The Vegas Gameplan

With Vegas only one week away, it's time to set out my gameplan for the 3-week duration. First off, let's be clear that this is more or less a make or break trip. Since September I have only managed to earn £2k from live cash-game poker. I've learnt loads and appreciate I've made some big mistakes but this is just not going to be enough to sustain a healthy lifestyle should I carry on at the same winrate over the next year. Unfotunately, although I still have the bankroll to plug on into January and February (and possibly March and April as well), if Vegas proves to be unfruitful it looks increasingly likely I'll be looking for part-time work come the spring of next year. Now although we shouldn't really slap on results-orientated or monetary goals, I think it necessary in this instance.

As such, with a 20-day trip to Vegas and complete freedom to play $1/$2 and $2/$5 cash-game poker whenever I want, my target is to make $3000 by my return to the UK on the 15th December. This is my goal. This isn't to say I will stop when (or if) I hit $3k, but this is what I wish to make if I am to consider the trip to be a proper success. $2k will be satisfactory but $3k is what I'll need to confidently carry on with the business. Let's move onto the plan and how I'm going to attempt this... This chart shows the venues and stakes along with the minimum and maximum buy-ins:

Now unlike my last visit in 2011 where my goal was to visit all 20 poker rooms, this time round is more about winning dollars. From top to bottom and in groups of four they are: Group A, B, C and D. My aim is to play a minimum of 40 sessions (around 1-5 hours per session) by building up from playing the $1/$2 game at Group C and D venues at first (10 sessions), then moving to playing $1/$2 at Group B venues (10 sessions) before graduating to playing $1/$3 and $2/$5 at the Group A locations (20 sessions). Of course, my system will allow fluctuating between the groups (depending on mood and how well I'm doing) but this is generally how I see the campaign going.

As for buy-ins, it'll be max buy-ins at the $1/$2 and $1/$3 games with a $700 buy-in at the $2/$5 games (~£400) which may rise to a full $1k buy-in when (or if) I get the confidence to do so.

One more week to go...

Week 1: Review

The phrase "crash and burn" is often bandied around in the poker world these days but it's fair to say that it describes my week perfectly. So much so that I was so deflated last night, making my way back from The Vic Loyalty freeroll, that a two week break from the game is now needed before my trip to Vegas on the 25th. Rewind back to the 5th November and I'm playing good, solid poker and looking at a £850 profit for the month; everything is rosy and I feel like a proper professional player doing the biz.

Fast forward to Friday 7th and I'm looking at my aces being cracked on the river by a straight in a £2/£5 game and seeing about £400 going south, then another £300 going the same way after I find it difficult to fold top pair top kicker to a guy who also makes a straight. Couple all this with being bluffed while holding AK on a raggedy board by someone holding nine high - and you get the picture.

Now yesterday, while £150 down for the month after my disastrous £2/£5 session, I'm at The Vic's loyalty freeroll. There are about 35 players left and 30 get paid with the min-cash being £482. I look at the electronic screen and see that 10th on the final table gets £1700 - nice. Anyway, the blinds are at 1500 / 3000 with 500 antes and I look down at 10 10 in early position. There's around 10k in dead chips there and so with about eight big-blinds left I decide ship in 25000 chips into the middle. The old fella in mid-position wakes up with KK, the board bricks out and I hit the rail. Out on the bubble table. Close but yet so far!!

We're now at the 10th November. I've made just £2k since the beginning of September which is just not good enough. I know that my basic strategy is fairly sound but that I'm falling short through a lack of discipline... so I've come to a very important crossroads and I've made an important decision. It all hinges on my trip to Vegas...

As mentioned, I intend to lay off poker for 2 weeks. I shall study my balls off by watching training videos and reading up avidly over the next fortnight. The idea is that by the time I land in Vegas I'll be hungry and ready to play top-quality poker. Now one thing I've learned while playing fairly profitably over the last six months is that a man in my position cannot earn a decent living while playing £1/£2 live cash-game poker. A little bit of extra income: yes. But a decent monthly wage to support a family of four? No. In Vegas, I plan to play a lot of $2/$5 just to see if I've got what it takes. If it all goes tits-up... well, I guess I'll be done with trying to make a living out of poker and my four month experiment will most likely come to an end. Furthermore, it'll probably be a case of looking for a job (at least part-time) in 2015. However, if I can make a good go of it, I'll take this as a green light to mix in a lot more £2/£5 games when I get back in the UK.

In my next post, I'll go into a little bit more detail on my Vegas campaign. 

October Review

This is going to be brief as I pretty much summed everything up in my last post. October, like September, has been all about sorting out early teething problems and learning lessons. I basically need to think the big hands through more thoroughly and be on my guard in not calling off big bets when, in retrospect, there's a huge chance that I'm beaten. This usually occurs when I'm card-dead and getting a tad frustrated and it's really just about turning the discipline up a notch or two when the going gets tough. That's all I need to do. As I mentioned in my last post, if I had just stopped to think in the three biggest hands that I lost last month - and they really were stupid, basic errors - then I would have saved myself around £1k.

As it is, with a very modest £2.1k in earnings thus far, I'm putting the first two months of the business down to the building the foundations phase. From now on - with me being off to a flying start to the month of November -  it's about discipline, focus and controlled aggression all the way. One other point of note about October is that I put in 133 hours which is exactly the same as what I did for September. That's £7.89 per hour which smashes the minimum wage - hurrah!!

Anyway, as I say, November has started off really well with Sunday and Monday sessions yielding  reasonably good payouts; let's just hope I don't fuck up and end up writing about big losses on Sunday when I'll do my week 1 round-up. Anyway, until then - so long!!