Turning 30

As well as May the fourth being Star Wars day, this year it also saw me hit the big three zero. I’m no longer one of the young guns of the game, but I’ll have stern words for anyone who classes me as an old timer just yet! My birthday celebrations were awesome. My friends and family really made my party special and my the lovely Emma spoilt me rotten taking me to a birds of prey experience and a sausage making class of all things! Both were absolutely excellent experiences, the birds of prey appealing to my love of Science and Biology and the sausage making class appealing to my love of innuendos and food.

This year saw me enter into my 5th year as a professional poker player (whatever that is!) These past 4 years have been simultaneously the strangest and best years of my life. I left a job I loved for a job I love/hate, I got married, bought a house and have met some weird, wonderful and fantastic people both through poker and through the wife. Overall turning 30 hasn’t been so bad!

I remember 10 years ago, during the boom induced by the “Moneymaker” effect there was great debate about the differences of skill levels between the young guns and the old timers of the game. The old timers then had seldom played online and many of the young guns had seldom played live. The best of both generations learned quickly that the other generation had something they could teach them. The young guns had quickly played more hands online than the old timers had live, and had spent time with their peers perfecting the maths and intricacies of the online game, while the old timers had the ability to thrive under live final table pressure and pick up physical tells.

The discrepancies between the next generations will be so much smaller. People my age who have been grinding online for years will have played countless hands online and many will have a lot of live expertise too. But the young generation has the benefit of learning what my generation has learned and adding their fresh new perspectives to the game. It will be interesting to see just how much more difficult the game will be in 5 more years as the young guns quickly gain experience and learn from more practiced players they will certainly be a force to be reckoned with.

The game won’t be solved by then. Not by a long shot. Many people mistakenly say “Hold ‘Em is dead! Everybody knows how to play now!” I remember having the privilege of sitting down next to Ryan Laplante at the WSOP one year. Aside from being a damn good poker player he was also a very nice chap. Holding up his fingers he drew a graph in mid-air. “If the most knowledgeable poker player is this far along the graph” he said, while miming an inch along the imaginary graph “then we have about this far to go before we have solved the game” I don’t think his arms were long enough to get the scale right of that imaginary graph. The more sessions I put in with my friends and peers over skype working on the game the more I realise that in my 5 years I know so little about the game despite having worked so hard on it. I absolutely love that about poker, the intellectual challenge of the game never ends as long as that remains true there will always be money to be made in the game. It really is just a question of who is willing to work hardest for it.

I just hope the new young guns don’t make the game too hard for this old timer.