500 SNG's This Week

I am believer in goals. I set goals all the time and even when I don't meet them (which to be honest is more often than not) I still make more progress than if I hadn't set any goals at all.

My current short term goal is to play 500 single table sit-n-go (SNG's) tournaments between Monday morning and Saturday night. More specifically I am going to play 100 $38 buy in 9 handed SNGs and 400 $60 buy in 9 handed SNGs all on pokerstars.

There is a good reason for this split - the Battle of the Planets leader board! Pokerstars SNG leader board is split into 8 divisions (all named for planets) based on stakes with each division having a "high orbit" and a "low orbit leader board". I'll briefly try to explain how it works.

Every time you finish in the money in an SNG you score points - for 9 handed SNGs it's 45 points for first, 27 for second and 18 for third. The low orbit leader board involves blocks of 20 tournaments and the high orbit leader board uses block of 100. Tournaments 1-20, 21-40, 41-60 etc. will be grouped together as will tournaments 1-100, 101-200, 201-300 etc. Only your first five blocks count for the low orbit leader board, but you can have as many blocks as you like for the high orbit.

Is this all for pride and glory? Of course not! It's for cash! In the "Uranus" division, (where the $60 tournaments fall) the top 15 scores of the week in the high orbit and the top 15 scores in the low orbit pay with 1st place of $1,000 and 15th place of $80 with everything else in between (it's much more of a linear payout schedule than a normal tournament - 2nd place is $700, 3rd is $500 etc.). In the Neptune division (where the $38 tournaments fall) 20 places pay with 1st place being $900 and 20th paying $60. I'm planning to play 100 $38 tournaments so I can have the maximum number of low orbit blocks and one high orbit block.

Of course it's not easy to win one of these leader boards with all of the players out there, but I expect to make some significant money out of this. Even if it's $80 or $100 a week on average that adds a lot to my bottom line over the course of the month and the year.

Maybe as important, this keeps me motivated. I want to win one of these leader boards! Last week I finished in 11th on the Uranus High orbit leader board which paid $80. This week I want to hit a top ten. I'll let you know how it goes.