They can be very cheap to enter and take you from the early stages of a tournament, past the bubble and into the money spots in 60 minutes or less. By playing sit-and-gos you get to appreciate the shifting worth of hand values and the importance of chip stack sizes, position and aggression.

We’ve learnt the hard way, so you don’t have to. Just follow our 15-step guide and sit-and-go glory won’t be far away.

Step 1: Keep It Tight

In the early stages when the blinds are small in comparison to the chip stacks, keep it tight. There’s nothing to be gained in stealing the tiny blinds with substandard hands. You’ll also set yourself up with a solid table image which will put the fear of God into other players when you crank up the aggression in the later stages. Play big hands strongly, and muck your muck.

Step 2: Sneak In With Danger Hands

Try and see a lot of cheap multi-way pots early on with hands that have the potential to do damage. Suited connectors, small pairs and A-x suited can all decimate an opponent’s stack if you hit the flop big. However, fold these types of hands to pre-flop raises or if you don’t make a major hand on the flop.

Step 3: Big Pairs, Big Bets

Play big pairs (A-A, K-K, Q-Q) aggressively. If four players have limped in before you’ve acted with the blinds at 25/50, stick in a pot-size raise to about 400. You’ll now either pick up all that dead money when everyone folds, get the hand down to

heads-up where big pairs are most effective, or someone will make a mistake, re-raise, and over-play their smaller pair or two ‘big’ cards. If someone has Aces and you have Kings or Queens, well, that’s just bad luck, but you should be looking to exploit opportunities to pick up these sorts of pots, or force others to make mistakes all the time.

Step 4: Get Paid Off

Don’t be afraid to jam the pot after the flop with big hands. You’ll find a lot of players think top pair/bad kicker is enough to call an all-in. If the flop has come K-J-5 and you’ve managed to flop two-pair in the big blind with J-5, don’t slow-play it and wait for another King to arrive on the turn – make your opponent make a mistake.

A check, followed by a bet from someone else, should see you re-raising heavily or moving all-in. At this point they’ll either fold and you’ll pick up a nice pot or, as is the case so often, players will call with K-x and will be about a 3/1 underdog to hit one of their few outs and win the hand.

Step 5: Be A Survivor

If you’re the short-stack early on, you’ve still got time to hang around. You CAN come back from just 200 chips if you pick your spots. Be patient for one or two rotations. Make it hard for others to get their grubby mitts on your last few chips.

Step 6: Punish Weak Betting

Forget that minimum betting crap. You’ll see it time and time again online – players getting into a flop reasonably cheaply and thinking they can then steal the pot with a bet of 50 into a pot of 400. Punish those aquatic creatures with a big raise (if you have a hand) or call along with drawing or marginal hands. Usually they fold or make bad calls and turn over middle pair or an underpair to the board at the end.

Step 7: Speed Up

For the gamblers among you turbo STTs are great fun, but you have to make moves very quickly. While normal sit-and-gos require patience, these require you to push any edge you have and hope your hand holds up. Overpairs, top pair/top kicker and even flush draws (when you’re a big stack) become pot-jammers.

Step 8: Keep Firing…

Continuation betting is essential in sit-and-gos. Generally, a pre-flop raise, followed by a bet will take down most pots. If someone plays back and re-raises, you can simply lay down your hand if you’re weak. But essentially a bet of around half to two-thirds pot after the flop will be a profitable play in the long run and allow you to accumulate chips when you don’t have anything more than two cards in front of you.

Step 9: …But Know When To Run For Cover

It’s crucial that you know when to back down with marginal hands. Your hand requirements might be less than when playing long large-field tournaments, but even so top pair/bad kicker in the face of a big re-raise usually means it’s time to take cover.

Step 10: Be A Bully

If you’ve accumulated a big stack you should put pressure on smaller stacks all the time. Pick the right times and right hands to raise with but as you approach the middle stages of an STT, the short-stacks will be looking to hang on or double through to make the money. Raise their blinds, move them all-in (with hands which you won’t mind being called with), and generally terrorise them into making a mistake.

Step 11: Money Management

Observe all the players’ chip stacks fluctuate wildly as the blinds increase. Keep an eye open for the big stacks you don’t want to mess with and make a note of the small stacks you want to bully. Also, never believe you’re dead and buried just because you drop into last place. Use it as an opportunity to become the danger man. As a short stack you can use the force of the chips that you do have left to prise unopened pots away from your opponents with an all-in push. You’ll either pick up lots of blinds or potentially double-up and head back towards the top of the field.

Step 12: Don’t Fade Away

If you’re imperilled in the latter stages (about seven or fewer big blinds left) you must be prepared to stick your chips in with lesser hands, which can still make something. Look to get your chips into an unopened pot with hands like K-8 suited, J-10, 6-7 suited, small pocket pairs, etc. If you pick up the blinds, fine. If you get one caller, you’re usually not worse than a 2/1 underdog. Don’t get blinded down to a stage where you have no fold equity, and don’t put yourself in the position where you won’t get much back if you do double-up.

Step 13: Burst The Bubble

On the bubble it’s often correct to get aggressive as play often tightens up when people can smell the money. With a biggish stack try moving all-in a lot and you’ll find you pick up blinds uncontested, or have a good chance to knock someone out. If you’re a short-stack, wait for a big hand and chuck in your chips in the attempt to double-up, or move all-in on the button with any two cards if the pot is yet to be raised.

Step 14: Get Aggressive

When short-handed (three or four players) it’s time to get even more aggressive with you raising from the button virtually every hand. With escalating blinds, there’s no time to wait for premium hands. Don’t be kamikaze about it but raises and re-raises in position followed by aggressive play after the flop (when you’ve made a hand) are the keys to getting to the heads-up confrontation.

Step 15: Finish Him!

When it’s down to two, it’s time to raise, raise, raise. Don’t let the big blind have free flops, realise that most of the time the other player doesn’t have a hand, and you can bully with a big stack. If it’s your big blind being raised every hand then you need to push back. Try a big re-raise and more often than not you’ll pick up the pot and send a message out that you can’t be bullied. Also consider that pot odds can often dictate that it might be correct to call an all-in when you’re an underdog if there’s a good chance to win the tournament. Remember to push every small edge, as top pair on the flop will often be good enough to win the hand.

A bad player might get all his money in as a 40% underdog and get lucky a couple of times. His strong opponent knows that he got his money in as a favourite, but with a sample size of two he can’t complain. The important thing is to keep getting your money in as the favourite, regardless of how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ you are running.

The difference a lot of players have is their approach to variance. A lot of players play very well for long periods, lose a hand where they are a big favourite and begin to lose track of the decision process that gave them the positive expectation in the first place.

For example, someone playing a lot of high-stakes Omaha could well get into five or six big pots during the day where he was a 60% favourite and lose them all.

After becoming disillusioned and losing heavily, he might try to break even, thinking that it’s fine to get his money in as the 40% underdog on a few occasions, as he’s obviously running bad and somehow ‘owed’ some good fortune.

Poker forgets

Wrong. Poker has no memory of how well we run, how much we lose and how badly we get sucked out on. Each result is an individual event, made up of specific probabilities getting a result dispersed around the mean. This is variance, and allows bad players to keep playing badly and strong players to keep pressing home strong statistical advantages.

You can’t expect to win every day, every week or every month. Poker money does not move in such a simple way – results deviate from the norm, and luck can prevail. Bad luck can destroy not only players that play too high for their bankroll, but an average player’s game mentally. Losing is part of winning in poker. Good players know how their edge makes them money.

What’s your style?

Your style of poker has a dramatic effect on your variance. If you’re a good, tight-aggressive player, you’ll enjoya relatively stable income. Loose-aggressive players have to put up with much bigger swings, a fact of life if you’re playing good, loose-aggressive poker. But often, loose-aggressive players have a better win rate in the long term. There is something of a trade-off between variance and win rate. Playing ABC solid poker can grind you out a respectable, reliable income at a lot of levels online – very useful if you are operating on a shortish bankroll of say, 15 buy-ins.

Very good loose-aggressive opponents can enjoy far greater win rates, but they have to stomach the occasional heavy downswing that accompanies this style of play. If you are adequately bankrolled this makes little difference to your overall earning capacity of course, but it is something you should always bear in mind.

High stakes or low stakes?

The stakes you play has a huge effect on your variance.

Compare player A, playing $10/$20 Hold’em with 20 buy-ins, with player B, playing $1/$2 Hold’em with 100 buy-ins. The difference in variance can be quite brutal. Player A is playing high-stakes poker in a game where even the best players only have a small edge on their opponents. He is likely playing on one or two tables to maintain focus on betting patterns, timing tells and complex levels of thinking.

If he drops five buy-ins in a week he has just lost 25% of his roll. This affects him financially (he probably will know he’s playing too short for that game now) but could also affect him mentally. He could start to play scared poker, lack heart and conviction when the pots get big or pick up some other disadvantage.

Player B has the luxury of playing in a game where he knows he has a big edge over the long-term, can afford to play numerous tables at a time to further reduce his variance and knows that dropping five buy-ins won’t hurt him in the least. By being over-rolled, he can relax and play the game. This can be a bad thing for some players too though. I know many players who can’t play their A-game when the money at stake doesn’t hurt.

The fact remains however, that if both players have the same expectation, let’s say a 15% edge on their foes, player B is going to have a much better ride with regard to variance. The losing streaks won’t hurt as much and the increase in hand volume will help to force achieved results to conform more closely to expected results.

Hopefully you now have a slightly better understanding of what variance actually is. By being adequately bankrolled for your game, you should be able to make variance work with you rather than constantly battling it. Playing high-stakes Omaha on a short roll is not embracing variance – it’s pitting you against it. Remember, playing good poker is about knowing the game inside and out and never letting ego get in the way. Variance is a key part of the game, so get to grips with it and your game is sure to improve.

• Don’t tune out. Most of the time when you’re playing on PartyPoker you aren’t in a hand, so keep busy by observing the other players. Use the software’s notes feature to write down your reads on the opponents/
• Don’t run distracting programs. When you play PartyPoker, try to only have the game software open. Close your web browser, and shut down Skype and other instant messaging programs.
• Don’t let other people interrupt. Sometimes people think playing poker is a pastime like watching TV. It’s fun, but you need to concentrate when there’s a big payout looming. If you’re playing an important game, take your laptop somewhere private and close the door.

You’re the boss when you’re a poker player! And at work, your boss would soon come down on you if you spent all day browsing poker gossip forums.

So next time you play on PartyPoker, give yourself the biggest chance of winning a cash game session or big tournament by being your own boss and breathing down your own neck!

“Laak raised pre flop from the small blind, and Viffer was out of position. 8s 2d 10h came the board, and Viffer bet the pot. After Laak called they see an 8c at the turn. Viffer bet the pot size again and Laak called. The river brings a 7D and Viffer bets the pot size again – which is now £9,000! Laak simply knocks over his chip stacks and lets them fall into the middle for another £20-£30k!”

“I leave the table and speak to the people watching. I say that I would fold a 22 here, because Laak holds 8-7 suited or even 10-10, or 8-8. Viffer folds after thinking about it for 10 minutes.”

“After this there was a break and a few players met for a discussion about this hand. I heard over and over again their ratings, partly they assumed a 77 for Laak which is absolutely not understandable for me. But they didn’t share my opinion either, and were laughing about it. They were incredulous: how could I think that Laak could hold 8-7 suited?”

“I know Phil Laak by now quite good, because I’ve played 4 times with him. “Eventually Laak stops by to listen to our conversation and says “listen to the internet –kid, he always is right” and confirmed that he held 87. Yes!!!”

Developing reads on other players is important if you’re going to win consistently at poker. Is this something you like to do at the poker table? Leave a comment and let us know.

Amarillo Slim once said, “If you can’t fold the best hand you can’t play.” But then he also once said, “I’d put a rattlesnake in your pocket and ask you for a match” so it’s hard to know what to think.

One thing, however, is for certain: the art of the great laydown is dying out in poker. This is happening for two reasons. First, players are far more loose and aggressive than they used to be. This means it’s often correct to call players with marginal hands. The second reason is the internet. It’s so easy to call when all you have to do is click a mouse, and it’s even easier to be swept up in the momentum of a hand than to work out whether you’re beaten.

However, making good laydowns is vital to being a winning player, no matter what your style.

As Mike Caro famously pointed out, at the end of the year would you rather have $100,000 taken off your losses column or added to your wins column? Well, Mike, most of us would like $100,000 to make the choice; but his point was that wins and losses have the same value, yet most players don’t spend enough time minimising their losses.

When I talk about laydowns I mean folding a hand that has some merit. You’ll get no points for mucking A-K when someone re-raises you on a 9-8-7 flop. I’m talking about folding hands that could be winning, but may be beaten.

For example:

• An overpair to the board
• A set when the flush card arrives. Knowing when to let this kind of hand go is a blend of art and science.

The feeling

Some part of laying down a good hand is down to that overused term in all poker discussions: ‘feel’. You’re sitting at a table, whether it’s live or online, and you ‘feel’ that your hand is no good. Now, if this is a sense, the best way to explain it is your subconscious mind feeding back to you the experience you’ve accumulated in your time playing. Did you pick up on a facial tick? Did they wait too long when betting? Often you’ll be well served by acting on this instinct. One thing that separates the good from the great is the ability to back their instincts at the table.

Some people can do this naturally with complete accuracy, and those people are called Phil Ivey. For the rest of us it’s a skill that can be honed and worked on. Remember, there are two different things to hone: first, hearing the voice that tells you you’re beat; and second, acting on it.

Danger signs

There are basic moves that should get those voices in your head instantly whispering concerns. Min-raises and check-raises practically scream ‘monster’ or, at the very least, a hand that is drawing to the nuts.

When you face either of these value-milking moves think back to the pre-flop action. Did they flat-call and then check-raise on a small to middling flop? It’s quite possible they’ve got a small pocket pair and have flopped a set, and then you’re in all sorts of bother if you still think your overpair is good.

Chips are there for a number of reasons, one of which is to find out if you’re ahead and, if your opponent calls, to determine what they may be holding. If you think you’re facing a player that understands pot odds you can rule out lots of drawing hands if they’ve paid over the odds for a flush or straight draw, especially if they’ve called out of position. If they’ve called your bets on the flop and turn, only for runner-runner flush to pop up on the river, followed by a heavy bet, ask yourself: have they really got the flush? Probably not, but have they still got your top pair beaten?

It’s quite likely, especially if you’ve projected a tight table image.

Weird science

Of course, you can also make your decisions easier with some poker science. First, by looking at pre-flop decisions. In no-limit Hold’em, a lot of the best laydowns are made pre-flop because it stops you from losing a lot of chips in one hit or across a few streets.

Deciding whether to fold a good starting hand pre-flop or commit to it can be difficult, but the shorter you are on chips the easier the decision. Problems arise when you face action pre-flop on a good but not great hand. If you’ve opened for a raise with a hand like 9-9, 10-10, J-J or a big Ace and find yourself being re-raised it can be a tough tournament-changing decision.

Often, the temptation is to call the re-raise and see if the flop helps you. That’s fine, but you can all too easily get trapped doing this. For instance, if you call a re-raise with 10-10 and the flop comes 7-4-2, then your chips are almost certainly going in against a hand that could easily be beating you. Sometimes the best play is to fold the hand pre-flop.

It could be argued that dropping such hands is an unfashionable play, as players are more aggressive now and will re-raise you pre-flop with a wider variety of hands, but that creates an even stronger argument to the ‘find a better spot’ school of thought as you can wait for a premium hand before dropping the hammer.

As with most decisions at the table, laydowns are player-dependent. After playing with someone for a decent amount of time you should sketch out their pre-flop re-raising range, how much they’ll bet with a premium hand, and how often they will do it as a move with a sub-standard hand.

You should also often be folding semi-decent hands in the blinds. If the pot is opened with a raise and you are in the big blind with A-J or A-10, you should be able to throw these hands away quite easily. It’s often better to lay these hands down and prevent getting into difficult situations later in the hand. Remember, a lot of mistakes and difficult decisions can be traced back to calling with a marginal hand pre-flop.

Odds, I call

Pot odds are an extremely important part of judging when to make a good laydown. A lot of players don’t take them into consideration – or use them wrongly – when they’re in a tough spot. You’ll often hear poor players lament the fact they ‘had pot odds so they had to call’, regardless of their hand or what the pot odds were.

When the betting is ending, i.e. on the river or when the money is going all-in, you should figure out your pot odds. You should then compare this to your chances of your hand being good (if possible, against the range of hands your opponent could be holding) to assess whether it’s right to call or lay the hand down.

So let’s say you’re playing against a weak, predictable player. You’ve been betting two-pair and he’s been calling. On the river the dreaded flush card arrives, you check and he bets. The pot is 7,000 and he bets 3,000. This gives you a price of 3,000 to call, which could see you win 10,000. So your pot odds are 3.333*/1, or 30 percent. Now you need to assess if your two-pair has a 30 percent chance of being good. As an example, you could say there’s a 10 percent chance he’s bluffing (there’s always a chance they’re bluffing even if they’re an opponent who doesn’t do it frequently), a 10 percent chance he has a weaker hand that he now thinks is good because you’ve checked. The rest of the time he has the flush or a big hand he’s been slow-playing.

So there’s a 20 percent chance your hand is still good – not enough to make the call. In this spot, against this weak, predictable player, your best play is to lay the hand down.

Powers of reasoning

Making the right laydowns is tough, as no one likes to think they’re folding the winning hand. So the more times you can use hand-reading and pot odds to make the right deduction, the more often you’ll be able to get away from losing situations and that will win you lots of money in the long run.

Even after this advice, it is most important that you don’t play scared! Just think clearly during a hand, try to deduce what players are holding through their actions and your intuition, then back your judgement to the hilt. Think of the number of times that you thought you were behind but couldn’t face dropping your hand. Now think of how much it would have saved you in chips or cash. The key is to be able to pull the trigger, either by committing to the hand or making a good laydown.

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Move #1: Pay to hit a set

In the early stages of most multi-table tournaments you have a lot of chips relative to the blinds, so losing a few of them early doors isn’t going to do much damage to your tournament chances long-term. In that case paying over the odds with small or medium pairs in the hope of hitting a set is an absolute must.

You’re about 8/1 to hit trips on the flop, but when you do hit, you’ll be in a great position to win a big chunk of chips from someone with an overpair. Your implied odds at this stage of the game are so big that it can be worth investing as much as five to 10 percent of your stack to try and hit a set. Pay over the odds, especially when you’re in position, as you might be able to take the pot by betting out on the flop even if you miss.

Hands: 2-2, 3-3, 4-4, 5-5, 6-6, 7-7, 8-8, 9-9

Tournament clock: Early

Your stack: Average

Move #2: Fast-play monsters

At the start of low stakes tournaments there are a lot of fish. These aquatic types will call huge bets down with top pair/top kicker because they’re blind to the fact that someone might bet two-pair or a set so hard. You’ll also get some terrible calls from players paying way over the odds for drawing hands, so make sure you punish them.

Hands: A-A, K-K, sets, flushes and straights

Tournament clock: Early

Your stack: Any

Move #3: Push the flush

You’ve put in a healthy raise with two suited face cards and have got one caller, only for the flop to bring rags. But all is not lost – you’ve flopped a big flush draw. If you’re first to act and have your opponent heavily outchipped, try checking the flop to incite your opponent to bet, which they’ll do more often than not whether they’ve hit it or not. Now take this opportunity to hit them hard with a check-raise, pushing your entire stack in.

If you find yourself short-stacked or it’s the middle-to-late stages of a tournament then you’re usually best shoving your chips in as first to act on the flop when a pot-sized bet accounts for a third of your chips. If your opponent calls with an overpair to the flop (but which is lower than both your hole cards) you’re actually still a slight favourite to win. Combined with the fact that you’ll often make a player drop their hand this semi-bluff shove is a powerful weapon to have in your arsenal.

Hands: A-Ks, A-Qs, A-Js, K-Qs, Q-Js

Tournament clock: Any

Your stack: Medium to large

Move #4: Stop-and-go

The stop-and-go is a great move to make when you’re in the blinds and starting to run low on chips and ideas. The tactic involves you calling a late position raise – hopefully targeting a serial raiser – and whatever the flop comes you move all-in. You’re not making the pre-flop call on the odds it will help you (if it does it’s a bonus), but on the fact that two live cards will connect with the flop only a third of the time. Is it a gamble? Yes. Is it a gamble with the odds in your favour? Also yes. You do, however, need to have enough chips left so that it’s not an automatic call for the raiser.

It’s a great move to pull with a low pair if you think an all-in pre-flop would get called because you’re forcing someone who probably hasn’t hit to a tricky decision if they want to see the final two cards. If they’ve hit already then they would have hit by calling your all-in anyhow. But by pulling this move you’ve got an extra chance for survival.

Hands: Any

Tournament clock: Middle to late

Your stack: Small to medium

Move #5: UTG raise with rags

Everyone knows that a minimum raise from under the gun is often a sign of strength. It’s not likely to be respected in the first few levels when it costs so little to see a flop, but in later levels, when the blinds are larger and most of the fish have already been knocked out, a minimum raise from under the gun will be respected if you’ve been playing tight.

If you meet some resistance, in the form of a big raise, then you know you’re usually up against a genuine hand, in which case you can just fold. So although stealing from UTG is a ballsy play it’s potentially profitable providing you don’t do it too often. You’re also more likely to get it through as a low or medium stack as the raise will look extremely suspicious, as if to say, “I want action!”

Hands: Any

Tournament clock: Middle to late

Your stack: Any (but preferably medium to large)

Move #6: Short-stack shove

Tournaments are all about survival, but there’s no bigger sin than blinding yourself to death. So when your total stack is down to around seven to 10 big blinds it’s time to take a deep breath and stick your chips in the middle. And it’s even more important to look for the right spots to do this. Always make sure you’re the first into the pot (unless you have a monster) so that it puts the decision onto the other players at the table and they have no chips already invested. If the action is folded around to you be prepared to push with any Ace, any pair or suited connectors, where you think you’ll have live cards if someone calls. The closer you are to the button the looser you can be with your hand, purely on the basis that there are fewer players to get past. Likewise, if the players in the blinds are sitting on medium-sized stacks you should be pushing with any two cards. They’ll be loathe to risk half to three-quarters of their stack with anything but a big hand. And even if they call, 7-9os will beat A-K suited a third of the time.

Hands: A-x, suited connectors, any pairs

Tournament clock: Middle to late

Your stack: Low

Move #7: Pre-imperilled shove

Tournament players have become so accustomed to the short-stack shove (see Move 6] that they are far more likely to call with a weak Ace or a couple of high cards than ever before, which is great if you have a genuine hand. The only problem is that once your stack is running low you can’t guarantee that you’ll pick up a marginal hand let alone a premium one.

Therefore, an all-in move with a stack of over 10 big blinds will be a lot more respected than a standard short-stack shove as most players appreciate that short-stacks will push with any two cards if they’re given a chance. Although your risk-to-reward ratio is higher you will be more likely to get your hands through.

This move is important to throw in if the blinds are about to jump up a level because it will effectively cut your stack, and chance of making other players fold, in half. Picking up the blinds, or doubling through, will keep you in the race at the higher blind levels.

Hands: A-K to A-10, K-Q, K-J, Q-Js, 10-10 to 7-7

Tournament clock: Middle to late (when the blinds are about to change)

Your stack: Low to medium

Move #8: Beat the bully

There’s always one player who will raise every time from the button or late position if it’s folded to them. And after a few rounds it’s quite obvious who they are. Target these loose-aggressive individual(s) with selective re-raises when you have position on them or when you’re battling from the blinds.

You should invariably be raising rather thancalling if you don’t believe someone’s pre-flop raise is genuine. This way you’ll give yourself the chance to either take the pot down there and then, or your perceived strength should enable you to take control of the pot with a confident continuation bet after the flop.

Of course, you may find yourself getting re-raised pre-flop, at which point you might have run into a genuine monster, and on these occasions it’s best to fold. But don’t let it put you off – if the aggressive player knows he can steal your blind every time, he will.

Hands: Any

Tournament clock: Any

Your stack: Any

Move #9: Big stack pressure

If you’ve never been the big chip leader in a tournament before you’ve got something to look forward to. You can use your stack to put pressure on your opponents with smaller stacks, pushing every edge and generally being an all-round meany. Use frequent testing bets and raises when you get close to the money.

Short-stacks will be in shove-or-fold territory while the medium-sized stacks will be all too aware of the fact that you have them easily covered. You’ll frequently get your raise through scooping the blinds and antes, which will slowly turn your big stack into an enormous one. What’s more, it’s great fun winning loads of pots with rags.

Hands: Any

Tournament clock: Middle to late

Your stack: Large

Move #10: Squeeze play

Why do you raise in late position with marginal hands? To steal the blinds. So what do you do when there have been lots of callers behind a single raiser? Raise, of course. Make sure you put in a big enough bet that you’re not giving ‘value’ to any of them to call. If you get past the initial raiser then you’ll almost always get past everyone else.

If they had a truly premium hand they would have probably re-raised rather than called. Punish their weakness! Usually you need to make a pot-sized bet to scare others off. So if the blinds are 100/200 and there’s been a raise to 600 and one caller, the pot will be 1500 before your call. Make it 2000 to go and watch their hands hit the muck.

Hands: Any

Tournament clock: Any

Your stack: Medium to large

Having a medium stack in tournaments is always an uncomfortable situation.

You’ll often be put in tough spots, and need to decide whether to hold back and conserve chips, or go gangbusters and try to accumulate chips. Here, we’ll look at what do who when you’re in the situation of having a medium sized stack.

First, let’s define what a medium stack is. Since you stop being short-stacked when you have over 12 big blinds, for the purposes of this article we’ll focus on situations where you have between 12 and 25 big blinds.

“Let’s gamble!”

The tournament’s structure will have a big effect on how you play your medium stack.

In faster structures, there’s more pressure on you – and your chips will soon reach emergency levels. This should make you more inclined to take on 50/50-type situations (e.g. playing for all your chips with hands like A-Q or 8-8 against an underpair or overcards).

In slower structures, medium stacks have more room to breath. You might be able to chip away at your opponents’ stacks, but you can still get away from hands – as you will have longer before the blind pressure becomes intolerable.

The mistake many players make when they have a medium stack is feeling too comfortable.

If you have chips towards the top of the middle stack range (say, 20-25 big blinds) it’s still easy for all your chips to end up in the middle in one hand. Almost any re-raised pot pre-flop will be all-in by the flop.

It could be argued that having between 12 and 16 big blinds is the hardest situation to be in.

This is because you’re not under immediate threat from the blinds (or may not feel so) but if you do enter a pot you can very quickly become committed to it. This can lead to difficult spots with semi-strong hands, and if you’re called when attempting to steal the blinds.

Players often make the mistake of folding when it’s correct for them to call.

For instance, let’s say the blinds are 100/200 and you have 2400 in chips (12 big blinds).

If you raise to 600 and the big blind calls there is now 1300 in the pot and you have 1800 left. It’s now not possible to make a bet that doesn’t commit you to the pot.

You’ll either have to get all your chips in or fold. You cannot bet and then fold to a raise as the odds you’ll be getting to call are too great.

The solution to this situation is to steal less and to re-steal and re-raise more. Any time you open a pot with a standard raise you should know what you’ll do if you’re re-raised. Although this is true at all times in No-Limit Hold’em, it’s particularly important as a medium stack when you can be pot-committed so easily.

If you’re going to make a standard raise as a blind steal with a medium stack (especially at the lower end of the range) you should choose your spots very carefully. If you get action from a tight player you’ll very often have to shut down after the flop.

Applying pressure

Re-raising and re-stealing are very important weapons to have when possessing a medium stack.

Both moves can be used to put a lot of pressure on your opponents and maximise your ways to win, by either forcing your opponents to fold or by having the best hand at showdown if called. As a medium stack you restrict your opponents’ options when you re-steal – they can only call or fold.

Re-raising pre-flop is generally a better option than calling in No-Limit Hold’em, and with a medium stack it’s almost always the better option. This is due to a combination of it being better to commit your chips as the aggressor, particularly in a situation where you may well end up committed later in the hand, but crucially because you’re putting pressure on your opponents to fold. Other medium stacks will often fold too much in tournaments giving your re-raises great equity.

Re-stealing is valuable for the same reasons, and if you pick the correct spot it greatly increases your equity in the tournament – as you’re winning more chips than your fair share.

With more and more players opening pots with marginal hands to steal the blinds it’s vital you have it in your armoury. When looking to re-steal from an opening raiser you need to consider the range of hands he will bet with and the range of hands he’ll call a re-raise with. Obviously the more likely the raiser is to be stealing the more often you should re-steal. You can do this with a very high frequency if the player doesn’t call re-raises often enough (most players you’ll encounter).

So, for example, you’re in the big blind with blinds of 100/200 and you have 3,000 chips. An aggressive player with 4,000 chips raises to 600 from the button. You should be looking to move in here reasonably often. If he’s a typical player he’ll be opening with a huge number of hands that can’t call your all-in. If they fold you pick up 900 chips, increasing your stack by 30 percent. If you’re called and double-through you’re well on your way to becoming a big stack again. Any time you find a hand with some value (especially hands that play well against an opener’s calling range – e.g. suited connectors) you have an opportunity to push your medium stack.

Battling the shorties

The final note I’ll leave you with is about playing against short stacks when you have a medium stack. When raising a short stack you have to think about what kind of player they are. If they have the kind of stack that’s likely to make a stand you should tighten up your opening and stealing standards.

On the other hand many players don’t call enough when a short stack moves in. This is because you’ve correctly been taught to be the aggressor in pots. However, if the short stack is moving in with a substandard hand this can be a great opportunity to get some chips in positive equity situations. Just remember to consider which stacks are left to act after you!

Medium stacks can be difficult to play and greater experience at spotting the right situations to commit chips is the key to improving your play of them. Just remember to always be an active player and look for opportunities to put pressure on your opponents.

Between the devil and the deep blue sea

It’s no fun when you’re stuck in the wrong place…

Being sandwiched between a big stack and a short stack is a typical situation for a medium stack and can often force you to make tournament-defining decisions. Imagine you have an aggressive chip leader to your left on the button and an aggressive short stack to your immediate right who keeps shoving all-in. You are in the cut-off when the short stack shoves all-in.

How should you play the following hands from the cut-off?

• Blinds: 100/200
• Big stack: 19,000
• You: 5,500
• Short stack: 1,400

With K♦ Q♠

Usually pass. Calling is dodgy as it invites a raise from the players behind or others may enter the pot giving you a tricky post-flop situation. Moving in is an option but the hand is not very strong, and if another player calls you’re almost always behind and often dominated.

With 8♣ 8♥

Move in or occasionally pass. Calling isn’t an option because it invites others into the pot and the hand plays badly post-flop. Moving in is a good option, as you’ll often isolate the all-in player who you are usually ahead of. However, there is the risk that the big stack could find a hand and put your tournament life in jeopardy too, so passing is also fine.

With A♦ A♠

Move in or call – both options have their merits. Moving in is fine with any big hand in this spot. However, calling is also an option as the weak-looking call may induce a squeeze play from the big stack or another aggressive player in the blinds, putting you in a great position to double up.

Whatever stage you’re at in a tournament make sure you’ve got a plan of how to build your tower

Early stages

Vary your play according to the structure. If it’s a slow structure, try and steal your way to a big stack. If the structure is fast, look to get your chips in even when you’re marginally ahead – taking a 50/50 race if necessary, especially if you’re getting better odds on the call. Build that stack for the big blinds to come.

Middle stages

This is where it’s vital not to sit on your medium stack. Use it to make plays and take calculated risks to give yourself a shot at the big prizes. Don’t sit on your stack or the blinds will turn your medium stack into a small one.

Late stages

Balance aggression with avoiding unnecessary confrontations. Keep the pressure on your tight opponents who are looking to move up in the money with re-raises and re-steals. Try to avoid playing hands that you’re not willing to be completely committed to.

Read this guide and remember, PartyPoker is the only online poker room who can give you access to every single WPT event in 2010, wherever it’s being played.

It’s one of the first things you learn when playing tournament poker: don’t bet into a dry side-pot.

People say that if you and an opponent see the flop when a third player is all-in, you shouldn’t normally bet – because it’s more important to eliminate the all-in player than win a few extra chips.

This has become one a common fallacy in poker. In fact, there are many situations where it is correct to bet rather than attempt to knock out the third player. Let’s look at some situations where it is correct to bet into a side-pot – and some where it’s best to hang onto your chips.

When not to bet

First of all, let’s talk about situations where this received wisdom is true. That is, when you shouldn’t bet into a dry sidepot:

One situation is when you’re in the bubble stages of a tournament, or when you’re at a stage in the tournament where there’s about to be a significant jump in prize money. Then, your primary goal is to eliminate players. That’s because you make money time a player is knocked out.

For example, imagine you’re in a tournament where 27 places are paid, and 28 players remain. The player in 27th place gets $10,000, while 28th place gets nothing.

If two of you are in the pot and another player is all-in you should do whatever is necessary to eliminate the opponent who is all-in.

Usually, this means checking the hand down to give the maximum possible chance of eliminating the third player. (If your hand doesn’t eliminate the all-in player, your opponent’s hand might.) So In general, you would only bet a very strong hand like a set, straight or flush – hands that are virtually guaranteed to win the pot.

If the third player is eliminated, you’ve just earned $10,000 in real money. But had you had bet, you may not have eliminated the player – and may even have risked going out on the bubble yourself. Obviously, this alternative costs you money in the long run, and it’s something you should avoid.

So it’s clear that there are situations where you should not bet, and should try to eliminate players instead.

However, the big mistake so many players make is to carry this advice over to all tournament situations, instead of just the specific ones it applies to. They see this as universal advice because they don’t fully understand the concepts behind it.

When to bet

Take the same situation, but now there are 500 players remaining, again with 27 places paid. In this case, eliminating a player has almost no value whatsoever – there are no big money jumps or significant prize differences to worry about. It’s great if you send someone to the rail, but there will still be 472 other players to eliminate before you make any real money.

Consequently, you should make whatever play has the highest expected value at the time – your overall equity in the tournament is not yet important. Often, this means protecting your hand by betting, regardless of whether there is a side pot.

Let’s look at an example:

The blinds are 100/200, and Player A raises all-in for 1,500. It’s folded to you on the button, and you call with A♣ Q♠. The big blind also calls, making the pot 4,

The flop comes Q♣ 9♥ 8♥, giving you top pair with top kicker – a nice hand. The big blind checks. Remember, Player A is still all-in.

Now it’s on you. This is a situation where if it was the bubble, you would definitely check. You wouldn’t mind too much if the big blind held something like A♥ 10♥ and made a flush or a straight – because at least the third player would be gone and you would have made some real money.

However, at the early stages of a tournament, you should almost always bet. At this point in proceedings, winning that 4,600 pot is much more important than eliminating the all-in player, and you would be annoyed if you let your opponent hit a flush or straight and win the hand for free.

Therefore, you should protect your hand by making a suitably large bet, and make your opponent pay to hit his draw.

Because most players do not generally bet when there is no side pot and a player is all-in, be aware that if you are called in this situation, your opponent will rarely have a weak hand. If you are called on a dry-looking board like Q♣ 7♥ 2♦, you should slow down accordingly against typical opposition. If you get called on a draw-heavy board and the draw hits, you should be very careful.

As you can see, poker isn’t as simple as some would make it out to be. Generic advice like ‘don’t bet into a dry side pot in tournament poker’ shouldn’t be taken at face value, so the next time you hear Captain Casino and his re-buy army offering poker lessons like this at the table, think about what they are saying in more detail. Try to work out if the underlying concepts are correct – and why – before applying them yourself. As this rule shows, received wisdom isn’t always reliable.

Side Action

The following hand involving Ted Forrest (in the Mirage Poker Showdown, WPT season four) shows why it can pay to bet into a side pot…

The Scenario

It’s four handed, blinds are 15,000/30,000 with a 3,000 ante and the starting pot is 57,000. Kido Pham has just lost most of his chips and is pretty desperate. In first position he moves all-in for 190,000. In second position, Ted Forrest, with 2,690,000 in chips, looks down at A♠ 9♠ and quickly calls. Chris Bell, on the small blind and with 1,485,000 in chips, also calls. Gavin Smith, on the big blind, folds. There’s 603,000 in the pot and the flop is K♥ 8♠ 4♠. Chris Bell checks. Now it’s up to Ted.

The Play

Many players would check here without thinking, but Ted is not so hasty. Ted isn’t here to move up the pay ladder into third place, which pays $289,693 compared to the first place prize of $1,153,278 – he wants to win. He throws out a bet of just under half the pot, and Chris Bell folds. Internet forum posters, ever ignorant and quick to criticise, ripped into Forrest for making what was actually a world-class play.

Ted knows that Kido Pham’s range of hands is extremely wide, and includes many holdings that he is a big favourite against – like worse Aces and small suited connectors. He would be unlucky to run into a hand that has him in big trouble, and probably expects to be at worst a coin-flip. Chris Bell’s hand is somewhat more of a mystery – not strong enough to re-raise and isolate on Kido, but good enough to call.

Analysis

By betting, Ted achieves several things at once

He protects his hand in case Chris has called with a hand like Q♥ J♥, which would fold to a bet, but which has a chance to outdraw him.

He can isolate on Kido Pham, whom he is probably a significant favourite against. If Kido has a smaller ace, Ted is a huge favourite. If Kido has a pair smaller than Nines (which hasn’t flopped a set), Ted is a still a favourite with Aces, Nines and spades to hit on the turn or river.

He creates dead money. If Chris folds, Ted has increased his equity in the pot significantly because Chris has contributed to the pot but cannot possibly win it. Ted may even eliminate some hands that are stronger than his own.

In the unlikely event that Chris has a genuine hand, Ted may still win a giant pot and eliminate Chris Bell if he hits his flush on the turn or river, because it’s very unlikely for Chris to put him on a drawing hand.

The only downside to betting is that the chances of Kido Pham being eliminated on this hand are slightly decreased, because there are some variations where Kido makes a hand that’s better than Ted’s, but would have lost to Chris’s had he remained in the hand.

The Result

In the actual hand, Chris Bell folded pocket Nines and the turn came with the case 9, giving Ted a pair that was enough to beat Kido Pham’s A♣ 5♦. Ted went on to finish second in the event after taking a couple of nasty beats, with Gavin Smith the eventual winner.

There’s no doubt about it: when it comes to your chip stack, bigger is better. But what can you do when you’re not so well endowed (with chips)?

In tournaments, the worth of a man’s play can truly be measured by the size of his stack. But, to coin a phrase, although bigger is undoubtedly better, it’s not necessarily the size of your stack that matters, but what you do with it. In tournaments, players will find themselves in situations to which they are unaccustomed. Sometimes, you will find yourself the chip leader, on other occasions you will be chip dog. In these two situations, the same hand must often be played very differently.

How to play with a big stack

When you have a big stack, people take notice. Opponents are much less likely to steal your blind or raise into you. That’s because in tournaments, once you lose your chips, you are history. One of the most basic rules is not to get involved with the chip leader unless you have to.

Much of what you do, as ever in hold’em, will be dictated by position. When you are in early position (for instance, first, second or third to act in a nine-handed game) you need a genuine hand to raise. Even if you are a massive chip leader, you don’t want to risk losing your chips to people behind you. If you are on a slow clock (the blinds only go up infrequently), much of the play will take place at the final table and although your chip lead is important, you will not win the tournament when there is more than one table left. So from an early position you must have a premium hand.

You should avoid regularly playing medium suited connectors such as 6c 7c or 9h 10h. The reason for this is that in no-limit or pot-limit, after a couple of hours of play, the blinds will be big enough that you will be unable to call a significant-sized raise. If you do look down to find AK, QQ, KK or AA then it is better to raise. It is unlikely, if you’re the big stack that you will get re-raised. Therefore, you are likely to face two or three players and will be an underdog to win the pot, whereas if you only have one caller, you will be favourite, unless he has a higher pair.

In mid-position (fourth, fifth or sixth to act in a nine-handed game) you can be slightly bolder than in early position. If you are sixth to act, you may think about stealing the two blinds. This is an advantage of having the big stack. As in late position, it depends who is to act after you. If they are rocks who will fold if anyone raises them when they don’t have a premium hand, then it is worth exploiting when you have a passable hand.

You would not want to raise with 94 off-suit, but you could raise with A9 suited or J10 suited because – unless you run into a monster hand like kings or aces – you will see a flop and have a chance of flopping at least a draw. You can try and see more flops in mid-position when you have a big stack. Even if it is just the big blind and yourself who see the flop, it may be worth a bet if your hand has not improved. That is because even if the big blind has bottom or middle pair they may not call a raise and risk getting into a battle with the big stack.

Conversely, if you do have a premium hand, you may only want to call a raise or make a small bet into an unraised pot. If you have Aces, your big stack will scare off A10 or AJ with a re-raise. It may be better for them to hit their 10 or A and think they have the best of it, thus enabling you to extract some more chips out of them.

Leave it till late

It is in late position that being the biggest stack is most advantageous. Playing on the button at all but the most aggressive players, you should try to steal their blinds irrespective of your cards. You should not even have to look at your cards!

Your opponents will really need to have a hand to enter a flop with the chip leader. If they have a monster, they will re-raise and you can put it down, but if they have a fair hand such as A10 or 99 and don’t hit their flop, you can find this out with one bet and may well take a larger pot than if you had not raised it. You can also do this from one off the button or in the small and big blind. The exception is when facing a small stack as they may be forced to call to avoid being blinded away.

Don’t be one-dimensional

Even when you’re more heavily stacked than Dolly Parton, it is important to vary your play. If you keep raising, all but the weakest players will twig and start playing back at you. You want to take your fair share of blinds from late position, but don’t want to be in every pot. Even in late position it is not advisable to continually be calling with AQ or QJ suited or any hand where if you hit you can still do your dough. You also don’t need to be in the 50/50 pots.

Avoid calling when you think you are facing two overcards to your smaller pair or vice versa. You can raise with these hands, but you don’t need to call as you don’t need be in these gambling hands when you are chip leader.  Be aggressive but don’t be wild or have a laissez faire attitude to your chips. You may be doing well, very well, but the real money in most tournaments does not start until the final table, so you are not moving up the money ladder by gaining chips at this stage, just gaining a stronger foothold on it.

Work on your reputation. If you have become chip leader by playing solid, then loosen up – people will respect your raises. If you have got there through loose play and playing non-premium starting hands then tighten up; only play when you are favourite and you will be paid out on your hands.

How to play short stacked

The people with the most chips know that ultimately their main obstacles to the big stack will be the fellow chip monsters first at their table and then in the tournament as a whole. Often, though, the big stacks will try and delay confrontation with each other. Instead, they gang up on the smaller stacked players to try and eliminate them and move themselves closer to a guaranteed money finish.

The best way to play the small stack often depends on just how small you are. If you are really small and cannot survive more than one more round of blinds then, when you get a passable hand, you have to go all in, whatever position you’re playing. If you find yourself in the big blind and the compulsory posting is half your stack, then you are pot committed and have little alternative but to go all in. You will not survive another round of blinds and even if you do double up, you will only be in the same position again one round later.

It is true tournaments are about survival, but there is no point being blinded away.

Whatever two cards you have are unlikely to be that much of an underdog against any other two cards. Under different circumstances you may have mucked the hand you go all in with but remember that 8-5 off-suit is less than a 2/1 underdog against AK.

Short but not that short

If your stack is short but not dire then you have far more options. Playing in early position, you have to be even more careful what you raise with, as big stacks will be more likely to call you. If there are two of them on your table then they may put you all in and then not bet against each other, to try and eliminate you. If you have aces or kings then you will probably be happy to take your chances, but if you are holding AK or QQ, you may want to see a flop before committing all your chips.

In mid-position and facing only one big stack, you may want to raise with any ace with jack kicker or better and a pair of jacks or higher. If you are unlucky enough to run into something higher then you will need an outdraw, but you may be getting your hand in with the best of it in a two-way pot or win the hand uncontested.

In late position, you will need a lot less to raise the pot. It is not advisable to try and steal the blinds from someone who is chipped up. They may call with less as they can afford to see a flop and may have the added bonus of decimating your stack and knocking you out. If you do want to nick the blinds, it is not worth doing so from a fellow short stack as they too are unlikely to pass even a hand as weak as one high card or anything suited.

It is the medium-sized stacks whose blinds are up for grabs. They will probably give you more respect if you are short stacked as they will reckon you have a lot to lose and would not want to risk tournament exit. Again, whether you want to attempt to take the blinds from the button or one off the button may depend on whether you think you will be called. If the blinds are rocks it may be worth trying to steal, but if they are loose or have been prone to defending their blind, it may be unwise, unless you are sure you will call a re-raise.

Some players may try to hang in there for as long as possible, but this is only the best strategy if you are near (or in) the tournament prize money and there are other short-stacked players. Being short stacked not only makes you a target for others, it bars you from many important aspects of a successful game such as seeing flops, playing drawing hands and picking up the blinds. It is vital to get out of the position as soon as possible.