Yes, it's possible, not probable though. If you are break even after 700 hrs, you could be a slightly winning player running bad.

You are most likely not a good player (7-10bb/hr) that's running bad enough to be break even.

Ask yourself this, how many times are you really stumped about a decision at the table?

I'd say 1,000 hours of live play is a good sample size to begin to determine a somewhat accurate winrate. It definitely won't be exact but you will start to narrow it down to a pretty small range.

Also, it takes about 6 months to play 1,000 hours of live poker. Meaning you probably improved your game in the past six months which means your winrate might be slightly higher then what it current is.

I have had 400 hour stretches where my winrate was $32/hr at 1/2. I have had 400 break-even stretches and 250 hour downswings, so you can see that 700 hours will definitely will not be exact.

This actually relates to a conversation I had with a buddy about,

How much margin of error is there in any given session (~10 hrs) for suboptimal play? Obviously the real answer is none, but the conversion was more geared towards, how much error does it take someone to make in a session before concluding that they are good or bad? i.e. loss of BB or number of suboptimal plays.

One thing's for sure, you have my respect eternally for being the 1st poster in the Live section of this site to ever admit to being down/break even. Every single other person here has a massive hourly winrate, didn't you know? Kind of like how everyone in Shawshank is innocent.

Uh, how can you state the # of months it takes to get to 1000 hours played? Some people -play heavy hours, some moderate hours, some play one session every ten days. Who knows how long it would take OP?

Thanks Radar!! Am definitely looking forward to the move and having a much less structured/more fun lifestyle. Truth be told, I've wanted to move to LV since my first trip there in 1991.

I believe he meant full time (7-8h/day, 5 days/week).

26 weeks x 40 hours = 1040...

Wow, that sounds miserable. Props to those that can push 2000 hours a year in poker.

up until recently, I played 20-40 hrs a week at a track that closes. But now that I do it full time and in a real casino, I play 60-80 hrs a week.

30 hr sessions rule

vinny - long story short. You are a break even player and do not have significant edge on the game - period. The good news is you are most likely beating rake and toke. With some work and focus you can become a winnar

coming from someone who played for a living successfully for several years.

if you want to double your winrate in short order, do the following:
1. take 1/4 of the time you spend in the casino and spend it actively studying poker (practice range breakdowns, equity evaluation against fold/call ranges, 2p2 hands)
2. take 1 hour a day and spend it exercising

if you already do these things, great!

Maybe that's why you're losing?

or possibly this???

One of the tables I played on during summer was a $2/5 @ RIO where it was mandatory "take 2 shots when you join the table". Everyone was drinking HEAVILY and the floor even allowed us to turn away patrons that didn't want to abide by the shot rule. We all must have had anywhere from 5-12 shots (depending on how long each person was there). Every pot was at least single or double straddled & chips/bills were flying. Just the fact that a game like this exists and 9 + people were allowed to come together at a time & go crazy is a testament to how good the summer LV action is.

Or possibly this

700 hours is a pretty big sample. If you're still BE and there's no pattern month to month of improving, it's likely that you're not a big winner.

A few quick questions: What's the buyin and rake/time structure of your game? If you're playing a short game with a large rake or drop it may be extremely difficult to impossible to win.

Do you have an online poker background? What levels did you play? If you were beating a certain limit, we can estimate your skill level.

If you're that serious, I seriously recommend checking out Bart Hanson's stuff. CrushLivePoker and Deuce Plays Premium. I don't want to become a shill and I"m not associated with him in any way, but for $9 a month each those made me such a better poker player b/c there's not a lot of good live training out there.

I hope you're not saying you play 30 hours straight with no sleep. I'm the biggest proponent of long sessions in the world, but there's no way after 18+ hours straight poker your game isn't going to suffer. I can't imagine how horrible my NL game would be after 30 hours. If you get rooms comped, take breaks. If there's no hotel, I honestly think playing more reasonable sessions would improve your win rate.

That's a totally awesome mini article.

People make fun of me because of how cheap I am, but I think it adds up.

I buy cases of water at home for like $4 and take it with me to the casino, instead of having to get tiny bottles at the table and tip $1 each time.

I have a system for dealer tips which may be good or bad, but at least I know how much I want to tip so there's not tons of variance.

I use my comp dollars very efficiently which pay for almost all of my food at the casino. I'll take a little bit of food with me to cover some of the nutrition I"m losing and so that I'm not buying uncomped food at the casino.

It might not be much, but it really adds up.

Yes, since I'm an educated individual who can do basic math, I'm aware he meant full time. OP did not state that he played full time in his initial question (he has since clarified), and very few people do to begin with, so full-time hours wasn't a reasonable assumption.

the hours after 12ish are probably killing you in your 30hr sessions.

I actually used to do the same at 1/2 when I first started playing live. Then I realized it way destroying my winrate and probably my health.

This is pretty comparable to playing too many tables online.

I agree, it was an excellent input! And I approve to be aware of where you put your pennies . I think its a big difference between being cheap and being thrifty!

So it sounds like I'm the only person that thinks that the outside expenses associated with playing poker like eating, traveling time, etc shouldn't go into consideration unless they are more than you would have spent if you were at another job/etc. I generally spend less on food when I'm playing poker full time because of casino comps. When I was working full time we'd take a lunch together and routinely spend 10-15/day at lunch. If I'm spending say $5 a day after comps on food at the table, I think I should be calculating 5-10 profit :-p

I agree.

I think you should still calculate how much you're spending, because you want to have SOME idea how much food etc is costing you.

I disagree 100% about traveling, time etc. Those are absolute musts. For instance, the train costs me $10 each way. The train also takes 1 hour and 40 minutes. It makes a big deal if I'm staying over in AC for 3 days (where I'm spending $20 and like 3.5 hours on the train) or if I go back and forth each day ($60 in trains and spending >10 hours).

Also, your travel time is basically like time playing poker where you're earning $0. So if every day you drive an hour each way to the casino and you play 8 hours while you're there, it's really like you're playing 10 hours only 2 you don't earn anything.

The casino that I play in has a monthly tournament for anyone who plays more than 40 hours a month. If I cash in this, should I include this in my hourly rate, or should I treat it more like the comps that I get from the casino? Or should I just roll it into my winnings for the month and add the tournament hours into my hours played for that month?

Sorry if this doesn't belong here. I realize it's not enough for online 2/4 or 3/6 NL but is it enough for live 2/5?