The 3 Biggest Mistakes Poker Players Make During Downswings (And What To Do Instead)

Every poker player ends up here at some point.

You're on a downswing and no matter what you do, you can't book a winning session. It feels like the poker gods are against you, and it's not just frustrating, it's destabilising. When your self-worth is tied to being a poker player, the losing starts to bleed into your identity.

The doubt always follows.

Self-doubt creeps in and you start questioning everything. This is exactly where most players make the mistakes that turn a rough patch into a real problem, wiping out good win rates and good habits in the process. Most players don't lose their edge at the table; they lose it in how they respond to the downswing.

Here are the three biggest mistakes, and the three skills that actually help you through it.

Mistake 1: Forcing Things

When results aren't going their way, players feel the urge to make something happen.

This shows up as playing more hours, taking higher variance lines, or being more aggressive than usual. The root of it is an inability to sit with the fact that variance isn't on your side right now. So instead of accepting it, players push harder and usually make things considerably worse.

Forcing never fixes variance. It just adds mistakes on top of it.

Mistake 2: Avoidance

The opposite of forcing, but equally damaging.

Players start playing less, studying more, and finding every reason not to sit at the table. Maybe they were putting in five hours a day and now it's two, or nothing at all. It looks like discipline from the outside, but the real driver is fear.

Avoidance feels safe. It isn't.

Mistake 3: Making Drastic Changes

Things aren't working, so players blow up their strategy entirely.

They start making big deviations, trying lines they'd never consider during a winning streak, completely overhauling their game. The logic feels sound, something must be broken so I need to fix it, but most of the time the downswing isn't a strategy problem. It's variance, and drastic changes during a downswing usually just introduce new leaks on top of the existing ones.

Most of the time, nothing is broken.

All three of these mistakes come from the same place. Results aren't going your way and you want to do something about it. That urge is completely natural, but acting on it impulsively is what separates players who come out of downswings stronger from those who spiral.

So what should you actually do?

The 3 Skills to Build During a Downswing

1. Resilience

Resilience isn't about pretending things are fine.

Instead of asking why me, when is this going to end, try treating this as your resilience chapter. This is where you toughen up, where you learn to keep showing up even when nothing is going your way. I spent six months losing during a shot take early in my career, running incredibly bad, reg battling every single day, and if someone had handed me a winning month back then I'd have taken it without hesitation.

But those six months are what I'm most proud of in my entire poker career.

Not the wins. The fact that I kept showing up. That period built something that no winning streak ever could, and almost every serious poker player I've spoken to has a chapter just like it.

Treat it session by session, day by day. Prove to yourself over and over that you'll be there no matter what.

2. Perspective

When you're losing, your brain zooms in.

It finds the highest point you've ever been and the lowest point you're at now, then tells a story about the gap between them. "I've been on a downswing for 30 days" sounds devastating when you're framing it that way, but it ignores everything else that came before it. The skill of perspective is learning to zoom out and put the current patch into context.

You're still a winning player. One bad month doesn't change that.

If you're shot-taking a new level and the sample is small, widen your time horizon. Give yourself 100k hands, 500k hands, a full year to let results stabilise. When you zoom out, the pressure drops, and you play considerably better as a result.

3. Getting 1% Better Every Day

Rather than making drastic changes, ask a simpler question.

How do I get 1% better today? A small leak fixed, a spot studied, a pattern noticed. When I was on a downswing playing heads up, I used it as a signal to find my blind spots, not to overhaul everything, but to look for the small edges I was missing. If you've been on a downswing for three months and you've been quietly getting 1% better throughout it, you should come out the other side a significantly stronger player.

You might even look back and be grateful for it.

These three things work together.

Resilience calms the emotional reaction. Perspective calms the narrative your mind builds around short-term results. And the 1% mindset gives you something constructive to do with the energy that would otherwise go into forcing, avoiding, or blowing up your game.

Don't hit the panic button.

Most of the time you're just on the wrong side of variance. You don't need to blow anything up. You need to stay consistent, see the bigger picture, and keep going.

If you're in a downswing right now, this period is building something. Six months or a year from now, you'll likely look back and see it as one of the more important stretches of your career.

Want to see these ideas broken down in more depth? I covered all of this in a recent YouTube video. Watch it here.

Ready to work on these skills properly?

This is exactly what we work on inside the Poker Athlete Program.

The mindset, the process, and the skills that let you perform at your best even when results aren't going your way. Players who go through the program come out the other side more consistent, more resilient, and better equipped to handle whatever variance throws at them.

Learn more and apply here.

Adam