This summer in Vegas was an awesome experience. I came out to Vegas with my poker buddies from Atlanta. Of course, poker dominated the vast majority of our conversations. Later, I spent several days discussing poker at the TPE house. As the WSOP Main Event neared, I met up with the guys from Thinking Poker podcast to do an episode and discussed poker even further. I attended a local poker discussion group and heard November Niner Jesse Sylvia talk about the game. During my time in Vegas, the only time I wasn’t discussing poker was when I was playing it. All of this poker immersion led to a very successful summer in the small stakes live tournaments I played.
Since returning home, all of this has come to a screeching halt. I started reading a poker book and writing a review, but never completed it. I am almost 10 episodes behind on the Thinking Poker podcast. I have yet to make time for my weekly local discussion group. I played a few sessions at my local game with worse results than normal. I’ve played a few tournaments online, but haven’t been able to make the final two tables, much less the final table to have a decent shot at winning. I believe a lot of this “runbad” can be attributed to the fact that I have not been immersed in the game like I was before.
I am a math tutor by profession and the new school year is just starting in my area. At the beginning of the year, most parents are not in need of my services. It takes about two months before my phone starts to ring because that is when the first report cards come out. When kids start failing, I start tutoring. In the meantime, I decided to take a long term substitute teaching position. Going back to a 9 to 5, miles away from any poker games, has affected my poker thinking tremendously.
I recently wrote an article relating the game Rock, Paper, Scissors to poker. In hindsight, this was a terrible example. Being swamped and exhausted from school led me to write that article at the last minute and rush through it with a rusty poker mind. In the article, I made many mistakes that I never would have made had I been immersed in poker thought like I was in Vegas.
The point of this article is to stress the importance of being immersed in the game. There are some like Chirp Herm who can just get off a plane, late reg a WSOP, and final table it or like Big Dog who can just play a couple Sunday Millions in a month and final table half of them, but most of us need to be constantly playing and studying to stay on top of our games.
If you can get fully immersed in the game like I did in Vegas, you will likely see great results. But even if you work a lot like I do, you have to make time for study and play if you don’t want to get rusty like I did. Make it a point to watch one video, read one article, discuss one hand, or play one session at least 3-4 times a week. If millions of people can make time every day for Candy Crush, then we should be able to make time to get better at a game that is actually +EV.
p-jam
Great article mate.