MisterKing
01-21-2005, 02:39 PM
We all take some swings in small-stakes hold'em, that's just the nature of the game with so many players chasing longshot draws and the like. As someone who knows this, I've been very good about handling the highs and the lows in recent months, but now find myself in a position where a downswing has gone past my established threshold for short-term pain. But that's no reason to post. Rather, I'm posting here to see what strategies you all use to deal with particularly tough losing stretches... any advice is appreciated.
Without getting into the nitty gritty details, here's some context:
-I've been a winning player 10 months out of the last 10 (excluding this month) at various levels.
-I've played about 20,000 hands at my current level (2/4) with a short-term winrate of 3.5BB/100 (yes, I know this rate is meaningless since the sample is so small... no worries), a VP$IP of about 17, and a PFR% of just under 10.
-I make pretty extensive use of PT for "opposition research" and review of my own play, and also use PlayerView when multitabling.
-My current downswing has lasted generally over a 3 week period, consisting of a little more than -100BB over approximately 3,900 hands. (I don't have my exact PT data right in front of me).
So, beyond taking extra care to review my plan in PT after each session, paying closer attention to seat and table selection, and perhaps stepping the number of simultaneous tables down a little (from 3 or 4 to 1 or 2), I'm looking for other things that might be good steps to take.
I've identified Axs and 98s as two hands that I may need to play less first-in, so that's one thing to do. But beyond these smaller adjustments, I think the downswing has more to do with the nature of small-stakes than with the way I play.
For those of you who play more often than I do, I take it -100BB swings aren't all that uncommon over periods of 4K hands -- at least from time to time? Certainly I've had upswings of 100BB or more in half that many hands before. Point is, I don't want to cop out and shirk responsibility for the bad results, but part of me thinks that high variance is just part of the game and I better take to accepting that if I'm going to continue.
Take me to the woodshed, tell me I'm nuts, or, if not, maybe enlighten me as to things I should be doing to weather the storm. A healthy BR means that I can continue to play "my level," though I do anticipate switching up when the conditions look good at 1/2 full and 6-max in the next few sessions. Thanks!
Without getting into the nitty gritty details, here's some context:
-I've been a winning player 10 months out of the last 10 (excluding this month) at various levels.
-I've played about 20,000 hands at my current level (2/4) with a short-term winrate of 3.5BB/100 (yes, I know this rate is meaningless since the sample is so small... no worries), a VP$IP of about 17, and a PFR% of just under 10.
-I make pretty extensive use of PT for "opposition research" and review of my own play, and also use PlayerView when multitabling.
-My current downswing has lasted generally over a 3 week period, consisting of a little more than -100BB over approximately 3,900 hands. (I don't have my exact PT data right in front of me).
So, beyond taking extra care to review my plan in PT after each session, paying closer attention to seat and table selection, and perhaps stepping the number of simultaneous tables down a little (from 3 or 4 to 1 or 2), I'm looking for other things that might be good steps to take.
I've identified Axs and 98s as two hands that I may need to play less first-in, so that's one thing to do. But beyond these smaller adjustments, I think the downswing has more to do with the nature of small-stakes than with the way I play.
For those of you who play more often than I do, I take it -100BB swings aren't all that uncommon over periods of 4K hands -- at least from time to time? Certainly I've had upswings of 100BB or more in half that many hands before. Point is, I don't want to cop out and shirk responsibility for the bad results, but part of me thinks that high variance is just part of the game and I better take to accepting that if I'm going to continue.
Take me to the woodshed, tell me I'm nuts, or, if not, maybe enlighten me as to things I should be doing to weather the storm. A healthy BR means that I can continue to play "my level," though I do anticipate switching up when the conditions look good at 1/2 full and 6-max in the next few sessions. Thanks!