Hi Lou, can you introduce yourself?
I’m Lou Krieger, writer, poker player, and now the host at Royal Vegas Poker. I’ve written a regular column entitled
On Strategy for Card Player magazine for more than a decade, and I’ve written six books: Hold’em Excellence:
From Beginner to Winner (1995), MORE Hold’em Excellence: A Winner For Life (1997), Poker For Dummies
(2000), Gambling For Dummies (2001), Internet Poker: How to Play and Beat Online Poker Games (2003),
and Winning Omaha/8 Poker (2003).
How did you get into gambling?
I don’t like to use the term “gambling” to describe poker. Gambling, to me, is when you bet against the house and
the odds are fixed and immutable, and you can’t win in the long run. Poker is a game of incomplete information
predicated on risk taking and the proper management of risk. Moreover, the odds in a poker game are always shifting,
and the winning players are those who take the best of it most of the time. While poker players wager money, it’s
not gambling in the sense of risking money at a game where the payoff odds are always less than the true odds.
Have you ever worked a "regular" job in your life?
Oh, sure. I’ve been a management consultant for one of the worlds largest consulting firms, a partner in a small,
9-employee consulting firm, and been peripherally involved in politics. But I like writing and poker playing a lot
more than working in an office.
Do you consider tournament poker to be a "sport?"
It’s a game; not a sport. To be a sport it would have to have some physical dimension associated with it. But
poker is no more a sport than chess or checkers. I’ve seen writers refer to poker as a “mental sport,” and poker
players as “mental athletes,” but that’s a stretch, and by the same definition Scrabble and working crossword
puzzles would have to be considered sports too.
Do you see the Internet as being a major poker education venue and a way to start to bring poker players
together as a subculture and initiate growth and change?
Absolutely. The advent of online poker, and with it play money games and “micro” betting limit games (where the
bets are under one dollar), provide a great opportunity to learn poker, to play in more tournaments online in a
day than you can in the traditional world in a week, and to learn poker skills as sites such as Poker School Online.
The philosopher and father of modern communications, Marshall McLuhan said, “The medium is the message.” And the
medium of online poker, along with poker on television, has changed the game more than anyone imagined, and the
impact of this is still in it’s infancy. I expect poker to continue to change, and in ways we can barely imagine.
Do you think a player who has done all the homework, studied the art and techniques of the game of poker
can excel at both tournament play and live cash game play, or should they concentrate on one or the other?
That’s not an easy question to answer because I play much more cash game poker than tournament poker. While there
are outstanding tournament poker players who are really fish in cash games, there are others who do quite well in
both, so I think if one has the discipline and temperament, along with the skills, one can do well in both forms
of poker. Come to think of it, you don’t have to any further down the poker food chain than Doyle Brunson to find
someone who has excelled in both forms of poker.
Can you tell me more about your poker books?
I’ve written six books: Hold’em Excellence: From Beginner to Winner (1995), MORE Hold’em Excellence: A Winner For Life
(1997), Poker For Dummies (2000), Gambling For Dummies (2001), Internet Poker: How to Play and Beat Online Poker Games
(2003), and Winning Omaha/8 Poker (2003).
I always wanted to write a book, any book would have sufficed, but it wasn’t until 1995 that I wrote my first book,
Hold’em Excellence: From Beginner to Winner, and followed it up with five more in eight years.
I also had some terrific encouragement when I needed it most. I was immersed in my first book and was fortunate
enough to interview Al Alvarez, the author of The Biggest Game in Town, in London. When I told him I was
beginning my first book, he told me it would be a hell of a lot of work, would never make me rich, and that I
should only do it if I really had the desire to work hard and believed strongly in what I was doing. I’m not sure
whether he was trying to encourage me or discourage me, but I decided he was trying to tell me to be prepared to
work my ass off for not much money, and to do it only if I had a burning desire to write. Coming from Alvarez, who
is one of my favourite writers, I took his admonition as a sign of encouragement, finished my first book and just
kept at it.
And you know what, I’d give the same message to any aspiring author that Al gave to me. Do it because you have a
visceral need to write, because you are literate and articulate, and because you have something to say. And those
are the only reasons that matter.
What about your website www.loukrieger.com?
My web site is a place where I post articles I am proud of, as well as a site where readers can learn a bit more
about me. Visitors can also purchase my books on the web site, by connecting directly to Amazon.com, or in the
case of all my books except the two “Dummies” titles, by going directly to the publisher,
www.conjelco.com
