Good To Be Back Playing Poker

Its good to be back playing poker, I stopped playing for a while because i was a bint skint and had to withdraw my Bankroll. I played in the occaisional freeroll but nothing serious untill the other day. I was bored and had just been watching the poker channel and i decided that was it, i had been away too long and deposited money on Bet365. I only deposited the minimum, which is £5($9.34), as money is still a bit tight. That was Tuesday morning and i'm now up to $69.73.

I've been mostly playing $2.50 5 seater SnG's, I've played about 10 since i came back, winning about 8 and finishing 2nd in the others. I've also done better at the $0.05/$0.10 NLHE tables, although i lost about $10 on them last night.

My bankroll got a big boost today as i sat down at the $0.50/$1.00 NLHE tables for the 1st time ever, i've never played at a higher level than $0.05/$0.10. I bought in for £20, my total BR was about $44 and i was tempted to go in for the whole amount but sense got the better of me and I stuck with just $20, most of the other players had around the maximum buy-in, which is $100.

I only really wanted to see what the quality of play was like at this higher level but after about half an hour i was up to around $45. I called it quits there as i didn't want to push my luck. I'm glad I tried it becuase i held my own and even out-played a few my oppponents to win a few hands. I'll definately sit at these tables again although I want to get my BR up to around $200 before i do.

How is everybody doing?

nice work building up your BR like that, i wish i could.

Don't take this personally but you shouldn't be playing .50/1 NL with your bankroll. You are lucky to have won $45 sitting down with the minimum. Big stacks are salivating at the mouth when they see somebody sit down with the minimum. To play .50/1 NL you need a bankroll close to $1000. Why would you just throw away all that hard work of grinding it out on the SNG's?

I would recommend to keep grinding it out until you get a bankroll of atleast $150. Once you get there you can play up to .10/.25 NL. Once you get over $250 you can test the waters in .25/.50 NL.

You're spot on mate. I was curious and I got lucky, whenever I got a good starting hand, it hit on the flop and I was able to get the most amount of chips out of it. I want to play at that level again but i'm taking the time to build my BR properley. I spent most of last night playing in the $2.50 SnG's that have been so good to me, up to around $105. I'll keep playing in these for a while before trying my hand at $5 SnG's and $0.10/$0.25 NL.

It's better to buy in for the full amount at a lower stake than the minimum amount at a slightly higher one, generally, because you can then wait for a solid, playable hand, without losing most of your table stake in blinds. If you still stand to win much the same amount when you hit your hand and someone pays you off fully, then minimising the cost of waiting for that hand is good.