Help!

[FeliciaLee]

Okay, I need help. I need coaching.

This is hard for me to talk about. Not because I'm ashamed or have built up some facade that I'm a better player than I actually am. In fact, if anything, I am much harder on myself than most players I know.

My problems are two-fold. Number one is that I am not maximizing my profits in cash games. I'm a good player. I can win at 20/40, 40/80, and the couple of 50/100 sessions I played at Foxwoods. Ted Forrest and I have talked, and he seems to think I could hold my own at even higher limit games and used the 300/600 Razz game as an example. Ted might be delusional, btw [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Anyway, although I win, I'm not maximizing my wins. I'm not charging other hands enough to stay with me, nor am I betting enough for value. I don't steal enough, either, not even in steal position when no one has opened the pot. I need to maximize my wins, while keeping my losses small (I'm pretty good at that part, lol). [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

My other problem, which is much worse because it so negatively affects my bankroll, is tournament play.

Up until the 2004 WSOP, I'd never played in an event more than $100 and had little real tournament experience. No problem, because I freerolled my events in the WSOP by playing satellites, and the structure was pretty good, so I was able to play a bit more of a cash game-type strategy. I still didn't cash, but I got awfully close in one of the Stud tourneys, and did not feel too outclassed.

Enter big buy-in tourneys with a poor structure... that is where my nightmare begins. I absolutely cannot adjust my strategy. On the surface, theoretically, I know what to do, how to play, but I can't force myself to do it. I have the rock, cash game player mentality.

I'm getting totally outplayed, outdrawn and outclassed. I am 100% dead money.

I need HELP!

I just got back from Commerce and the LAPC, where I was killed. In the end, we came home two weeks early. I absolutely could not win. I even forfeited the last two Stud tourneys ($1000 Stud & Stud 8) in order to come home and lick my wounds.

I lost every single satellite I played in, STT and MTT. I lost Stud, Stud 8, Omaha 8 and NLHE. I lost, then lost some more. I couldn't even win a STT with seven of the worst Stud players known to man.

Yes, I know there is a huge, huge luck factor to tournaments. I know the variance is outstanding. I know that I can go years without a win, blah, blah. These aren't the things I'm talking about, though. I'm being OUTPLAYED. I'm not adjusting.

Ray already turned me down for lessons a year ago, so I won't even bug him again. Some of the top players are not the type who would mesh with my style of play and my problems, although I know they are WCP themselves. I'm not sure who would be my best fit (besides Ray).

Last year I finished in the red about $3500. Doesn't sound like much, I know, for someone playing in big buy-in events, but it was greatly offset by my cash game wins, plus the fact that I am very frugal and always try to get into events playing sats.

At Commerce I would have been down about 5k, had it not been for the cash games and Glenn winning a few sats for my entries.

For once, I don't feel like I can compete. I don't even feel like experience will be a good teacher, because the only horribly structured big events I play in are in California, and I don't attend often enough to gain that kind of experience (LA is a five hour drive for me). Other venues have much better structures.

So I'm at a crossroads. I'm not going to "give up," I'm not willing to pack it in, but I'm also not willing to continue to be dead money at Commerce twice a year, when I feel that these events are still beatable and there is often a good overlay.

Advice?

HELP!

Felicia [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]