The Art Of Re-Raising Pre-Flop In Short Handed No Limit Games – Introduction

This is a beginning of a series that will explore the art of re-raising (three-betting) before the flop in no limit Texas holdem. Re-raising in Texas holdem games is an extremely important strategy to master and can help an average player become excellent. I will teach you to put fear into your opponents and learn to dominate and control them before the flop in short handed no limit poker games. I will be focusing on short-handed six-max no limit. This is for a couple of reasons.

• Many more people play six-max no limit games these days than full ring games (9 or 10 handed). Since Holdem Review is generally based around helping you play poker online, this will be much more relevant to most people who are looking to play poker by visiting this site.

• There is much less re-raising going on at full ring games. This is because most people play less hands at full ring games, meaning that the overall quality of hands being played goes up. This leads to people assuming (incorrectly) that if someone raises, they have a very big hand most of the time. Players then automatically flat call more hands (both big and marginal) and re-raise less. Read my article on re-raising pre-flop in full ring games.

• There are many more opportunities to re-raise in short-handed games, so there are many more opportunities to use re-raising strategies to make money.

Why Should I Re-Raise In Short Handed Poker Games?

Players tend to be very loose and liberal with their raising hands in six-max no limit games. This means that players are raising weaker hands along with their strong ones. When you have position (importance of position) on these players, you can re-raise with a variety of hands (I’ll get into hand selection later) and either take the pot right away by them folding, or if they call, you will have superior position and be able to control the hand post-flop.

Many players play a “fight or flight” approach when the get re-raised out of position. It is difficult and uncomfortable to play a large pot out of position when your opponent has position on you. So instead of getting into an uncomfortable spot on the flop, many players will fold a lot to your re-raise (even with very good hands) and will four-bet your re-raise a small portion of the time with their best hands. Not many players will flat call your re-raises. (And they are correct not to.)

A byproduct of you re-raising players often is that many players become more cautious and start folding or calling more often instead of open raising. You are conditioning these timid players to allow you to control how they play. Once they start playing more timidly, they are allowing you to bully them around and steal more small to medium sized pots rather than them fighting back against you.

A smaller minority of players (usually better ones) will realize that you are three-betting lightly and will fight fire with fire. These players will occasionally four-bet bluff you preflop and some will flat call you three bets and attack you on the flop more often. You will recognize these players quickly and you need to adjust your play accordingly. I will go over this in more detail later.

Conclusion To An Introduction

This is an overview of playing aggressively pre-flop in short handed no limit Texas holdem games. I will post more parts to this series and you will be able to see into the mid of how an advanced player thinks when playing aggressively pre-flop and re-raising often. There are some pitfalls that you can run into, but the pros are many when playing aggressively and “putting your opponents to the test” before the flop is dealt. Click a link below to read the other parts of this series.