Live poker has been booming in recent years and that trend isn’t going anywhere. There is a lot of money to be made in live games, and this applies especially to low stakes tournaments.
These games tend to be quite soft, attracting a lot of recreational players that you’ll have an edge on by default. However, there is always room for improving your results.
In this article, I will share with you three simple but very effective and easy-to-implement tips that will see your results in low stakes live tournaments skyrocket.
As simple as these strategies may be, many players are either not aware of them or don’t care enough about their results to try and implement them. Either way, this is good news for you.
Tip #1: Always Show Up on Time
There is a trend among professional players to show up late and register for tournaments last minute. This is the exact opposite of what you want to be doing in low stakes events.
You mustn’t be lazy. Always show up on time and play from the very first card off the deck. This will provide you with ample profitable opportunities to play deep stack poker against less skilled opponents.
Unlike pros, recreational players tend to show up on time because they want the full experience. This means that during early levels, you’ll be playing primarily against a soft field, giving you a chance to build a massive stack to take to the middle and late stages.
Tip #2: Play Big Pots in Position
Position is everything in poker. You can’t build a big stack playing passively and out of position – it simply doesn’t work.
The way to consistently run deep in low stakes tournaments is to 3-bet frequently in position, looking to play big pots when the situation is favorable for you.
Use polarized 3-bet ranges to steal the pots and utilize small c-bet sizes across a variety of flops. In these events, you should be moving away from the GTO strategy and continuation bet at a higher frequency, with a view of winning the pot right then and there or barreling your opponents off of their hands on turns and rivers.
The simple fact is that players rarely raise against small c-bets, resorting to either folding or calling, giving you a lot of opportunities to steal pots.
You should be particularly barreling board-changing turns that favor your range. For example, the flop comes J♦6♣3♠ and the big blind check-calls. The turn card is the K♥.
You should be betting this turn with your entire range. After calling the flop, the big blind player will not have many kings in their range. Their flop calling range will consist of weaker pairs and draws, all of which will fold under pressure more often than not.
With this strategy, you’ll win more than a fair share of pots and keep your stack going in the right direction as the tournament progresses.
Tip #3: Stop Hero Calling Rivers
How often did you hear a player in one of these tournaments say that they knew they were beat, but they just had to call and see it?
This could potentially be the biggest leak of small stakes players! They often have big egos (even if they’d never admit to it), and feel the need to prove that they are just running bad and getting unlucky.
When it comes to river bets, you should simply stop hero calling, and this will tremendously improve your long-term results. Your opponents are not bluffing enough, which means that every time you call, you’re losing a small amount of EV.
You don’t need to see “it.” You’ve seen it plenty over time, and time and time again, you saw them tabling the nuts after firing a big river bet.
So, tighten your river calling range and stop calling with most, if not all your bluff catchers!
Summary
These simple tips will give you a big boost in low stakes tournaments. Although these strategies are easy to implement, many players choose to disregard them for one reason or another, and their results continue to stagnate or deteriorate.
You can set yourself apart from the crowd by taking this advice to heart and putting it to the test from the very next event you play. The odds are, you’ll start to see the benefits straight away, and the more you stick to these tips, the better off you will be.
