Regular tournaments and turbo tournaments aren't one in the
same. The majority of tournaments will have normal blind
structures whereas turbo events move much faster. For example,
many live poker tournaments have blind levels that last around
45 minutes to an hour. In a turbo event, however, these same
levels are shorted to 15-30 minutes. Needless to say, the game
is going to be much more fast paced and your decision making is
going to be directly affected. Whether you are looking at the
strategy for the beginning of an event or as a whole, changes
are going to be made.
In live poker, levels can last for a long time, but the standard level time in online poker is 10 to 20 minutes. However, in turbo tournaments, the time needed for levels to go up is even shorter, and it is usually around five minutes. You can now probably conclude what hyper-turbo tournaments are. They are even faster than turbo ones. In this poker strategy article we share with you some top tips for playing in turbo tournaments on PokerStars. Turbo tournaments offer a fast and fun version of their slower paced regular tournament cousins that can be quite profitable, and in a fraction of the time it takes to win a tournament played at normal speeds. One way is to find a video poker strategy chart for the specific game featured in a tournament. Some of the main video poker variations, like Jacks or Better, Bonus Poker, and Deuces Wild, have strategy charts all over the internet. Another way to practice is by using a training program, which points out correct and incorrect decisions as you play. Poker Strategy for Live Turbo Tournaments When you sit down to play a live turbo poker tournament you should only really have one goal, to win. If you don't want to win you shouldn't have signed up for the tournament. Most times you will find that you have to shove all in with weak hands in order to survive in these turbo tournaments. What's the best strategy when it comes to playing turbo poker tournaments? What are the key factors that separate the winners & losers? What is the ONE SKILL.
The attraction to turbo tournaments is that they don't take a
long time to play. The tradeoff to this is the fact that there
will be less opportunity to play and there will be a heavier
emphasis on the luck dynamic. You may just not be cut out to
play in turbo tournaments at all. There's going to be much higher
levels of aggression in a turbo tournament than what you will
normally find in regular events. The types of players that you
face are going to be different as well. There are so many
variables that need to be accounted for when you go from one
type of tournament to the next.
Player Type
You may or may not realize it, but the general type of player
that you'll face in these events is going to be quite
different. In normal tournaments, most players are going to be
very passive and will lean towards the more amateur end of the
poker playing demographic. The reason for this is that many
poker players are only in the game for the recreational value.
They don't have any interest in being competitive to the point
where they are failing to have fun with the game. This is the
primary reason for why tournament poker is profitable for so
many.
When you move into the turbo tournaments, you are still
going to be running into many weak players. The difference is
that these players tend to be more well-adjusted to their game
of type and will usually have a more diverse skill set. Turbo
tournaments are much like any variation of any game in that its
uniqueness creates more specialized players. Welcome bonus casino no deposit uk.
General Approach
The standard strategy to turbo tournaments should not be
drastically different than what you would find in any other
event. The primary difference is also the most noticeable, with
the speed of play definitely being at a faster pace. You aren't
going to have as many people who sit around and wait for hands
as the structure just won't allow for this to work. You'll
need to widen your hand ranges right from the beginning so as to
allow yourself the opportunity to get involved before you
cripple yourself through the blinds alone.
Aggression is going to be met with more opposition in turbo
tournaments than in regular tournaments. In a regular event,
there will be a lot of people who just back down to pressure so
that they can last another hand and pick another spot. Because
your odds of lasting longer are greatly decreased by the speed
of the blinds, players in turbo events are more inclined to
fight back. This doesn't mean that you should be backing down
on your own levels of aggression, not by any means. All that it
means is that you'll need to be more willing to play in raised
and re-raised pots. The play in turbo events is going to be much
more aggressive as a whole from start to finish and you need to
adjust your play accordingly.
Luck Factor
The amount of luck involved in tournaments is hard to
overstate. When you consider turbo events, you'll be
subjecting yourself to even more volatility than normal. Earlier
it was mentioned that the play is much faster, which in turn
leaves less opportunity for anyone to really play a ton of hands
over a long period of time. Instead, you'll be playing in few
pots for greater amounts of chips. There's nothing you can do
to change this dynamic of the game, but you can still work
towards minimizing the extent to which luck personally affects
you.
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One of the most optimal ways to reduce the role that luck
plays in turbo tournaments is to be the aggressor whenever
possible. As a general rule of thumb, the person doing the
betting is going to be more likely to win a hand than the person
calling down the bets. You should be trying to win all of the
uncontested and unraised pots that you possibly can.
Even though players are going to be more active in turbo events, it doesn't
mean that there won't be a fair share of dead money
floating around. Make open raises, bet the flops, and use
your aggression to force your opponents into a corner. There's
no better environment in which to use aggression to your
advantage than in a turbo tournament.
Running Deep
A deep run in these events is going to mean two very
different things. Again with luck, you are going to need things
to go your way in a turbo tournament. Not to say that this isn't
true in any poker tournament, but the lack of actual play is
going to create an even greater need for bigger hands that can
win on their own. In the bulk of normal poker tournaments, even
players at the final table will have 50 or more big blinds to
work with. In a turbo event, the number of big blinds could
easily be closer to the range of 5-20 big blinds. This will
inevitably create a storm of all-ins where ultimately players
become handcuffed.
In a turbo tournament, you'll need to have the will power
and determination to take down pots and make plays when you are
running low. You can't fold and wait for hands. Sure, your life
is going to be on the line over and over again, but this is the
only way that you can really expect to win.
Learn to play your
opponents as much as you can because the cards can only help you
so much. Turbo tournament poker is much more about picking the
correct spots than it is about having good hands. If you can
successfully control your opponents, it won't always matter
whether you are being dealt the best of hands.
Turbo Tournament Strategy Adjustments - How To Profit In Faster MTT Games!
by Matt
Turbo multi-table tournaments are a beast all their own. Especially if you come from a non-turbo background. Some players adjust too much, opening tons of hands at 10/20, only to realize they're busting tournaments left and right. On the other hand, you have guys like me, who sat down at his first turbo sit n go only to watch the entire game breeze by him like he was standing still.
The key is to find a sweet spot. Know when to pick up the aggression so you can build a stack and stay ahead of the blinds, and not have to resort to a push/fold strategy. We want to have a workable stack that we can use to lean on and abuse other players.
That's what I'm going to help you with now.
Key Differences Between Turbo and Non-Turbo MTTs
The first thing I want to do is point out a couple of differences between a turbo and non-turbo MTT.
- Turbo MTTs have 5 minute levels. Standard MTTs have 10-20 minute levels.
- Antes are in play a half hour into a turbo MTT. Antes are in play 1-1.5 hours into a standard MTT.
- Assuming you haven't chipped up, you'll reach a level where you have 10-15 big blinds in 30 minutes in turbo MTTs. It takes about an hour to reach that level in standard tournaments.
What you want to take away from this isn't so much that turbo MTTs are faster.
That's obvious.
What's important to understand is that mistakes in turbo MTTs compound faster. Make a mistake and you have minutes, maybe seconds before the blinds change and (effective) stack sizes and fold equity shrink. That's unlike a non-turbo tournament where you can make small mistakes and have time to correct them before the blinds go up.
So, with that in mind lets move on to some strategy.
The First Couple of Levels, Nothing is Different
Your turbo MTT strategy should be similar to your non-turbo strategy during the first couple of levels. That's to play relatively tight. The reason why is the same. You start with 100, 150 or 200 big blinds, so picking up a 30 chip pot does little to change that, much less your equity in the tournament. To put this into perspective, picking up the blinds with a 2000 stack increases your stack by 1.5%.
Whoop dee doo.
What we want to do instead is focus on building our fold equity. The image we want to project is that we're tight. We'll use our image/fold equity later on when antes kick in to (successfully) steal the blinds, or shove if we have a short stack (10-15 big blinds). So stick to the top of your range, including hands like pocket pairs, broadways, premium/suited aces, (over-limp) suited connectors, etc.
Since you'll have some downtime during this stage, what I recommend you do is check the win / loss records of everyone at your table using services such as SharkScope or the awesome PokerProLabs - and record their stats. Pay attention to who appears to be good/bad too. All of this will help you to develop ranges for later on.
Ultimately, during the early stages you don't want to overcompensate for the faster levels. You can still widen your hand range some, compared to a non-turbo MTT or even a turbo sit n go. But your primary goal should be to create a tight image so you can use that fold equity in the levels with antes.
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Turbo Poker Tournament Strategy: Antes = Aggression
The antes in a turbo tournament will kick in about a half hour into the tournament. Assuming you haven't chipped up, your stack will be around 50 big blinds.
This is the time that you want to start picking up the aggression. The pots start to actually matter at this point because of the dead money the antes create. We're not desperate though, so you should still be selective based on position, your opponent and effective stack sizes. But go ahead and start opening a wider range of hands to steal from middle to late position. I prefer to open hands that still have some equity (potential) if I'm called. For example, I'll open Ax, Kx and even Qx suited hands, anything that might have high card / showdown value and the occasional suited connector.
Once you get a few levels (with antes) in, the pots are big enough to justify 3-betting your opponents. This is a great move to make to build your stack. If called you can just c-bet the flop and often times you'll pick up a large pot. Reshoves are very effective, too. You'll want to have your ranges dialed in, though, and I don't recommend reshoving until the pots make up 20% of your stack, or more.
Speaking of reshoves, you'll want to be aware of stack sizes to your left when you open hands. Players with 15-20 big blinds are going to look for opportunities to build their stack (or stay alive), and will shove on you with a wide range of hands, especially if you're stealing the blinds frequently. To counter this you'll want to open less, opening with hands you can call off with. But don't keep opening/folding -- that will chip away at your stack quickly.
If you're on the short side yourself (around 10-18 big blinds), don't sit on your hands. Find a good spot and shove. Waiting around does you absolutely no good. The smaller your stack the less fold equity you have. The increasing (turbo) blinds are bad enough as is. Don't make it harder for yourself.
The last thing I wanted to point out is to always check the blind levels to see when they're going up next. Sometimes you'll want to make a wider shove because the blinds are going up in 30 seconds and/or they're going up and you're going through the blinds next hand. So you'll want to shove wide to maintain your fold equity for when the blinds increase.
Late Stages - Before the Final Table (Bubble)
Live Turbo Poker Tournament Strategy Pdf
During the late stages your strategy is going to depend on several things. Things like your (effective) stack sizes, your position in relation to certain opponents and your stack size in relation to the other stacks. You need to pay attention to all of this. It's going to affect your opening/stealing strategy, as well as who you can lean on.
Overall, my strategy going into the later stages is the same. Reshove, steal and selectively play pots to build my stack. One thing to add to this list is isolating short stacks. That's another good way to build your stack. However, it's important to have stats/reads on these players so your ranges are close. Isolating short stacks with incorrect reads will do just as much harm as good.
Poker Tournament Strategy Live
Our goal at this point is to build our stack so we can lean on medium sized stacks during tense situations of the tournament, such as the money and/or final table bubble. We also don't want to get to the final table and be short and desperate. Not if we can help it, at least.
And that's my strategy for turbo MTTs. In a lot of ways it's the same as my turbo sit n go strategy, other than being a little wider/aggressive in spots. But you still want to start off tight to build fold equity, explode during the ante levels to build a stack and consistently add to your stack so you can exploit players later on. If you follow this approach closely I'm sure you'll make more than your fair share of deep runs in the turbo MTTs you play.
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More Articles For Tournament Fans Aiming For That Big Score:
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