[gomberg]

Well, I first found paradise poker in 2000 when I was starting out in grad school at U of I. I lost $400 right away playing in some really tough 3-6 limit games. Then I played Planet poker and won some back. Then I read HPFAP, and lost more at paradise. Luckily, I won one of those 1,000,000th hand promotions (can you imagine a site w/ only a million hands nowadays?). And I was back to even [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

After TONS of reading, studying, practicing, etc., I was making $10 / hour / table at paradise 3/6 and making some decent money at the planet 5/10. I would always take shots at higher games though so unless I cashed out, I would eventually go bust on a site. These games were way tougher than the 15-30 games of today IMO.

In my 2nd year of grad school, I started playing pokerstars and winning some 60-100 people tourneies for $10-$30 entry fees. I also started playing PLO and $25 NL Holdem. I liked these games much more than the limit games I had learned to beat, so moved to mainly NL.

I started working in 2002 and kept playing low-limit and up to $100 NL and PLO and MTTs mixed w/ some sit'n'goes. I'd do ok but never kept a bankroll of over 1k.

In december 03, I came in 18th place in pokerstars freeroll and made $600. Then in Jan. 04, won a 305 person $50 MTT on stars for about $2650. Then I got into 1/2 NL. I moved up stakes very quickly w/ a bankroll. I took shots at 5/10 w/ varied success and finally moved up there for real in January 05 on Full tilt, stars, and party.

In 04, I probably made about 26k playing a little over 10 hours / week on average. This year, I've been making 5k / month on average while only playing about 5 hours / week lately because of work / girfriend back from the peace corps / moving in with me, playing hockey, going out, etc. I tried moving up to 10-20 this week but lost 2 buy-ins and played badly, so I'm going to move back down to 5/10 and gain some confidence - then take another shot in a month or so as long as I win in 5/10.

Throughout my NL "career", I've made 10PT BB / 100 at all levels while playing on average 1.5 tables at a time (except 10-20 obviously). My biggest downswings have been in the 6 buy-in range and happen about once every 5 months or so. I would play more MTTs but don't have the time. I also suck live and am a lifetime loser at the live game (although a very small sample size and playing drunk in vegas don't help).

I've thought about going "pro" but it would pose problems with my GF and I like my job which pays well (software engineer for a proprietary trading firm) and has good benefits (and can be interesting at times). Playing poker on the side has the added benefit that I can just not touch my bankroll and let it grow w/out spending any of it.

I've also taught classes in chi-town a couple times. It's been fun and has helped out my game as well. Posting here has been +EV for sure... probably would have taken me longer to get to 5-10 w/out it.

can't think about anything else to say...