There and Back Again: A Punter's Tale by Matthew Harris

Staking

Following my exit from the GPS Southend, an event which I have been looking forward to and pretty desperate to run deep in since it was announced, I decided to comfort-buy a car wash. This gave me a little time to do some thinking about what the event meant to me, and I ended up coming to a few conclusions about staking. Since there have been a lot of questions/threads on this topic lately, I'll share my thoughts on here.

In total, I sold 50% of my action for the GPS. I'm not properly rolled for this event, so financially, selling this much action made sense. I will never sell more than 50% of myself for an event. This is my cut off point, if I'm that under-rolled for an event then I simply won't play it. For me at least, a huge part of the learning curve for this game is grinding the shit out of it so you can afford to move up the stakes. This is why I didn't play the Monte Carlo this year, for example.

I've seen it written that being staked takes away some of the pressure. This, I massively disagree with. Frankly, it feels fantastic that people are confident enough in my ability as a player to put up there own money to allow me to play, essentially betting on me to succeed in the tournament. It's a very humbling feeling. When I then turn up to play, I want to affirm their belief in me. I enjoy going up to people after I've cashed and paying them their share, because it justify's their gamble not only to them, but to me as well. When I lose a big pot, I don't sit there and punt it in at the first opportunity, I do the very best I can to fight with the stack I've got left. Noone likes busting, but it feels a little worse to then have to tell the team about it, and this really is added motivation to think and play well.

In answer to those questioning why I'm not selling at a mark up, it's not because I don't believe my "edge" in the tournament is worth it. If I didn't believe I was good enough to win, then I wouldn't be playing. I do believe, however, that I'm not yet proven enough to sell at a mark up. I think it's much more sensible for me to keep selling at face value for the time being, until I rack up a few more results. I also think too many people expect too much from their backers, and I'd kinda like to start out giving everyone willing to buy pieces of me the best deal possible.

As such, I will be playing the side event today, and freerolling the GPS team in said event. First place should be somewhere in the region of 8k. Gl me!