I have never been a great poker player in the strictest sense of the word. I am for want of a better term… “Manufactured”. What exactly do I mean by that? Well I mean that at no time has playing poker ever come natural to me. I have got to where I am by sheer hard work and brute force and not through having any sort of natural ability. However there are many examples in other fields of how hard work and perseverance can achieve great success.
Look at Jose Mourinho, the guy now manages the biggest clubs in the world and he was barely a footballer and worked as an interpreter when he got his first big break. If this isn’t a case of someone overcoming adversity against the odds then I don’t know what is. Look at Gary Neville who has just retired at Manchester United, limited in ability and he is the first to admit it but what a career. The lessons here can be carried forward into poker. You do not need bags of ability to make very good money.
You need to work on the basics and there have been many sporting coaches at the highest level who coach based on the belief that “simplicity is the true genius”. Believe me when I say that trying to become a serious “player” is like trying to catch a knife that’s falling from a very high altitude…..one person in a million may get lucky and catch it by the handle while the rest lose their fingers. Well I got fed up of trying to catch a falling knife and got back to basics.
My worst periods in poker have always come when I was trying to be someone. These days I stick to basics and simple things and they work like a charm. I make rakeback, multi-tabling, full-ring games and tight play my primary philosophy and of course PokerTracker which has now become a main focal point of my play after not using it in my $100-$10k challenge. I am playing more small ball as well which is heavily exploitable at the middle limits but not at the stakes that I play…..well it is…..but they just fail to do it.
I tried copying Belok’s style on CardRunners but it doesn’t work for me and I get into a tangle when I play too many tables with that style. Small ball is effective in NL50 through NL100 full ring but the key is in applying money management to individual hands and not to your overall bankroll. So this year will be about one word and that word is….. VULTURE! That’s right; this is the full ring no-limit system that I have been working on for the past two years which regular readers will be aware. I need to get the balance right with how much poker I play. Too much and I get bored and want to play other forms of poker to keep my interest up.
I was playing 12 tables at NL50 about 18 months ago but with a style that wasn’t working but now I think that I have that style. So after reworking my swing so to speak I am back to 5-6 tables now but at NL100 and working up to 10 by the autumn or maybe sooner if I can be bothered to play some poker which I haven’t for a while.
The Dean will hopefully soon be coaching his Vulture system and if you want to be considered for this then contact Carl at Carl@Pokerquest.f9.co.uk
