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#1
07-30-2006, 01:57 AM
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Variance and dreading the eventual downswing
I have been running extremely hot in July. It scares the crap out of me b/c I know variance will even things out and I'm facing a major downswing soon. When most people run hot, they try to play as much as possible. I just don't know how much longer this can last and I'm basically dreading every session. I'm usually a 4.5ptBB/100 winner in 1-2 NL; this is over a big sample size. I have almost doubled that for July. Today I sat down to play and I think the start of my downswing occured. I lost to 3 two-outers after getting it all-in during the first 30 minutes of my session. What did I do, I just stopped playing because I believed that it was only the beginning. What do you guys do when it seems the downside of variance is upon you?
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#8
07-30-2006, 02:19 AM
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Re: Variance and dreading the eventual downswing
I can't stay on this heater forever. My normal winrate is over 250,000 hands. I don't think that I got so much better that I doubled in a month. Eventually I will lose a 200BB pot when getting it all in preflop with A-A. In July, I can only remember 6 or 7 bad beats for my stack and cold decked maybe 5 times.... My hands can't just keep holding up... mathmatically speaking, it's impossible. Am I being a moron about this? Could someone explain it to me?
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#9
07-30-2006, 02:22 AM
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Re: Variance and dreading the eventual downswing
[ QUOTE ]
I can't stay on this heater forever. My normal winrate is over 250,000 hands. I don't think that I got so much better that I doubled in a month. Eventually I will lose a 200BB pot when getting it all in preflop with A-A. In July, I can only remember 6 or 7 bad beats for my stack and cold decked maybe 5 times.... My hands can't just keep holding up... mathmatically speaking, it's impossible. Am I being a moron about this? Could someone explain it to me? [/ QUOTE ] i just flipped a coin 10 times in a row. EACH TIME IT CAME UP HEADS!!! the next time MUST be tails right, cos that coin is due!!
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#10
07-30-2006, 02:44 AM
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Re: Variance and dreading the eventual downswing
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] I can't stay on this heater forever. My normal winrate is over 250,000 hands. I don't think that I got so much better that I doubled in a month. Eventually I will lose a 200BB pot when getting it all in preflop with A-A. In July, I can only remember 6 or 7 bad beats for my stack and cold decked maybe 5 times.... My hands can't just keep holding up... mathmatically speaking, it's impossible. Am I being a moron about this? Could someone explain it to me? [/ QUOTE ] i just flipped a coin 10 times in a row. EACH TIME IT CAME UP HEADS!!! the next time MUST be tails right, cos that coin is due!! [/ QUOTE ] I think you are being unnecessarily (and insultingly) facetious and condescending here. The poster is obviously not an idiot who believes that simply because he has been on an upswing a downswing is now more likely than before. You're pretending that's what he is saying so as to make snide comments and make yourself feel smarter, but that's not what he's asking. What the OP is saying, I believe, is roughly this: if you look at the graph of a winning player who has a solid idea of his true winrate, there will be periods of very high and very low variance, along with the regular dips and upswings one would expect to see in such a graph. The poster believes his true winrate to be about 4, yet he has recently been running at about 8 for a long period. If his winrate ends up staying at 4 over the life of his poker career, he will invariably have to lose money to bring his winrate into line. This may come quickly, and it may come slowly, but if 4 is his true winrate, if he plays long enough it WILL happen. Thus, the OP is a little gunshy right now because he knows that unless his true winrate (as correlated with his skill) has become 8, there will be some losing in his future if he plays long enough and his winrate ultimately stays at 4. He'll be riding some dips if he keeps playing long enough, and they may be precipitious. These are perfectly natural emotions and we all feel them from time to time. Heaters do not last forever, and the gambler's fallacy has nothing to do with the OP's perception (likely accurate) that he has been on a heater and his true winrate is not reflected in his recent results. Note further that it is precisely the same phenomenon, but in reverse, that allows a solid, winning player to look at a downswing and know that his true winrate is X/100, that he WILL recover if he plays long enough, and thus that this too shall pass. We nod our heads sagely at the winning player when he understands this, and we believe he has thought correctly about his recent negative variance. Yet when someone comments on their positive variance in exactly the same way, yet instead of optimism about the future (based on an accurate conception of their own winrate) they expression some (well-founded) trepidation, posters like you ridicule them. It's YOU who is not thinking correctly about this issue, and though the OP could have expressed it more clearly, he's certainly not falling victim to the gambler's fallacy. In short, stop being a one-liner douche and try to understand what people are saying, instead of imputing a meaning to their posts that allows you to insult them.
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