When Jamie Gold won the main event of the WSOP in 2006, it confirmed for some what many had believed when Chris Moneymaker won the event in 2003: You don’t have to be a hardened professional to win a poker tournament.

Poker tournaments come in all shapes and sizes these days. There are  online poker  tournaments and live casino poker tournaments, tournaments with buy-ins of thousands of dollars and some with buy-ins of mere hundreds, or less. If you’ve played a few poker tournaments, you may already have faced the dilemma of what to do in the middle rounds.

Much of what you do in poker tournaments is centered around the question of trying simply to survive until the next round or to be highly aggressive, risking your tournament life in order to accumulate chips to give yourself more options if you make it to late in the tournament.

Middle Round Survival Strategy vs. Aggression Strategy: Short Stack

Pursuing a survival strategy with a short stack in the middle rounds of a  Texas Holdem  tournament is quite difficult. The blinds are getting pretty high, so it is likely that in a few rounds your stack will be wiped out. Furthermore, when you do move your chips in, your stack may be small that multiple players will call because the potential damage to their stacks is so small. In these cases you run a high risk of being knocked out with a low reward, since if your stack is infinitesimal even a double or triple up may not help you that much. In general, you need to be aggressive with a short stack in the middle rounds. Pick a hand you like and go with it. Ideally, you want to move in when you are the first one in, so you have a good chance of picking up the pot without a fight. Most players are prepared to move in with any pair or any ace in this situation. Some players like to try to move in with suited connectors, figuring that anyone who calls them will be playing big cards, so they are less likely to be dominated.

Middle Round Survival Strategy vs. Aggression Strategy: Big Stack

If you have a very large stack in the middle rounds, you can certainly hang back, pick your spots, and just try to pick up a few chips to stay ahead of the blinds and antes until the money spots. However, if you prefer to pursue an aggressive strategy, this is a great time to pick up pots. Players with medium stacks often will not want to mix it up with you, since you can eliminate them and they are within reasonable distance of cashing in the tournament. Short stacks may want to play with you, but they will often feel compelled to do so with less than the very best hands, since they don’t have a lot of time to double up, so you will have a reasonable chance of picking up their stacks.

A survival  poker strategy  is more likely to make you some money during each individual, whereas many feel that an aggressive poker strategy gives you the best chance to win the tournament or at least finish in a high spot. Continued practice will give you an idea of which strategy you prefer to pursue.

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