I played 2 donkaments in New Orleans, both Friday. I played Circuit Event # 1, a $500 event, and a $300 "second chance tourney." Neither tournament was very eventful and I never really was in a spot I liked. In both tournaments I ended up short stacks and shoving wide which eventually resulted in being knocked out by a better hand.

The real story comes from playing cash game on Saturday night. I was playing 2/5 NL with a whole crew of locals and a few good players. After about 2 hours of play I was down to about $250. I called a $20 raise with 77 from the BB along with 4 other callers. Flop comes K67 with 2 hearts. I check, someone bets $100, 3 call, and I shove my remaining $230 in. I get 2 callers who both cover me by about $200. So the main pot is about $900. The turn is the 6 giving me a full house and completing a flush. The other 2 players shove/call the turn. One tables A6 and the other KJ. River - K.

I go back to my hotel busto and ready to get the heck out of New Orleans. Nothing like putting your chips in with 98% equity and losing.

Most of you work a 9 to 5 job like me and play poker for recreation and extra income. Poker only made up about 10% of my income in 2007 and although I am off to a slow start I hope to best that in 2008. The problem is that poker is an extremely consuming hobby compared to other activities. People who enjoy, say, mountain biking or wine tasting, don't read strategy forums constantly, think about the equity of AKo with an M of 7 during their business meetings, or stay up late at night staring at a computer screen analyzing all the minutia of activity 6 or more tables can provide at any given moment. Most recreational activities also allow a fair degree of socializing during them, while online poker does not. Most nights my girlfriend lays on the daybed watching TV or browsing the net on the laptop while I play 4 to 6 tables. She complains I am like a "zombie" when playing, but how can one not be a zombie when he needs to take note of continuation bet sizing patterns or MP raising ranges? She introduced me to poker, so I remind her that it's all her fault anyway.

Having said that, here are brad2002tj's 6 tips for balancing out your life with poker:

1. Set aside "date nights" for your significant other. Take her out to dinner, a comedy show, get drunk together, etc. Talk about anything but poker. Tell her you like her dress. You know, all that crap you did when you met her.

2. Exercise. I run 15-25 miles a week. It's one of the few things that keep me from truly being a degenerate. Find something athletic you like to do, even if it is just lifting weights. You will live longer, look better, and the afore-mentioned significant other will be much more likely to give you sexytime you after you donk out of all your games. Plus exercising with your SO keeps her in shape, so what's not to like about that?

3. Do non-poker related projects, especially if they can be done with your SO. Landscaping, home improvement, writing, etc. are all good ideas. My SO loves working on the yard, so often our weekends involve trips to Home Depot and working together outside.

4. Set professional goals. Don't be satisified with where you are. The sad truth is that for most of us our mental resources would be better spent applied to our profession than poker. Volunteer for extra projects. Don't even think about "going pro" until you have a year or two of living expenses in your bankroll. Considering that I usually spend my winnings, that will be never.

5. Spend time studing the game away from the tables. Many of us post/read online strategy forums, and I am always reading poker books and magazines (review of Harrington on Cash 1-2 is forthcoming). Dedicate at least a small portion of your day to doing this so that you don't get lost in the minutia of the game and to help see the big picture.

6. Play for fun again. Every now and then I'll open up a $1 STT, especially after some alcoholic beverages, and play like an absolute maniac. It's amazing what moves you can make when you really don't care about the money. You can be the fearless poker player you always wanted to be, and it's actually fun and stress-free. The free games at your local bars can be a great stress reliever as well.

Happy living!

I used to play at Full Tilt a while back, where I grinded out $200 or so playing STT, cashed out profits, and then ran (played) horribly and went bust. Someone at 2+2 recently needed a tilt to stars transfer, so I decided to help them out and transfer $200 from stars to tilt and try out the site again. When Tilt announced the $100.00 bonus from their network problems it gave me extra incentive to play there.

I played a little over 100 STT with only breaking even and was starting to get frustrated. Then Sunday night I finished 5th out of 600 in a $10 KO tourney for a payount of $270. I also went on a STT heater, cashing in 11 out of 12 straight with several wins and along with bonuses and the 5th place KO finish grinded my $200 up to $700.



I havn't been playing stars much, but as you can see I've been only breaking even, except for wasting $50 or so at the Sunday 100k lottery and WSOP steps.



Seperately I cashed out my AP account to have bankroll to play 1/2 NL at Harrah's New Orleans when I go there tomorrow for a business trip. My earnings rate there has historically been very high, and I hope that trend continues Wednesday through Friday. Will put up a trip report this weekend.

For the longest time I played regular smaller-field MTT's on AP and only SNG's on Stars and FTP, except the occasional huge field Stars MTT.

I'm about to cash out my winnings on AP and add that roll to Stars. I paid $12 to have full access to my stats on the pokerdb so I could see how I did. Here are the numbers:

Winnings: $3,216.68
Est. Buyins: $2,130.70
Est. Profit: $1,085.98

Biggest Cash: $1,020.09 Average Cash: $201.04

Biggest Buyin: $50.00 Average Buyin: $23.45

Wins: 2 2.08% Return on Investment: 42.90%

Seconds: 2 2.08% Avg. Finish: 40/100

Thirds: 2 2.08% Avg. Expectation: $10.06

Top Three Rate: 6.25% Avg. Field Size: 216

Final Tables: 16 16.67% Avg. Buyins Won: 1.638

Cashes: 16 16.67%

Total Played: 96

Sample size is obv. small, but looking at it overall numbers I'm pretty pleased with all but ROI. The top players have ROI's near or above 100% right?

This blog was inspired by Bond18's current heater as described in his blog and Body Man D's sick heater the last two weeks:

It's funny how poker can make you feel. When you are winning you feel like you are a great player and when losing you feel like you have completely lost touch with the game. Even though February has been pretty good to me (up over $1k) I continue to doubt my abilities. One of the biggest factors is that I have yet to have a big online MTT score. Making $2k grinding 2,000 STT is not near as rewarding to the ego as taking down a large MTT donkament and winning the same $2k in a single day.

I have been playing poker nights and weekends for around 2 years now, the last year pretty seriously. I have live profits of around $10,000 (most of this from the WSOP Circuit donkament I finished 3rd in) and relatively meager online profits of around $2,000. According to thepokerdb I have profitably played 156 MTT at Absolute and unprofitably played 80 at Stars. I've also played around 1,000 STT in between all the major sites and made most my online profits that way. By contrast, I have played maybe 30 live tournaments (only when in Vegas or New Orleans). Which begs the question: given the small sample size of live tourneys vs. online, why havn't I enjoyed the same level of success online? Much is said about the generally poor quality of live play, and while it is certainly true that live poker is more +ev depending on the venue I would expect a $2,000+ cash somewhere in those 200 online MTT's.

On the flip side, my $9k cash at the WSOP in a $300 buyin event equates to a cash of about $600 at a $20 buyin event. I have had several $600+ cashes online, so I guess it maybe just an economy of scale/bank roll issue.

Did my WSOP cash create too high of expectations? I was, after all, playing outside of my poker bankroll since my online bankroll at that time was <$500. Maybe I've answered my own questions while writing this blog. I took a shot playing above my bankroll and happened to have a good result. Now I need to grow my online bankroll so I can eventually play bigger and better games as I improve. In the past I would cash out my profits as I made them. The $700 I currently have on stars is the largest I have ever maintained and I do not plan on withdrawing.

So tell me, Two Rags, is my perspective correct? Since I've shown consistent profits playing STT should I focus on those for bankroll purposes and play the occasional MTT?

I hope to one day tell you all of an 5 figure online heater. Until then, I'll keep grinding.