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Holdem
Bankroll |
Keep your poker bankroll in a different stack than you day job money. When you first start out make a reasonable assessment of the kind of money that you can afford to bankroll your poker playing hobby. How much can you really afford to risk? This is between yourself and yourself, so be honest with yourself. Start thinking of your stack as how many big bets you can make. Online poker games go as low as .50 and a dollar. A four hundred dollar bankroll will allow you to make 400 big bets. A five and ten dollar game will allow you to make forty big bets. As you can see it is way better to have the protection of a 400 or 500 bets to ride through a bad luck streak. Start Small and Build The best method is to start small and build your bankroll. Sure, I know, it is your dream to go, "All In" at one of the big tournaments in Las Vegas while holding four Aces, that you have slow played since the flop against the best poker players in the world. But...It's another one of those walk before you can run deals. Start small and learn the game. Build your stack as you go along. There is nothing that says that you can't add money to your poker bankroll from the discretionary money in your pocket from time to time. Especially at the beginning. You are bound to have some losses when you start out. Just be sure to keep a record of the additions. As Your Hold em Bankroll Builds As your bankroll builds you will be able to move to a higher stakes game. The higher the stakes the easier it is to bluff and the more you can play the semi-bluff in your tactics. Apply the same formula before you move up to a higher stakes Texas Holdem game. Just divide your stack by the amount of the big bet to see if you have enough to ride out the bad luck when it hits. It's a Matter of the Zeros To somebody who can afford to lose $10,000 a week playing poker, siting in a Two and Six game is going to be a lot less than exciting. To somebody with a $500 dollar bankroll the same Two and Six game is going to be almost heart stopping. Every Big bet really means something. You are in essence playing with a short stack while every other player in the game has a large stack. Your tendency to tilt will be great, and you decision making poor. Those of you who can afford to play in the higher stakes games does not mean that you should. Over time, your losses can add up to the kind of money that even you will regret. It is far better to play in a low stakes game while you learn. Establish a bankroll that is a lot lower than you can afford and when that is exhausted. Quite. Just pretend that your bankroll is ALL the money that you have to play Texas Holdem. Step back and think about your play. Are you getting hammered by some bad beats, a bad run of cards, or are you in pots that you have no business playing?
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