm off to work right now, Not enough poker money to pay the bills yet, later....

nice signature

it's great that u've found a way to win. i find with poker, you really struggle until u do get winning at a particular limit/style/game

there was a time when i struggled at ring games. i was mainly a bonus hunter and i couldn't do more than break even. then i found SNGs. learnt how to beat 6+0.5, then went through the same process for 15+1. I went back to ring games and played tAGG and lost... tried counterplay, LaGG, and then went bag to TaGG and finally started winning.
and once i started winning, i kept winning, and winning... so i think it's very much a confidence thing

bonuses are also great for building confidence - it adds that buffer so you can outlast variance, and gives you patience 'cos it gives u some meat when you have a break even session. and when u run into a roadblock there's always FTR.

good luck

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Originally Posted by fade177

Alright, this is my first step to recovery from my poker ailment I am faced with and I know FTR can help. Let me explain:

This is probably the first of many walls (hopefully the severity of which decreases) I will hit in my career.

In the past month I have lost $175 dollars to deposits on Stars to try and build up a BR on that site to play in the Gauntlet with. I have also lost about $150 on my Full Tilt BR, not including my withdrawals. I am now down to about $200 in my total BR, 30 on stars 170 on Tilt. I started this whole thing with a $50 dollar deposit on Tilt.

As you can see, my BR, had I not had those losses, would be around $525. I think this shows I'm capable of solid poker. What I am asking, is how can I reset my poker game? How can I get back to the fundamentals to get out of this rut? I feel every hand I play that I'm running into a brick wall the last few weeks. Hell, I lost quads over quads today, it was disgusting. I want to get better, I want to start making enough from poker to actually spend some of my earnings (the goal for 2006 is to win >10K and by a new car ((one that works!)) with the winnings). Help me get back to basics guys?

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the key to getting out of a long long rut is to admit to urself that u r playing poor poker and not just CONSTANTLY getting unlucky