I’ve written about my passion for online poker in the past, and how some people have expressed their concern because I love poker. My previous response to those concerns reflected my view that poker is not gambling if you know what you’re doing. I am not betting against the house. I am able to control my betting based on the decisions and information I’ve gathered. Doesn’t that description sound very similar to investing in the stock market?

Tonight, I happened to revisit my Poker Analyst page on CardPlayer.com. I decided to chronicle my poker wins and losses to see if I could analyze a trend, and to be more “business-like” with this hobby. Currently, I have no delusions of becoming a professional gambler. It is merely an enjoyable hobby of mine. I don’t have many dips in my poker winnings because I usually seek out large prize pool freeroll tournaments or profitable low buy-in tournaments.

You can see from the graphs that my poker activitiies have tapered off somewhat, due to my increased activities in other aspects of my life, such as blogging and maintaining my fitness levels. But I have been playing tournaments off and on. I’ve neglected to log the last 20 tournaments that I’ve been playing in, so I would say the graph is off by a little – I’m up approximatley $100 more than the graph is showing!

Anyways, here is the proof that I know how to control my hobbies, and I can remain profitable! Back in January, I was hoping to get a 5 digit profit margin by the end of the year, and I may get there one of these years, but I am very happy to have improved my poker game over the year thus far.