Secrets of the Amateurs

Here's an excellent post by Bond18 in his "Round the World in 90 Days" section on Full Tilt :

Day 92

Before you point out the obvious contradiction, he's gone round the world and is now taking stock. There's not that much for me to add to it, just read the post. I don't put in huge volume because, well because I'm Mr. Lazy, in a nutshell. I try to put in 3 x $2K sessions a week, most weeks I manage it, some weeks I don't. I'm running at 104% since January 2007, although this is almost certainly not sustainable given the massive positive skew of winning the Party $300K twice in 40 trials. Then again, it's a hell of a tournament ...

But the point remains, and it's a good one. If you have good technique, good discipline and you put the hours in online, you can indeed grind up $200-300K in a year, and then, as Bond says, you're in a position to play a few live tournaments with some judicious selling and swapping of action. You don't have to be a genius or a great player, you just have to work at it, put the hours in and play consistently to a reasonable standard. And this is why I have no tolerance, and in fact borderline contempt, for live "pros" who think they're the nizzles when they're fucking broke and scraping around for a stake. Because that's the other point ; you don't even need a massive bankroll to do this. If you're capable of nipping and scraping up $10K just so you can be seen at EPT London, then you could put that online and off you go. People don't do this because they're either too lazy, not good enough, or both.

The money's online, and in poker if you're looking for the best players, you follow the money. You ask me who the best British tournament player is and I'll say Chris Moorman, without a moment's thought. And I'd take anyone in the UK Top Ten on p5s (which doesn't include me !) above the vast majority of "live tournament pros". Whatever TV or Bluff Europe wants to tell you.