Poker Resolutions for 2010

1. Set Your Goals

As in most of life’s pursuits, it pays to have a target in poker to help stay motivated. Ask yourself what you want to get out of the game in 2010. If you’re an experienced player you might want a seriously tough challenge, like logging 100,000 cash hands in a year with a win rate of 4BB/100, or making $20,000 profit over 12 months.

If you haven’t got the time to put in that kind of grind, however, you might prefer taking shots at the tournament dream by playing a GUKPT, UKIPT or even WSOP event for the first time. Or maybe simply becoming a winner in your Friday night game will make you happy.

Whatever it is, take the time to sit down and write out your goals and the date(s) by which you want to achieve them. Having tangible targets on paper will serve as a great motivator, encouraging you to put in more time and play better. And, of course, don’t forget to reward yourself with a nice cashout once you achieve your goals.

2. Hunt The Fish

Game selection, as we all know, is hugely important, but a key part of that process is choosing the right site to play on. PokerStars and Full Tilt are unrivalled when it comes to player traffic and huge guaranteed tournaments, but you’ll invariably come across tougher opponents. The reason for that is simple – they still welcome American players, who as a nation are the most difficult opponents you’ll come up against. Even at low stakes tables like $50NL or $20 sit-and-gos you’ll find plenty of full-time US pros grinding away.

That’s not so much the case on sites with a European focus. Barring the odd exception (ElkY, Dario Minieri), if you’re sitting at a table with a Frenchman or an Italian you might never want to leave,
as they’ll usually hand money over like an ATM. Whether it’s tournaments or cash games, the standard of play is so much worse than the American-facing sites that it’s irresponsible bankroll management not to play on the iPoker, Boss or OnGame network at least some of the time. And then, of course, there’s PKR, where the hordes of recreational players lured in by the fancy graphics and ‘live poker’ feel mean the games really couldn’t get any softer.

3. Join an online training site

We know you’ve heard this pitch before, but joining a site like CardRunners, DeucesCracked or PokerXFactor is simply the fastest way to improve your game off the felt. Don’t be put off by the relatively high sign-up fee and monthly payments – if you’re a regular player the amount you’ll learn will see you recoup that sum with interest in no time.
Watching a video with someone like Brian Townsend playing $2/$4 NLHE and talking about good spots to double-barrel bluff and when to thinly value bet second pair will teach you ideas in an hour that may take thousands of hands and a pile of cash to figure out for yourself. There really is no substitute for learning from the best.

4. Learn PLO

Hold’em may never lose its status as the world’s most popular poker game, but pot-limit Omaha is now a strong second choice. The high stakes games both online and live already revolve mostly around PLO, as there’s far more action and excitement than in Hold’em. That sentiment has now started to filter down to the lower stakes tables, which are densely populated with new players trying their luck.

As that suggests, the level of play is particularly weak, so there’s still time to get good before the fish catch up! Watch training videos, take part in forums, play as much as possible and follow PokerPlayer’s regular Omaha features in 2010 to learn how to get to grips with this trickier but ultimately more lucrative variant. By adding a new game to your repertoire it will also help rekindle your initial love affair with poker and give you another option to play when the Hold’em tables look tougher than usual.

5. Set a Bankroll Challenge

Between durrrr throwing down his $1.5m challenge, Boku87 turning $100 into $10,000 inside 15 days and Nick Rainey playing a mammoth 16,000 SNGs in one month, 2009 was the year of the poker challenge. However, you have to travel back a few years to Chris ‘Jesus’ Ferguson’s legendary bankroll challenge – in which he turned $0 into $10,000 on Full Tilt – for the next bit of 2010 inspiration.

While you don’t have to follow Jesus’ rules to the letter – getting off that starting point of $0 through freerolls is akin to repeatedly slamming your head in a car door – giving yourself a bankroll challenge could be one of the most rewarding acts of your poker year. You’ll learn the importance of game selection, how to avoid tilt and, above all, bankroll management. A good place to start may be trying to turn $50 into $500. Check out www.pokerplayer.co.uk/challenge for the best route to success.

6. Reap The Benefits

There is so much competition among online poker sites that they are willing to go to any lengths to get you signed up, and you need to take advantage of all of them. First, you must get rakeback. Most sites will refund around 30% of the rake you pay if you sign up through an affiliate such as raketherake.com. The benefits are huge – even a casual $50NL player stands to benefit from over $1,200 per year (though note that some sites, including PokerStars, do not offer rakeback, preferring their own loyalty systems).

Similarly, don’t be afraid to be a bonus whore. Open accounts on as many different sites as possible – most will offer 100% or even 200% sign-up bonuses which can provide you with an easy, risk-free boost. Two of the best to look out for are Full Tilt’s 100% bonus up to $600 and Betfair Poker’s $500 incentive.

Another thing to watch out for is when there’s a big overlay on a guaranteed tournament, which sometimes happens on smaller sites when they overestimate the number of players they can attract. There’s no science to finding this sort of value, but it’s always worth looking out for, especially on weeknights.

7. Multi-table

If you currently only play one table online you should make 2010 the year you branch out a bit. The benefits of multi-tabling are huge: by playing more tables and hands you can increase your hourly rate (assuming you’re already a winning player of course!) and the variance will flatten out more so you won’t feel the sting of bad beats as much. Also, if you have a rakeback deal or get loyalty points you’ll earn more dollars or prizes too.

You’ll soon learn the number of tables you are comfortable playing and we suggest you add one at a time until you think your game is being negatively affected. Also, it may depend on what game you are playing. Eight-tabling full-ring sit-and-gos should be a doddle after some practice, while six-max cash games require more concentration so four might be the ideal amount.

An additional bonus of multi-tabling is that you’ll never again get distracted by the TV/internet/fridge or get bored and start playing too many hands, as you simply won’t have the opportunity. So next time you log on add a table or two and see where it takes you.

8. Think Positively

When you’re on a bad run it’s easy to get down on yourself and allow your game to fall apart. But the simple concept of positive thinking can really turn around your results at the poker table. Instead of believing you’re the world’s unluckiest player after a bad beat, think the opposite, remembering all the times you’ve got it in behind and sucked out.

You’ll find the bad beats won’t affect you as much, you won’t tilt so expensively, and the natural swings and variance of the game will become just that – natural. Leave it to poker’s biggest positive-thinking exponent, Mike ‘The Mouth’ Matusow, for the final word on positive thinking: ‘I realised that if you think positively you really can’t lose.’