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This blog will follow my day to day journey to rebuilding my bankroll. I guess I should give you a little history about myself. I use to play 2/4 NL regularly on Stars. I decided I wanted rakeback and moved to FTP and began one of the worst downswings in my 5 years of playing poker... 70k hands of losing poker was demoralizing and crushed my bankroll. As I began to move down I realized it wasn't getting any better. Before I knew it I was grinding 25NL and going no where. It seemed I couldn't get out of the hole. I'd grind 3k hands a day to only end up breaking even or down... Then it happened for the first time in 5 years I was felted. Not life felted, but my online bankroll(something I keep seperate from my live bankroll), was down to 0.00.
I started playing poker in 2002 when I joined the US Navy. It was the first time I had seen NL Texas Hold'em played and it was quite a big game for my first night. Most the stacks were $1000+ and that was a lot to me... I sat down with $400, being we were in the gulf I didn't have much else to spend money on, and I figured how hard could it be right?
Now I had played for fun a few $5 sit n go's with friends, but never a real cash game so I was aware of the rules.. Very first hand I'm dealt 8c8d and the flop comes 28Trainbow. We get all in on the flop and I was demoralized when he fliped over a set of tens. But that wasn't to be. The turn blanked and the river was the case 8. Giving me Quads Over Full. My hands were shaking and my heart racing. I couldn't believe I just made $400 in a matter of seconds. Albeit I knew I had sucked out, it didnt matter to me then. I didn't think I played the hand bad, and i didn't looking back at it. My first hand of REAL cash game poker I catch quads and rake a $800 pot. I was hooked from the word go.
Upon leaving the Navy I got a job as an electrical engineer making a nice wage of about $20/hr. I soon realized I could make more money playing poker(at this point I had been playing for nearly 5 years), and had been a consistent winner online and live, so I took the plunge.
Fast Forward to the beginning of the story and the present. As I said everything was going great until I switched to FTP and began losing buy-in after buy-in. Now I'm hoping that getting this out there and being able to talk with people will help me as I begin the process of rebuilding my bankroll.
I moved from Vegas to Texas recently to live with some other full time players to not only improve my game, but just be around poker as much as possible. Silly you say, I leave Las Vegas to be around more poker? Well this comes from having no friends in Vegas other then the charachters I know around the table. People I considered friends I knew no more then nick names. The Rabi, an elderly gambler who'd been making money at low stakes grinding for years, and a few other charachters. I'm now in a more comfortable atmosphere where I feel my game will improve immensley over the next few months.
My goal is to play 2000 hands a day minimum, while playing optimal poker. Studying, reading, and using this blog as a medium to discuss situations i've found myself in, and improve my game and become the best player I can be. My first goal which you will follow me on is grinding my way back to 400NL. Yesterday after getting settled in Texas, and playing a few of the live games around town here in College Station, I redeposited $500 onto FTP to begin the climb back to where I once was.
I hope you enjoy and we'll see what happens over the next few months as I begin my climb back to the top. I will be using a 20BI rule until I reach 50NL and then will move up to the 35BI rule until I reach 1/2. Once that happens will use a 45BI rule and upon reaching 3/6 I will use a 100BI rule for the rest of my poker career. Excessive? Maybe, but being felted ias a sick feeling. "Getting Broke," as said in Wisdom of a Poker Champion happens to us all... To me I am determined to only have it happen once.
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