Another small step towards more generalized poker competency

Night before last, I signed up for two of the single-table HORSE tournaments that I've been enjoying lately on Poker Stars, one for $5, one for $10, and thought I would play whichever filled up first. One started, and before I could unregister from the other one, it started, too! So I had to manage two of these puppies simultaneously.

At first I thought it wouldn't be too bad, because starting within a minute or so of each other, I assumed they would progress pretty much in parallel, so that I wouldn't have to be focusing on different games at the same time. Unfortunately, the $10 game had two players who kept having disconnect problems, and every time that happened the tournament clock would stop for a minute or so. It didn't take too long for the two tournaments to become completely out of phase.

I realize that there are plenty of people who are completely comfortable with all of the different games, and can size up any given situation in just a few seconds, so that switching back and forth is not difficult. But for one like me, it's quite a challenge. Hold'em, of course, is my bread and butter; at this level of play I could do it in my sleep. And in razz I have played enough to at least have a basic A-B-C strategy down, so it doesn't take a lot of thought to make a reasonable decision.

But Omaha, stud, and stud/8 are still big foggy areas in my brain, and it takes a great deal of concentration for me to end up with even a vague notion of whether I'm ahead or behind in a hand, especially if there is more than one opponent. (In the split-pot games it happens embarrassingly often that I think I'm going to win the high, but when the cards are revealed, I actually lose the high but win the low--or vice-versa. That's how far off my radar is for those games.) So switching rapidly back and forth between the games was a real test for me--particularly at 4:00 in the morning, which is when this happened.

But I did it. I came in 2nd in the $5, and 1st in the $10. Uptick a massive $52!

And just before these two started, I had finished in 3rd place in another $5 one (payout: $8). Three consecutive cash finishes, with two of them played simultaneously but asynchronously, is not bad for never having studied strategy in 3 of the 5 different forms of poker that make up these things, just kind of winging it on general poker knowledge. (Of course, it also helps that none of the opposition is greatly skilled at all of the games, or they wouldn't be signing up for the lowest stakes the site offers. It's a safe bet that we're all early in the HORSE learning curves. There are no sharks patrolling the waters of the $5-10 sit-and-go.)

Anyway, it seems that the ol' brain cells still have a bit of flexibility left in them, even at my advanced years.