Making Some Progress...

Phew. March was long and busy. So let's take a look at how I did with my goals for March:

[ ] Play at least 350,000 hands. I played 325,000.

[X] Juice every morning. Did it every morning I was at home. I went to Montreal for a couple days and one morning there I found a pretty nice raw food and juice bar. This will always be a goal but it has just became apart of my routine so I probably won't mention it again.

[X] Finish reading 'Check-Raising the Devil'.

[ ] Read '127 Hours'. Huge fail. I have read about 5 pages.

Poker went pretty well this month. For the first time in a long time I booked a winning month from the tables. This whole year I feel like the lessons I learned last year combined with making an effort to work on my game off the tables, is slowly starting to pay off. I deleted all my hands from 2010, but I can tell you that my graph was usually like the rocky mountains. Not at all like the graphs that other regs post that look like the most perfect 40 degree upward slope with hardly any downhill spots. Here is a look at my graph for 2011 so far:



OK, and because every poker player is entilted to a little whining, the same graph with the All-In EV line:



Nah, I'm not really whining, I just think it's weird. Since I'm just not one of those people who can explain things like this, I won't try, but I will just say, I honestly think- you play good- the closer you run with your all in ev line, the worse you play - the more below ev you will be. I only say this because the whole year last year, every month I was plenty of buy ins below. I don't at all think it was because I was unlucky. I think it was because I was playing bad. Plus- all the people who I consider to be amazing, never really seem to run far below.

Although I probably did run good this month, I don't feel like it was exceptionally different than other times, and as you could see I was pretty close to the EV line:



Obviously programs like HEM and PokerTracker are our best friends, but I know a lot of people for whom this all-in ev line seems like their worst enemy. I think it's best to take a look at the overall picture, and since I have only had HEM since January, some of the things that it has to offer that have helped me the most is being able to search a certain player and look at there trends a long with all of their hands according to pot size. I really feel like my slight improvement this year is alot to do with HEM. The other part is something that is continually growing, especially as I get a taste of actually having a profitable month without rakeback. I really had a dumb mindset last year. I always said to myself, and outloud, it's OK if I loose a little and get SNE, I'll still be making a good amount overall. Because I was constantly saying and thinking this, I think my focus became so much on playing a large amount of hands for rakeback that I totally put my poker game and actually trying to beat the games on the back burner. Early this year it started to be that I was forcing myself to work on my game off the tables, but now I really want to. If I play a session where I feel like one particular opponent was really owning me, it now makes me anxious to start studying there game and figure out what I can do differently vs them.

Over the past few months I have been flirting with the idea of getting a coach, but for now I have decided against it, although I'm always passively looking for someone who seems like they might be a good match. I am sure it wouldn't take too much to change my game, and I know an outsider perspective could really help find my leaks quicker than I could. The thing is, I would say that honestly, 30% of my playing time I am really trying. I also know that a coach is going to get me to reduce my table amount, so I'm already going to be playing better. I'm just going to give it a go on my own, as I have always done. Partly because I am lazy, and I am a pretty independent person, probably to fault.

April is going to be a pretty important month. As of tomorrow, I'm going to move up to 200NL. I was scoping out the tables today, and it didn't look very good, but I am pretty determined to give it a good shot this month and make it work. The hours needed at 200NL to maintain and achieve SNE are significantly lower and if I could maintain a decent win rate, my hourly rate would be much higher than it would be at 100NL. If I don't end up doing OK and the games are really dry, I'll probably move back down in May. I just want to have a big sample size first to figure it all out and give it my best shot.

Goals for April:

[ ] Play 225,000 hands

[ ] Read '127 Hours'

[ ] Make $5,000 without rakeback (for law of attraction sake- no more negative thoughts!)