Microlimits Progress Quest: Post plans/updates/setbacks here.

[Trix]

I´ve played 2/4 for about a month now.
I was up 110 BBs after the first 11 hour, but the I went on a 100BB loosing streek and never got back.
At the moment I´m at +25BBs for the month, so I guess I´ll have to do another month of 2/4.

[bisonbison]

7000 hands at 2/4 up about 165 BB total, the last 2000 hands of which have been marked by some incredibly poor play on my part. I'm down about 33 BB over that period (after a +25BB night tonight), which is remarkable, considering how tilted and crappy I've been playing. Put a little bad short-term luck, mix it with impatience and bingo: bad mid-term results that perpetuate themselves.

Guh. I don't know what else to say. Guh. I forgot the reality of very loose games and let myself become frustrated with my opponents' bad play. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.

Tonight, I had a solid couple of hours, ended up embracing the grind again, and hopefully getting my attitude back on track. Chill out. Sit back. Aim for reasonable play. Let the variance take care of itself.

[sthief09]

I don't know if you noticed, but I was at your table for a little while tonight. if your goal is to hit 3/6 that's going to happen a lot sooner than later.

[bisonbison]

You know what's fun? Winning. You know what's not so fun? Losing.

April so far has sucked. 4500 hands, -90 BB @ 2/4. And that's with a 40 BB win today.

I've been tight preflop, but in addition to some bad luck, I've been playing pretty pretty poorly post-flop, giving up a lot of bets here and there and chasing, and forgetting that no one at 2/4 folds, and that that's why it's profitable.

On thursday, after 3000+ hands of online pain, having given back almost all of my 2/4 progress, I decided to go to my local cardroom, play some 6/12, and recenter myself. It was a nice break, I made 4 BB in 2 hours and I realized that poker's not so tough if you don't sweat it.

Since then, I've played about 1000 hands and am finding my feet under me again.

I'm glad that I played through the losing, cause I feel that in some way, shitty cards really did play a major role, but I've got to work on accepting the variance before I can move forward. If I can play without tilt, then I can know that bad short-term results are just variance.

For now, the goal remains the same 300 BB at 2/4. Only 200 to go.

[B Dids]

Swing, Swing, Swing.

I'm keeping regular updates of my progress(?) on my blog.

I've gone from 189 to 250 to 165 to 262 to 213 in the course of 7 days. I guess that probably isn't really even a meaningful swing. And it's still a winning rate- but frustrating.

[Nemesis]

My goal is 300 BB at .5/1... I'm currently at 100 BB.

[JSD]

[ QUOTE ]
You know what's fun? Winning. You know what's not so fun? Losing.


[/ QUOTE ]

Tell me about it. It has been a crazy three days at 1/2.

wednesday: down 50BB in 500 hands at 3am. can't win a thing. i am ready to quit poker for good. frustrated but still playing my "A game", i decide to stay up until i'm even, which happens around 6am (another 200 hands).

thursday: up 70BB in 500 hands. i am an unstoppable poker god. everything hits. TT flops a set on two hands in a row at the same table. i start making plans for my new career as a poker pro.

friday: down 80BB in 1000 hands of 1/2 last night. an absolute disaster. two other 2+2ers sat and watched me donate an entire $100 stack in a matter of about two hours. in 1000 hands, i won exactly 4 pots larger than 10BB. all of my wins were tiny (opponents fold on the flop, etc) and all of my losses were ginormous suckouts on the river.

the good news is that i'm getting better at riding out the inevitable downswings. i just wish they wouldn't come so often.

[bisonbison]

Oh, the other thing I wanted to add, is that I spent some time a couple of weeks ago figuring out what it would take to support myself playing poker.

Forgetting all the nuances, it basically came down to 8k - 10k hands per week. In almost 10k hands at 2/4 this year, I've been up to 200BB, back down to 50BB and now back to 100BB.

It is humbling to imagine these swings as a potential part of one's job every single week, and I'm really grateful that I'm currently employed. I'm nowhere near the point where poker could be anything but cash for toys.

[mikeyKay]

ive been on a bit of a downswing myself, and i guess it feels somewhat good to talk about it and get it off my chest. i was doing some bonus whoring and wound up making a whole whole lot of money playing 2/4 on planet poker(my origial 200 buy in to 708)...it was an insane run, and i was just basically playing higher limits(i usually play .5/1) to get my bonus, plus the fact that planet and most of the other sites i was getting bonuses from didnt have good stat taking features. so, i cleared the bonus at planet and have now gone to ultimatebet, which has handed me a huge downswing, i guess i can expect it since i was so on fire in planet poker. i think im just going to have to drop down limits and take forever to finish the bonus off. not only has my 2/4 bonus game been bad, but my .50/1, goal +300BB game has been kinda bad lately. after a few weeks of playing really well at paradise and party, this week i have had 9hrs and 41 mins of table time +2.25BB...atleast im still up this week in that game, but half way though the week i was really closing in on meeting my goal at +282BB, but now im down to +256.25BB...oh well, looks like this wasnt the week, im thinking about taking a day off tomorrow, relaxing for a minute, read some parts of some books and maybe looking at a few hands tomorrow night...good luck to everyone else and their goals.
-mike

[PraetorianAZ]

My story:
After a long break from poker, I had $70 in an old account at Party so I decided to get serious and make a run at trying to make a living by poker.

Started in Feb and by mid-March turned the $70 into $650 at Party .5/1. Then I moved up to 1/2 and had two 75BB drawdowns immediately (bad cards + bad play + scared of variance)

It took me a few days to adjust before running straight up 350BB at 9BB/100. Now I've got well over $1200 and reached my goal to move to 2/4, but trying to work up the nerve. I'm worried about handling the variance, plus I've got to be on a run. This has been too easy.

My stats on 1/2 only:
VP$IP 14%
Raise 8%
W$SD 53%
W$WSF 30%
Aggression 1.5
BB/100 3.8 (this includes some very bad play in the beginning plus some experimenting so I'm confident my real rate is around 5BB/100)

Am I ready for 2/4? That is the question.