Killing it lately

After struggling to win amid unbelievable terrible luck seemingly without end, I have been winning a lot more lately. I just went over 30M in the bankroll for the first time today, and have been steadily growing my bankroll week over week. I don’t finish every day with more chips than I started, but most days I do.

The last date I took a big loss on the day was July 4. Since then it’s been mostly up.

I’m still mostly playing the short table games, Heads Up SNG and 3-max SNG, plus my 3/week league MTTs. So that hasn’t been the variable that changed. I’ve played maybe a handful of 9-max SNG in the last month, but I’ve done well in those that I’ve played.

I’ve been noticeably happier at the tables, tilting much less, more emotionally resilient and even-keeled, and I’m sure that contributes to the better win rate, but it’s also a product of it. I’ve definitely done a better job of managing my emotions and keeping steady in the face of a loss. Maybe that’s all it takes.

But I also feel like the hand outcomes have been more in line with probability for me lately, so maybe the variance problems I’d been feeling plagued by in previous months have gone away for the time being. I’m actually playing fewer games per night over the last couple weeks, so I have not been fixing variance with volume.

In general I’ve just been playing about as well as I ever have, and it’s been aligning with getting decent cards, getting in ahead and having it hold up more often than not, and occasionally winning some underdog hands as well.

Last 7 Days Total Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
Tournaments Registered 19 3 4 5 6 1 0 0
Tournaments Unregistered 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0
Tournaments Refunded 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Tournaments ITM 11 1 3 2 4 1 0 0
Tournaments ITM% 61.11% 33.33% 100.00% 40.00% 66.67% 100.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Last 30 Days Total Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
Tournaments Registered 95 29 20 13 11 12 8 2
Tournaments Unregistered 13 5 3 2 0 0 2 1
Tournaments Refunded 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Tournaments ITM 38 9 9 6 6 6 1 1
Tournametns ITM% 46.34% 37.50% 52.94% 54.55% 54.55% 50.00% 16.67% 100.00%
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@puggywug

All great to hear. I would compare you with Phill Hellmuth in your inability to let bad emotions steam your brain. As with PH this is also your biggest weakness. If you can focus on improving that you will improve drastically.

Even if your luck has improved as you indicate if you can continue to play cool headed your game will improve drastically. Its very difficult to play well after losing a big pot if you cant let it go & lose your cool.

Continue to focus on your mental game & I’m sure you will notice decent improvements. Never forget its a game & supposed to be fun. GL

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Re: Hellmuth, I do see a bit of a resemblance in how I can be when I get tilted by a bad beat or cooler. The thing is, I’ve always thought that it reflected extremely poorly on Hellmuth when he’s acted that way. And yet I fell right into the same emotional traps.

I only have seen edited footage of Hellmuth blowing up, so not the full first experience to know really how he reacts after he vents, but I bet unlike I have, he’s gone right back to work and keeps playing a strong game, rather than throwing away chips in anger as I had been doing.

I’m glad that recently I’ve been playing better, getting better results, and feeling better overall, and I hope that it continues. I wouldn’t mind playing with the success of a Phil Hellmuth, but I’d much rather cultivate a more cheerful image, like a Daniel Negreanu (although I hear recently he blew up in public when his hand was folded due to a network glitch, so I guess it really is true that we’ve all been there before.)

2 Likes

Totally. No one is happy to lose and everyone gets periods of terrible luck, but not everyone reacts the same way. JoeIngram did a podcast interview with Kristen Bricknell that was interesting and touched on emotions etc whilst playing. Worth listening to whilst your playing.

A few days ago the RP quote was something to the effect: expecting sympathy in poker is pointless and unproductive.

Even when you lose & played well you can still learn something from the hand by being objective & intelligent. You cant do this by blowing up, swearing and losing cool.

OFC Phil Hellmuth would probably play for an hour or hours without blowing up. I dont think he is any less lucky than anyone else but he always thinks he is. Even when he plays bad & loses with the worst hand playing badly he still things he deserves to be lucky and win.

Yea the Negreanu blow up was funny & a bit of an over reaction. I think he gets very defensive of his wife. I couldnt find out exactly what it was all about & TBH I havent bothered too much.

1 Like

where do you get the graph from?

@moofish wrote a chrome extension that generates the graph and puts it on your bank transactions page. You can find it on the extensions page if you want to search for it. There was a thread about it on the forums some time ago as well.

1 Like

Another week in the can, still killing it in league MTT play, heads-up, and 3-max.

Last 7 Days
Tournaments Registered 24 2 6 2 3 0 11 0
Tournaments Unregistered 2 0 0 0 0 0 2 0
Tournaments Refunded 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Tournaments ITM 13 2 2 1 2 0 6 0
Tournaments ITM% 59.09% 100.00% 33.33% 50.00% 66.67% 0.00% 66.67% 0.00%