ill tighten up to wait to get to the positions whereby they win money. This is actually a good time to loosen up and win more pots, as other players become conservative.

c. ‘M’. M is known in professional circles as the ratio between your chipstack and the total sum of your small blind and your big blind. As you approach the final stages of a poker tourn

Sit-N-Go tournaments or WSOP-style freeze-out tournaments create a certain structure that influences players and how they approach the game. You as a poker player should be receptive to this and know how this affects the dynamics of the players on the table.

Therefore, we set out for you a number of factors that you may like to consider when playing tournament games:

a. Re-buys. Some tournaments allow players to re-buy when they are short-stacked or once they have finished their chips. Inevitably, this causes players to become more loose in their game, knowing that they are not exposed to tournament elimination if they lose all their chips. A number of players will to win the big pots – this gives them a chip lead in the early stages of the tournaments. These players are therefore willing to gamble more thinking that they can take an early chip lead. For you as the player, you may realise that it is harder to get players to fold when you bet, because everybody tends to be more loose. You may find that you are up against as many as 5 or 6 players during a hand, and therefore, the odds of you specifically winning are very slim – you may therefore wish to play tight at this stage and let the other players eliminate each other first. In the alternative, you yourself may decide that risking your chips a bit to take an early chip lead may be a good idea.

b. In the money. As you approach the prize money, most players will tighten up to wait to get to the positions whereby they win money. This is actually a good time to loosen up and win more pots, as other players become conservative.

c. ‘M’. M is known in professional circles as the ratio between your chipstack and the total sum of your small blind and your big blind. As you approach the final stages of a poker tourna

ment games:

a. Re-buys. Some tournaments allow players to re-buy when they are short-stacked or once they have finished their chips. Inevitably, this causes players to become more loose in their game, knowing that they are not exposed to tournament elimination if they lose all their chips. A number of players will to win the big pots – this gives them a chip lead in the early stages of the tournaments. These players are therefore willing to gamble more thinking that they can take an early chip lead. For you as the player, you may realise that it is harder to get players to fold when you bet, because everybody tends to be more loose. You may find that you are up against as many as 5 or 6 players during a hand, and therefore, the odds of you specifically winning are very slim – you may therefore wish to play tight at this stage and let the other players eliminate each other first. In the alternative, you yourself may decide that risking your chips a bit to take an early chip lead may be a good idea.

b. In the money. As you approach the prize money, most players will tighten up to wait to get to the positions whereby they win money. This is actually a good time to loosen up and win more pots, as other players become conservative.

c. ‘M’. M is known in professional circles as the ratio between your chipstack and the total sum of your small blind and your big blind. As you approach the final stages of a poker tourn

hip lead in the early stages of the tournaments. These players are therefore willing to gamble more thinking that they can take an early chip lead. For you as the player, you may realise that it is harder to get players to fold when you bet, because everybody tends to be more loose. You may find that you are up against as many as 5 or 6 players during a hand, and therefore, the odds of you specifically winning are very slim – you may therefore wish to play tight at this stage and let the other players eliminate each other first. In the alternative, you yourself may decide that risking your chips a bit to take an early chip lead may be a good idea.

b. In the money. As you approach the prize money, most players will tighten up to wait to get to the positions whereby they win money. This is actually a good time to loosen up and win more pots, as other players become conservative.

c. ‘M’. M is known in professional circles as the ratio between your chipstack and the total sum of your small blind and your big blind. As you approach the final stages of a poker tourn

and therefore, the odds of you specifically winning are very slim – you may therefore wish to play tight at this stage and let the other players eliminate each other first. In the alternative, you yourself may decide that risking your chips a bit to take an early chip lead may be a good idea.

b. In the money. As you approach the prize money, most players will tighten up to wait to get to the positions whereby they win money. This is actually a good time to loosen up and win more pots, as other players become conservative.

c. ‘M’. M is known in professional circles as the ratio between your chipstack and the total sum of your small blind and your big blind. As you approach the final stages of a poker tourn

ill tighten up to wait to get to the positions whereby they win money. This is actually a good time to loosen up and win more pots, as other players become conservative.

c. ‘M’. M is known in professional circles as the ratio between your chipstack and the total sum of your small blind and your big blind. As you approach the final stages of a poker tournament, you begin to have to think about increasing your own chipstack significantly if you wish to win first place. M also determines how many more rounds you can last in the tournament without playing, based on the chipstack that you have. Big stacks begin to dominate the shorter stacks as the shorter stacks become increasingly concerned about their tournament life – they need to time their moves to make sure they do not get eliminated, and hence, may get bullied out of pots by the big stack. Big stacks, by contrast, want to take chips off their major rivals so as to consolidate their lead at the top.

These are a number of factors that you may like to consider when playing tournament games. The structure of the tournament – re-buys, how many players are left, how many positions win a pay-out of the prize money, and so on, influences how players play the game.

Whilst you begin to think about these factors yourself when playing tournament poker, you should also be alert to how these factors are affecting your opponents’ game.