How I approach Improvement
Dusty Schmidt said “Treat Your Poker like a Business”. For me poker is a sport and that defines my approach to playing. I “prepare, perform, evaluate and analyse”. I make sure everything is 100% while I’m playing and I know what to expect from myself and the games.
My approach to improving is heavily based on what the book has taught me about how the learning process works. Every night I play I make notes on things I think that affected my mental game and areas where I think I was weak strategically. I will always look at these notes before I play the next day to make sure there isn’t any basic stuff I am doing wrong that can be fixed with some concentration and practise.
Every Saturday when I am winding up my week’s play I will analyse these notes. I will pick three specific weak areas and these will be my core focus for improvement over the next week. These will sometimes be quite broad areas and so may come up in next week’s notes also.
For example right now the three core areas I am working on are HU play, hand-reading and 3-betting. These areas are very general and so I imagine I’ll be on them for more than a few weeks. I make my schedule on a Monday giving specific time-slots to these areas. For example for HU play I will watch a Primordial vid on Cardrunners. For hand-reading I will go through some hands on 2p2. I also found this excellent exercise for hand reading practise that I intend to start using this week,
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/10...-nlhe-1107105/.
For 3 betting I have been reading Small Stakes No-Limit Hold Em. This is a fairly complex book that as well as working on my weaknesses is teaching me a lot of new things. For anyone starting out in poker I would recommend they read Professional No Limit Hold Em a couple of times and then move onto this.
I know that these areas will always need to be worked on but for now they are my main focus. I want to clear up as much fuzzy thinking as I can in these areas as they seem to stall my game the most while playing.
Working on core weak areas does not mean neglecting areas where I feel I am strong in. As well as doing full HH reviews I still use SNGWIZ every few days. For SNG grinders this is an excellent article on the best way to use that program to improve
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/36...-tl-dr-625856/
One of the most important things for me now is that I separate the mental and strategic game. Problems in one area usually cause problems in another. Being aware that they are two separate things will free up a lot of mental space helping you see each facet of your game much more clearly.
Last edited by sheeprustler; 01-16-2012 at 09:19 PM.