Game Over

Well it has finally happened, my love affair with poker is truly over. The effort required to keep on top of the game is now to me no longer worth it.

I look back over the last 10 years and the fun I have had and nearly all of it happened in the first 7 years.

The last 3 years, I have literally been flying solo. Moving to cash, with the amount of tables I have to play, I could no longer have the chat windows open on MSN with all the great people that I used to chat with on a nightly basis, I think I miss that more than anything.We used to have such a laugh it was untrue. Winning money seemed to be an added bonus to the craic that we used to all have. But I guess people move on, times change and attitudes change.

I actually only moved to cash as I could no longer put the time in for the 8 hour tourneys and the minimum of an hour playing regular sit and goes. I think I fooled myself in to thinking that with the experience I have in the game that it should be enough for me to tick over a small profit at the tables and make all the money back in rakeback, but the games are so much tougher these days, you need to study much more to just stay afloat.

I have therefore took all of my money off stars and have taken the tough decision to not play any more till at least October. Even then, I will not put any money back in to any poker site, I have about $60-$80 in bonuses that I have yet to cash in and that is all I am willing to use.

Its a shame in a way as I am running at about 3bb/100 at 5NL over 120,000 hands so far this year, so I do know the more I play the more money I will make, but for the amount that is coming in, I just can't be arsed.

The time I used to spend playing poker will now be spent back how I used to spend my time before I played poker and that is fitness training. I have neglected my health for to long. I already have my "before" photo from January the 1st, maybe the next post on this blog will be on New Years Even with a comparison to my "after" photo.

So thats it folks, I am sure I will keep in touch with a lot of my poker buddies on forums and on facebook, but for now, the poker dream is over.

Good Luck at the tables and may all your rivers in life be in your favour.

Goth.