How do you know if your good enough to beat a limit?

[me454555]

I'm a winning player in general. Over 60k hands at various limits I've been a siginificant winning player. I'm well bankrolled and pretty well read. I know the basics and can beat the LLs so like most good LLers, I decided to move up to the 5/10 6max game.

Over the course of the game I've met some of the worst online players I've ever met and over my first 5k hands hand a great run where I won 250 BBs. Then over my next 5k hands I've almost all of it. I realize I'm not the 5bb/100 winner I was during my frist 5k hands and I'm not the 4bb/100 loser I was over my next 5k hands. I'm somewhere in the middle. So how do I know where I stand? How do I know where I play? I feel I stil make a lot of mistakes @ 5/10 6max but I feel I should at least be breaking even. But its been almost 2 weeks since my last winning session.

What should I do? Should I drudge on @ the limit I'm currently @ and hope the pendulum will swing in the other direction or should I drop down in limits to rebuild? My biggest fear about dropping back down is that I can beat the game w/out improving much. Will dropping down stunt my growth as a poker player? Is this just typical 6max varience? This is the first time I've felt overwhelmed by a new limit or game. I've had downswings like this before but I've always had a couple thousand hands to back me up that I'm a winning player. In this situation, I don't have that data to say I'm a winning player on a losing streak. I guess the real question is how do you know if your a winning player on a downswing vs a losing player who had a good run?

I feel very lost so any advice is appreciated.

[SittingBull]

a particular structure before U have enough data to answer ur question. If UR a net winner after 2000 HRS of play,UR a CONSISTENT winner at the level UR playing.How MUCH of a winner is another matter.
SittingBull

[Sykes]

5K hands is nothing when it comes to 6max. Usually it takes 10K hands for a reasonable analysis of your play in full ring. For 6 max, I would say it takes 20-25K just due to the swingy nature of 6max plus the aggressive nature of 5/10.

[wackjob]

Stats: A 50K hand sample is *decent for judging how well you play. I'd suggest posting your stats in the HUSH forum and getting feedback on the stat you do have from 5/10 and other limits you've played in.

Bankroll: I wouldn't play 5/10 with anything less than $2500 unless you are a very skilled player. Even then,you can still have a 10K hand losing streak. Bankroll will unconsciously play one of the largest rolls in how you play when stepping up in levels.

I am a winning player over 100K hands at 5/10 about 2.4BB/100. However, every time I go on a losing streak I step down, or switch over and play some lower limit Omaha Hi/Lo. It ALWAYS works that when you are taking a lot of bad beats, day after day, you will play worse. People say they can avoid this, but I find it very hard to nearly impossible to do. I typically stop multi-tabling and play 2/4 or 3/6 until I feel I am back in full control, then will step up again.

If you don't already read HUSH like the bible, you should take that up as well.

[William Wilson]

Don't do what I did:

I worked my ass off to get the 300bb necessary to move up to 5/10 6-handed, and was very confident about making the jump. My first night -- my first 90 minutes -- I won $700, just like that.

The next week or so, I battled at the same game, but got frustrated that I couldn't get that same big win. As a remedy, I forced pretty much every halfway decent hand I had, and would bet it the whole way.

In no time at all, it seemed every 5/10 player had caught on and was slowplaying very marginal hands (like second pair), then raising for value on the river.

This put me on tilt, and I lost about $1600 in 36 hours because I couldn't stomach the "small" pots in 3/6, and kept telling myself I needed just one big night at 5/10 to get back. I almost lost my whole roll, and still haven't recovered. I'm now playing 2/4 10-handed and am slowly climbing back.

You sound like a much smarter player than I was, so you'll likely stay out of this trouble. Just take this as advice from a guy who blew a new laptop's worth of money because he fell in love with the bigger pots at 5/10.

But, as you said, 5/10 is probably as beatable as 3/6. Just make sure you play the same game that got you there, and make sure you're able to take a small step back if needed.

Good luck, though. I hope to see you up there in 6-8 months.

[me454555]

I read HUSH daily and bankroll is not an issue, I had 7k before this downswing and I still have abougt 5500 left. The real question is just trying to figure out where I stand. I see players that are worse than me and feel I can make money off them. I'm gonna give it another 5k hands and see what happens. If I break even, I'll go another 10k, if I keep losing, its dropdown time

[onegymrat]

Come play some live 4/8 at Commerce. Mix it up. You'll get a breather from the monitor. They may settle your mind a bit.

Haven't heard from you for a while.

[me454555]

Actually I'm in Michigan now for the next year. I'll be back in Cali at the end of Sept. We'll catch up then