June 30th, 2007 lifesagrind
I’ve now had two losing months this year. Sadly the two losing months outpace the four winning ones making me a small ($100) loser on the year so far. This also marks as the worst year I’ve had at the tables. Technically the years only half way over with so all this could/will change but I’ve never been down at this point in a year since starting in 2003. Granted my bankroll also hasn’t been this small since 2003 so that may have something to do with it.
This month was a combination of losing at .25/.50 NL, having a bad run in my SNG’s, and continuing my bad streak in the MTT arena. When it all happens it seems to happen at once. If you refer back to my June goal post I fell victim to weakness number one. I took shots at hight levels that failed and then I let number four keep me from dropping back down.
I’m confident July will turn out to be a different story for me as I’m going to stick to playing within my bankroll (really I will this time, I promise).
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June 1st, 2007 lifesagrind
The last goal I set for myself was back in March as I emptied my bankroll down to $300 in a effort to see if I could rebuild. I considered that goal a success at the end of April and have since just been playing the SNG’s.
In an effort to give myself something new to look forward to I felt I had to address my weaknesses as a poker player. So in no particular order I came up with the following:
1) I’m very risk adverse. I know I cannot resupply my bankroll so if it ever runs dry I’ll have to quit playing for a while. As a result I don’t handle downswings very well. It also means I’m very cautious about putting my bankroll at risk.
2) I get bored quickly. No matter how much I want to play the game, after about an hour or so my mind starts to wander and I make critical mistakes. This has been my achilles heel in the cash games. This is also why the turbo SNG’s work well for me.
3) Don’t like to study. This is a bit of a fallacy. When something is new to me I consume as much information as possible. On the poker front I’ve been playing for several years and I just figure if I have the time to study the game, I have the time to play. I’m quite certain this is the reason I’m more of a feel player than a math player.
4) Pride/Ego. This has always been a problem for me. I simply don’t like to lose and rarely do so gracefully. Combine this with being risk adverse and I can sometimes spiral downwardly out of control. I don’t consider anyone, and I do mean anyone, to be a better player than I either am or have the potential to be.
With those highlights in mind I’ve approached my next goal with some careful planning.
I want to post a positive month in NL cash game play.
This may not seem like much a high reaching goal, but when the above listed issues have reared their ugly heads, I’ve been a cash game loser over my three years of play. So how do I plan to address each of the above issues in my new goal:
1) Going back to a philosophy I adhered to when I first began playing this game, I’m installing a stop loss. That will be in the amount of one buy in per session. It also means that I’m going to limit myself to one table at a time and in an effort to have as little regard for the money as possible I’m going to play $25NL 6 max.
2) To curb the boredom I’m going to limit each session to 60 minutes. This seems to be my threshold but I will allow flexibility if I feel I’m really into the game. I may also extend it if I’m just having my way at a table.
3) I really still don’t like to study. I will make an effort to do reviews of key hands from each session though.
4) I’m hoping 1 and 2 take care of number 4.
I’m not giving up on my SNG play. In fact I have qualified for Iron Man status for seven months in a row so far and I don’t want to lose that. To make up my points I’ll be playing 16 $12 Turbos at least 5 days a week.
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