The 1 in 50 theory

As we know, poker requires a lot of patience. It's only natural to ask just how much patience it requires. I've come up with a heuristic for this; I call it the 1 in 50 theory. My theory is that one of every fifty hands is special in some way, whether or not you win it. It is special because you will either win or lose an outlying number of chips on it, anywhere from 5 to 10 times the number of chips you win or lose on an average hand. To be a successful player, you need to satisfy all of the following requirements:

1. you must be patient enough to wait for that one hand in fifty to come to you
2. you must be willing to put all your chips on that hand
3. you must be lucky enough not to be outdrawn by an underdog

Clearly, you can't count on the third one :-)

Applying this theory to last night's session, since I played 151 hands, there should have been three special hands. As, indeed, there were. Was I patient enough to wait for them? Check. Was I willing to put all my chips on them? Check. Was I lucky enough not to be outdrawn by an underdog? No. Not on any of them, sad to say. If I'd won those three hands, I would've had a profit on the night. Since I lost them all, I took a big loss. However, I still consider the session a success, since I stayed true to my principles.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 151 hands and saw flop:
 - 18 out of 21 times while in big blind (85%)
 - 11 out of 22 times while in small blind (50%)
 - 61 out of 108 times in other positions (56%)
 - a total of 90 out of 151 (59%)
 Pots won at showdown - 9 of 25 (36%)
 Pots won without showdown - 11

delta: $-62,218
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,803,591
balance: $7,160,544