blonde poker forum

I am currently writing a new entry on my blog detailing the profit/loss of poker this year and thought it would be good to have a thread on the subject.

2007 has been the worse year for Poker for me since I started playing 6/7 years ago. Infact, this year I only made enough from poker to send me to Vegas and the wife to Egypt - VERY poor indeed.

It is true I have been playing less this year (live and online) so that could be a contributory factor - that and buying into 3 or 4 £750+ competitions with no cashes. Infact, this year online has been where the losses have occured, the profits have come from live poker.

The standard online has again increased and so have the numbers of players - I am hoping that the poor year is down to variance (as I am playing alot less online) but my game certainly needs improvement - I will be working hard on this.

So my goals for 2008 ? To improve my play online and hence make a profit and build up a bankroll again!
Live? obviously to continue to improve, to play smaller tournaments and try to build up some sort of bankroll - but this is hard as cash is alot easier to spend in the real world than an online bankroll is.
To play at least 4 GUKPT events.
Goto Vegas again - This time, with Charmaine.

To retain my sense of humour and win and lose with as much style as I can muster

This year?..Went from playing professional to going back to work..qualified for APPT Sydney but couldn't go because of having to work..that about sums up my poker year..but..screw it all..I got married :) :):):):):):):):) Best year of my life.

Next year it shall be Vegas ad 1GUKPT event and I shall get a new job (hate the one i have now )

Forgot to look back at 2007............
Went on TV to play poker.........quite a lot.....great fun
Saw my children go to bed at 8.05pm on TV....quite a lot........great fun
Qualified for the Irish Open..........great fun
Went to Waterford.......great fun
Played at the G, Walsall, The Vic, The Gutshot, The Western........had great fun at all of them

Had a tougher year with the poker gods but still made a profit.........great fun
Felt I had to apologise to two players during the year for being unpleasant.......not great fun but own fault for letting outside influences affect my behaviour at the table.

2007 and poker............great fun

Internet wise, it's been ok.  I've managed to build my empty bankroll to a small amount that will hopefully mean that I don't need to redeposit from my hard earned again, or at least for a long time. It's not mega bucks, but at my levels and given that I hardly play cash, I'm quite pleased.  I also made enough to go for a week away in May and pay for my DSLR camera and a couple of lenses, so overall, I'm very pleased.

Live wise, I'm well pleased.  I'd like to be able to get out more, but what I have played live, I think I've done ok for a newbie.  I've played at the Western a bit and honestly think I'm up overall.  I've made 6 final table appearances but have only played there probably a dozen or so times, overall, I'm sure I'm up or at least even.  Sadly I'm yet to win one, but I'm sure it's not too far away (tonight maybe!)

I managed to make a goal for the year in that I wanted to play live in a major poker tournament.  This was achieved in November when I won the Blonde/Virgin team challenge and played the GUKPT Blackpool.  This was excellent and I loved every minute of it.  My initial goal was to make day two which I did in reasonable shape having above average chips.  I was a little disappointed to get knocked out just shy of the cash, but I had a great time and it's definitely a route I want to be taking in my poker career.  Thanks again to Blonde and Virgin and also to my team mates for the opportunity :)

2008?  Well, to play more live poker is my main goal, I just love it.  I'm hoping to qualify for more live events.  I'll have a bash at the WSOP of course, but I'd like to play at least one GUKPT event.    I'll try and get to the Western more and will make the effort to go to DTD too.   I'd like to try and get at least one of my mates to come along for the ride to save me doing these things by myself, but I'm not sure that will happen :D  I also just have to win a tourney on Stars.   I'd settle for a win on any site, but I'd like to win one on Stars as I never seem to run good there.   I think it's mainly my fault, I'm sure it is, I can't blame anyone else I suppose!

From the middle of this year I've actually applied myself to the game better and my consistency of cashes is improving. I have identified one major weakness and have improved this, as my results show.

I will not be buying into the larger comps next year, I will try and win a seat otherwise I will be sticking mainly to the £50/£100 which seems to suit my game.

2007- Absolutely thrilled to have paid all the bills and added a few quid to my bankroll.

During this year, prompted by snippets of wisdom from players that I admire a great deal, (Thewy, Wernick, Ash Hussain etc) I have made small but significant adjustments to my game. It's early days yet, but so far the results have been very positive. Thanks are also due to tikay, who has done much to help me develop a good mental approach to poker in particular and life in general.



2008- Well of course, like everyone else, I would like to win a major. Perhaps an EPT or a GUKPT. I would like to go to Vegas, and (dreamland now) I would like to find that holiest of holy grails, a sponsor! But...

The first priority is PAY THE BILLS and STAY IN THE GAME. After that, everything else is a bonus.
 

To be honest i feel abit like Red-Dog, i have managed to survive the year not having to get a job and playing poker full time. That is the main goal at the start of every year and for the 2nd year running I have achieved it.

In the last few months my  6 max cash game has improved allowing me to move away from sngs, which are getting harder to win at due to ICM becoming more widely known.

I would like to be less lazy, be generally better at poker in 08'. In all honesty if im still playing for a living this time next year i will be happy and that is the one big goal. The other is to qualify for WSOP any bracelet event will do, failing that some form of visit to Vegas with hopefully a bit of California tacked on the end.

For reference:

http://blondepoker.com/forum/index.php?topic=17923.0


Will get back to you on my goals for 2008. Have been running good consistently lately so perhaps should be slightly more focused......or maybe not.

My goal at the start of the year was to match 2006 profit wise. 2006 was first year in which I started to make anything significant, $11k approx. I was determined to match that this year because I jumped around sites a lot last year, picking up various '1st deposit bonuses' then moving on.

I'd matched this target by June this year, which I was over the moon with, and in the last 6 months have roughly doubled this. But in a strange way I feel slightly disappointed as I feel as made numerous mistakes in MTT's at crucial points over the last 2 months, and have had little success to note in MTT's.

BUT of course I would have bitten your hand off for the profit ive made in 2007 12 months ago, so I cannot complain.

For 2008 I hope to match this year, no doubts it will have its ups and downs, I feel far from the complete player but realise you will NEVER be 'The best', but as long as your better than 'Most' there is profit to be had. I would also like to play more live, so we'll see...

Great year:

Quit my office job to play poker and write about poker
Won more than I ever would have earnt at said job
Also earnt a bit more writing than I ever wouild have there. This has been the first year of my life I've actually had plenty of money.
Moved in with the missus
Even played poker in Australia

2008:

Its funny, a year ago my response would have been something like 'I want to play in all the EPTs and some of the highest stakes games online'. But 12 months on I realised where the real value is in poker. Instead I would like to continue finding easy and profitable games online and reserve my tournaments for good value games - GUKPTs/DTDs/Green Joker Poker thingies.

Made a few final tables this year live, I think if I do have a specific goal it would be to actually win a trophy for vanities sake, but if I can grind in 2008 like I did this year, a happy man be me.

At the start of the year i had a few issues outside of poker which seemed to creep into my game, this manifested itself in the form of losses generally from throwing chips at marginal pots and chasing straights/flushes etc.
As a result my bankroll which was never that big as a recreational player, got slowly smaller and smaller. In the end i withdrew what i had left in a couple of sites and went away for a long weekend.
At this point with no bankroll i decided to just not bother with poker so stopped playing for about 6 months, this was partly due to not wanting to fund my bankroll but also that i felt disinterested with the game.
About two months back i got a free £10 to play at an online casino, which i managed to turn into £23 and having staked enough at the casino was able to transfer this to my poker account, since then i have played the occasional stt/mtt at low levels with my best result being in a 3$ freezeout coming 2nd out of 550ish runners for $220.
So coming to the end of the year i'm back to enjoying poker for fun, back to enjoying visiting this forum everyday and looking forward to the new year, where my poker goals are purely to get from that original £10 freebie to as much money as possible for my August two weeks in the sun with the family while still just enjoying my poker.

I gave up a £120k a year job in August to play online full time, (I am a contractor so it's not a real risk as I could return whenever I wanted).

Five or so months later I am up about $70k and going out of my mind. I cannot deal with being home alone playing day in day out so am packing it in and returning to work.

I'm glad I did it but it is just so not the life for me.

For 2008 I plan to play a couple of hours a day and spend all winnings on loose wimmin and booze... seriously!

FYP..but why you would want to swim and drink at the same time goes beyond me.

As a hobby player my aims are always simple, not go bust, any profit however small is a bonus, & keep enjoying playing. All achieved this year. More of the same for next year I hope.

My goals for 2007 were


Did that but only the 2-7 triple draw has really stuck, other than that I think I'll just be sticking to the HORSE games from now on.


Technically I did try and improve my cash game, but I'm still a bit rubbish at it so I think that counts as a fail.


Oh yes  ;D the Razz cash was particularly memorable for some reason :D


I did enter more, but 2nd place is still my best result - I'm kind of running out of time for this one this year.

In hindsight mentioning something about the WSOP would have been a good idea in last years goals. I'm not going to make the mistake of being under-ambitious again. So my aims for 2008 are:
      (i)   Qualify for at least one big domestic tournament (e.g. GUKPT)
      (ii)   Qualify for at least one big European tournament (e.g. EPT)
      (iii)  Qualify for at least one 'Rest of the World' tournament (e.g. WSOP)
and (iv)  To cash in at least one of these big tournaments.

I did have a witty riposte but got distracted by your floatation device avatar...is that you?!?

As poker is essentially a hobby for me 2007 has been a fantastic year. I have met loads of people through the medium of poker and had loads of fun at the live games etc etc. I went to Las Vegas and funnily enough won a few bob that covered the whole trip. To me this is what poker is all about, the people, the craic and a few drinks along the way. Wins or cashes are then purely a bonus

2008 -- much of the same please

Ger

2007 has been indifferent year, I have had a number of decent cashes both live and online but I am hopeless at managing my own finances and tend just to piss it against a wall or gamble it all back on the cash tables,  house games, horses, dogs football etc!  In short I'm a degerate gambler.

2008 curb the gambling instinct, to do this I aim to put an ammount aside in one account and play only on one site for the first half of the year, stay out cash games I dont have the bankroll for and start to keep a proper record of tournament profits and losses. 

I hope to play more sats online I seem to play these quite well and try and get into the bigger freezeout games and live tournaments with as little expenditure as possible and who knows a cash in one of these would be very welcome :)

One of my goals for 2007 was to work on my MTT game.  I've spent the last 2 years grinding away at SNGs, but I wanted to be able to challenge for the bigger tournaments.

I had a poor first half of the year and wasn't getting anywhere.  My bankroll was on a steady downward slope.  I'm not sure what turned it around, but I've had some nice results in the latter half of 2007:

- Won my first Stars 180 at last;
- Finished 3rd in Full Tilt $13.5k Guar for $1700 (disapointed to blow monster chip lead but still my biggest cash to date);
- Cashed in my first ever Full Tilt $750k Guar for ~$330

I also had some decent results playing live:
- APAT Cardiff - finished 17th for £300
- Finished 3rd in Gutshot £5 rebuy for £220
- Finished 2nd in APAT Regional last month for £199 (chopped 1st + 2nd)

My goals for 2008 are therefore to play more MTTs and work more on my game.  I'd also like to qualify for a major event, such as GUKPT. 


This is exactly my thought as well.  Last year, I was saying I'd like to play in an EPT.  Now with the high buy-in, I realise this is near impossible for me to even qualify.  The GUKPT presents a decent high-profile tournament with a realistic chance of qualification from someone with my bankroll and modest ability.

2007 has been fun and certainly interesting:

Blogging for PokerStars all over Europe and in Las Vegas, becoming an analyst on Sky (http://www.skypoker.com/poker/sky_lobby?aff=1062) Poker (http://www.skypoker.com/poker/sky_lobby?aff=1062), writing about poker for various magazines. Together with playing a little online, it was all a scream. BUT I felt that each "job" was taking up a lot of time yet collectively the financial reward was not really comparible to my old stomping ground at The Sun. Basically, as I hit 40 and started on the rocky road through middle age, I felt I needed the security of a full time "proper" job again. So, all the above were jacked in and I took up an offer from PartyPoker to be their head of copy.

2008:

Work hard, hopefully making some contribution to the general good of poker. On the playing side, I have recently started a Bankroll Challenge on Stars to regain some much-needed discipline. I dusted off the $3 that sat forlornly in my account there and have spun that up to $284 in a month using the strict 5% rule.  I want to grow that in 2008 to something worthwhile and treat the family to something nice. I spent too much of 2007 away from them.

Good luck to everyone else in 2008.

Nice thread, by the way.

My new aim is to get Simon drunk and challenge him to a $284 heads up game, then he has to do the Jesus challenge instead.

  rotflmfao rotflmfao

I havent got any plans for 2008 no idea what ill be doing or where ill be doing it really

2007 - Having spent 2006 learning the basics and playing pub poker I made my last deposit of $200 into Full Tilt in Feb and have managed to be a winning player since. Managed to stop playing games with buy-ins of less than $10. Done ok at a couple of live games.

2008 - I want to build a proper live bankroll or at least make enough money online to spend at DTD. Stop going on positive tilt and chucking away all of my profits (I am a poker God, hey wait where did all that money I just won go?) Play live more in games with really good players so that I can learn.

2045 - Retire and move to Vegas.

Didn't achieve any of my poker goals for 2007, partly due to hardly ever playing. Did finish the year in profit, all that really matters to me as a recreational player.

Goals for 2008.
Play more, particularly live. Only really played live whilst in Vegas and made a decent profit, even with the appalling rake the house takes.
Play more cash.
Rebuild a roll so I can move away from the bloody micro levels again.
Attend a GUKPT. The WSOP and EPT are probably too far away to realistically aim for.

My 2007 goals were to play more poker, improve my game and try to win enough from poker and punting to stay away from the 9 to 5 in an office, in a tie, hating it.

What actually happened was I played less, my game is worse but overall on the year I made more than last year. Strange innit?

My 2007 goals were to improve my game, be in profit ( for a small time player like me important) and hopefully be more consistent.

Those have definitely happened, am rapidly learning from errors in my game and results have steadily improved. Instead of being happy to get in the money and be in profit.. I now take more risks and shoot for the stars.

Think it has worked taking $1.7k ( nearly triple my previous highest cash) only a couple of days ago, and higher and more final table finishes!

My 2008 goals are a tough one to decide. I suppose it'll depend on where I'm living lol.

I'd like to aim for decent live tournament qualification ( GUKPT etc).. but who knows.

oh, and I'd like to learn to play cash!

2007 has been a good year, every year so far has outdone the previous year for me so i guess that's my goal for 2008, beat 2007.

In practical terms i want to play less UK events, they are on the whole a waste of time, when you consider expected return against the time spent. EPT's on the other hand have added benefits, like you just have a holiday if you get busted! I guess my aim is not to play more than 3 UK festivals, somehow get myself into EPT's either via sponsorship or sats. Continue to improve at the FLHE games i am playing at the moment, they are serious money spinners. Hopefully get a 6 figure tournament cash if i don't i won't be upset. Invest enough of my money that if i go bust i will have enough of an income to never have to work.

What i don't want to do......care about European rankings, care about winning major events, play online PLO when drunk.....

Have one of my 'horses' develop into a shit hot player, capable of making some serious money, that would bring more joy to me than anything else......especially when i am counting my cut!

For 2007 I didnt have any serious goals except to get better at poker. I seem to remember a thread like this last year and i  said something about trying the wsop ladies event. I didnt try to get in but after seeing all the comments about womens tourneys being easy id give that a bash. I think I've achieved that and exceeded my own expectations this year. Ive got a bankroll 100 times more than i had this time last year and have won a good few grand. Ive had some intensive coaching and its incredible how much my game has improved. I even got the courage to post in the PHA threads:) Ive won about 8 or 9 blonde tourneys and that was more fun that winning the other thousands:)  I used my winnings to get my neices and nephews some holidays:)

This coming year, Id like to play some live events to test my new skills but its difficult while I'm working. Im off to vegas soon so that will be a bit of a test. Apart from that I just want to  have fun and keep my aggression in check. Ive mastered my patience (most of the time..lol) because I now play to a solid theoritical framework. Poker is still lots of fun but learning is better:)

Good luck everyone for next year

My 2007 objectives were based on a good end to 2007, and feeling very positive about my game.
I set out to keep improving, make at least as much money from Poker as from my proper job, start playing live poker, and consider going full time by the end of the year.
I also wanted to improve at MTT's.

By the end of Jan I was almost at the bottom of my roll, and had little confidence in my game.
During Feb, I changed a few things, the key one being moving away from Pokerstars, and onto more European based sites.

After that things fell into place, and I've ended up having a good year.

I have definitely improved, and I have met my financial goal.
I am still working FT, but am in a position where I can make the switch if I want to, but am being ultra-safe, and have set a list things that need to be ticked off before I switch.

I played live, but not until September, but, living near DTD, will be a frequent live player from now on.

Still can't play tourneys (and don't bother most of the time) but won a couple this year so I can claim I've improved.

Goals for 08?

I will set a financial goal which will be a chunk above my 07 result, will go part time or full time by the end of the year, and want to win a live tourney.

Similar to everyone else playing a big live event would be neat : played a couple of times at DTD and being surrounded by 'names' is a buzz, as well as a good learning experience.

Rocky year 2007. I've boomed and busted all year long.
I've got really sloppy and stopped applying myself and lost my discipline, sitting in bigger games than i can afford is a regular occurence.
12 tabling nlhe earlier in the year destroyed my love of the game for quite a while.
Not played nearly as much due to the better half moving in.
Had some decent tournament scores (but not the 7+ decent wins of previous years) and an EPT seat that was a disaster but a nice holiday with the mrs was 2nd prize.
Discovered PLO as a serious money making option, but have to learn to play within my roll.
Easily my worst year ever for profit, i've earned more than my salary for 2 of the last 3 years before 2007 but 2007 has returned around a quarter of my salary, although it could have been much more without dropping ££££'s in games i couldn't afford.

2008

I have started again over the last couple of weeks with only a few hundred $'s online and i'm trying to play well again with real discipline.
If i can't manage it this year then i'm giving up in 2009.

My Objectives were to increase my poker knowledge & build a bankroll to play more events.  This year time hasnt been available in abundance due to various things, but my skill set has certaily improved.  Before this year I never really played live poker before, but have tested the £5 reby's & APAT regional tourneys and have improved with each one.  Have managed a few cashes in the rebuy's & got 36 in the last national in Manchester which I was happy with.  Made my first bad move of the day after 11 hours play oop with a marginal hand and got caught out! 

On-line this year have worked around different variants of the game, cash, STT's, MTT's & omaha at various levels.  Have slowly built a small bankroll to give me a chance to play more.  On-line has funded my live game & still in profit for the year.  Ive not really taken poker seriously, using it more as a hobby (rather than playing on the playstation!) but have now come to really enjoy the theories & the exitment of the game.  Met loads of great people who have also helped me in improving my game & giving me some terrible hangovers!

My biggest lesson for the year has to be ...........  Poker + Beer = Bye bye cash!!!

for 2008 I want to settle down into a single form of the game & concentrate on building my play to build my bankroll.  I would like to qualify for a few more live events through Sat's & aim to get some more MTT wins & get to a final table of one of the APAT's.  Also want to win the footy tourney at the next blonde bash!!!!

Onwards & upwards........

xxlojxx quote: Also want to win the footy tourney at the next blonde bash!!!!


not much chance of that unless you get invite to play for the bellys boys!

 rotflmfao rotflmfao ;tightend; ;tightend; ;tightend; ;tightend;

If you want to bring another horse into the stable let me know!

I didn't really have any goals for 2007, mainly because I'd only just started playing poker so really, my only goal was to build a roll. Which failed.

In October, I set myself four main targets for 2008, along with some other aims. They were:

1. Qualify for a GUKPT Event
2. Take down a Stars 180
3. Go to Vegas
4. Attempt the "Jesus Challenge"

Along with the build a roll, make enough money to live on that most people also aim for, although I'm still debating whether to go down the cash route or the STT/MTT route.

So yeah, those were my aims in October. And I've already done one :D

Well, a nice way to end 2007 :):):)

Merry Christmas one and all

It's an interesting question as a lot of life changes this year meant that my poker distraction was replaced by other distractions.

Always really been a hobby player able to spin up a few hundred to a few thousand and lose a fair bit of it again. This year I really lost interest in the online game - partly because I played so rarely that when I did I was fish tastic so not vey rewarding.

Highlight live was a chop at Luton the night before BB4 (I think it was 4) - Norman Pace was a fellow choppee and that made it a little more of an experience, as was having to dole out 10% to James 'flushy' Dempsey.

On the day of the bash I was feeling a bit subdued and tired actually from the 4am finish the night before - lightweight - Dave C was dealing our table until a dealer arrive. That was a second highlight since I think he made the conclusion I'd never played before - at one point I heard him quietly apologise to the dealer on my behalf as I didn't return my cards promptly at the end of a hand - "these guys don't play much". When he was dealing I remember as the action came to me and I gave a little thought to my move " you don't have to call". So, personal tuition was another highlight.

Played a few live games in a rush at the beginning of November - enjoyed them thoroughly, went fairly deep in two but no cashes and as ever with poker, met some good people to spend time around.

For 2008, more live stuff and a trip to Reno or Vegas will do nicely

Merry Xmas and HNY blondes

xx

Send!

poker goals/aims for next year, so far are:
i want to devote a few hours a week to looking at cardrunner videos as i really do feel that they helped me climb out of a long slump during the middle of the year.
pick 6 or 7 events out of the 80 or 90 i'll prob play & really try to prepare as best as i can, mentally & physically, in the days leading up to them, or to try & at least pinpoint what prep works best for me - it's all to easy to roll up & get into the groove as the game progresses.
that's it...for now  ;fishing;