Half Way Through the Year

Half Way Through the Year.

Well, we’re at about the halfway point of the year, so I figured I’d post an update on my Poker goals for the year.  Back in January I defined a few things I’d wanted to achieve, so let’s see how I’m doing.


Goal #1.  Move up to $3/$6

I started the year as primarily a $1/$2 player who dabbled in $2/$4.  My goal was make $3/$6 my limit of choice.  Right now I’m at $2/$4 so theoretically I’m halfway there. In all honesty though I don’t know if I’ll make it.  I might be at a point where I’m starting to test the $3/$6 waters at the end of the year, but I don’t think I’ll have actually made the full move.  

I kind of cheated to get to $2/$4.  Rather than playing a ton of hands at $1/$2 and feeling confident that I could beat that game before moving on, I took about a month break from poker due to a vacation and the preparation for/recovery from that vacation.   When I started again I decided I’d jump right in at $2/$4 and see if I could do well.  Overall I’m down a little at $2/$4 this year, but I would attribute a lot of that to chasing VIP status at Stars during their 5 billionth hand promotion.  I admit I played a lot more than I should have during that stretch, and played more tables at a time than I’m capable of playing a at successfully.  I’m not tearing it up, but I’m not loosing my ass either.  Either way I don’t have nearly enough hands in to consider it a good sample size, so another move up would not be based on any scientific analysis of my skill level.

Since I’m currently in the middle of my second month long poker absence of the year, I’m guessing that another move up in limits isn’t likely.

Goal #2.  Play More SNG’s

I had a loose goal of playing 10/15 SNG’s a month or 120-180 for the year.  I know, 10-15 is a days work for some people, but I find it difficult to find the time required for tournaments, and when I do, I usually opt for the MTT variety.  

I actually met my goal in January, playing in 15 and cashing in 6 of those.  I’ve played 11 since.  I only managed one in March and didn’t play any in June.  

This one doesn’t look like its going to be reached, but you never know.  Maybe I’ll find myself addicted to them again later this year and reel off 100 or so in a month.

Goal #3.  Win a tournament with at least 100 players.

Last year I more or less broke even in my MTT play.  I had enough small cashes to cover the entrance fees for the year, but no big wins.  I figured as long as I could stay at even with the small cashes, eventually I would win one and be way ahead.  In the long run I thought these tournaments could be +EV as long as I didn’t go broke waiting for the win.

I actually met this goal pretty quickly.  In January, I came in second in one of the PokerStars 180 player SNGs (note, these do not count for goal #2) for what I thought would be my biggest score in quite a while.  I would have been content with just that but I followed it up a few weeks later by winning one of the 180 player SNGs.  Unless I go crazy playing at stakes way over my head, that basically guaranteed me a profitable year.  Overall I’ve played 22 MTTs so far this year and cashed in four of them.  I’m certainly pleased with my results in that regard.  Of coarse my success at large tournaments is making it difficult to achieve goal number two because I’m finding that when I used to sit down for three or four single table SNG’s in a night, I’m now playing one larger tournament.  Oh well.

We’ll see how I do in the rest of the year.  Maybe I’ll actually play some cards this month.  Won’t that be interesting?