Hey guys just curious, what are your biggest live downswings? Both in terms of buyins and how long/# of hands they lasted? Oh and what stakes they occurred at if you don't mind sharing ?

I go by sessions. In four years of keeping records, I once had an 11-session losing streak, and have had 7-8 long losing streaks, as well.

Longest winning streak is 14 straight sessions.

I play $2/$5 NL and have been on the biggest downswing of my life from September 1 through the present (although I actually booked a win last night so maybe it’s finally over). My net result over 261 hours from September through November was -$5,989.

I take a lot of notes when I play, and after running so bad for so long I decided to make a spreadsheet with every significant hand (pot > $100ish) where I was all in before the river, including my equity and the size of the pot. Over that sample I found I was running over $8,000 below EV, with several $1k+ pots where I had over 85% equity when the money went in (and in two cases I had over 90% equity) and lost. I’ve also lost a lot of big pots in cooler situations like set over set, straight over straight, KK vs AA, etc..

Had worst session of my life just last week actually. Professional player to my left hit Quads vs my full house twice in one session. That was only two buy ins but probably worst luck I've ever had.

Back in the 90's $4-8. Had three months of winning almost every hand I played. It got old, winning so much the table wouldn't play against me after a while. Then for the next five and half months I broke even maybe half a dozen times. The worst loss was $300.00 plus in less than three rotations, it was brutal. Wish I would see a winning streak like than again.

Wow lol that's pretty crazy.

Consecutive losing sessions: 5
Consecutive winning sessions: 8

So hard to quantify a downswing IMO. Is it hours, sessions or BIs? As shown above, you can lose BIs very quickly via coolers or suck-outs. Thus your session may be cut short (in hours and hands played) .. which prevents you from seeing a bigger light at the end of the tunnel.

I think the best approach is suggested by 'flying' above and mentioned in many posts on this site ... Take a good look at your key hands to see if your reads were right and the money went in good. Does your range open up too wide when you lose your first BI or do you tighten up too much?

I play in basically 5 different rooms and I went through a 6 week stretch earlier this year where I felt I couldn't win anywhere applying any style of play. But each session I would work my way through the key hands and talk myself into feeling better ... which might be a bad thing!!

There is still one room that I struggle to win at .. you'd think I would just stop going there (dang dealers).

I didn't really keep track of individual 'streaks', but I would say that over that 6 week stretch playing 15-20 hours a week I lost a 'net' 36 BI in some very aggressive games playing 1/2, 2/5 and 5/10 (twice), but mainly very aggro 1/2 games. I don't really look at a +$60 session as a 'win', especially when I cash out for 3 BI + $60 in order to do it. Maybe I'm too hard on myself from that regard. GL

Poker has been my sole source of income for a little over 2 years now. I've probably averaged 140 hours a month over that span. I play mostly 2/5 and 5/10 now. In that span, I've had one losing month (bad downswing combined with the fact that I didn't log a ton of hours).

In terms of BI, I've had one or two 10 BI downswings. All in all, it's pretty rare for me to DS more than 6 or 7 BI.

Having said that, if you're trying to relate your own experiences to other people's, know that the severity of your downswings is going to depend on what your expected hourly is, and also whether or not you play worse when in the midst of a downswing, or you tilt off money, etc... I have what many would consider a very good hourly, and I don't play a super high variance style of poker. I also pride myself in having tilt control. Those factors keep my downswings pretty mild, and not everybody is like that.

Let's say, hypothetically, I'm a 10bb/hour winner (nice, round number). In order for me to go on a 10 BI downswing at 2/5 over the course of 100 hours, I actually need to run 20 BI below my expectation, which is $10,000. If your hourly is much lower than this, then your downswings are going to be both more common, and more harsh.

I had 12 consecutive losing sessions (6 tournaments, 6 live) for a $3300 loser over a span of 5 weeks. This ended about 2 weeks ago. I haven't touched cards since and will not for the remainder of 2015.

I'm on a nice, little upswong. I've won 33 of my last 40 sessions.

Jesus Christ, game? Location? Style?

This year I was up around $22K

I was running bad in novemeber - I lost about $3,000 in about 8 sessions and up only $19K

I won all but $300 of it back this week.

So now i'm up 21.7K LOL


I play 1/2, 1/3, and 2/2 PLO

About this time last year I went on a massive downswing.....losing with good cards too. Got to the point where I was thinking that I just couldn't win, no matter what. Made me take a break for a bit.


a few examples:

- KK on the button in a straddled pot (1/2 NLHE), 2 callers of Straddle, so $18 in the pot. I raise to $60 & get 2 callers. Flop comes K52......Checked to me & I jam for about $230 & get SNAPPED called from UTG. He shows 84 & rivers his flush.....so this guy just paid almost $300 for an 8 high flush draw.....

In that same span of time I lost with AA about 4 times. a few on them after flopping an Ace & getting called down with a gut shot & of course they hit their gut shot....

Flopping sets, losing to straights. Flopping flushes to lose to rivered boats.

This lasted for about 3 months.....I still haven't fully recovered those loses.

ya that would happen to me

They would call a 3bet of $60 with like 65 and just random hands and just hit it - stack you - and just dump it a few orbits later to someone else. Or they rack up and cash out.

I would just keep rebuying and putting in very long sessions. One session I was in for about $1700. and won all but $300 back. This donkey was up like $2k and shipped it all back. I told myself I wasn't leaving til he left. Luckily I have deep enough pockets to handle the swings. It makes it much easier when you play way over rolled.

Lol 2/5 Vegas...not telling u where!

That's about my year-round average (75%-80% winning sessions) at 2/5 in SoFla. My problem is that my winning sessions are usually in the $100 - $400 range, but my losing sessions can be $800 to as much as $1,500.

Last month was a perfect example. I won my first nine sessions of the month for a total win of $2,537. However, my last session in November I lost $1,500 before calling it quits for that night. And what galls me the most is that I was up over $500 in the first hour of that session before going on a $2,000 downswing over the next four hours. Everything that could go wrong did: FH over FH, set over set, people hitting draws on the river, and on other hands, me missing every draw I had.

Just the nature of the game.

Just to clarify, you're saying you've won 33 sessions *in a row*, correct?

...no?

Oh! I thought the question was about consecutive swings, my bad.

Downswings don't necessarily have to be "consecutive" and in most cases aren't.

For most poker players their entire life will be a downswing.

Can you elaborate?

What he is saying is most live players are not winning players which is a fact.

Played around 3000 hours live and well over 2000 hours of 1/2 GBP
My standard deviation is really small.
5 BI £1000
Worst it's been was £1500 but £750(1.5 BI) of that was 2/5 losses.
So yeah, guess i'm either very fortunate or have a very solid game. I hope it's both