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k2o4 United States. Mar 09 2009 15:25. Posts 4803 | | |
Strange how it's so much easier to grind a shit load of hands while breaking even or losing than when winning.
I've played like 6k hands this month. That's horrible. Last month I'd played like 20k hands at this point. I'm fighting 3 things that are keeping me from achieving mass grinding:
1) Winning - I'm consistently winning and winning quick. Like I sit down and in the first 100-200 hands I'm up 2 buyins. I stay a bit longer and hit the 300-400 hand mark and am at about the same place in terms of session winnings so I quit before I get apathetic or lethargic or greedy or pretty much anything that might get me into a bad mental state. And because I keep winning and it's a higher limit so 2 buyins feels like a huge score, I have much less motivation to grind it out.
2) Higher limit and less tables - Last month I did a lot of 12-16 tabling of NL100 cause I had a huge BR for it and about 250k hands of experience, so I felt very confident and was fine with mass grinding. This month I try really hard to stick to 6 tables because I really do play my best game when I have 6 tables or less and time to think about everything. Being up at a higher limit where I don't have hands on everybody or long term reads to use, I really need to pay more attention. I don't have the 100k hands winning here to get myself confident in playing a lot of tables. Plus I'm trying to learn as much as possible - I don't want to just grind it out and do what I already know.
3) Mental fatigue - I'm not watching TV while I play anymore and am thinking very deeply about all hands/situations, and that's much more taxing on the brain than 16 tabling NL100 while watching a movie and just robot pokering. 500 hand sessions are hard to get myself to do cause I have trouble maintaining a peak mental state for that long. And when I take a break I never want to go right back to grinding because of reason #1. I guess there's also the mental fear of a downswing or losing session. I still haven't gotten used to the bigger loses and wins per session of NL200 compared to NL100. So I have a mental battle to deal with there. I think when I hit a 10k BR I'll feel a lot better and not so scared of a losing session.
So I just gotta keep grinding it out, hit that higher BR, and eventually my comfort with NL200 will be complete and I'll be able to put in longer and longer sessions. I'm already feeling better but I can feel a huge gap between how I was with NL100 and how I am now with NL200. Luckily all these things have basically only held me back from playing mass hands... sux for the FPP but is great otherwise cause I am nearly always playing in a great mental state and playing my best poker. I'm not playing with scared money and the second I feel myself protecting a win I quit. So overall my volume has decreased but that's not bad considering that everything else is going great. I feel like over the last 30 days I've played the best poker of my life. It's been really great.
Anyway here's March so far:
BR @ 9k. It's down despite winning because I made a payment to my awesome coach, cause without him I'd still be stuck on NL50/NL100 =)
Oh and one last piece of good news is that I'm finally a lifetime winner on NL200! I was down like 3k in failed NL200 shots or something like that but the last 30 days I've recovered and am in the green! WooT
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its a common mistake for players to play tons when down and play little when up.. should be the opposite even though its tough... you have to force yourself to play more and try to create a good work ethic, you lose so much by not playing when winning. And this might be one of the most important things in poker for long term success. |
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I don't agree. It's player dependent imho. When I play to long I lose my A game as well even when I think it's opposite.
BTW. GOOD JOB k2o4 ! |
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| | Last edit: 09/03/2009 16:53 |
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k2o4 United States. Mar 09 2009 16:55. Posts 4803 | | |
| | On March 09 2009 14:37 CamilaPunt wrote:
its a common mistake for players to play tons when down and play little when up.. should be the opposite even though its tough... you have to force yourself to play more and try to create a good work ethic, you lose so much by not playing when winning. And this might be one of the most important things in poker for long term success. |
I think the most important thing is to play while in the best state of mind. Everytime I force myself to grind to make FPP or get in a certain # of hands I end up pushing myself to play while I'm not on my A game and I regret it. |
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Big_Rob_48 United States. Mar 09 2009 17:33. Posts 3432 | | |
I hope you are starting to see how wise my advice in your blog has been. I have advocated an extremely large BR and lots of grinding because it helps you avoid obstacles to your game like this. If your BR was $20,000 I guarantee you would not have any trouble playing hands. The money matters to much to you. Just play a ton, win/lose a lot, and don't give a fuck and keep playing playing playing! : ) |
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| My AIM sn if you want to chat: YoRobbyMiller | |
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ThuNDeR Bulgaria. Mar 09 2009 17:34. Posts 371 | | |
"I'm consistently winning and winning quick"
wish I had your problems :D
very nice run ofc,gtz  |
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k2o4 United States. Mar 09 2009 18:29. Posts 4803 | | |
I also have trouble when I hit rollercoaster sessions. Like just now I quickly lost 1.5 buyins and then quickly won 2.5 buyins and at that point I had some adrenaline going cause it all happened in 300 hands and was back to back to back big pots. Now I go get calm and centered again before I play more. I don't think that's bad but I do think I take too long to get back to the tables. |
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Big_Rob_48 United States. Mar 09 2009 19:13. Posts 3432 | | |
I repeat, the money matters too much to you. If you wanna get anywhere in this game then you need to not give a shit about a 10 buyin downswing or a 10 buyin upswing. Look at results after a week/month of playing instead of every 200 hands dude. |
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| My AIM sn if you want to chat: YoRobbyMiller | |
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k2o4 United States. Mar 09 2009 19:29. Posts 4803 | | |
meh, I look once I close down PS, and I close down PS cause I don't feel like I"m playing A game. But yeah, bottom line is that money is mattering too much right now and that's causing me to stop playing my A game. At least I'm stopping when I'm not playing well but it would be better to avoid losing the A game in the first place! |
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milkman United States. Mar 09 2009 19:51. Posts 5719 | | |
i duno if anyone else has said this yet, but it looks to me like your playing less hands because your not comfortable with the stake yet, and kinda not able to put in the hours and feel solid.. when this happens i like to set some rules up and then make sure you play enough, and just do it like 1K hands at nl100 b4 or after ur nl200 hands.. normally after is better incase u lose in both stakes.. but either way, u should figure out a way.. cuz playing lik 6.5K hands by the 9th just isnt enough. |
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| Its hard to make a easy buck legally, its impossible to make a easy buck morally. | |
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k2o4 United States. Mar 09 2009 20:10. Posts 4803 | | |
that's an interesting idea about grinding out a bunch of hands 1 level lower to get the hands in even if I"m not up to grinding em on NL200. |
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whamm! Albania. Mar 09 2009 20:51. Posts 11625 | | |
just keep playing nl100 after playing a winning 200nl session, confidence is still there and youve got a nice buffer. eventually ul get comfy with 200 if u hit a nice br level imo |
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Lots of good advice here, keep at it Brett could be an epic month |
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