Wednesday, July 1, 2009

All Volume Aint Good Volume

The title of this blog post totally summarizes my whole month. I am very proud for myself from getting down to the nitty gritty and putting in the games but how may of those games where actually good volume? How many games was I playing my A game? Well I guess its hard to know unless I review every single HH but at the same time I know I didn't put in the best volume I could.

Last night, I was inspired by TheLipoFund who actually played for 30hrs straight trying to win the TLB so I decided to grind a long session late last night. I was so focused on getting to 1.5k SNG's for the month that I really didn't care. I just kept loading and playing. Granted that I didn't run the greates it was clear after reviewing some HH's with Reasons14 that I was not playing my A game. That got us starting to talk about how I need to be mentally prepared for the game.

We started talking about how with variance included and you are 16 tabling you have to be on your A game. I have heard many succesful players that said this same thing but I think I took that statement for granted. Last night I had a volume goal and I was forcing myself to play instead of wanting to play. I mean I always want to play don't get it twisted but, the wrong thing was motivating me on this session.

The reason I am so angry at myself is because I am hard headed and don't keep lessons in my head. When ParadiceCity was coaching me we always talked about not spazing out and really focusing on what you are doing. Now it seems like I am not for some reason. It has always been a struggle for me to focuse period though. I have a hard time sitting down doing one thing at a time. Like I only can look at something for a little then my mind wanders. I guess my mom was right when she called me scattered brain growing up lol. Anyways I either I have Adult ADD or I need to find a way to concentrate more. I have some plan of actions that I am going to take and I am going to list those.

1)Dropping down to 12 Tables.
-I think I was so focused in moving up on tables that I really started slacking with my game play. Sometimes I think I play too many tables too because I feel rushed and am not thinking about each situations to the fullest. For @ least the first half of the month I think I am going to 12 table and focus on everything going on more. Seeing what types of hands people show up with etc etc. I know this could be bad because I can get bored and tempted to surf the web or message but I will work at focusing on everything more.

2)Closing all IM programs and cutting of phone while grinding.
-I feel like I just get too easily distracted. I work from 6:00-2:30 every day and when I am off of work I want to talk to people. People usually call me when I am grinding and I will pick up the phone for like 5-15 mins and I will talk. This is very distracted and I cannot focus on my A game when all of this is going on. Thus the reason why I am going to stop. I end up missing way to many shoves/iso spots when this is going on so it has to stop.

3)Focus on playing my A game all the time.
-Obviouslly I have struggled with this because this past month I have already written about playing like a robot/zombie. I need to be focused on everything. What % of my stack am I raising with? What ranges I put this person on. What my image is perceived? How do I get max value from hands? These are just the little things that I must constantly askign myself when I am in every situation.

These are all of the things that I am thinking about that are off the top of my head. I left a thread on both forums I am a member on becauce I feel like I need more help to focus. I don't know if I need to get checked for adult ADD or what but I refuse to just grind that long for only a measily 7%. I know I am better than that and no matter how bad I run I refuse to believe I am that "bad" of a player. Below you can see the graphs for my month.

I am thinking about taking a couple of days off not really thinking about poker. I am going to relax and start next month with a clean slate. I need to take advantage of the months I have before my grad school program finally starts. Even though thats another story that I don't like to talk to this time. I hope when people read this stuff they can learn from my lessons and not do the same thing. Till next time stay classy.

wbmustang aka wbdonkstang :-(

1 comment:

Yodaddy379 said...

Dude, I feel the same way. I've been 18-20 tabling recently and I've felt pretty rushed. I also haven't had the best results over the last 900 games or so (breakeven). Some good ideas in here imo.