FEB 2011 Poker Knowledge Contest Closed! Winner Announced!

Posts: 3854 · Posted: 03.02.2011, 19:18

EARLY AND MIDDLE STAGE STRATEGY OF A "SIT AND GO"

Single-table no-limit hold'em tournaments (also known as "sit and go" tournaments or SNGs) are incredibly popular. The strategy for this article focuses on tournaments that are ten-handed, with the payout structure of 50% to first place, 30% to second place, and 20% to third place. If you are playing in a winner-take-all single table tournament, you will probably need to play a much more aggressive strategy than the one advocated in this article.

At the beginning of the tournament, you should be more willing to see a flop. You can often limp in with speculative hands, such as 3 3. Obviously, raise when you hold very strong hands like Q Q, but limp to see a lot of flops if you can with hands like J 10 suited.

For the lower buy-in tournaments, there are a lot of bad players that will quickly lose their money in the first few rounds. If you happen to hit a really strong hand, there is a decent chance someone will pay you off with a lot of their stack.

As the early stages progress, you should still attempt to see quite a few flops. However, if the pot is frequently raised, you will need to play tighter preflop.

Once the middle stages of the tournament begin (when the big blind is around 10% of a player's starting stack), you need to start focusing more on stealing the blinds. Except for a few circumstances, you should almost always raise if you are the first to enter the pot (no one else has called or raised the big blind yet). A typical raise is 3 to 4 big blinds.

One example of a situation where it may just be better to limp in is if you hold AA in early position and want to induce someone else to raise after you. Then, you can reraise him all-in when the action gets back to you.

In the middle stages of the tournament and later, the "gap" concept comes into play more. There is a "gap" between the (lower) hand strength that is needed to open a pot and the (higher) hand strength that is needed to call someone who raised. This implies that blind stealing is effective.

You should be more willing to enter a pot if no one else has already called or raised the pot. If someone has already entered the pot, they likely have a strong hand. Thus, stealing the blinds is much more difficult, and it is much more likely your hand will be challenged. So when someone else has already entered the pot, you need to be more selective with your hands.

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Posts: 17 · Posted: 03.02.2011, 22:58

Count me in!

Posts: 2787 · Posted: 04.02.2011, 00:22

count me in too please

Posts: 1100 · Posted: 04.02.2011, 00:23

count me in all so

Posts: 6338 · Posted: 04.02.2011, 03:06

Count me in too

I don't have the slightest Idea what you are talking about lol

win4maw

Posts: 1454 · Posted: 04.02.2011, 14:30

count me in please

Posts: 140 · Posted: 06.02.2011, 14:22

count me in please

Posts: 1825 · Posted: 07.02.2011, 22:36

I love sit n' go's. They play fast and are a lot of fun Smile

Posts: 13 · Posted: 09.02.2011, 15:19

IÂ´m here..

Posts: 1704 · Posted: 09.02.2011, 16:14

ty for the useful info as always patti

Posts: 822 · Posted: 12.02.2011, 14:53

Count me in please.

I have noticed that if I am patient these tournaments really work for me. My problem is that when I have a hand like AA that gets beat by someone's K8 I get all mad and start playing like an idiot. If I could just keep that in mind while playing!! LOL

I will come back and read this the next time it happens!!

Posts: 387 · Posted: 14.02.2011, 05:23

Thanks for the strategy.

Posts: 2993 · Posted: 20.02.2011, 19:14

Count me in please.

Ty for te info Patti......I have soooo much to learn and you have really helped out! Very Happy

Posts: 76 · Posted: 27.02.2011, 12:42

I'm in. TY

Posts: 2954 · Posted: 01.03.2011, 21:40

count me in please. the sit'n go tournaments sounds like fun,i'll have to give one a try.thank you