Yesterday was a good day. It seems like I've been stuck between about $135 and $150 forever, but I've finally broken through.
I've switched my focus a little bit. My mother recently had sugery, which has complicated my schedule. Instead of doing what I usually do in such cases, which is to fit in as many small tournament as time allows, I've been playing larger fields, from 90 players to a few thousand, even if I only get in as few as one or two a day. I haven't posted in a while, and I need to be more dilligent--my wife and my father read this thing, even in no one else does.
Yesterday I got some decent work in. with five tournaments: one just after midnight, one in the afternoon, and three between about 9 P.M. and midnight. I cashed in 3. Here are the results.
Entry fees, $10.50
Cashes, $28.95
Total bankroll, $162.85.
I also got 1/2 hour of study time in.
I'm really going to try to post at least every other day, and I'm also going to start doing complete weekly and monthly summaries, including how much I won and how I spent my time.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
#28, 5/17/2010--They still don't get it.
My son just called. He said that he is going to bring back the lawnmower that he borrowed. I told him that I'm glad he called, because I'm just about to play some poker, but that I'll wait until after he drops the mower off. He said that I could go ahead and play, because he won't be over for about 20 minutes.
Seriously? Just when I think that at least those close to me are understand my poker playing, I get something like that? My son not only knows that I play only tournaments--we sat at the same table at a live tournament a few months ago. So how can he think that I can play for 20 minutes and then stop?
I don't expect a casual acquaintance to understand this, but my son, who plays live once in a while, still doesn't get it? Disappointing, to say the least.
There have been way too many times where I have been "frozen" like this. I am ready to play poker, and then I get put on hold because someone, usually a family member, does something like this--keeping me waiting much longer than the specified time.
For anyone other than our parents, I'm going to have to stop answering the phone when I'm playing, or ready to play.
Seriously? Just when I think that at least those close to me are understand my poker playing, I get something like that? My son not only knows that I play only tournaments--we sat at the same table at a live tournament a few months ago. So how can he think that I can play for 20 minutes and then stop?
I don't expect a casual acquaintance to understand this, but my son, who plays live once in a while, still doesn't get it? Disappointing, to say the least.
There have been way too many times where I have been "frozen" like this. I am ready to play poker, and then I get put on hold because someone, usually a family member, does something like this--keeping me waiting much longer than the specified time.
For anyone other than our parents, I'm going to have to stop answering the phone when I'm playing, or ready to play.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
#27, 5/13/2010--A new poker book
I've recently been going through the Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide: Tournament Edition, edited by Michael Craig, with chapters by Andy Block, Richard Brodie, Chris Ferguson, Ted Forrest, Rafe Furst, Phil Gordon, David Grey, Howard Lederer, Mike Matusow, Huckleberry Seed, Keith Sexton, and Gavin Smith. All of the authors are very succesful poker pros, and some are very highly educated. For example, Chris Ferguson has a Ph.D. in computer science with an emphasis on artificial intelligence.
What's particularly interesting about this book is that each author tackles a different subject, such as bet sizing, playing with a big stack ["stack" refers to how many chips you have in front of you], or playing with a small stack. The kicker is that the authors often disagree on how to approach a particular problem.
For that reason, I would never recommend this book to a beginner. It's not that the concepts are too advanced, it's more that at the level at which these guys play, poker is both an art and a science. For someone just learning the basics of how, when, and whether to make a raise, this would be way too confusing.
The chapter that helped me the most is No Limit Hold 'em: Play Before the Flop by Andy Bloch. He talks about starting hand systems, and he details the starting hands that he uses, backed up by twelve pages of tables and charts of starting hand values in different situations.
This has helped me in at least two ways:
1. I am weak as far as being able to change gears, that is, change my playing style to keep my opponents off-balance. Bloch's basic system is to play a lot more hands than I do (more than twice as many), so I've been trying it out, with the book open next to me when I play online. The point isn't to learn to do it exactly as Block does. The point is to get out of my comfort zone, play more hands than I'm used to, see how it feels, and figure out what I can take from it to improve my game.
2. It reminded me how much work I still have to do on my fundamentals, especially the dreaded m-word--memorization.
I have commited the math of many common poker situations to memory. For example, I know that the odds of hitting a flush draw with one card to come are 4.11:1. That is, if my hand is 2 diamonds, and there are two diamonds on the board (the community cards), that means the final community card (the river) has to be a diamond for me to make my hand. That will happen 1 out of every 5.11 times, in other words, the odds against me hitting my diamond are 4.11 to 1.
So, knowing that I, can look at the bet I have to make to stay in the hand, and if I'm not getting 4.11 to 1 odds (that is, if the amount of money in the pot is not more than 4 times what I have to bet), I have to fold. Over the long-term, it's a mathematical loser. Knowing the odds for or against you is pretty basic, and it's hard to be a winning poker player if you don't.
But, if you want to get better, there are always more fundamentals to learn. Consider a young musician that thinks he has it down because he can play "the scale". Then he finds out that scales come in different keys, and that there are different types of scales to memorize, such as major, harmonic and melodic minor, modal (7 of those), and pentatonic. The same idea holds true in poker. As you get better, there are more and more fundamentals that you have to learn.
It's the same thing in poker. Remember the phrase from earlier in this post: " . . . backed up by twelve pages of tables and charts of starting hand values in different situations"? So, do I really need to memorize all that? Well, that depends, because the answer to that question is another question--How good do I want to be?
On the twoplustwo.com poker forums, I have often seen threads opened with a question such as, Do I have to . . . ? or How important is it to . . . ? The most common is, Do I have to understand math to play poker?
My response is that if you start a question with "Do I have to . . ", then you probably don't have the right attitude to be a really good player.
Do I absolutely need to memorize all the charts and graps in this book to be a decent, even good, poker player? No. But when I do memorize them, that's an edge that I'll have against every player at my table that hasn't done the work. I'll close this post with excerpts from the last paragraph before Bloch's six page of tables of tables, Hands by Position--Ante Tournament, followed by Hands by Position--No-Ante Tournament:
"Having these numbers gives you a starting point for all your pre-flop decisions. Your instincts and ability to read the table are important, but now you don't have to make decisions in a vacuum . . . The rankings and percentages of playable hands give you exact answers when you don't have opponent-specific information."
What's particularly interesting about this book is that each author tackles a different subject, such as bet sizing, playing with a big stack ["stack" refers to how many chips you have in front of you], or playing with a small stack. The kicker is that the authors often disagree on how to approach a particular problem.
For that reason, I would never recommend this book to a beginner. It's not that the concepts are too advanced, it's more that at the level at which these guys play, poker is both an art and a science. For someone just learning the basics of how, when, and whether to make a raise, this would be way too confusing.
The chapter that helped me the most is No Limit Hold 'em: Play Before the Flop by Andy Bloch. He talks about starting hand systems, and he details the starting hands that he uses, backed up by twelve pages of tables and charts of starting hand values in different situations.
This has helped me in at least two ways:
1. I am weak as far as being able to change gears, that is, change my playing style to keep my opponents off-balance. Bloch's basic system is to play a lot more hands than I do (more than twice as many), so I've been trying it out, with the book open next to me when I play online. The point isn't to learn to do it exactly as Block does. The point is to get out of my comfort zone, play more hands than I'm used to, see how it feels, and figure out what I can take from it to improve my game.
2. It reminded me how much work I still have to do on my fundamentals, especially the dreaded m-word--memorization.
I have commited the math of many common poker situations to memory. For example, I know that the odds of hitting a flush draw with one card to come are 4.11:1. That is, if my hand is 2 diamonds, and there are two diamonds on the board (the community cards), that means the final community card (the river) has to be a diamond for me to make my hand. That will happen 1 out of every 5.11 times, in other words, the odds against me hitting my diamond are 4.11 to 1.
So, knowing that I, can look at the bet I have to make to stay in the hand, and if I'm not getting 4.11 to 1 odds (that is, if the amount of money in the pot is not more than 4 times what I have to bet), I have to fold. Over the long-term, it's a mathematical loser. Knowing the odds for or against you is pretty basic, and it's hard to be a winning poker player if you don't.
But, if you want to get better, there are always more fundamentals to learn. Consider a young musician that thinks he has it down because he can play "the scale". Then he finds out that scales come in different keys, and that there are different types of scales to memorize, such as major, harmonic and melodic minor, modal (7 of those), and pentatonic. The same idea holds true in poker. As you get better, there are more and more fundamentals that you have to learn.
It's the same thing in poker. Remember the phrase from earlier in this post: " . . . backed up by twelve pages of tables and charts of starting hand values in different situations"? So, do I really need to memorize all that? Well, that depends, because the answer to that question is another question--How good do I want to be?
On the twoplustwo.com poker forums, I have often seen threads opened with a question such as, Do I have to . . . ? or How important is it to . . . ? The most common is, Do I have to understand math to play poker?
My response is that if you start a question with "Do I have to . . ", then you probably don't have the right attitude to be a really good player.
Do I absolutely need to memorize all the charts and graps in this book to be a decent, even good, poker player? No. But when I do memorize them, that's an edge that I'll have against every player at my table that hasn't done the work. I'll close this post with excerpts from the last paragraph before Bloch's six page of tables of tables, Hands by Position--Ante Tournament, followed by Hands by Position--No-Ante Tournament:
"Having these numbers gives you a starting point for all your pre-flop decisions. Your instincts and ability to read the table are important, but now you don't have to make decisions in a vacuum . . . The rankings and percentages of playable hands give you exact answers when you don't have opponent-specific information."
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
#26, 5/13/2010--Home Office
I'm in my home office now. It's going to make things a LOT easier.
I've spend the last two weeks trying to force myself back onto a daytime schedule, and it wasn't easy. I was setting my alarm so I didn't sleep more than four hours a day, but I was still up until 2 A.M. or later every day. In fact, I'm up that late now, but it is no longer the norm. I'll be up at 7 A.M., and still more-or-less on my daytime schedule. I'll just take a nap during the day if I need to.
During my schedule conversion, I was in a kind of a no-mans-land. I was always tired, and seldom had a block of time when I was awake enough, when the living room was available, to play a tournament of any size. My wife and I always had to figure out when we were watching TV, when I was playing poker, etc. We managed to work things out pretty well, but it wasn't an ideal situation.
Now we're done with that. I'm on my daytime schedule, and I can start a large tournament at 7 or 8 A.M. If I go deep in the tournament, I can just keep playing when my wife comes home from work, and she can watch TV, entertain the cats, or whatever else she wants to do in the living room.
I've had a real problem getting my hours in, but now I'm on a more-or-less regular schedule, I have a place to play whenever I want, and things should go much better.
I've spend the last two weeks trying to force myself back onto a daytime schedule, and it wasn't easy. I was setting my alarm so I didn't sleep more than four hours a day, but I was still up until 2 A.M. or later every day. In fact, I'm up that late now, but it is no longer the norm. I'll be up at 7 A.M., and still more-or-less on my daytime schedule. I'll just take a nap during the day if I need to.
During my schedule conversion, I was in a kind of a no-mans-land. I was always tired, and seldom had a block of time when I was awake enough, when the living room was available, to play a tournament of any size. My wife and I always had to figure out when we were watching TV, when I was playing poker, etc. We managed to work things out pretty well, but it wasn't an ideal situation.
Now we're done with that. I'm on my daytime schedule, and I can start a large tournament at 7 or 8 A.M. If I go deep in the tournament, I can just keep playing when my wife comes home from work, and she can watch TV, entertain the cats, or whatever else she wants to do in the living room.
I've had a real problem getting my hours in, but now I'm on a more-or-less regular schedule, I have a place to play whenever I want, and things should go much better.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
#25, 5/7/2010--Treating poker as a job
Someone started a thread in the twoplustwo.com poker forums, basically whining about what a rotten someone has when they play poker for a living. The following is an exchange that happened in one of those forums. To make it a bit easier to follow, I will put the comments of the three different posters in different colors.
Originally Posted by ~Caligula~
whether or not playing poker professionally is a ****ty life, depends entirely on the individual.
scenario1: you wake up at 4pm daily, switch on your pc and light up cigaretter no. 1 of 32 for the day (yesterday's remnants spilling out of the ashtray on your desk). You fire up 8/12/24 tables and grind away without even looking outside at the sun.. You never call your friends anymore.. You eat takeaways daily because you couldn't be bothered to shop or cook anymore. When you make good money or run well, you're hyper-ecstatic. However, a bad run and you're morose or even suicidal.. questioning everything in your life.. even your own sanity.
Scenario 2: You wake up at 7 or 8 every morning like the rest of the world. You eat a healthy breakfast, walk the dog, walk yourself.. go for a run. You clean your "office" and read the paper/novel. You analyse yesterday's play and plot your aims for the day. You either go to a local casino to play sociable poker for a few hours, or play your usual online games. You take regular long breaks. You go out in the evenings with friends.. revelling in the fact that IF you're hungover or tired you don't HAVE to wake up early in the morning. You travel regularly with a laptop so you can carry on earning, but at the same time you see the world, learn new things and meet new people daily. You take advantage of the gift of a non-fixed profession.. a job without borders/bosses/obligations. You spend every third or fourth day on a new hobby (if you can't spare this kind of time, you shouldn't be playing professionally).Option one is depressing. Its no better than flipping burgers, only you work alone.. Your mind and body WILL atrophy.Like any other job, you can and should take some time off. But if you're playing a live cash game, it's not a good idea to bail after two or three hours Option two is a gift.
Posted by Poker Clif:
I agree with the thrust of your argument, but the danger is that this could lead to approaching poker as an easy, part-time job. And that's a bad mindset for several reasons.
1. If you're playing cash and you have a couple fish at the table, that's not the time to play for a few hours. Make the money while it's there to be made.
2. If you play MTTs, short sessions aren't an option.
3. Your scenario doesn't include much time for reading/studying/recordkeeping. It's amazing how many poker players try to do their income taxes while having no idea how much money they made the previous year, and don't have a single receipt for expenses/deductions.
4. If you've never been your own boss, I would suggest being very disciplined at first. If, after a few months, everything is going well and the money is rolling in, then you can cut back your hours. If you start out lazy and quit playing every time one of your friends calls, you'll wind up having to fix your habits AND retrain your friends. It's best to let the people in your life know from day one that poker is a real job.
All of that said, yes, you should have a life. Lots of people work 30, 40 or more hours a week and still have a life. I want to get in good enough shape to run my second marathon. I went out for my anniversary last month. I will be going to three birthday parties (my grandchildren) this month. I hope to start playing more live poker soon, both to make money and to associate with real, face-to-face people.
So yes, definitely, have a life. You don't have to grind for 16 hours a day, 7 days a week, to make Supernova Elite.You can if you want to, but it's not my idea of a good time. Just make sure you understand that if poker is going to be your living, you have to treat it that way, be serious about what you're doing, and make choices with that in mind.
Posted by RedVortex:
I was thinking the same thing Plus, in poker even when your making money, it's a good idea to play more to get a cushion that will help you move up (so that its a bit easier to play less). And poker pros MUST keep up with trends in poker. Like when three-betting weak on the button became hot **** two years ago. If you didn't keep up with your hw, you might give people a lot more credit when credit is not due. Fantastic post Poker Clif.
Originally Posted by ~Caligula~
whether or not playing poker professionally is a ****ty life, depends entirely on the individual.
scenario1: you wake up at 4pm daily, switch on your pc and light up cigaretter no. 1 of 32 for the day (yesterday's remnants spilling out of the ashtray on your desk). You fire up 8/12/24 tables and grind away without even looking outside at the sun.. You never call your friends anymore.. You eat takeaways daily because you couldn't be bothered to shop or cook anymore. When you make good money or run well, you're hyper-ecstatic. However, a bad run and you're morose or even suicidal.. questioning everything in your life.. even your own sanity.
Scenario 2: You wake up at 7 or 8 every morning like the rest of the world. You eat a healthy breakfast, walk the dog, walk yourself.. go for a run. You clean your "office" and read the paper/novel. You analyse yesterday's play and plot your aims for the day. You either go to a local casino to play sociable poker for a few hours, or play your usual online games. You take regular long breaks. You go out in the evenings with friends.. revelling in the fact that IF you're hungover or tired you don't HAVE to wake up early in the morning. You travel regularly with a laptop so you can carry on earning, but at the same time you see the world, learn new things and meet new people daily. You take advantage of the gift of a non-fixed profession.. a job without borders/bosses/obligations. You spend every third or fourth day on a new hobby (if you can't spare this kind of time, you shouldn't be playing professionally).Option one is depressing. Its no better than flipping burgers, only you work alone.. Your mind and body WILL atrophy.Like any other job, you can and should take some time off. But if you're playing a live cash game, it's not a good idea to bail after two or three hours Option two is a gift.
Posted by Poker Clif:
I agree with the thrust of your argument, but the danger is that this could lead to approaching poker as an easy, part-time job. And that's a bad mindset for several reasons.
1. If you're playing cash and you have a couple fish at the table, that's not the time to play for a few hours. Make the money while it's there to be made.
2. If you play MTTs, short sessions aren't an option.
3. Your scenario doesn't include much time for reading/studying/recordkeeping. It's amazing how many poker players try to do their income taxes while having no idea how much money they made the previous year, and don't have a single receipt for expenses/deductions.
4. If you've never been your own boss, I would suggest being very disciplined at first. If, after a few months, everything is going well and the money is rolling in, then you can cut back your hours. If you start out lazy and quit playing every time one of your friends calls, you'll wind up having to fix your habits AND retrain your friends. It's best to let the people in your life know from day one that poker is a real job.
All of that said, yes, you should have a life. Lots of people work 30, 40 or more hours a week and still have a life. I want to get in good enough shape to run my second marathon. I went out for my anniversary last month. I will be going to three birthday parties (my grandchildren) this month. I hope to start playing more live poker soon, both to make money and to associate with real, face-to-face people.
So yes, definitely, have a life. You don't have to grind for 16 hours a day, 7 days a week, to make Supernova Elite.You can if you want to, but it's not my idea of a good time. Just make sure you understand that if poker is going to be your living, you have to treat it that way, be serious about what you're doing, and make choices with that in mind.
Posted by RedVortex:
I was thinking the same thing Plus, in poker even when your making money, it's a good idea to play more to get a cushion that will help you move up (so that its a bit easier to play less). And poker pros MUST keep up with trends in poker. Like when three-betting weak on the button became hot **** two years ago. If you didn't keep up with your hw, you might give people a lot more credit when credit is not due. Fantastic post Poker Clif.
#24, 5/6/2010--Satellites and poker profits
I have realized something that, logically, I should have figured out much sooner. If I can win tournament dollars playing satellites faster than I can win real dollars making other tournaments, then I will make less profit when I am converting my $t to USD.
As an example, let's say that I spend a day playing 21 $2.20 satellites to the PokerStars Sunday 1/4 Million, and I cash (earn a tournament ticket that can be cashed out for t$11) in one out of every 3 tournaments:
Gross winings = (21 tournaments) X (1/3 cashes per tournament) = 7 cashes = t$77.
Expenses = ($2.20 entry fee per satellite) X (21 satellites) = $46.20.
Net profit = 77 - 46.20 + = $30.80.
Keep in mind that to keep the bookkeeping simple, I count a dollar as a dollar. When I enter a tournament, when I win one, and when I lose one, it doesn't matter if I've won, lost, or spent t$ or $US. A dollar is a dollar. It's no different than when I play a tournament that is denominated in euros. I have PokerStars set up to automatically convert everything to USD, not matter what currencies are shown on the list of tournaments. As Freud might say, sometimes a dollar is just a dollar.
Ok, the bottom line is coming, I promise. Keep in mind that the example above is a day of playing nothing but satellites. theoretically, I could use all of my t$ to play more satellites, win more t$, and pretty soon, the majority of my bankroll is $t.
So let's say I have a bankroll of $200: 25 $US and t$175. And I want to cash out (withdraw from my PokerStars account) $50. I can't cash out tournament dollars, so I have to convert t$ to $US, and the only way to do that is to spend T$ on tournaments where I can win US dollars. That is, I have to play something other than satellites in order to have $50 that I can cash out.
This leads to an interesting result when I count my profits. I can spend a day playing other-than-satellite tournaments, spend t$25 and cash for US $25, and the change to my bankroll is 0. My total bankroll is still 200, but now it's US $50 and t$150. Now I can take my $50 out.
But in real life the satellites are much softer than the other tournaments, so when I'm not playing satellites I'm going to make money (build my total bankroll) more slowly. To keep my profits steady, I have to make sure I don't play too many satellites. When I play only satellites, my total bankroll will almost certainly go up quickly, but I can't keep that up indefinitely if I ever want to cash out. And when I'm not playing them, that is, when I'm converting my t$ to US$, my bankroll will go up more slowly, and there will be longer stretches when I only break even.
It's amazing how many things there can be to think about that don't have anything to do with actually playing poker. And of course, it's not just a matter of whether I play tournament A or tournament B. It depends on the payout structure, the tournament structure (how long it takes, how quickly the blinds go up, etc.), how soft the field is, what time the tournament starts, etc.
This week, for the first time I played a "bounty" (also called "knockout") tournament, where you pay a little extra in entry fees, and get a "bounty" each time you knock someone out of the tournament. My spreadsheets don't have a place for bounties, and I don't have room for any more columns, so I'm going to have to redo the whole thing.
I guess poker is like anything else at which you want to excel. An elite runner doesn't just go out the door and run when he feels like it. He stretches. He has workouts to build speed, or endurance, or resistance (such as running hills or stairs). He practices good nutrition, and does weight training.
There's a lot more to running than just running. Likewise, poker is more than just playing poker.
As an example, let's say that I spend a day playing 21 $2.20 satellites to the PokerStars Sunday 1/4 Million, and I cash (earn a tournament ticket that can be cashed out for t$11) in one out of every 3 tournaments:
Gross winings = (21 tournaments) X (1/3 cashes per tournament) = 7 cashes = t$77.
Expenses = ($2.20 entry fee per satellite) X (21 satellites) = $46.20.
Net profit = 77 - 46.20 + = $30.80.
Keep in mind that to keep the bookkeeping simple, I count a dollar as a dollar. When I enter a tournament, when I win one, and when I lose one, it doesn't matter if I've won, lost, or spent t$ or $US. A dollar is a dollar. It's no different than when I play a tournament that is denominated in euros. I have PokerStars set up to automatically convert everything to USD, not matter what currencies are shown on the list of tournaments. As Freud might say, sometimes a dollar is just a dollar.
Ok, the bottom line is coming, I promise. Keep in mind that the example above is a day of playing nothing but satellites. theoretically, I could use all of my t$ to play more satellites, win more t$, and pretty soon, the majority of my bankroll is $t.
So let's say I have a bankroll of $200: 25 $US and t$175. And I want to cash out (withdraw from my PokerStars account) $50. I can't cash out tournament dollars, so I have to convert t$ to $US, and the only way to do that is to spend T$ on tournaments where I can win US dollars. That is, I have to play something other than satellites in order to have $50 that I can cash out.
This leads to an interesting result when I count my profits. I can spend a day playing other-than-satellite tournaments, spend t$25 and cash for US $25, and the change to my bankroll is 0. My total bankroll is still 200, but now it's US $50 and t$150. Now I can take my $50 out.
But in real life the satellites are much softer than the other tournaments, so when I'm not playing satellites I'm going to make money (build my total bankroll) more slowly. To keep my profits steady, I have to make sure I don't play too many satellites. When I play only satellites, my total bankroll will almost certainly go up quickly, but I can't keep that up indefinitely if I ever want to cash out. And when I'm not playing them, that is, when I'm converting my t$ to US$, my bankroll will go up more slowly, and there will be longer stretches when I only break even.
It's amazing how many things there can be to think about that don't have anything to do with actually playing poker. And of course, it's not just a matter of whether I play tournament A or tournament B. It depends on the payout structure, the tournament structure (how long it takes, how quickly the blinds go up, etc.), how soft the field is, what time the tournament starts, etc.
This week, for the first time I played a "bounty" (also called "knockout") tournament, where you pay a little extra in entry fees, and get a "bounty" each time you knock someone out of the tournament. My spreadsheets don't have a place for bounties, and I don't have room for any more columns, so I'm going to have to redo the whole thing.
I guess poker is like anything else at which you want to excel. An elite runner doesn't just go out the door and run when he feels like it. He stretches. He has workouts to build speed, or endurance, or resistance (such as running hills or stairs). He practices good nutrition, and does weight training.
There's a lot more to running than just running. Likewise, poker is more than just playing poker.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
#23, 5/1/2010--April Results
Bankroll, beginning of April, $140.87
Bankroll, end of April, $151.45.
+$10.58
It was certainly an interesting month. I had huge swings. There were quite a few days when I wasn't able to play at all. I completely changed the tournaments that I played.
I played a lot of $2.20 satellites to the PokerStarts Sunday 1/4 Million, tournaments that usually have anywhere from about 30-130 players, depending on the time of day. I'll play the actual 1/4 Million (that's the prize pool guarantee, but it's usually more than that) one of these days, but for now, I'm cashing the satellite wins out and using the $11 to add to my bankroll.
A lot of players who play satellites aren't very good. They hope to get lucky on the cheap, and win a chance to go for the big money. So, the fields are very soft, and once you understand the format, they are usually a much easier way to make money than a small $2 tournament that is not a satellite into something bigger.
In fact, I'm so good at them that I have a problem. When you cash out a satellite win, you don't get actually money in your PokerStars account, you get t$ (tournament dollars). You can use the money to enter other tournaments, but you can't cash out and withdraw it from your PokerStars account.
That's not a big deal, it's all fungible anyway. t$ are real dollars that I don't have to take out my bankroll to play tournaments. The problem is that since I have to use the t$ for other tournaments, I eventually have to stop playing satellites so that I can use up my t$. It's pretty easy to cash out a few $11 tickets and have have more than 1/4 of my bankroll in t$--which doesn't do me any good when I'm ready to cash out and buy things or pay bills in the real world.
So I gave the satellites a rest and played 5 of the $1.40 90-player tournaments last night before I had to stop because of the possibility of thunderstorms. These are new tournaments. The stucture isn't as good as some MTTs, but it's decent, a much better structure than much of what I was playing in early April. And $1.40 tournaments fit nicely into my bankroll.
I had a slow start and didn't cash until the last one, but that 4th place was good enough to put me up for the session, and it pushed my bankroll over $150.
I think that $150 was a psychological barrier for me, and that $200 might be as well. It's hard having to fight to get back where I was a couple years ago, but things happen. I had to tap my bankroll, and I can 't let myself get discouraged.
Once I get my bankroll up to the $250 or so I had as a part-time player, it will feel like a weight has been lifted. It's crazy that it's so hard to do what I seemed to do easily in the past, but poker can be like that. Just like any job, there are times that it's easy, and times that it's hard. I can keep plugging away, or I can crawl under a rock and eat worms. I choose to keep fighting.
Bankroll, end of April, $151.45.
+$10.58
It was certainly an interesting month. I had huge swings. There were quite a few days when I wasn't able to play at all. I completely changed the tournaments that I played.
I played a lot of $2.20 satellites to the PokerStarts Sunday 1/4 Million, tournaments that usually have anywhere from about 30-130 players, depending on the time of day. I'll play the actual 1/4 Million (that's the prize pool guarantee, but it's usually more than that) one of these days, but for now, I'm cashing the satellite wins out and using the $11 to add to my bankroll.
A lot of players who play satellites aren't very good. They hope to get lucky on the cheap, and win a chance to go for the big money. So, the fields are very soft, and once you understand the format, they are usually a much easier way to make money than a small $2 tournament that is not a satellite into something bigger.
In fact, I'm so good at them that I have a problem. When you cash out a satellite win, you don't get actually money in your PokerStars account, you get t$ (tournament dollars). You can use the money to enter other tournaments, but you can't cash out and withdraw it from your PokerStars account.
That's not a big deal, it's all fungible anyway. t$ are real dollars that I don't have to take out my bankroll to play tournaments. The problem is that since I have to use the t$ for other tournaments, I eventually have to stop playing satellites so that I can use up my t$. It's pretty easy to cash out a few $11 tickets and have have more than 1/4 of my bankroll in t$--which doesn't do me any good when I'm ready to cash out and buy things or pay bills in the real world.
So I gave the satellites a rest and played 5 of the $1.40 90-player tournaments last night before I had to stop because of the possibility of thunderstorms. These are new tournaments. The stucture isn't as good as some MTTs, but it's decent, a much better structure than much of what I was playing in early April. And $1.40 tournaments fit nicely into my bankroll.
I had a slow start and didn't cash until the last one, but that 4th place was good enough to put me up for the session, and it pushed my bankroll over $150.
I think that $150 was a psychological barrier for me, and that $200 might be as well. It's hard having to fight to get back where I was a couple years ago, but things happen. I had to tap my bankroll, and I can 't let myself get discouraged.
Once I get my bankroll up to the $250 or so I had as a part-time player, it will feel like a weight has been lifted. It's crazy that it's so hard to do what I seemed to do easily in the past, but poker can be like that. Just like any job, there are times that it's easy, and times that it's hard. I can keep plugging away, or I can crawl under a rock and eat worms. I choose to keep fighting.
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