Casino Poker Tournament Strategy

Modern Poker Tournament Strategy. The game of poker has changed a great deal in the last decade, and the reason is clear: resources. Nowadays, it’s easier than ever before to get top-tier poker training. Not long ago, players had to figure things out on their own using the resources they could gather. Latest Freeroll Poker Tournaments – Get multiple weekly EXCLUSIVE Casino.org freeroll passwords for the best sites. Win real money by playing poker for free! In poker tournaments, you need to first understand the rules of the game if you’re going to come out on top. For Texas Hold’Em tournaments, you’ll start with two cards in your hand, aka “hole cards,” that aren’t shown to other players. If you ante up, you’ll then go to the next round of play, known as the “flop.”. For the people that go and play these live casino tournaments and cash quite frequently, what is your strategy for these tournaments? I own a book called 'Tournament Hold 'Em: Hand by Hand' by Neil. Poker strategy articles and information for various online poker games. Scroll down to read various articles ranging from no-limit Texas Hold'em poker strategy, Razz Poker, Omaha poker, limit Texas Holdem and others. Choose your specific poker game and go through any of the following links to read a Games & Casino poker strategy article.

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Someone recently asked me how many tournaments I have to lose in a row before I start to get annoyed. They also asked when I start looking for holes in my strategy. While the answers to these questions are probably obvious to most professional players, many amateurs come up with severely incorrect answers.

First off, you should try your best to remove your emotional attachment to your poker results, both good and bad. If you have watched me win a World Poker Tour event on television, you probably noticed that I did not jump up and down and yell about how I am the best poker player in the world immediately afterwards, which is what you might see from players who run hot enough to win a major event.

The reason why I do not celebrate is because I realize that when I buy into any event, I am going to place in each position some percentage of the time. If I happen to bust on the first hand, bubble, final table, or even win, I don’t care too much because I understand I am going to have a fairly random distribution of results over time, hopefully trending in a positive direction because I have an edge in the games.

Casino Poker Tournament Strategy Against

Sometimes you are going to go 40 tournaments in a row without cashing, which has happened to me twice in my career. While the experience is certainly not fun, you must accept it will happen if you play enough tournaments.

Going on a substantial downswing does not necessarily mean you are playing poorly, although it could be an indicator. Assuming you have a large enough sample to know you are a winning player, a routine downswing should not cause concern. The reason most players get depressed over long downswings is that they are either playing way too large for their bankroll, or they have not played enough games (or done the math) to realize how much variance there is in poker.

As a quick example, I once won three tournaments in a row and then lost 30 tournaments in a row after that. Does this mean I suddenly forgot how to play after winning three tournaments in a row? I don’t think so.

Whether you are winning or losing, you should constantly look for leaks in your game. An extended losing streak should not alter your study time too much, assuming you spend a decent amount of time studying poker on a daily basis even when winning.

When I used to play sit-n-gos online, I would play roughly eight hours per day and study four hours per day. I am confident this is why I was one of the biggest winners at that game. When I play poker today, I write down almost every hand I play and review them both at the end of every day and occasionally when I have free time at home. I suggest you do the same. If you are not looking for leaks and constantly improving your skills, you are certain to fall behind.

Everyone who takes poker seriously should get a poker coach. I have paid well over $25,000 for private coaching throughout my career and I firmly believe that was the best $25,000 I have ever spent. If I could go back in time, I would have actually spent substantially more.

When I used to play a lot of sit-n-gos, I noticed my return on investment was slowly dwindling. I hired a coach, paid him $5,000 for 10 hours of his time, and watched my return on investment immediately rise by two percent. While this may not sound like a lot, I was playing around 2,000 $200 games per month, meaning this coaching made me an additional $8,000 per month. Obviously, that is money well spent.

At some point, you will find you no longer need a private coach. Instead, find a group of peers who play similar games as you. I have a close group of friends I regularly talk to about hands and other poker-related concepts. We bounce ideas off each other and constantly try to find holes in each other’s strategies. If you try to master this game alone, you will find it impossible.

I understand that paying hundreds of dollars per hour for private coaching is not realistic for most poker players, so I made my training site, PokerCoaching.com, which features over 1,000 interactive hand quizzes, monthly in-depth homework assignments, gigantic courses, live webinars, and private streams.

Casino Poker Tournament Strategy Game

In addition to having lots of content for novice players, I have also hired many of the best players in the world (including James Romero, Faraz Jaka, Matt Affleck, Jonathan Jaffee, Girafganger7, and many more) to make high-level, cutting-edge content that I personally learn a lot from. If you are looking to take your game to the next level, check out PokerCoaching.com. Good luck in your games! ♠

Jonathan Little is a professional poker player and best-selling poker author with more than $7 million in live tournament earnings. If you want to learn how to play fundamentally sound poker and increase your win rate, check out PokerCoaching.com. Click here to try PokerCoaching.com for free.

Table Of Contents

Tournament poker is exciting enough thanks to the ever-increasing blinds and antes, and the fact the playing field is gradually being decreased to one single winner. Turbo and hyper-turbo tournaments enhance this excitement by rapidly increasing the blinds and antes.

A typical standard online tournament blind structure increases every 10-20 minutes. The actual speed depends on a number of factors including the tournament’s buy-in.

Turbo blind structures tend to increase every five or so minutes, with hyper-turbos being even crazier, raising the blinds every three-minutes or so.

READ MORE: Blink and You’ll Miss It! PokerStars Turbo Series Returns

These faster-paced structures suit recreational players down to the ground for a number of reasons. First, they don’t take as long from start to completion. Second, they level the playing field somewhat because Lady Luck has a more prominent role to play in what happens.

All tournaments are, on the surface, the same beast. Everyone starts with the same number of chips, the same percentage of the field is paid out, and the big money is usually reserved for the top three finishers. There are, however, several key differences in the strategy you need to employ to be successful in turbo and hyper-turbo tournaments. You can’t simply approach them in the same way as you would an MTT with a standard blind structure.

Tight Is Right at the Beginning

The early levels of any tournament are almost identical. You’ll start with a healthy stack, usually 100-250 big blinds. This means you shouldn’t be going out of your way to pick up every possible pot. Adding 75 chips to a 5,000 stack just isn’t really worth it in the long run.

Ever heard of the saying tight is right? This is true in tournament poker where conserving chips at the start of the event is more important than accumulating them. By all means be super aggressive with your strong, made hands, but try to create a tighter image because it will come in handy later on when we start getting all-in happy!

Be aware that mistakes in faster paced tournaments are compounded and what seems like a small error can end up costing you your tournament life. Your always only going to be a few minutes away from a jump in the cost per round, so slipping up and losing 10-20% of your stack may not seem much right now, but you could find yourself short stack within a matter of minutes.

Always keep a eye on your stack size and those of your opponents. You should be doing this anyway but it’s crucial in turbos and hyper-turbos. It’s extremely easy to think you’re cruising along only for the blinds to go up and you drop below 20 big blinds. This is a tricky stack size to play and many players approach it the wrong way by still calling three-bets and making continuation bets with hands they can’t call a shove with.

Watch for which opponents have failed to adjust to their more difficult stack sizes and take advantage of them.

The Middle Stages Come Around Much Faster

Be aware that the middle stages of the tournament come around far more quickly than in a standard structured tournament. Be prepared to start stealing more from late position and with a wider range of hands than usual to keep your head above water. A lot of turbo players continue to play too tight for too long and find themselves in the unwanted position of being in push-or-fold mode far too early,

Downstream Casino Poker Tournaments

Speaking of which, you need to master the art of short stacked poker because you’ll be playing a lot of the tournament like this! There are dozens of apps and “cheat sheets” out there that show optimal pushing and calling ranges. Memorise them. Commit them to memory, or have them on notes stuck to your monitor.

Poker Tournament Strategy Pdf

Most lesser skilled turbo players push and call too tightly. You’ll be surprised at how wide some stack sizes dictate you should be committing your stack with.

Poker Tournament Schedule

Finally, not really a strategy adjustment but be prepared for a much lower Return on Investment (ROI) when you play turbo and hyper-turbo tournaments. Your hourly rate will likely be higher but your money won per tournament much less because luck plays a larger role than your typical tournament.