About me:
I’m 30 years old with a full time job that pays $20/hour. No children yet. 6+months living expenses saved. I live in Indianapolis. I’ve been playing poker for a while, and would say I study more than I play. I take the game seriously, but haven’t really had enough money in the savings account to play live “part time”. I’ve deposited on numerous sites and ran my $100 into around 1k before cashing it out over the course of a couple months.

Goals:
1. would like to eventually make at least $20 per hour playing 2/5 in the next 1.5 years (with a BR specifically for poker).

2. Meet a couple likeminded people in the area throughout my journey who have similar aspirations who can talk strat, etc.

Situation:
Due to Indiana law, casinos cannot have live dealers if the land isn’t on a boat. My options to play, from closest to furthest include:

1) All of the charity games in Indy (3 in total). These are usually 1/3. Occasionally some will run 1/2. I’ve never played. No comps.

2) Indiana Grand Racing Casino. 30 miles away. E-Tables, no dealers. Only plays 1/2. Went Saturday night and they had a whopping 2 tables playing. No comps.

3) Hollywood Casino. Lawrenceburg, IN. 85 miles away. Seems like there isn’t really any action here unless it’s on the weekend. Has comps.

4) Belterra Casino. Florence, IN. 89 miles away. Not sure what games run. $1/hr comp.

5) Jacks Casino- 100 miles away (Cincinnati, OH). Game usually has 4+ tables of 1/2 on the weekdays. Max buy-in = 200.

6) Horseshoe Southern Indiana. 114 miles away. Has comps. Not sure what games play.

Out of all the above, I feel like the Charity games (even though I’d rather play 1/2) should come first, followed by Jacks casino, and then the rest.


If you were in my shoes what would your plan be? Do my goals sound reasonable?


I’m on my phone so if I need to update this later for any additional info needed please let me know.




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To be perfectly honest, if your main goal is to make more money, I’d spend my extra time to improve my full time job situation.

As far as live poker goes, the charity rooms look like the only real option. You can’t really drive 80+ miles after work to play poker and then drive back. You could go to Jacks on the weekends but have to decide between paying for a hotel room or driving an additional 4 hours total which isn’t good for your hourly.

Advice would be not to bother

Yes, the plan is to obtain a Masters degree in my field in the next year. This is certainly the goal. Thanks.


Also, If I can get comped hotel rooms that wouldn’t be a bad idea to stay multiple days..


Oh ok. Just not play huh? Even if I was only a breakeven player I’d still play because I like the game. Being is that I am a slight winner, getting a nice side hustle is nice when I have no kids or other responsibilities right now. Can you explain your reasoning a little more?



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Yeah anything past number 2 simply isn't an option unless you can make enough to afford cheap staying overnight. If you want to do this then you simply must move to a different location at some point in time.

If you want to play anyways then play, but don't expect it to make much money. If you do win then it's a bonus.

Can’t edit the OP.

I’d like to add that I don’t NEED a second job. It’s more like supplemental money and building a roll to where I can make the more supplemental money.


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Sounds like what you are looking for is what would be a recreational poker hobby that at worst pays for itself and at best gives you a nice bit of extra cash to use as you wish. This is actually an ideal outcome for most folks. Eventually you might be able to move closer to these casinos so you can play more often and cut travel expenses down a lot.

I drive to Jack Cinn when I can. It's a good room and busy enough on weekends for you to make a long weekend out of it. Games at Belterra and Lawrenceburg are meager and reg infested. South Indiana is a bit like Jack , or at least they used to be. I wish we had charity rooms in KY like you have. Then again maybe Indiana law will change eventually!

That's obviously much better than needing it, but realistically with the opportunities you have for playing live it will be really tricky to make decent money. To have a proper chance of making money you need to have access to 1/3 or 2/5 games within 30 minutes driving. If not you'll certainly not lose if you're a decent player but it won't be that $20/h additional income that you are targeting.

So, let's toss some realistic numbers around. Let's assume you can play 8 hour sessions. Let's assume 3 hours dive time. Let's assume round trip travel is 190 miles and that your car gets 25 miles per gallon and that gas run $2.60 a gallon. If you are targeting $20 an hour effective, that means you need to gross $239 a trip, or approximately 6 bb an hour at 2/5. That maps out to approximately 20 bb per 100 hands, which is a somewhat unusually high win rate.

I don't know the games up there. Do you think they are soft enough and with enough repeat donors that someone with a medium level of skill and experience can come in and extract that much from the game?

By all means play. Especially since you have a primary income. But have realistic goals in mind in terms of winning. Remember, poker is a negative sum game, for you to win, others have to lose, and the house takes a cut. So you have to find games where people love to play, but play badly enough that you can consistently win.

Better to play because you enjoy it, and track your win rate over time. Maybe you will get to the point of $20 and hour, but that seems ambitious.

You didn't account for wear and tear on the car that can lead to needing maintenance or repairs (or eventually a new car).

The current IRS mileage rate is 53.5 cents per mile.

Just using the IRS mileage rate as an estimate, the travel expenses are more like $100 per trip for 190 miles roundtrip. Probably actually somewhat less than that though because the IRS mileage rate takes into account cost of insurance, registration fees, taxes, etc. (some things that Original Poster would have to pay anyway if he still had a car for other personal use that are probably not increased by the additional miles). So, travel expenses per trip less than $100, but more than the $20 that just considered gas.

20 bb per 100 hands is to be expected in live games if you are that good relative to your competition. It has been done online also in good games for a long enough time.

The top scores online year after year at medium (and below) limits (around 1/2) are 5 bb per 100 hands with rakeback (that way the house takes half of your profits, not 2/3rd).

The live skill needs to be rather mediocre compared to the online skill, so the live games are a shortcut to success. But rarely easily available, making the online option better as long as one is improving.

In live games, one PLAYS perhaps 1 or 2 hands per 10 minutes, that's nothing compared to 70 or 100 hands dealt per hour per table online. But one plays higher limits in live games with a higher win rate, and it can be good for mental recovery if one doesn't get it during the other times.

You seem focused on comps a little and I'm not sure why, especially when talking about the charity games which are close. My wife is from Indy and I've played the E-tables at Indiana Grand once. Kinda cute to try it out but nothing I'd want to make a habit of if I had a better option. If I were you I would just do more research into the charity scene. I've never played any of them but as far as distance it's clearly your best option. There may be some conversation here on 2+2 in the regional communities. Since your goal is to be a rec player and you think you can win on average, I'd probably try to stay as close to home as you can. You'll be able to play longer, more often, and safe on your travel expense. And you likely wouldn't be taking away from your educational goals.

Sounds like charity events are the best bet due to proximity. I wouldn’t drive as far as you would need to go get to casinos unless I knew I’d be making bank playing 2/5 or higher. At 1/2 and 1/3 you just won’t be making enough on average to make the long distance worthwhile.

While yes, online 9especially with multitabling) has a much higher hand rate than live, you probably need a new room if you are playing 6 to 12 hands an hour.

Play for fun with a goal of getting to the point that it's a 2nd job, but don't actually rely on it.

It's like trying to become an entertainer. It may be a dream and you might be able to do it, but there is a decent chance of failing as well.

Aside from that play hands and study. Work your way up to 25 or 50NL online with a positive winrate at those stakes over a >50k sample size. Then play live at the lowest stakes and try to take notes to learn to adapt. You'll be playing against a ton of limpers, large preflop raises, and finding yourself in weird spots where you'll have to value bet light when they're calling down 3 streets with weak kickers or a middle pocket pair. I've never played live but I play on my regional site which I'm told plays pretty much exactly like live, and it's weird. I've just started betting nearly pot for 3 streets or even overbetting with TPGK hands because I'll get called with weak kickers, 2nd pairs and average draws. Generally just fold against any aggression since they always have the nuts.

Anyway making 20/hour is a good goal to have, but to don't let it be an expectation. It's a bonus. Otherwise you're setting yourself up for failure and frustration if you struggle which isn't unlikely.

In regards don't travel too much. You'll end up hating it. You'll be tired a lot, you'll take a lot of time off because you don't wanna go. You'll have to deal with gas prices, car maintenance etc. 85 miles is too far to go after work. If you wanna head out there on a weekend for a day of poker and maybe have a meal or two out you could do somewhere further away.

I can give you the advice from someone who had the exact situation but was in another field. The way I would do it was to build money at lower events with the intention of making money to fund my bigger event. YOU ARE GOING TO LOSE. Understand that going in. Take it as experience. Budget yourself knowing that the money is in the wind. If you want to do this you can't go out for beers with friends, you can't get a nicer car, you have to live in a basement apartment. I did it and wouldn't have it any other way. My brother and I had similar choices in our sport and he went the wife and kids route. His day is the same every day. 1 hour in traffic going to work 1 hour in traffic on the way home. 2 kids with hockey practice, dinner and bed. You will blink and 20 years will be gone. I know he's happy but he's not. We're only 3 years apart and his hair is totally grey, he looks worn and his life is spent in a cubicle waiting to retire....and he has a political science and law degree. I brought him in for one low level tournament and I got hot and won. He cried like a baby. Dude, you're not going to make it. The odds are so heavily against you. But let me tell you the ride is fun. Anyway, one day after playing these small events they'll get easy and boring and I've seen it a hundred times that once you break that glass of playing well at the next level, you'll stay if you keep working at it. I'm not talking about being the best in the world, I mean being competent around the best. Don't forget that there is a giant luck component and that poker like my sport is long-term. You'll need some luck in the right spots. Put a clock on it. Give yourself 5 years. Learn along the way, meet good people with good work habits. I had to cut off some amazing friends with ****ty work habits. I lost a good year or two having friends with ****ty habits.