When it all started!

It was in May 2005 who my friend told me him and a few of the lads were playing poker reguarly and he thought I would love it. My first reaction was to mock him for being held up in his room for hours sat in front of his pc, gambling money based on a game of pure luck!! "Cards is a game for mugs, completely down to luck" I proudly said, happy with my non gambling lifestyle (apart from the occasional football bet). Well later that month he had convinced me to play a game on line one quiet Sunday afternoon....... here we are 17 months later, god knows how many hours of poker later and yes I’m just like the rest of you, completely in love with this game. I never really knew it existed apart from seeing the occasional scene in a movie with some gangster bluffing all his money (or Delboy cheating in Only Fools & Horses!!). Yes I've pretty much played non stop since that day in May!! I started off only playing on the internet, betfair poker on £5 STT, I had to much ego to start any lower as my friend (sheff1979) was playing that level. Luckily I picked the basics up pretty quickly, after a first month loss of £80 ive made a steady profit ever since (see monthly profit & loss below). I played this format for a few months along with the occasion £2 or £5 MTT (those £2 MTT with 500 runners were crazy maniac style playa lot alot of fun in the beginning to learn the format etc of MTT!). I progressed to £10STT by Aug 05. Then in September I found the game that would become my main source of profit, NL Cash. Starting on 25p 50p I couldn't loose and my profits suddenly rose dramatically (for new player playing I couldn’t believe I could make £400-£800 per month and have fun. I quickly progressed to 25p 50p where I stayed for a while, I also discovered it wasn’t all rosy and had the natural swings but usually ended up ahead or even at the end of the month. The best thing I ever did was start to keep records from didn't I didn’t want to lie to myself and in terms of on line ive been very good at tracking exact profit losses. I did progress to 50p £1 and even £1 £2 NL cash by 2006, however I think this was a mistake as I didn’t really have the bankroll and I suddenly found the swings stressful and it affected my game (loosing a £450 pot when I flopped the nuts with 9 7 on a 977 board, getting A7 all in and the A hitting on river still makes me shiver!) Luckily I still made money on these higher stakes but the swings definitely effected my game, also I still have a lot to learn and am no where near the standard I want to be so have dropped back to 25p 50p as I find I can try things I wouldn’t dare on higher stakes and develop my all-round game as a result.

Internet Monthly Profit/Loss 2005 Profit (bold)/Loss (red) (£)
2005
May £-75, Jun- £+55, Jul £+55, Aug £+94, Sep £+445, Oct £+816, Nov £+232, Dec £+10
2006
Jan £0, Feb £+160, Mar £+630, Apr £+302, May £+1!, Jun £+450, Jul- £+310, Aug £+554 Sep £+396, Oct £-135, Nov to date £+250

I have also played quite a lot live in local Casino's mainly on MTT's. I have to admit I haven’t kept as detailed of records in live events (I will do from now I promise), Ive had a couple of big wins but no where nearly as I should be aiming. MTT's are definitely not my strength, I spent a week in Vegas playing live last month and ended up £250 up which I was proud of (loosing £650 on casino games we wont talk about ;)). In general in live play do ok but nothing spectacular, I’m working hard to specifically improve this part of my game specifically MTT where most live action is and will talk about that more in a future blog.

Well in a very top line nutshell that’s a quick background to my game. As my title in my blog says I really believe the biggest risk to making a profit is yourself, I know I have a lot to improve, Ive been lucky enough to make a steady profit since starting but I see better players every time I play on my tables and I want to be the best I can be. Hopefully this blog will help me analyse my game and others even more as that’s the key to getting better. I hope I haven’t bored you enough never to visit again, I thought this would be a good starting point but I promise my entries wont always be this long winded!