[downtown]

When I was in engineering undergrad, I would try to plug things into a formula. Or I would try to find the formula in the book. Then, one day, I sort of "got it" and was able to figure things out better on my own when problems weren't so straight forward.

Really low level SNGs are sort of formulaic, and the approach is similar for a lot of players. Look at all the posts that say "tell me what to do here," rather than asking why or allowing or allowing for all variables to be taken into account.

The easy formula at the beginning aspect of SNGS is what makes them easy to learn, and it's how I got into SNGs in the first place. Moving up is sort of like not being able to plug into the quation anymore, but having to take into consideration more variables. The higher you go, the more considerations there are.

And to answer the second part of your question, since I only play the 55s, what holds me back personally is not having played enough to figure out what all those variables are and what all the necessary changes are as you move up. Also, wanting to play as many tables as possible in order to maximize my hourly rate, rather than fine tuning my game slows my progress upward, so I try to compensate by surfing 2+2 a couple of times a day at work.