Thoughts on how man hours we log...

[ggbman]

There was a thread about this a few weeks ago, and i want to say i think that it's definitly possible that the consensus in these forums about how many hours people can consistently multi-table could be wrong.

I am not presenting any of this as fact, merely opinion. The thing is, there are a lot of college kinds who get in 15-20 hours of playing a week and are full time students. I don't see how it's not possible mentally to log 30-35 hours a week. I guess if you take weekends off then its more difficult, but really 2 thee hours sessions 6 days a week would be 35 hours a week. I on't get how no one reports doing this.

It also seems amazing that O'doyle can log in 120,000 hands in 2 months when thats half a years worth for some people. The point here is to suggest people are lazy, merely to generate discussion about why we set these potenitally artifical boundries for ourselves, and if they are indeed correct.

[7ontheline]

I am shocked - SHOCKED - that you would suggest that a professional poker player in his 20s who doesn't want a regular job because he likes his freedom and has lots of disposable income could ever be the slightest bit lazy. Shame on you.

[NLSoldier]

[ QUOTE ]
There was a thread about this a few weeks ago, and i want to say i think that it's definitly possible that the consensus in these forums about how many hours people can consistently multi-table could be wrong.

I am not presenting any of this as fact, merely opinion. The thing is, there are a lot of college kinds who get in 15-20 hours of playing a week and are full time students. I don't see how it's not possible mentally to log 30-35 hours a week. I guess if you take weekends off then its more difficult, but really 2 thee hours sessions 6 days a week would be 35 hours a week. I on't get how no one reports doing this.

It also seems amazing that O'doyle can log in 120,000 hands in 2 months when thats half a years worth for some people. The point here is to suggest people are lazy, merely to generate discussion about why we set these potenitally artifical boundries for ourselves, and if they are indeed correct.

[/ QUOTE ]

i sort of agree, but it seriously is alot easier said than done. i have so many times where ill be playing a session and just totally start to see my game deteriorating and ill know that to keep playing would be probably -EV. also, the fact that we do our work on the internet where there are an infinate number of distractions (read:2+2), doesnt help either.

[ggbman]

I've never been tempted to post while i play, even while i was 4 tabling. When i 7-8 it would just be impossible.

[Danenania]

Just because someone is satisfied with the amount they make and would rather do fun things instead of making superfluous cash doesn't make the person lazy. Maybe he is writing a symphony or training for a marathon in the meantime.

[MicroBob]

I agree with much of your post....and admit to being lazy.
I also admit to posting too damn much on 2+2 when I should obviously be playing.


One consideration - there ARE players who put in significant hours online and are successful at it (and avoiding the lazyness).

We are less likely to hear from them though....precisely because they ARE playing....and not stopping off to feed their silly 2+2 addiction.

Thus, we are obviously MORE likely to hear more frequently from the less-than-25 hour a week types.


I know one player who logs his 1700 or so hands per day.
And another player who is probably in the 35-45 hour-week range.

Both are regular posters on 2+2 (not naming names because I haven't asked them)....just not every freaking day like some of us.

I don't know if it means anything that they are also both in their late 30's and early 40's (small sample-size!!).
One of them has a wife and 4 kids so certainly has a greater incentive to take it seriously and get his hours in.


David Ross would also fit into this group (and he is not one of the first two players I was thinking of).
He easily is getting his 35+ hours per week I believe.


I think for many of the young players there is a tendency to see that you have made enough money to pay the bills, and then to slack off.


I'm 34....but I'm not married and my expenses are minimal.
So I'm more in the 'young-guys' camp on not getting in as many hours as I would like.
I suspect that if I had greater responsibilities that I would be less lazy much of the time.
Slowly but surely I'm getting there.

[Schneids]

For me it's a matter of playing worse from hours 20-40 in a week if I try to put in those hours online. I know this, so, I keep the hours down and keep the freshness up. Plus, during the summer I like having a life outside of poker and during the school year there's hours to devote to that.

[stoxtrader]

I think it's different for everyone, being a function of a few factors, particularly need and resolve.

IF I were to play fulltime I'm pretty sure I would not have a problem logging 100k hands/month if I needed to. But I would likely end up in the 75k hands/month camp. I currently have a pretty busy life and generally am able to log 20-40k hands/month.

[Justin A]

A lot of us play poker so that we don't have to work 40 hour weeks.

[ggbman]

[ QUOTE ]
A lot of us play poker so that we don't have to work 40 hour weeks.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is true, but seriously, if you played 40 hours a week for the next 5 years, you would probably be able to retire like 2 DECADES earlier factoring in interest, etc...

[stoxtrader]

A lot of us play poker so that we don't have to work 40 hour weeks.

This is true, but seriously, if you played 40 hours a week for the next 5 years, you would probably be able to retire like 2 DECADES earlier factoring in interest, etc...

bump for emphasis. nicely put.

[ggbman]

Thanks Stox, it really just hit me the other day how exaggerated this myth about people's mental threashholds could potentially be. I should also note to schneids, since you are a full time student, playing more than 30 hours a week would be pretty insane. I like to enjoy myself during the summers as well, and i consider my social life to be pretty active, but i still think there was more rrom than i allowed for poker during last summer.

This post was really inspired by a combination of things. First of all, i recently started college and am trying to implement some doable but ambitious goals. Secondly, as i have moved upin stakes, i begin to realize just how muvh EV i give up by "taking it little easier on myself since i work so hard anyway." I always remember telling my parents, you're lucky i make $100/hour at 5-10, because if i was beating higher limits there is no way i could force myself to go to school right now. Now that i am, i realized there is basically no chance of me not going to school, so i just hae to tr to balance both of them with a social life. I'm trying to get in more hours that i would have originally thought possible. (I'm going for 20/week)

Anyway, of course this is all just conjectures on my part. Everyone should be able to assess their own situation and do what's best for them. In no way am i saying people should be playing more, but i did want to introduce the idea that although it's a widespread belief that a pro poker player should only work 20-25 hours/week, that isn't neccesarily true.

Gabe

[___1___]

[ QUOTE ]
There was a thread about this a few weeks ago, and i want to say i think that it's definitly possible that the consensus in these forums about how many hours people can consistently multi-table could be wrong.

[/ QUOTE ]

I 4-table 40hrs a week. It isn't that tough...if youre running well. When you're running well hands tend to play themselves and loggging a bunch of hours is pretty simple. It's running bad where every decision is difficult that is very fatiguing.

I don't love playing all these hours but as a newlywed looking to buy a nice house and start a family in the next coule years, now isn't exactly the time to be lazy. Also, when I think about the alternative of being in an office with a boss playing a bunch of poker doesn't seem so bad.

___1___

[ggbman]

I agree, and like you said, the money you make now will affect your lifestyle a lot in the future.

[Nietzsche]

It does seem strange but I think part of the reason is that an of poker hour is much more draining than an hour of work at a normal job because we are concentrating practically every second, and they are not. So it is natural that we play less than people work in terms of hours.

I had one month recently where I played 35 hr/wk. But the two following months I played less than my previous average hr/wk because I couldn't force myself to play much after that. I guess I was feeling slightly burned out and needed to slow down to regain energy and interest.

[Surfbullet]

Honestly, this summer it was all about opportunity cost. Sure I could make $100-$150/hr playing poker, but seeing friends & family for the first time in a year, and my g/f consistently for the first time in a year were both worth way more to me than extra spending $.

Now that summer's over I've got heaps of free time - but the waves have been spectacular! While this is awesome, it also means I surf between 3 and 7 hours a day depending on conditions. Even so I've been logging 3-4 hours a day 7days a week no problem - if the waves died down I imagine 6+ hr days would be totally do-able.

Surf

[elmo]

I'm 20, finishing school next semester, and am going to play full-time for at least a few years, passing on an opportunity to perhaps take over the family business. There were two factors that made this decision clear for me- The Party 30 is a great game right now, and there may never be an easier game in terms of hourly expectation for the number of tables I play. Earning money now is worth so much more than earning money in 10 years. Even if my lifetime non-investment earnings would be greater if I chose the business world, my overall income will be higher by earning alot now by being able to invest early in my life with very few expenses... compounding interest blah blah blah, as opposed to earning and being forced to spend in my early years.

Perhaps this doesn't offer value to anyone, but I guess the point for me is I know what I want financially, and my long-term goals will help me put in the hours here. Call me crazy, but my goal for my first year is 1 million hands, playing 10 tables 32 hours a week.

Second point- This all kinda of came together once I met my now-serious girlfriend. I think this adds motivation and makes running poorly infinitely easier to handle.

[ggbman]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm 20, finishing school next semester, and am going to play full-time for at least a few years, passing on an opportunity to perhaps take over the family business. There were two factors that made this decision clear for me- The Party 30 is a great game right now, and there may never be an easier game in terms of hourly expectation for the number of tables I play. Earning money now is worth so much more than earning money in 10 years. Even if my lifetime non-investment earnings would be greater if I chose the business world, my overall income will be higher by earning alot now by being able to invest early in my life with very few expenses... compounding interest blah blah blah, as opposed to earning and being forced to spend in my early years.

Perhaps this doesn't offer value to anyone, but I guess the point for me is I know what I want financially, and my long-term goals will help me put in the hours here. Call me crazy, but my goal for my first year is 1 million hands, playing 10 tables 32 hours a week.

Second point- This all kinda of came together once I met my now-serious girlfriend. I think this adds motivation and makes running poorly infinitely easier to handle.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'll call you crazy. Granted im sick so my head is sucked, but i just ran those ambitious numbers and they dont quite hit a million if you take 0 days off for the whole year. 500k hands will make a lot of money in that game anyway /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[elmo]

When my sessions are over 2 hours I average over 630 hands x 32 hours a week= 20160 hands a week x 50 weeks + 2 weeks vacation. Likely? Well maybe not. I'd rather set my sights high and fail then shoot for 500k hands and be content with that.

[Nigel]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm 20, finishing school next semester, and am going to play full-time for at least a few years, passing on an opportunity to perhaps take over the family business. There were two factors that made this decision clear for me- The Party 30 is a great game right now, and there may never be an easier game in terms of hourly expectation for the number of tables I play. Earning money now is worth so much more than earning money in 10 years. Even if my lifetime non-investment earnings would be greater if I chose the business world, my overall income will be higher by earning alot now by being able to invest early in my life with very few expenses... compounding interest blah blah blah, as opposed to earning and being forced to spend in my early years.

Perhaps this doesn't offer value to anyone, but I guess the point for me is I know what I want financially, and my long-term goals will help me put in the hours here. Call me crazy, but my goal for my first year is 1 million hands, playing 10 tables 32 hours a week.

Second point- This all kinda of came together once I met my now-serious girlfriend. I think this adds motivation and makes running poorly infinitely easier to handle.

[/ QUOTE ]

You're 10 tabling the 30, or plan on it?

Last night most tables had average VPIP's of high teens, low 20's. Not what I'd call a great game.

How do you even find the time to pick good tables (not that there are very many) while 10 tabling?

Nigel

[elmo]

I have been doing it for months. At teh beginning, I join all the waitlists until I get to 10 tables, then I start leaving the ones that are bad. I'm sure I spend some time at tables that I'm not beating for much, but I think its incredibly rare that the table would be -EV. Just because table VPIP is low doesn't mean its not a great game. Most players still don't defend well, play strong enough ppositionally. at a table of all 15/11s, with 2 30/xs, You'll have lots of chances to play against the 30/xs. To beat this game, I think you need to excersise blind opponent selection more than game scelection. Honestly, there are a few playerse in that game who I never sit near because I know that I can't outplay them in the blinds, particularly while 10 tabling.