Tilting hard at NL200

[Salerosa]

I just got done with a two hour session where I managed to drop 1k. Nothing was going my way, outkicked by everydonk, outdrawn by every good player, got in alot of races and lost everyone. What concerns me is 400 of that was lost on bad beats, 200 lost on questionable play, but the other 400 was pure tilting. Guy pushes an AA8 flop. I hold AK. I know he has 88. I call anyway. I push all in with flush draws, miss of course.

I am wondering what you guys do for tilt? Maybe its just because Im hungry and tired and impatient and had no business playing poker in the first place, but this really has me somewhat concerned. I now look at at as I am going to have play for the next 6 or 10+ or so hours just to break even. Plus my luck has been [censored] for my last 6k hands or so...(11 set over set with me on bottom, and even that didn't have me tilting this hard).

I get frustrated with poker easily (I have broken several things laying around on my desk) but tilt has never really been a problem for me. What do you guys do to alleviate stress/tilt while playing? I just feel so damn stupid as I could have spent the last two hours doing homework and then gone and bought a friggin couch or something and still been positive for the day...

[mrh86]

I don't know what to tell you. It's hard to tilt when you play NL50 and are up 20BB/100 over the past few thousand hands. /images/graemlins/grin.gif Seriously though, if you find yourself on tilt, just stop playing. Don't think of your losses as money that has to be regained immediately. If you are a good player, it will come back to you. Everytime you get outdrawn or donked out on, just type "nh" so that player feels confident playing the same way against you.

[jjacky]

i stop playing whenever i get stacked because of a stupid mistake of mine. if that happens i either was on tilt before the play or get on tilt instantly after the hand.

I play nl200 also and just hit a huge bad run this week. My final straw was kk, I re-raise to 30 pf and 55 calls me, flop Q94, I bet 30, he single raises to 60, I reraise to 175 and he called me and hit 5 on the river. This was my 3rd lost stack in under 2 hours.

These things happen, and are suppose to happen, hard to remember that in the moment.
I play nl200 for a living, but I dont hesitate to quit when I hit a bad run. Taking off 3-5 days is good for you every now and then, you spend a little of that time thinking about your play and come back refreshed and generally playing your best. I would say for every 5 weeks I play, I will take almost 1 complete week off. Poker has a way of wearing you down sometimes. Even my worse day of poker is still better than spending even 1 hour trapped in my old office though.
This is my 4th day off, tomorrow its back to work, and I definitely feel I will play my best.


P.S- I'm actually looking to get a punching bag put up in my computer room. Also, working out after taking a bad run has always worked for me in the past, then at least its constructive

Two great things I have learned from this post:

1 Tell donks 'nh' when they outdraw you on a stupid chase call so that they will continue to do that in the future.

2 Punching bag in computer room -- I NEED THAAAAATT

[-Skeme-]

Races?

[Salerosa]

[ QUOTE ]
P.S- I'm actually looking to get a punching bag put up in my computer room. Also, working out after taking a bad run has always worked for me in the past, then at least its constructive

[/ QUOTE ]

I concur that working out is good, my bench has gone up like 10 pounds after a bad run of poker.

[utmt40]

I broke my hand once hitting the bag here with no glove on after a bad session. That was a long time ago.

[Salerosa]

Example: I hold AKc, board shows 4d 8c Jc, opponent has QJo, and we get it all in.

[Komodo]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">Svar till:</font><hr />
Races?

[/ QUOTE ]

All-in situations like AK vs 77 and other situations where everything goes in as a coinflip.

[Escotme]

I'm fairly new to this game after just 8 months of playing, so needless to say, I don't play at your level and I don't have to make a living out of it.

Last week I experienced my second loosing streak. My first didn't stop until I was down $500 (playing 30 NL...) and almost made me give it up completely. I was almost back to break-even when the second slide started last week. It really terrified me and I promised myself I would handle the situation differently/better than last time - where I tilted by going for all-in coin flips, playing higher stakes/tournaments - or else I deserved to be broke.
Instead of playing poker, I "punished" myself to analyzing my play in poker tracker. I went over, and made notes, of every hand where I'd lost or made more than 30BB, categorizing the leaks and identifying one or two smart moves.

The real epiphany came when I realized that I hadn't misplayed as many hands by as much as I thought. It was a bad streak! So I can really relate to what Greg Raymer said after being busted out of WSOP 2005 by a runner-runner flush. He claimed to be more pleased with his efforts this year than last as every DECISION he'd made had been the right one.

Analysis also helped in detaching myself from the emotional turmoil. Seeing yourself fck up a hand in PT replay might be painful, but nowhere near as painful as breaking things on your desk or - the best one yet - your hand on a punching bag. And... it might even be more constructive.
Those are my two cents. Good luck climbing back.

[fimbulwinter]

a good thing to do until you've played say 200K hands is to stop and examine every time you lose your stack. just take a break and go over the hand, bad beat or not, and see if you played it optimally. very often you didn't EVEN IF you were ahead when the money went in.

there does come a point at which its just work and the results of a day dont matter. i dont know what i'd do if i had a losing month, but that is highly unlikely. funny thing is this: if you remove tilt and other players don't that's like a 10BB/100 overlay right there...

fim

[Ghazban]

You'll get better responses and less commiseration in the psychology forum.