I’m a sixty-year-old psychiatrist — that’s an MD who works as a shrink — and a serious poker player. Think of me as a guy who has the look of Dan Harrington, the avuncular nature of Doyle Brunson, and the playing skill of the average of the rest of you. I played once with Phil Helmuth and finished ahead of him, if that helps. I’m a medical school professor and part of the Texas poker underground.

Every so often we read an article that seems almost mysteriously directed at our situation in life, or more importantly, our situation in poker. That’s what happened to me when I enjoyed Niktak’s article about his experience of bouncing around with his bankroll. Let me add a couple of comments to his excellent observations about winning, losing, and bankroll management. I’ll try to do it without appending any bad beat stories.

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I’ve been playing a lot of live poker lately and for a while, things were going extremely well. It’s not that every session was a winning one, but I was certainly winning much more than I was losing, and my bankroll was swelling nicely.

Of course, being on something of a rush I thought – as many of us do – that my game was dialed in. I knew the people I was playing against, my strategies were working, and I was in the zone. So, I did what any reasonable player would – I took a shot.

For me, this meant playing a $250 tourney with a $250 re-buy. As someone who’d never played anything greater than a $100 buy-in event, this was a huge leap up the ladder but I was feeling confident. Cocky, even.

And yeah, I didn’t even come close to seeing the money. I won’t go into details and I won’t make excuses but, after a few hours of play, I busted out just about dead center in the event. And that’s where my lesson started.

After busting, I didn’t really take any time to think about my play. I was hyped on adrenaline – and tilt – and all I could really think about was getting into a cash game to win my buy-in back. I mean, really, it couldn’t be that hard. I’d taken hundreds of dollars out of this game on a regular basis, I could do it again.

Except that I couldn’t.

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Let’s call it the Septic Touch. When King Midas touched things, they turned to gold. When you touch anything at the poker table, it turns to … well, we all know what septic tanks hold. So you’re in the throes of a big downswing, huh? I’m not talking about having just lost a couple of buy-ins to a donkfish or being just below break-even for the month. I mean a vicious, profound, sustained series of losses.

Let’s run through a few of your options:

1) Stop playing. This one is tough to beat for its simple logic. I guarantee that you will stop losing money playing poker if you stop playing poker. But then what would you do with those extra fifty three hours a week? Go to the local museum? Read a book? Make new friends and attend new social events? C’mon, all that stuff is for wimps.

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I started my Saturday in terrible shape. Hung over and jetlagged, I emerged from my hotel and stumbled into the Dublin streets at about 1pm. My mind was capable of a single thought: get coffee and get it now. I’m nasty in moments such as this. I threw a clock at a college roommate under similar circumstances, and I once threatened a camping buddy with a spork.

Downtown Dublin was crowded with Christmas shoppers – and cold. I didn’t know what direction to head in and my annoyance level was getting extremely high. I needed coffee. In a moment, Gavin Smith and a few Full Tilt Poker employees appeared in front of me.

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Full Tilt Poker’s hand history feature has really helped me plug a few leaks in my game. I had been losing about $50,000 a month playing 1-2 No-Limit, but after taking the time to review my hand histories, my hourly rate is quickly approaching zero dollars per hour.

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These are my thoughts on the Cap No Limit games at Full Tilt Poker. I’ve been playing them for about a month and really like ‘em. Bonus code Falstaff! You can read more of my trash at www.pokerstage.blogspot.com.

Contrary to what you might be thinking if you read my last few posts there, I have actually been playing some poker. Life hasn’t been all rehearsals and theatre festivals, just 80% of it. When I’ve been playing, I’ve been inhabiting mostly the Cap No Limit tables at Full Tilt, so I thought I’d scribble down some impressions on how the Cap Limit game is different from standard No Limit.

Well, it’s capped. I know, duh. But basically that means that your Risk of Ruin on any given hand is significantly decreased. While your betting is unstructured, you can only put in a max of a given amount (I play the $.50/$1 tables, and the max is $30, so I think it’s usually 30XBB for the cap) for each hand. Once your betting has reached the cap, you’re treated as All In.

So why am I hanging out around these tables instead of the No Limit tables? Because they’re making me more money (I know, I just cursed it). The Cap allows me to play at a higher level than I’m bankrolled for by standard bankroll management theories, which says that to play NL100 I need to have at least a $3,000 bankroll. I currently do not have a $3,000 bankroll, although I do have a nice new digital camera and two plane tickets to Vegas in 15 days, so I’ll take the trade. But the Cap games allow me to play higher while risking on one hand no more than I’m risking at a NL25 game, which keeps me interested.

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I’m a very loose cash game player. It works well for me. The more I played, the more I opened up my starting hand requirements. But to this day, the hands I stay away from the most are The A and The Rag. I’ll raise UTG with 58s depending on my table image, but I won’t play A-rag ever. Why?

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