How to Become a Professional Poker Player

Poker has become increasingly popular due to all of the televised poker tournaments. Nowadays, thousands of people are trying to become professional poker players. Here is how to do that.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Money
• Poker
• Patience

Learn the Rules

1. Learn the rules of the game. Learn them so well you know every exception and possibility.

2. Study other people and watch others play. Watch poker on television and take note of different playing styles and strategies.

3. Host poker nights at your home with friends and family. Have it be a low buy-in ($10 or $20). Think of these poker parties as practice. It's low risk because there isn't much money at stake but play it like it was the World Series final table.

4. Start playing cards occasionally at a local card room or casino. Set monetary limits for yourself as far as what you can afford to lose per week or per month. Then start setting goals: How much you want to win? What percentage of hands do you want to take down? How much you would like to make per hour? This is what the pros do. They know what they need to make and what games (and where) pay the most.

5. Register for some smaller tournaments and try your hand at these. Tournament play is different from live play. Figure out your strategies and work from there. As you improve and start to really win, register for larger tournaments with more at stake and more reward.

6. Continue to study other players and vary your strategy. Read poker magazines, play on-line and watch games on television. All of this exposure to different plays and situations will only help. Good luck, it may be difficult but if you really want it and are willing to take the time to learn how to be successful, you will be!

Tips & Warnings

• Start with small tournaments and take your time
• Don't spend a lot of money on a tournament early on. Continue to practice and win smaller tournaments first

[sabongwon]

on 9/1/2009 Let me sum up what this said: read a lot and practice a lot... I've met all 6 criteria but I know just enough to know that there is much much more out there to know to be pro. For example, what kinds of programs are helping online pros be more profitable? rakeback, pokeredge... what else? which is best? thank you for the most generic post ever. (that was sarcasm, which I've explained because you don't seem to get the depth of things)