The Road Less Traveled

50% Discount on 1-1 Poker Coaching from April 16-24!

mscell — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 13:28:39 +0000

For those of you thinking about signing up for 1-1 poker coaching, now is a great time to do it! I am running a special promotion for all sessions held between April 16-24. The cost will be $75/hr (1/2 half off my normal rate of $150/hr!)

1-1 coaching is a great way to take your game to the next level. We will identify and correct leaks in your MTT game and work on strategies based on your individual needs. If you are not sure about coaching, you can check out my latest PXF videos where I recorded two coaching sessions.

Sometimes Less Is More; 2nd Place Stars $40K GNTD 6 Max

mscell — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 17:37:00 +0000

I didn’t play much poker at all in February which is why I didn’t bother to make any blog posts . It was a month filled with snow in NJ so I didn’t do much of anything actually. I caught up on some movies and started playing more FIFA and NCAA Basketball on PS3….In total my Feb poker numbers look like this:

MTTs played: 19 (-181 behind monthly target)
Cash game hands: 0 (-10,000 behind monthly target)

Maybe I was dealing with some burn out from January but I just didn’t feel like playing too much. Or it could have been the weather. Or it could be that I’m not making consistent money from MTTs like I did a few years back. It was probably a combination of a lot of different things. The good news is when you have a job and other sources of income you can actually just take time off and not play. Why waste money when you can’t bring your A game or stay focused for an entire MTT?

There is more to life than poker so it is important to have some balance. Having kids you have to think about someone other than yourself and for me this is good because it forces me away from the tables regularly. Sometimes it can go force me too far away and I get frustrated that I’m not getting to AC for more of these WSOPC and Borgata events every couple of months. But on the whole I think it’s better for me in the long run. I suggest everyone finds some balance and I think your game will be better off for it.

So yesterday I actually sat down and played a session. It was my first session for the month and I wasn’t too focused. I busted a few games with poor play and was down to one table pretty quickly. And as luck would have it, I actually had a decent stack and we were starting to get to the mid to late stages of the tournament. Sometimes when I’m not motivated and at the top of my game it can be hard to play those first 2-3 hours knowing that we still have a long way to go before the final table. (By the way, I don’t think there is an easy solution to the problem – I just think it’s a matter of discipline and professionalism. You have to be committed to getting the job done.)

So I really just started trying to get in the zone and focus on my opponents and find spots to chip up. I managed to make some good decisions, get a few very important suckouts and ended up heads up with a good size chip lead. I made one key mistake vs my opponent heads up which I regret but overall I thought I played pretty good. And although I am never satisfied with second place, I think it’s important to not beat yourself up too much. Poker is just so brutal most of the time – is it really worth turning what was actually a pretty good day into something else? I don’t think so…….

January Wrap Up

mscell — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:27:54 +0000

I can’t believe January is already over! Time flies by so fast some times. I did a good job of getting in volume for MTTs but didn’t play nearly as many cash hands as I had hoped. With Full Tilt’s new Rush Poker, perhaps I’ll be able to hit my target for February a little bit easier (or if I simply spent more time playing cash after I hit my MTT goal for the month!)

MTTs played: 313 (+113 ahead of monthly target)
Cash game hands: 2903 (-7097 behind monthly target)

Full Tilt had Double Guarantees Week last week and the prize pools were amazing. I had two deep runs but only managed to get 16th and 21st as my two best finishes. I feel very good how I’m playing so I’ll just keep plugging along.

Weekly Update – Week #2

mscell — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 16:10:37 +0000

Not much to report since last week’s update. I managed a third place finish in Big Double A last night and I had a deep run (15th) in the $10 Super Stack earlier in the week but I am hovering around break even for the month. Let’s check in on the stats:

MTTs played: 178 (+78 ahead of weekly plan)
Cash game hands: 2389 (-2611 behind weekly plan)

Noticing a trend here? With tournaments being my favorite form of poker, it takes more work for me to grind out the cash games and I have fallen behind plan each week so far. I’m going to see if I can’t at least hit the weekly goal of 2500 this week and possibly try to make up some of the deficit from weeks 1 and 2.

As for my game, I put in some time away from the tables this week reviewing HHs and watching some videos just to make sure I’m not developing any bad habits. Other than Thursday (when I really just didn’t feel like playing but tried to play anyway), I am pretty happy with the effort I am putting in at the tables. It’s just a matter of sticking with it and grinding it out. I’m going to try and dive into Holdem Manager (HEM) reports this week and see if I can do any more detailed analysis of my game that might help me identify one or two things I can work on. There is so much data available within HEM but it can take a little work to find the right things to look at for improvement. This week I promise to take one step closer to figuring out what I don’t know about HEM.

One week (almost) down – 51 weeks to go!

mscell — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 15:51:02 +0000

So we are about a week into the new year already and I wanted to take a look at my goals for 2010 and break them down into smaller components. Having end of year goals is silly unless you realize what the weekly/monthly targets are as well. To hit my goal of 2000-2500 MTTs played this year, I am aiming for 200 MTTs per month or roughly 50 per week. To hit my goal of 100.000-150,000 cash game hands played this year, I am shooting for 10,000 per month or roughly 2500 per week.

Here’s where I stand so far with one day left in the first week of 2010:

MTTs played: 80 (+30 ahead of weekly plan)
Cash game hands: 1400 (-1100 behind weekly plan)

Although, I’m playing MTTs today, I plan on playing more cash games on Friday and Saturday so we’ll have to see if I can make up some of the monthly pace in week 2. I am working hard to just focus on putting in the volume and playing well and then letting the money part take care of itself. In fact, I’m going to to adopt the cashout strategy outlined in Jennifear’s guideline. This means I get to withdraw 8% of my total buyins played each month for MTTs. It probably doesn’t sound like a whole lot but considering many people never actually cash out – I’ll happily take my 8%.

For cash games, it’s a bit trickier as you need to know your expected hourly rate. Although I’ve played cash games over the years, I’ve never done it consistently enough month over month to have a good idea what my expected hourly rate is. Therefore my plan for the first month or two is to not withdraw anything from cash games but to try and determine what my hourly rate might be and I’ll still set the goal conservatively since the data will be somewhat limited.

As for my actual play at the tables, I have been about 70-80% happy with how I’m playing. I have been playign a little too aggressively in the early stages and busting out in spots where I think it’s unnecessary. I’ll dial that down a notch and things will be better. I have been focused during my sessions and I am adjusting to the additional tables thanks to all the amazing software tools available. I am also doing a better job of following my work plan and balancing my time with my children and not letting either one get off track due to the other.

I didn’t play last night and I’m looking forward to putting in a full session today starting up in a little bit….

First Sunday Grind of 2010!

mscell — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 16:30:13 +0000

Since my goals for 2010 are all about volume, I decided to come out swinging. I played 16 MTTs on Friday and another 14 on Saturday. That may not sound like a lot to the true MTT grinders but it is a lot for me. I ended my Saturday session on the early side so that I would be fully rested for a long Sunday schedule. I’m starting out the year concentrating on Full Tilt and sitting out on Pokerstars. I noticed a disturbing trend of me constantly sending money from Tilt to Stars and have decided I would take a stand against that by focusing on the site where I seem to be doing better. (It’s not that I think Stars is rigged against me but by avoiding things that negatively impact my state of mind my confidence will remain high and I’ll be able to play better. So it’s Full Tilt all the way for now and we’ll see where this experiment ends up in a couple of weeks….)

For today, I am registered for 13 MTTs from 12PM-7PM plus another 5 satellites to the larger buyins MTTs. I will likely keep registering past 7PM as well but experience has shown it is wise for me to re-evaluate that later in the day. I am all set to put in a long grind with healthy snacks, meals and beverages on hand. You should always go shopping for that stuff before the weekend so that you’re prepared and not stuck ordering fast food. I also picked up some table, card and chip mods at the end of 2009 and I have to say I don’t know why I didn’t get them sooner. They are fun to look at it and easy on the eyes and they make me want to play more poker. There are plenty of free mods out there, but be sure to check out what the guys at Tilt Buster and PS Themes have to offer – you won’t be disappointed!

The first table is opening on my screen right now……..Hope everyone runs good today!

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention – I took 3rd in the Full Tilt $23.5K GNTD $33R on Friday night so the year is already off to a good start!

Blog Redux: 2010 Plans

mscell — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 17:14:44 +0000

I have decided to bring back my old blog this year……I wanted someplace to blog that was really my own rather than using my blog at PokerXFactor. I’ll probably still update the PXF blog with “work” related items but this blog is really for my self development and thus needs to be separate. So let’s start with goals for this year. I don’t set monetary goals for poker because I’d rather focus on things I can control and not chase a specific dollar amount. Here is the plan for 2010:

- Play at least 2000-2500 MTTs

- Play at least 100,000-150,000 cash game hands

That’s it. Plain and simple. I’ll be shooting for 200 MTTs and 10,000 cash game hands per month for the first quarter of the year. I’ll move up/down per my bankroll management plan starting the year with mid-stakes MTTs ($75 and under and $30R and under) and 6 Max 200NL. I’ll be playing mostly on set days for MTTs and using smaller pockets of free time for cash games. Cash game sessions will be no more than 4 tables and will last 60-90 minutes max. Those are the conditions where I have done the best in the past and I will stick to this rule every time. For MTTs, I can play a few more tables but I’ll try to stay between 4-8 tables most of the time since that is where I’m most effective.

I have more to say but it’s time to start a session…….good luck at the tables and Happy New Year!

Changing Up Your Game

mscell — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 03:16:34 +0000

About ten days ago I decided to take a break from mtts to work on my cash game. Initial results have been very good and I’m enjoying the freedom cash games offer. I have been playing 1-2hr sessions and trying to log 3-4 sessions each day. I plan to continue focusing on cash games in August but I will be playing a few FTOPS events when my schedule permits.

If you feel like your game is in a rut, try playing something different and see if it gets you back in the right mindset to play poker. It worked for me and I think it might work for you too.

Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift.

mscell — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 15:24:18 +0000

Imagine there is a bank account that credits your account each morning with $86,400. It carries over no balance from day to day. Every evening the bank deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day.

What would you do? Draw out every cent, of course? Each of us has such a bank. It’s name is TIME. Every morning, it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it writes off as lost, whatever of this you have failed to invest to a good purpose. It carries over no balance.It allows no over draft. Each day it opens a new account for you. Each night it burns the remains of the day.

If you fail to use the day’s deposits, the loss is yours. There is no drawing against “tomorrow.” You must live in the present on today’s deposits. Invest it so as to get from it the utmost in health, happiness and success!
The clock is running!! Make the most of today.

To realise the value of one year, ask a student who failed a grade.
To realise the value of one month, ask a mother who has given birth to a premature baby.
To realise the value of one week, ask the editor of a weekly newspaper.
To realise the value of one hour, ask the lovers who are waiting to meet.
To realise the value of one minute, ask a person who just missed a train.
To realise the value of one second, ask someone who just avoided an accident.
To realise the value of one millisecond, ask the person who won a silver medal at the olympics.

Treasure every moment that you have! And treasure it more because you shared it with someone special, special enough to spend your time with. And remember time waits for no one.
Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift.

That’s why its called the present.

Coaching Update

mscell — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 04:15:48 +0000

I have been getting a lot of requests for coaching but I have been having problems trying to schedule sessions with everyone. It appears I need to implement a better system than just asking what day/time or is good for each person. So here is the new process for booking a session:

1. Check the calendar for my available coaching times. (All times are Eastern Daylight Time or GMT-5 same as Pokerstars and Full Tilt.)

2. If you find a timeslot that works for you, please send an email to mscell@optonline.net with your online screennames, PXF name (if applicable), date/time requested and your skype acount name.

3. Lessons are $125/hr for non-PXF members and $100/hr for PXF members. A 10% discount will be given if you purchase a 4 hr block. For those on a limited bankroll, you can share the lesson with 1 or 2 people at a additional cost of $10/person/hr. So a 1 hr session for a PXF sub with 2 additional people would be $120. Payments must be sent in advance and can be done either through player to player transfer on Pokerstars (mscell) or Full Tilt (mscell) or through Paypal (mscell@optonline.net). If it is a group session, the entire payment must come from one person so please settle all the details with the other attendees before shipping me any funds. Once I have received both your email and your payment, I will update the calendar and reply to your email confirming the session. I reserve the right to decline any sessions not booked 48 hrs in advance.

4. Be prepared for your session. Have your HHs loaded into the PXF analyzer prior to the session. Be logged into Skype at least 5-10 minutes before your session is scheduled to begin. Please have a working headset or microphone.

Hopefully this makes things easier for everyone.

- Mark