The Weekend Problem

Weekends are the best time to to play poker, for lots of reasons.  There are more players, which means bigger prize pools.  Players who only play on weekends tend to be weaker because they don't play as often, Sites know that that most of the action is on weekends, and they often run special tournaments to draw even more players.  The larger sites occasionally run weekend tournament promotions with a total prize pool of a million dollars.  Depending on which sites you have access to, you can find tournaments with names like The Sunday Millions a few times a year.

The same thing is true on the smaller sites, just on a smaller scale.  The tournaments on weekends are always better than the ones on weekdays.  Serious poker players understand this.  In fact, in poker forums where someone is talking about "going pro, players are often told that poker is a nights and weekends business, they better be OK with that. and the people close to them have to accept it.  The general idea is that if you're young and you like to go with your friends to the clubs or parties on weekends, that will have to change.

I don't have those issues. If I go to a party its usually a family birthday party.  I'm married and my wife understands what it takes to be a poker player.  Even so, weekends can be a problem.

My work day usually starts around 2000 and goes well past midnight., Almost every night I play a block of tournaments that starts at 2019 and I'm still playing or studying well past midnight, in fact, I usually go to bed sometime around 0800.  Most of those tournaments run every night or at least several times a week--but some of the  best tournaments, the ones with the best structures and/or the biggest prize pools, are only on weekends.

Of course, it's impossible to completely control my time by doing everything at night.  I can't go to my doctor or dentist or mechanic at 0200.  That means that I have to adjust my schedule, and if I'm busy during the day, I compensate by taking a nap before it's time to work.  Even so, there are times when I get a little run down.

One problem is church.  When I'm used to going to bed around 0800 going to church is tough. My wife and I came up with a compromise where I would go to church every other Sunday, but still, it's not fun for her when I'm fighting to stay awake in church and I understand that.

Another problem is time with my grandchildren.  I love them dearly.  It was tough not seeing them for four years when my son was stationed in Germany  Now they live only five miles from us, and their school is even closer when we want to pick them up.  We have one of them over each month from Friday afternoon to sometime Saturday.  Last night was kind of a mess.

We picked one of them up from school on Friday afternoon, so I didn't get to sleep very long.  I enjoyed that time, but it was obvious to my wife how tired I was.

We went a couple places with them, came home and had supper.  Then I went to bed to sleep for a few hours.  I skipped my regular 2019 tournament so that I could get some rest and play the better tournaments later.  I got up at 2200 to play the two best tournaments that night, which were running, at 2214 and 2314. When I started the 2214 my granddaughter was still awake.

So there I was with my monthly granddaughter visit.  I was tired when we went out, I slept when we got her home, then I got up and went to work.  I was either tired or ignored her much of the time that she was here.

I had that on my mind, along with  trying some of new strategies that I've learned for playing flush draws, plus I was playing two tables when the second tournament, a good one that runs only on Friday night, started . . . this is too weird, it's 0247 and she woke up while I was typing.

OK, it's 0610 and I'm finally back. The point is that I was just tired enough and distracted enough to make a few small mistakes that cost me both tournaments.  I didn't make a lot of mistakes when playing individual hands, but I lost track of the big picture, the table dynamics.  I'm still working on getting better at playing two tables at a time.  I got in a weird situation where a lot of players at my table were sitting out and I didn't comprehend or take advantage of the situation at all.  All I was thinking about was myself and the players with me the individual hands.  It didn't end well.

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