Hi,

What is the best strategy playing a tournament?. I often find it difficult raising on early positions with hands like KTs, QTs, etc...When I play its a fold until I have premium hands and just fold majority of the time. Do I have to be aggressive in order to be good or what?.

Also, any good sites or few pointers on how to play post flop poker?

try playing a controlled lag style, the positive of this you frequently give yourself x2 ways to win the pot, your opponent folding or you having the best hand. When you play too passive you only give yourself the latter chance of winning. Its a tough and swingy way to play, but if you master it, it will bear fruit.

this is one of the best sites to learn postflop imo, study threads and posts. Youtube is good too

Yes, you have to be aggressive, but not from every position.

In general, I play tight from early position, LAGish in middle position and maniac from late position. Position is key in poker. Use it when you have it and respect it when you don't.

Learn how to win f*ckin' flips.

That is all.

Thank you for your response. This is my very first thread so its pretty exiting!


What do you necessarily mean by a controlled lag style? and also does it apply to the hand ranges that at I see online specially the hand range chart that upswing poker offers?

again thank you for your response. I feel like reading your response about being loose aggressive gave me confidence lol. Seriously when i Play it's just fold early and play late but with good cards. ABC poker status.

hmm that makes sense playing really lose on late positions. What do you mean by LAGish? lol and maniac as in any suited connectors and hands that can flop straights even the low cards?

Controlled lag is executing selective and smart aggression. Being selective means you have excellent timing and pick your spots and players very well. You know when to apply pressure and when to back down. Being smart means you know what yours and your opponents image looks like and adjust accordingly. You have excellent hand reading and postflop skills. Your maths, knowledge and experience of the game is solid. You are not a maniac and spewy but LAG is your default syle, to the fact that it should be apparent to others that you are playing a wider range than say a TAG or nit.

You won't see lag hand range charts because a lag can basically have atc at any given time.

If you were to draw a venn diagram with TAG of the left and LAG on the right. Controlled lag would be the space in the middle where the two circles intersect. Really good players will adjust within that space to play more slightly to the left or right depending on the table dynamics.

I'd really find a good training module/course to go through -- drop me a note/email here if your interested in one.

You just want to understand when and how to apply aggression in the correct spots. There's no real easy/quick way for this. Takes practice and marking hands to review and look over. There's plenty of charts to give you a head start/idea to follow, but it's gonna take practice and study.

LAGish MP hands - 22+, Axs, A9+, K9s+, any two broadway, suited connectors, suited one gapped, suited two gapped. And this depends on the totality of the situation. If I am getting away with it, I will push the envelope with more hands. If I've been caught and my image is damaged, I would fold the worst of these.

Late Position maniac - depends on the blinds. If they are giving up too easy just about ATC. I only fold the very worst hands here like 92o and total garbage hands. If they are fighting back, I might play about 50% - 60ish%. Again, it is not really a list of hands. If I've been hammering a good players blinds, I might fold some hand that would traditionally be a good steal hand like 74s. But if I haven't had the chance in several orbits, I might look for anything relatively playable like J7o. You know, poker is not really about hand charts, it is more about knowing when you can take a shot regardless of the hand, or when you might have to let something go by with just an ok hand.

Position, agressiveness, and selectiveness (thank you school of cards). This is what make total sense to me. Use position whenever you can. If you're in the CO or button, raise with just about anything that connects and up. If you're in MP with really passive players in LP and you're fairly sure they'll fold less than premium hands when pressured, try that too and rent the button. Be aggressive in these spots, and a little more passive and tight in the EP. It's not crazy to toss QJ or even KQ from early position, your spot in the hand matters that much. Finally, be selective. Choose spots to be aggressive, you don't need to do it every orbit or else you become predictable. If you've raised your button the last 3 orbits, it's not a bad move to fold a 89s on the fourth to preserve some table image.


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