Sole table competitions or sit and go as they’re also known can earn some decent cash with no thought before play. I personally love playing the free online poker sites and also the low stake (up to ten dollars) sit and go websites. I have my methods on how I play these different games which I will share.
Solid and Tight early on.
This means that early in a tournament you only play premium hands. Position is very important. Pairs from 22 thru 99 I only call and then only up to only 3 times the Big Blind. A larger raise and I fold them.
Big pairs such as 10/10, Jack/Jack, Queen/Queen, King/King & Ace/Ace I will always call for a raise on a short table.
Get ready to call an all in whichever of those cards are shown- cards such as Queen/Jack, Queen/King, King/Jack & & Ace/10I play similar with tiny pairs & fold to raises higher than three times the big hand.
Now the hands that can get you into trouble.
AJ, AQ, and AK….you got to know when to fold them!! They are great hands when down to 3 or maybe 4 players left, but early on they are dead to any pair.
Learn to lay them down in the early part of a free poker tourney. One of the things I also do until the last 3 and in the money is show my winners. The table see’s Those KK and trip 7′s and so on. And I haven’t bluffed on a single hand…Yet. That comes when only 3 left. No more show and tell.
This sets up some great steals. All they have seen is winners from you…they have no reason to believe you don’t have them now.
As you just played the best cards at the start you have opened the door for the ‘bingo’ players to put themselves out. The odds are by being strong and rigid the chance will fall for you to knock a few opponents out yourself.
The bottom line is- you’re playing to win- and by winning you hope to make some money, and making money on the sit and go games takes a lot less effort. The majority of the time the top three will get some money and by coming third you normally break even. Therefore making the cash is crucial to doing well in sit and go poker games.
One major part of any game is determined by how close you watch the play. You wouldn’t believe the amount of games I have been involved with where a knuckle-head keeps picking up the chips due to the opponents being away with the fairies.
Add with this there are always the common sense fundamentals when playing for money. I’m one of the old school and being in my fifties I have seen the game evolve in many forms over many decades. To quote one of mu idols “No limit holdem can be taught in half an hour but can take over a lifetime to master”.
To this I’d add, when you start or if you’re already familiar with poker but struggling – go and practice on micro/low stakes or free online poker site tournaments. There are some great ones out there and you can play loads with little or nothing at risk and in doing so really build your confidence and skills before starting to risk it bigger.
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March 27, 2010
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