Mind Over Poker

With poker tournaments becoming ubiquitous over the last six years, it’s hard to remember just how few there were pre-2003. Back then, the Tropicana was the only casino in Atlantic City to host daily tournaments, and it had only one no-limit hold’em tournament per week, which was held every Friday. (As a side note, the Trop had seven-card stud, Omaha, and limit hold’em tournaments on other weeknights. One of the by-products of the explosion of no-limit hold’em tournaments has been the evisceration of other daily tournament forms.)

The proliferation of no-limit hold’em tournaments has certainly altered play. When you can walk next door or click on your mouse and be in a new tournament, you are much more willing to gamble. Whereas a tournament used to be special, now it’s just another day at the office. The purpose of this column is not to reminisce, as I’m all for more action. Rather, what I would like to point out is the danger of becoming robotic. The more you do anything, the more there is a natural tendency to become mechanical in doing it. Experience is often accompanied by complacency. When something is new and challenging, your senses are heightened and you have an acute awareness of everything going on around you, lest you make a mistake.

If you can combine that acute sensitivity with experience, you’ll have a huge advantage over all of those players doing things by rote. It all begins with preparation. Rather than moseying in sometime during the first few levels, brimming with confidence that your superior skill will carry the day, get to the tournament ahead of time. Register, and make sure to get a copy of the blinds levels. Study it, in order to get a firm grasp of how much play you have, so that you don’t find yourself getting blinded and anted out. Inquire about the order of breaking the tables, so that you will know if yours will break up early or late. Get to your table early and talk to some of your opponents. You’ll be amazed at how much you can learn about their playing styles if you strike up a casual conversation about poker and manage to innocently slip in some probing questions.

Some other factors to consider are finding out when the breaks will occur, and the location of the nearest restroom. Plan accordingly. Don’t be caught having to order a meal while you’re playing. Have some snacks with you if need be. Have dollar bills available to tip your waitress if you’ll need drinks. It’s always good to have a big bottle of water with you when you start.

While doing these things does not guarantee success, it will serve to put you in the proper frame of mind. That is, you will be focusing on small details and heightening your awareness level, which can only help your play. Develop a game plan ahead of time, but make sure that it is flexible. For example, let’s suppose that your strategy is to start out tight, in order to observe your opponents and to cultivate a tight image to exploit when the blinds increase. If your table is one of the first to break up, there is not much point in following that strategy. Or, if you are getting a great streak of cards early on, take advantage of it. Or, if your opponents are playing too tight, you’ll have to loosen up. Whatever you do, don’t play by rote. Play from experience, with an acute sense of what is going on at your table and how you should be adjusting to all of the relevant factors.

Another way to maintain focus is to keep track of your play. In a previous column, I mentioned the value of analyzing all of your hands, a la Gus Hansen in Every Hand Revealed. I received a lot of positive feedback on that column, so I thought I would pass on the availability of notebooks to assist in that regard via pokernotebooks.com.

David Apostolico is the author of several poker-strategy books, including Tournament Poker and The Art of War. He can be reached at [email protected].