My Second Biggest Leak

For non-poker players out there, a "leak" refers to that part of your poker game which you do over and over again but which will lose you money in the long run. For a lot of players, this could include things done during hand-to-hand play at the table like playing too many hands in early position, defending the blinds too much, over-valuing pocket pairs or raising the wrong amount in certain situations etc etc. However, there are also other leaks that have less to do with hand-to-hand play but are more psychological like playing when tired, playing because there is nothing else to do, tilting too easily or playing with scared money. These are the leaks that make you screw up at the table and actually cost you more so it's important to have these well and truly plugged.

In an article, dated some time ago, in Bluff Europe magazine (author unknown), these two facets of the game were termed the "micro game" and the "macro game" respectively. Now, personally speaking, my efforts to reduce "micro-game" leaks mainly comes in the form of reading books - and I think my "micro-game" has certainly come a long way as a result. My "macro-game" on the other hand, is still not fine-tuned enough and even after all these years of playing, I still haven't bloody cracked it.

After my hiccup at The Vic during the week and after playing on the internet over the last three days or so, I believe I have hit upon a second "macro-game" leak which needs to be sorted out - and certainly something which needs to be corrected come 2012 when I relaunch the next phase of my poker career. The first leak has been very well documented in this here blog thank you very much - and that's the overuse of alcohol while playing - and this, I think, has cost me a small four-figure sum. The second leak involves what the great John Vorhaus calls "OMHS" or "One More Hand Syndrome."

I hate to admit it, but this not only cost me over a few hundred at The Vic in midweek but has now cost me a few hundred online as well. As I mentioned in a previous post, I was thinking of up and leaving at The Vic when I had £330 in front of me (a small £30 profit) - but stayed and duly lost a very large whack after getting slightly tilted soon after losing with QQ. If I had left in the first place, when the thoughts of leaving first came to me, I would still have had plenty of money in my pocket to enjoy a second session at Bluff@The Mint which I had promised myself.

Similarly, "OMHS" has cost me online as well. After a few good battles, and after what I considered to be good play, yesterday afternoon I stood on a $300 profit after playing at the $0.50/$1 and $1/$2 cash games. My "macro-game" thinking then kicked in and said that as my balance was over a certain milestone, I should log-off, be happy to have recuperated my Vic loss, take a break and go and do something else - good solid thinking. Unfortunately, greed got the better of me and "OMHS", or in this case "OMSS" (One More Session Syndrome) took over. I played more, lost, played a little bit more, lost more - and then lost a lot more - and ended up DOWN on my initial deposit. 

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It's now Saturday afternoon and I'm counting the cost of "OMHS". It's a real bugger and, I tell you now, when "OMHS" goes wrong, it can tilt you bad and make you play VERY BADLY INDEED.

So this is how it's going to be:

With "run bad / bad play" mode activated and my head in a losing mindset right now, my "macro-game" control room is screaming at me and it's saying "STOP PLAYING POKER!" And I hear it baby, I hear it - and I've cashed out my full balance from PKR as a result. (Yet again!) But there is one more thing I have to do before the shutters go up and that's to make one visit this evening to Bluff@The Mint which is the last live venue I have to check out for the blog.

The missus is driving me a bit mad nowadays so rather than strike her down with a rolling pin, my plan is to get out and play at The Mint tonight with a lower buy-in than usual and to see how I get on. After this, win or lose, I'm planning on putting the shutters up for much of December - and it will be a crawl to the finish line; much how I finished last year in fact! My main focus will then be on reading up and studying the game (I certainly have plenty of material) and less on actually playing. With lots to consider about employment and where my regular income is going to come from, I'll also need to figure out a strategy on how to launch my 2012 poker career.

Apologies if this turned into a tl;dr post. I just needed a longer therapy session today.