FIRST POST

[TrAdam5]

Hi guys,
Long time reader, but I finally decided to sign up so I can participate more actively. Anyways, a little background, I'm a 19 year old college student (Washington University in St. Louis) who has played online a little under a year (I played some live for about a year before that with high school friends). I've read both HoH books, and thanks to that, browsing this forum, and my incredible set of skills and instincts , I have done pretty well. I started with 50 on stars and worked it up to 2200 on the site after withdrawing 300 of it. I did so mostly playing SnGs, but decided to switch over to primarily the 20 180s since i was playing 20 dollar sngs anyway. i had some initial success, but the last few months or so I've been in a bit of funk. That cumulated tonight where I managed to blow off 200 dollars of my winnings (mostly in the 180s) just playing poorly and getting frustrated. So my question to all of u guys who worked through reading this mini-essay is how do u handle bad streaks in mtts. I make 8.00 an hour at my summer job, so finishing out of the money in 10 straight tourneys in a 2 day period makes me go Holy Shit looking back at it. I've read a lot of postsand strategy articles on similar subjects but decided to see if any one of u has great advice how to mentally handle it. I know some of u will say bankroll management but I am playing within my bankroll (around 100 buy-ins), and I have no problem losing one, two, or three mtts. But when it gets to 10, it starts to add up on my conscience. Thanks.

[jackvance]

How you handle the bad swings probably defines you as a poker player more than skill. I don't think there's anything wrong if your conscience starts to hurt or if it makes you doubt - you'd have to be one icecold mofo to shake that off without a second thought - but as long as it doesn't really ruin your game, it's ok I think.