My main goals is to start with a small bankroll and increase it practicing bank roll management once it gets to a certain size. It's tough with tournaments because most of them are around $40, but I will give it a try and if I go below my starting cash I will just add another till I can start to move in the correct direction.
Current weaknesses (leaks in game):
Playing cash games - I will no longer play cash games, I always win the tournaments then lose it in the cash games, this will need to stop since they are completely different games I'm going to stick with my strongest game which is tournaments.
Lack of focus, Not enough sleep - I have noticed if I don't get at least 8 hours of sleep and I try to play tournaments all day long I lose focus and miss things as obvious as flush draws. Energy drinks do not help as it just makes me play more aggressive which can cause issues. I also have this issue when I don't eat before a tournament, I get hungry and my mind wonders, need to make sure I leave enough time for food.
Drinking and lack of exercise - I never drink when I gamble to keep my mind clear, but I was drinking a lot from bad beats...etc It has become excessive so I have decided to cut it out all together. Today will be 10 days since I have had a drink. I have not started my exercise but I did go out and buy a mountain bike which I'm hoping to try out after work today. Exercise is by far the best way to work off those bad beats in poker and I know this, but for some reason this is one of the things I am not doing well, along with not eating properly. With just giving up drinking, I'm going to wait another week or so then start focusing more on eating correctly. I am very excited about a new way of life but I don't want to do it all at one time for the fear of moving backwards.
Dealing with bad beats/moves - I really beat myself up if I made a mistake, the majority of the time I am ok with a bad beat if I got my money in right, meaning I'm ahead then I just need to know that I played it mostly correct depending on the player..etc. If I make the wrong move I do play it over and over again, the mental stress on this is intense, but it is also a strength since I rarely repeat a mistake in less one of the above are true, tired/hungry.
Current Strengths
Playing live tournaments - This is a huge strength, I play very well live, I get very good reads off people and when well rested I feel I can break any game that I have been in. After playing online, watching extremely aggressive players play, learning the tricks, I feel that I can make moves whenever needed. I finally got the confidence I need this weekend, when a very good live player was worried that I was sitting as his table, I later went on to taking him out which just made me feel even better. I don't want to get cocky but I'm starting to think you need that mental state to pull off lots of moves, though I will keep my cockiness to myself and this blog.
Player reads - This is by far my best strength, I am very good at reading peoples body language and actions to put them on a hand. I have read some of Caro's book and it just helped me so much, I really need to finish reading it.
Not repeating mistakes - If I get knocked out by a mistake I made I repeat it over again and again in my head, walking myself through different ways of playing the hand. What could have worked better, what other lines I could have taken? should I have been in the hand at all? I go through these until I have an answer for myself, and these hands though they slip out of my mind after a few weeks the strategy of how that should have been played against that type of player does not.
Immediate Goals
Finish reading Caro's book
Rented some Poker DVD's through netflix, can't wait to watch them
Keep my poker money separate from my living/spending money.
Exercise at least 2 times a week (starting small)
No drinking
No cash games or slots, just hold'em tournaments
Practice identifying "the nuts" of each hand so I can very quickly identify it (3 seconds average).
Blog, lots of poker players blog so they can type out what happened, help get it off there mind or keep it on their mind, so I'm going to follow suite.
Long term goals
Live the dream in Atlantic City, Vegas or even near me since poker tables will be coming in a few months to my area.
Poker becoming my career.
Play in the WSOP
Well if anyone is reading this, that's enough to start off, I'm going to post my events from this weekend next.
Kevin
No comments:
Post a Comment