Let me know if you are interested in a leakfinder. I would review your last 30K hands and then do a 40-50 minute video review. The content would be made into a CR video.

PM me with some basic info about yourself:

1. Stakes you are currently playing.
2. Country you live in.
3. A little about yourself outside of poker.
4. What role does poker play in your life.

I'll pick one or two submissions.

I've been working on a book which documents from my experience what I believe is important to building a bankroll at the micros and moving up in stakes. The book centers on my experience of going from $200 to $10,000 in 2011. You can get more details about it here:

http://www.mtmicropoker.com/

The actual book is all written and is currently going through edits. If you would like to stay in the loop with updates and prizes, be sure to sign up for updates on the site. I'm very happy to be so close to having the product done. I think it will set the right foundation for anyone who wants to beat the micros and beyond.

Sigh ...

http://www.subjectpoker.com/2011/09/doj-merge/

As I wrote on June 8th, I was not happy with the answers I was given about player funds being segregated and have kept only a few hundred dollars to dabble in the 25NL games. Bottom line - until we get regulations in the U.S., I don't feel good about keeping money online.

"It would be some consolation for the feebleness of our selves and our works if all things should perish as slowly as they come into being; but as it is, increases are of sluggish growth, but the way to ruin is rapid."

-- Lucius Anneaus Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, n. 91

I just finished my fourth session with my student Patrick. He told me that he had a really bad session. I inquired about why he had the bad session and he told me that he tilted. I asked him to show me what happened and we looked at his hands + graph.

Over time, I've learned just how important it is to quit when things are not going your way. You're just not going to win some days. For example - here is a good one where the cards decided that it wasn't meant to be. Patrick said things like "I hate being in the red" and "I got frustrated and wanted to win it back". He has ambitions of playing for a living, and if he is to do that, he needs to learn to quit at the right time.

Here is the graph he showed me. I added my own notes afterward:



As you can see, towards the end of the session, his losing started to accellerate. This is the pattern he'll experience again in the future. Namely:

1. Staring out on the A-game, winning at a steady click.
2. A few losses, back to even.
3. Starting to win again, but not a lot of consistency.
4. A-game is starting to fade, now all the small pots we were winning at the beginning we are losing. Frustration is starting to mount.
5. Now we are losing the big pots.
6. After losing two big pots, we win a small one and we follow that up with another big lost pot.

At this point we need to stop. The deck is cleary against us - reglardless of if we feel like we are on our A-game or not.

"But Verneer - I can still play my A-game even after such a stretch!"

Probably not, but even if you think you can, take a break. Get away from the table, walk around, and come back. Poker will still be there.

Recognizing the point in which your B/C game meets bad variance is critical to knowing when to quit and that in turn is critical in being a consistent long-term winner.

A player that contacted me and asked for coaching (most of the time I say "not coaching atm" - sometimes though I take someone on for a bit) asked me about my winrate. I sent him my 2010 & 2011 results + graphs (close to million hands) and he wrote me back:

"when I asked about your win rate, I wasn't questioning your abilities."

I wrote back:

"You SHOULD question my abilities. You SHOULD question my winrate. You SHOULD question my coaching. Too many people in the poker industry aren't questioned and don't want to be questioned and that is a problem.

After these two sessions you have a sense of what I can offer and how I work. I would also encourage you (and all my students for that matter) to not settle for me as a coach just yet. If this is your first opportunity working with someone, you own it to yourself and me to look around the marketplace and see if there is someone better for you. I need to be clear - I am not saying that I don't want to work with you, but I do think that you should have a clear picture about what other coaches are doing and only then can you decide if I am the right one for you."

Only informed consumers can truly make good choices. I am all for transparency & choices in any industry.

With the super committee set to work on finding ways to reduce deficit, we get an opporunity to reach out to the 12 members and let them know about HR 2366 - the bill to regulate and legalize online poker.

I'll go ahead and use my "one-time" in anticipation for tomorrow.

Edit: Even though my expectations were really low, this meeting was still a letdown. Basically, FTP has another 6-7 weeks before the next meeting takes place. LOL. Anyhow, here are the cliffs from the 2+2 NVG thread which summarize today's events well:

Why is Jungleman so good?

My guess: He puts his opponent to a decision for all their chips?

So I'm on the final stages of putting my book together. While it sucks that poker is mostly dead in the U.S., this has been a long term goal of mine and I feel like I'm getting really close to the end. All the major content is there, and right now I am getting it peer-reviewed and edited.

One major thing that I still need is a cover. If you have experience with graphic design and could help me out, please let me know. Send me a PM with some samples of your work as well as your terms for compensation ($$, coaching, w/e you are interested in). You could forever be immortalized in print - unless you already are :)

If you know someone who could help me, send them my way as well. Thanks in advance!

For the first time in my life, I really wished I was in Vegas during the WSOP. There are three main reasons for this:

1. No major online poker. Huge bummer, especially when Full Tilt shut down world wide. More and more avenues for participating in poker were shut off and I found myself living vicariously through those immersed in poker - at the WSOP.

2. Twitter solidifying it's role in the poker universe. Yes, people used Twitter last year during the WSOP, but it seems like just about everyone was on Twitter this year - updating on a regular basis. This made anything happening easy to follow in real time. Yea Twitter! It's also really good at making you feel left out of a party. Damn Twitter.

3. Discussion of the soft fields. Since I've never played a live MTT, I'll just have to take people's word for it. Supposedly any solid online player has a major edge in some of the more popular events.

Now here is the kicker - not only do I want to play in the WSOP, I also want to not suck. In fact, I want to more than not suck - I want to feel good about my game.

My background is pretty much all online cash games at stakes up to 200NL. It's a mixture of 6-max (40%), FR (45%), and HU (15%) in terms of volume. I tend to have solid, steady results with limited variance. I have almost no MTT experience.

So my first question is ... assuming online poker doesn't get regulated in the next three months, what's the most +EV use of my time?

1. Move to Canadia, grind online MTT's.
2. Move to Vegas/LA/(?), grind live MTT's
3. Move to Vegas/LA/(?), grind live MTT's & Cash Games
4. Watch Moneymaker and Jamie Gold's victories, take it all in and mimic.