I feel that I am getting more confident in my preflop play, and more consistant in my flop play. Pre-flop I feel that I know what I am doing. I am comfortable stealing with sub-par hands, 3-betting with more hands than AA-KK, and folding deceptively bad hands out of position (KJ, KQ, even AJ). As some have reminded me, playing ABC poker should be more than enough to beat the NL25 game. On the flop I understand the value of CB-ing, and who has control based on the pre-flop raise situation and position.
All in all, I feel that my actions are more confident even when I lose a large pot. I feel no shame in folding a steal attempt, and getting past that initial hurdle of classical conditioning is what was holding my poker skill back. Being able to lose a pot but still feel confident that my play was correct is one of the most important skills in poker.
Where I need to go from here is a tough call. I understand some more advanced concepts such as squeezing and floating, but don't feel it is necessary to use them, and is probably even -EV, at the level I'm playing (NL25). So the next step is obviously not to learn more advanced techniques. I also never really believe that the next step is to continue grinding to move up in stakes because I should never be satisfied with my current ability. In conclusion I think that I should begin to vary my CB amount (currently it's pretty consistantly 3/4 pot) based on factors such as
- Dryness of Board
- Opponent stack sizes
- Opponents flop aggression (check-raising more...)
- Opponents suspected range based on VPIP and PF play
The one trap I don't want to fall into is running good for a while and mistaking this for being a great player. I feel this is the biggest mistake new poker players make, as it leads to tricking yourself that bad habits are good moves, and loses you a lot of money before you figure out where you are going wrong.
But it does feel great to run good :)
Session: +$32 -- 267 Hands
Overall: $352.60 -- +$137.60 -- 3414 hands
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