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Everyday players are sitting down at the tables and consistently making fundamental mistakes because of lack of knowledge, misinformation or failing to maintain focus.

By improving your pre-flop strategy, you will set yourself up for success in poker! Download my Preflop Charts at https://pages.pokercoaching.com/100bb-chart. Answering Where High Stakes Poker Leaks Are Coming From 12 Nov Unless you have been living under a rock, you already know that iconic High Stakes Poker TV Show is making a grand return on December 16.

Even just a small strategical adjustment in poker can potentially save you a huge amount in the long run.

In this article we will point out some of the best live and online poker tournament strategy tips you can use to improve your game as quickly as possible.

Tip 1: Play The Right Starting Hands

Whether it be lack of patience, or an unfamiliarity with opening ranges, many tournament poker players still open too wide. This is especially true when it comes to early and middle position opens, where there are still many opponents left to act behind who can be dealt a strong hand.

The problem is when called, wide openers are often at a range disadvantage. Often being dominated by their opponents, they are vulnerable to 3 bets since they frequently won't have a holding strong enough to continue under pressure.

Furthermore, although opening a hand like 7 ♠ 5♠ might at times not be a terrible strategy from early or middle position, speculative hands like suited connectors and gappers, as well as small pairs, work best with deep stacks behind.

These speculative hand types infrequently connect strongly with the flop, so those times they do you want to have deep stakes behind to have the potential to win a huge pot. Modern day tournament structures often only see deep stack play occur during the first few levels of play. This leads us into the next tournament poker tip, being stack size aware.

Learn which hands to open raise in MTT's - Watch lesson 6.1 from the Road to Success MTT Course. A power-packed 50 minute video below, just use one of the button options to unlock it and get instant access.

Tip 2: Be Stack Size Aware

Effective stack size plays a critical role in a tournament players success.

Having a deep stack, and therefore expanding an opening range to include a lot of speculative suited hands and small pairs is a tournament strategy that is going to be punished if a number of short stacks are yet to act behind. This most notably occurs in turbo tournaments where the average stack size is quite short.

Short stacks will be in push-or-fold mode. Being short, they don't have time to wait and will be looking to take any opportunity they can to move all-in. This high rate of all-ins will leave wide openers frequently being forced to relinquish their hands, without even having the opportunity to try to hit a nice flop. Problematic hands often include; J8s , KTo and weak Ax hands.

It's not just short-stacks that can cause a problem, aggressive players will be looking to attack wide-openers. This is especially true when a player opens with a vulnerable M8-M14 (20bb-35bb) stack. 3 bets get good leverage against this stack size, since continuing in the pot represents committing a significant portion of a players stack.

Wide openers would be wise not to commit a large percentage of their stack with marginal holdings, and so will be forced to fold, or face being in a high-risk situation. Staying aware of your own stacks utility, as well as anticipating how opponents will utilize their stacks, is an important tournament poker tip to keep in mind.

POKER TIP: If you are currently using BB to calculate stack size, here's a look at why using 'M' is a better MTT strategy.

Tip 3: Be Careful Overplaying In The Early Stages

As a stack gets deeper, the less willing a competent player will be to put their entire stack at risk since they have more to lose. It's rare to see good players all-in during the early stages of a tournament with hands like AKo or JJ preflop.

Smart players recognize that their counterparts aren't going to be risking their entire stack with weaker hands like AQo . Therefore, even a strong hand like AK could be at a significant equity disadvantage facing a deep stacked opponents all-in range. Could you fold QQ here?

Rather than putting in an extra raise, often times just calling with even very strong hands in the early stage of a poker tournament has great benefits.

• Allows your opponents to continue with hands they were folding to a re-raise that you have crushed.
• Disguises the strength of your hand and keeps you unpredictable.
• Prevents you from getting all-in facing a super strong range where often times you're crushed.

Tip 4: Continuation Bet Aggressively But Not Always

Players have learnt the value of c-betting, but it's a strategy that is often misapplied. Being the preflop aggressor shouldn't lead to a mandatory c-bet and double barrels.

This is especially true in multi-way pots yet players continue to make fruitless c-bets with weak holdings into multiple opponents.

Even in heads-up situations, key factors to consider include;

• How does the flop texture interact with players ranges?
• Who has the strongest range?
• Who has nut advantage (the biggest share of super strong hands)?
• How passive or aggressive is the opponent we're facing?
• How does the stack size/SPR allow us to operate on the flop and future streets?

The following hand illustrates the effect nut advantage can have on profitable continuation betting and how it applies to this tournament poker tip:

Tip 5: Be ICM Aware

The Independent Chip Model or ICM, is a great model players use to make more profitable decisions when deep in a tournament and especially at a final table.

Unlike in cash games, chip values fluctuate depending on the stage of the tournament and the competing opponents stack sizes. At it's most extreme, ICM strategy can make A♠A♣: an easy fold preflop.

Imagine a situation in a satellite where 9 players get a World Series of Poker entry and there's 10 remaining. The action folds around to a player with 100,000 in tournament chips who moves all in from the small blind. You're sitting in the big blind with A♠A♣: and also 100,000 in chips. You look around and see a few opponents with only 1000 chips left, which is the size of the current big blind. Obviously one of these short stacks is likely to bust very soon.

Obviously one of these short stacks is likely to bust very soon. Moreover the chance that they collectively out survive your 100,000 stack is extremely remote. You'd likely be a 99% chance to get a WSOP entry, so why would you call with your A♠A♣ and risk busting next around 20% of the time?

Aside from calling too wide in spots when the most profitable strategy is to proceed tightly, the opposite can also be true when it comes to pressuring your opponents. ICM allows players when they have the opportunity to assert pressure on there opponents stacks, to go ahead and do so liberally, since thinking opponents counter-strategy is to play a tight range of hands.

Here's an example of how drastically a hand range can change when the opportunity to assert pressure at a final table exists. 5 of the 6 remaining players at the Pokerstars Sunday Millions have 15bb's, whilst the UTG player has a short 2bb stack. Since the 15bb stacks wants to avoid busting out next and missing out on a large pay jump before the immanent bust out of the 2bb stack, the small blind can adjust their all-in range. Instead of the profitably 57% all-in range in normal play, they can move all-in with 100% of hands to apply pressure on the big blind.

Whilst the big blind should adjust their calling range from the regular 36% to just 10% of hands to account for the ICM effect in play.

The PokerNerve Road to Success course teaches players how to master ICM situations, which is key to tournament poker success since ICM comes into play as the prizes become significant. If there was only one tournament poker tip that you take away from this article, it's that you need to know ICM!

Tip 6: Bet The Appropriate Size

Strong players are capitalizing on their opponents tendencies to bet too big or too small in a number of different situations. With some similar considerations to that of continuation betting, when selecting a bet size important aspects include;

• Which player's range does the board texture favor?
• Who has the greatest nut saturation?
• How does SPR influence our betting strategy

There are many great articles online about bet sizing. You should be sure to check out ThePokerBank's and the Pokerology's to learn more about this tournament tip.

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Tip 7: Take Equity Realization Into Account

Possibly due to the popularity growth of Twitch, many poker players approach to big blind play has evolved. The current trend is to defend the big blind with virtually any 2 cards, as some top pros elect to do, and the justification for this is taking advantage of the excellent pot odds being offered.

While the inclusion of antes combined with commonly seeing a small open raise size does offer the big blind generous pot odds, this has led to a fundamental flaw in the way many players approach big blind play in poker tournaments. The key concept overlooked, is equity realization.

Equity realization reflects a players ability to take a certain hand, and win their share of the pot, frequently enough, to make it profitable in the long-term. Although some top pros have the ability to win their equity share of the pot even out of position, less skilled players rarely do. This leads to a large chip loss in the long run.

It is quite difficult to realize of your equity when out of position, with no initiative and a weak range. This means them glorious odds you are being offered aren't quite as good as you think!

The following article explains this crucial tournament poker tip in more detail; Equity Realization.

Tip 8: Don't Miss Double And Triple Barrel Opportunities

'One and done' is the plight of many aspiring tournament poker players. Everyday at the tables I see players missing profitable opportunities to double, or even triple barrel. Understanding what turn and river cards are advantageous to a players range, along with opponent tendencies, are crucial parts of a winning barreling formula.

The most common scenario at the table, is a heads-up pot where the big blind calls an open-raise. And this happens to be a great spot to barrel. Big blind defenders have a wide range, and it's important to pressure this wide range, especially on only partially connected board textures with one or multiple high cards.

RedChipPoker has a great article on spotting profitable double barrel opportunities which you can read here: THE +EV DOUBLE BARREL GUIDE

Tip 9: Check-Raise More Flops

The biggest difference between the current tournament population, and the future generation, will likely be their approach to check-raising the flop. This opportunity typically occurs in a heads-up pot, after defending the big blind verse an opponents raise.

Currently, MTT players only check-raise the flop in this situation around 7-8% of the time, when closer to 20% is a more optimal strategy. On certain flop textures, check-raising close to 25% of the time is an extremely profitable strategy. And if players are getting out of line with their c-bets, then check-raising at an even higher frequency could be a profitable exploit.

By giving up too easily on a wide range of board textures, or taking a more passive approach and simply calling, c-betting can be done with reckless abandon. However, by selecting a nice mix of check-raising hands, combining some strong hands with some good semi-bluffing candidates, a check-raiser can become tricky to play against and exploit the average players tendency to over c-bet.

POKER TIP: Applied correctly and check-raising becomes a super powerful weapon in your arsenal leading to more profitable poker results. But also think beyond the flop, there's plenty of check-raising opportunities you may be missing. This video demonstrates an interesting turn check-raise situation.

We discuss check raising strategy in more detail in our post over on unfeltedpoker.com.

Tip 10: Develop A Good 3betting Strategy

Whilst 3 betting aggressively is a strategy many players employ, especially in online poker circles, failure to apply optimal 3 betting strategies has certainly led to a lot of spewy poker. Simply attacking opponents who are suspected of opening wide doesn't cut it in the modern poker world.

Players have learnt to deal with 3 bets more profitably, by mixing in some calls with timely 4 bets. Moreover, the role stack size plays when it comes to 3 betting it still largely misunderstood by much of the poker community.

Sure there are certain stack sizes where 3 bets gain a lot of leverage, but how about the role blockers play? And when is 9♦7♦ a better 3 bet candidate than K♦T♠ ? These are just some of the considerations when it comes to a profitable 3 betting strategy. See how to design strong 3betting ranges in this article by Donkr.

Bonus Poker Strategy Tip: Avoid and Deal with Downswings

As a poker player you want to earn your money as easily and as stress-free as possible right? Well, understanding ROI, variance and bankroll management can help (see TopPokerValue's article on bankroll management).

All poker players at some point experience downswings. In some cases, this can affect their play, volume or state of mind.

You'll be miserable, hating poker, playing less and earning less per tournament as your play will suffer.

Along with finding ways that work for you to keep a positive mindset, taking pro-active steps can help keep you confident by knowing you are dealing with the situation like a professional whilst at the same time taking positive action to get back on track and winning.

What is ROI and variance?

Every tournament you enter has an EV associated with it. So if you enter a $10 tourney, as a good player maybe you have a 30% ROI, so you make $3. So it doesn't matter whether you brick that tourney or win it for $5000, you make $3 in the long run.

Now, of course, you don't make $3 each time. 80-85% of the time you lose that $10, some percentage of the time you win a little bit, and some very small percentage of the time you win a lot. How small those ‘small percentages’ are primarily depends on not only your skill edge, but also the field size which is an extremely important concept that is often ignored.

Variance is a factor of two things:

1) Your edge

2) The field size

Example 1)

You play the Hot $55 which has $30K guaranteed, every day for a year on Pokerstars. It has 1600 runners and you have a 5% ROI, because turbo ROIs are small. Your average yearly profit is $605 however you will lose money on the year 55% of the time.

Example 2)

You play a $20 tourney with $3K guaranteed on a softer site every day for a year. It has 200 runners and you have a 30% ROI, because it's a normal speed tourney and you’re against an easier field. Your average yearly profit is $2400 and in this case you lose money only 12% of the time.

A lot of people would look at those two tournaments and make a decision based on the buy-in and 1st place prize money as to which was better to play, and it would be grossly wrong. Once you accept all the above, you realise that the 'up top' number is largely meaningless.

Yes, on the same site bigger fields may mean a lot of fish have registered to play, but you'll find a lot of small field, soft, non-peak hour tournaments have a great pro-to-fish ratio and hence are great value. Of course once you consider other sites that have smaller fields, you'll often find they are a better choice than what might be running on Pokerstars.

So what can you do?

When players start losing money and along with that, confidence, not only does their game deteriorate but they often compound that problem by failing to make rational decisions. Often losing players, or players on a downswing, go 'bink chasing' and decide to take a shot to win all their money back in one tourney. Or load up some quick $82 hyper-turbos to try to turn it all around quickly.

People get overly fixated on what's 'up top' and wanting to score big in one tournament. That’s a sure-fire strategy to fuel a down swing. If your house got knocked down would you try to slap it back up in a week? Take that opportunity to rebuild a better, stronger house.

Make sure you're adding in some study and keep focused (see Sky's Matsuhashi How To Study Poker series), and stay fresh and positive as you approach each session. Be smart and get back into profit quicker instead of enduring a 6-12 month variance rollercoaster!

Closing Words On Tournament Poker Tips

Poker is a multi-faceted game which makes it fun but challenging. Challenge yourself to factor in the relevant concepts, and make more profitable decisions. Tighten up from the big blind, and in general around the table. This tip often quickly improves a new players results, or those that have a got a little sloppy with their play.

Calculate stack size using 'M'. Always be aware of your own, and your opponents stack sizes so you don't get yourself caught in awkward situations. One awkward situation that often comes up is when you hold an overpair to the board and an opponent puts the heat on you. Don't be afraid to make big lay downs to preserve your stack, especially in the early levels.

Be aware of your cbetting frequency. There's no need to waste tournament poker chips cbetting every time, especially when the pot is multi-way. Pick your spots to make profitable plays. Remember when it comes to the final table, regularly profitable playing ranges might alter due to the payouts. ICM is the key when it comes to those final big decisions.

Another key to success is knowing when to fire multiple bullets at your opponents. Barreling, especially against a wide big blind range can really help increase your non-showdown winnings. Finding ways to accumulate chips without always having the best hand is what top players do. This is why check-raising and having a good 3 betting strategy is so important. Correct use of these strategical concepts and the other tips outlines will get you winning more at the tables.

Now that you've acquired some great holdem tournament strategy tips to help you achieve MTT success, go out there an implement them!

One of the quickest way to improve your poker game is to take on a poker coaching, a course or join a poker training site; if that is something that interests you be sure to check out the PokerNerve road to Success Course for some advanced poker tournament strategy or you can check out HowToPlayPokerInfo's guide on poker training & poker courses to find the right option for you.

Any other poker tournament strategy tips? Leave them below in the comments, we would love to hear them!

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If you are playing just to pass the time and have fun, it’s completely okay. Sit at the table and enjoy yourself. But if you are in it to win it – and not just at that one particular tournament, you will have to take poker seriously and invest time in it even before the play starts.

As said by many, you win competitions in the gym, not on the field. And with poker is the same. There’s a lot of work to be done away from the tables, but in this post, we will give you advice on how to prepare for a poker tournament.

You could say that some of the professionals brought preparation to scientific levels. It’s one of the reasons they are at the top of the food chain. Before the tournament starts, they invest time in preparation for healthy food; they exercise, meditate, and much more. And you should do the same.

Don’t try everything you learn here at once; it can be too much.

Try a few techniques and add new ones before the next tournament you play. Also, some of the methods listed below might not suit you, but for sure, most will benefit your game. After some time, every single listed step will become a routine, and without realizing, you will develop a habit of always preparing in the best way possible for the tournament you are about to play. Together with off table work, results will soon follow.

Some of the advice is so-called no brainer, but still, a lot of new players skip them, so make sure you don’t do the same. And maybe the greatest thing is that implementing described approaches will significantly improve your day to day life too.

Table of Contents

1. Be sure you can play the whole tournament and clear your plans

Let’s start with the one that is easy to understand, implement. It also should always be on top of your mind when you are planning to play in a poker tournament. Imagine being in the chipleader after two days, but you have either already booked a flight back home or have a scheduled meeting with an important client.

Don’t be one of those players that register a tournament just for the sake of playing, without having your plans cleared for the duration of the whole thing.

2. Important things in »real life« have to be in order

This is one of the first things you should do before entering poker tournaments or playing any form of poker in that matter.

You won’t be able to play your A-game or even B or C game if you have unresolved problems in other departments of your life.

You should always be focused and concentrated as much as you can be, so you can notice leaks and mistakes other players are making, so you can exploit them correctly. If you have deadlines at the job, take care of them. If you need to take your better half to the shopping spree, do that.

Probably every one of us heard the saying, » if you can’t spot the sucker in the first half-hour at the table, then you ARE the sucker. « If things are bothering you, you won’t be able to focus for more then 5 minutes, and every unwanted event will easily allow tilt to creep in. And all of a sudden, you become a sucker. So talk to your friend, girlfriend, mother, father, or boss and clear your mind of unnecessary baggage.

3. Be sure that tournament you are about to enter fits into your financial abilities

Scared money makes no money. You probably heard of this one too, and you should write it down.

Bankroll management is one of the essential things in poker if you’re aiming to survive in the long run.

There are heaps of talented poker players that never made it just because they didn’t follow the basic rules of managing a bankroll. Never play in a tournament that will have a significant impact on your bankroll or your life in general. It’s irresponsible, and it will end badly – period.

Now that we crossed pure fundamentals out of the list, we can start with a bit more in-depth preparation. Remember, in the end; the little things can make a huge difference.

4. Eat Healthy

There are countless benefits of eating healthy. In poker, basically, everything comes down to being able to concentrate for more extended periods than your opponents. And it is what it is – eating too much or too little can also interfere with your focus. A heavy meal may make you feel tired. Too few calories will result in distracting hunger and, again, low energy levels. So make smart choices when selecting food before entering the tournament.

• Fish: a protein source linked to a great brain boost is fish – rich in omega-3 fatty acids that are key for brain health. So instead of having a burger, pizza, or spaghetti bolognese before the tournament starts, prepare yourself a salmon, for example. It will benefit you in the long run too.
  
• Caffeine: it energizes you and helps you concentrate. It can give you that well-known wake-up buzz, but the effects are short-term. But you should be careful – overdo it, and it can make you edgy and uncomfortable.
  
• Fruits and juices: sugar is your brain’s preferred fuel source – not regular table sugar, but glucose found in fruits, for example. That is why a glass of orange juice can offer a short-term boost to memory, thinking, and mental ability. But same as caffeine, having too much can affect your mind and your body in a negative way, so find your optimal input quantity and stick with it.
  
• Nuts and seeds: good sources of the antioxidant vitamin E, which improves your cognitive functions. It will get you the benefits you need with a minimum of excess calories, fat, and sugar. So having a little snack made from nuts and seeds during the tournament is also a good idea as metabolizing it won’t make you feel sleepy, and hunger will go away.
  
• Avocados and whole grains: every organ depends on blood flow, especially the heart and brain. A diet high in whole grains and fruit like avocados can cut the risk of heart disease and lower bad cholesterol. With enhanced blood flow, avocado offers a simple, tasty way to fire up brain cells.
  
• Blueberries: they are super nutritious. Studies show that diets rich in blueberries improve both learning and muscle function. Also, they are easy to get, delicious and straightforward to add to your smoothie.

At first, it seems like there is a bunch of food on the list, but everything is thought through and easy to fuse.

So you can make yourself a smoothie with oranges, apples or bananas and add some blueberries. For the main dish, you can have a salmon sandwich with wholegrain bread and avocados. And after that or just before the tournament starts, enjoy a cup of coffee. Like mentioned before, during the breaks, you can fill yourself up with seeds and nuts.

Of course, don’t forget the basics – drink water and be hydrated at all times.

5. Sleep well

Again, as eating unhealthy food, erratic sleeping patterns will mess up your ability to be focused and fresh. Almost every professional poker player that is playing tournaments for a living is suffering in this area. And it all comes down to little details in the end.

If you are fresher then your opponents at the final table, your chances of making fewer mistakes are going through the roof. So if you are playing to win, especially at those few day-long live tournaments, you should skip parties and stuff beforehand, so you are rested and prepared to grind. In the long run, there will be significant benefits if you sleep well on your poker free days too.

As said above, tournament players especially suffer from crazy sleeping hours, because most of the major tournaments are played during night time, so learn to cherish the moments when you can go to bed at reasonable hours.

6. No alcohol and no drugs before and during tournament

We need to be focused as much as we can, right? We all agree on that. Needless to say, alcohol and drugs won’t help you with that. It’s okay to have a beer or do tequila shots in a friend’s home game, so everyone, including you, is having a good time. You can’t be the only one at the table playing seriously and be sober, because it can quickly happen that you won’t be invited again. But when playing tournaments, bring your bottle of water and avoid doing things that will mess up with your ability to be focused, alert, and consequently make incorrect moves.

7. Set the Strategy

If you have already played in a tournament before, think about how you played. Think about the spots you encountered, what mistakes you have done, and of course, think about the spots you have played perfectly. Make the plan on how you are about to play in this one, so you can avoid mistakes you have done in the past and be in a good spot when an opportunity arises. Parts of your strategy will, of course, deviate a little bit as a lot depends on table draw and opponents you are seated with, but you can still make a general plan and stick to it as much as you can.

So you can decide between playing:

– TAG – Tight Aggressive

– LAG – Loose Aggressive

There are more ways to play like loose-passive (LP), for example, but we advise you to play either TAG or LAG. If you are a beginner, however, you should focus solely on playing solid TAGpoker.

So if you decided to play tight aggressive, you should still sometimes diverge from that and make a loose call while defending your big blind against someone who is stealing every orbit.

You should set yourself a goal that this time, you are going to focus on these few things:

• How many hands are opponents playing?
  
• Which hands are they playing, and from which positions (be aware of showdowns)?
  
• How much 3-betting is going on at the table?

When you are noticing and remembering things like that, you can exploit opponents mistakes:

• If the villain is calling too much preflop, so you can raise bigger and get more chips into play
  
• opponent is calling too much post-flop with weak hands so that you can go straight for value on every street

After a while, with training and more tournaments, you will detect and notice things like that automatically with less energy and you will be able to focus more in-depth and punish your opponents even if they are making small mistakes that no one else at the table benefits from.

But at the beginning, force yourself to continually be aware of what is going on at the table and follow at least simple fundamental things. To recognize preflop mistakes and to get to know how other players are playing, you need to prepare at least preflop ranges for different stack sizes. A range is a combination of hands a player might have at a given time.

So here is the example for UTG preflop range at start of the tournament:

Once you figured out and constructed ranges, you know you should open-raise around 13% of hands from the UTG position. Also, when you understand how the preflop range from UTG looks like, you’ll be able to recognize when someone plays differently. If your range is optimal, it means that someone who open-raises more from UTG is making a mistake, and you can punish him for that.

When you master basic open-raising ranges, you can construct further in-depth and decide which starting hands are profitable to continue with when facing 3-bets and so on.

8. Exercise

It’s crucial to be in good shape both physically and psychically. To improve or at least maintain your physical endurance, you need to exercise. Playing for five days straight with every day, taking 10-12 hours can be hard for your body, especially if you are in bad shape. So, avoid being the one with the worst conditioning. As mentioned numerous times before in this text, it all comes down to who can concentrate for more extended periods. A player who is in good shape, who slept well, ate well, and hydrated himself properly will make the least mistakes. So don’t be lazy and go for a run.

9. Go outside

As mentioned above, you should try a couple of things at the beginning, why not combine going outside with exercise.

It is super important no only for your poker game, but for your health in general to get some sunlight and fresh air.

Long tournaments can be grueling as you are sitting for hours in a closed room filled with hundreds of people with nothing but artificial lighting. Running for a couple of miles, sweating, breathing, and exposing yourself to the sun will do wonders for your well being.

Of course, don’t take your shirt off for six hours and risk sunburns. Still, moderate exposure will help you develop vitamin D. Research shows that the most efficient way to get vitamin D is via exposing your skin around midday, when basically no important tournaments are taking place, so no excuses there.

Until now, a lot has been written about preparing your physical part. From this point on, we will focus more on developing your mind by introducing techniques used by a lot of successful people.

10. Visualization

More and more poker players are mastering visualization to improve every department of their game. You should act in the same manner.

For example, the more you can visualize handling bad hands and coolers in a way that is calm and controlled instead of nervous, the more your brain will force you to act that same way at the poker table

Don’t forget to visualize good things that can happen too. Visualize your self winning the tournament and imagine yourself enjoying the reward. To achieve the goal, you have to see yourself as the player you want to be.

Poker Leak

The great thing about visualization is that you can do it while you are on the way to play the tournament or while you are doing your daily run. No excuses here!

11. Cold showers and ice baths

There are plenty of benefits of cold showers and ice baths. They will ease sore and aching muscles, and it will help your central nervous system and limit the inflammatory response. But the most important thing connected to poker might be that it trains your vagus nerve.

The vagus nerve is linked with the parasympathetic nervous system, and training it can help you face stressful situations more adequately. We have to agree that poker can be nerve-wracking at times, and making a correct decision while 9 players are watching every move you make can be stressful. So prepare yourself!

It only takes a few minutes, it’s healthy, and a lot of professional poker players are doing it. It will do wonders for your state of mind too. Not only will it make you think more rationally, but it will also help you deal with bad beats and not tilt, so you can continue to play your A-game even when the biggest fish at the table sucks out on you and hits that two outers on the river.

12. Breathing exercises

There are numerous benefits from breathing exercises, and a lot of professional poker players are betting their money on the » Wim Hof Method. « It helps your immune system, improves your mental health, relieves stress, increases performance, gives you more energy, boosts concentration, and much more.

Here are steps on how to approach it:

– STEP 1: Get comfortable – sit or lie down, whichever is most convenient for you. Just make sure you can expand your lungs freely without feeling any constriction.

– STEP 2: Do 30-40 deep breaths. Close your eyes and try to clear your mind. Be conscious of your breath and try to connect with it fully. Inhale deeply through the nose or mouth and exhale unforced through the mouth. Fully inhale through the belly, then chest, and then let go unforced. Repeat this 30 to 40 times in short, powerful bursts. You may experience light-headedness and tingling sensations in your fingers and feet. These side effects are entirely harmless.

– STEP 3: The Hold. After the last exhalation, inhale one final time, as deeply as you can. Then let the air out and stop breathing. Hold until you feel the urge to breathe again.

– STEP 4: Recovery of breath. When you feel the urge to breathe again, draw one big breath to fill your lungs. Feel your belly and chest expanding. When you are at full capacity, hold the breath for around 15 seconds, then let go. That completes round number one.

This cycle can be repeated 3-4 times without interval. After having completed the breathing exercise, take your time to bask in the bliss. This calm state is highly conductive to meditation – don’t hesitate to combine the two.

You can look at guided Wim Hof method breathing in the following video:

There is a lot of useful information on the official web site: https://www.wimhofmethod.com/

13. Meditation

If you have done some research about meditation before, you probably already heard the saying: »You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes a day. Unless you’re too busy, then you should sit for an hour.«

With meditating, we are lowering our stress levels and improve our focus, among other things.

And the beautiful thing is that meditation is easy and hard at once, same as the card game we all love.

We won’t go into details, but here are simple steps you can use to start meditating:

1. Take a seat and find a place that feels calm and quiet.
   
2. Set a time limit. In the beginning, start with five or ten minutes and make it longer as you gain experience.
   
3. Be aware and notice your body
   
4. Feel your breath and follow the sensation of it, in and out.
   
5. Notice when your mind wanders away from breathing and simply return your attention to the breath.
   
6. Don’t obsess over the content of your thoughts. Just come back and think about breathing.
   
7. You end the process with kindness. Open your eyes and take a moment to notice sounds in the environment. Think about how your body feels right now.

And that’s it. That’s how you practice meditation. It sounds easy, but in the beginning, you will find your mind wandering away after 10-20 seconds. But with repetition, you should get better at calming your mind, and it will show at the poker table too.

You can read more about meditation here: https://www.mindful.org/

Being calm and rational at the table while facing a lot of pressure is one of the most significant differences between regular winners and losing players. Embrace everything that helps you stay in the »zen mode. «

And now the final step, but just as important. It’s divided into two categories, depending on the type of poker you are playing – live or online.

14. Final details

A) If you are playing in a live tournament, always dress normally, smell nice and use bubble gum

The last thing you should do before leaving your house is to take care of how you look. This doesn’t mean you need to wear your most fancy sunglasses or headphones like other players do.

Even tho you are going to encounter everything imaginable at the table, try not to be the table weirdo. So after you have done your exercise and took a cold shower, use deodorant. I can’t describe enough how annoying it is to sit next to a guy that smells like a dump. The same goes for your dental hygiene. Brush your teeth and use bubble gum.

Dress in a standard, casual wardrobe so that you won’t stick out, and you’ll feel comfortable throughout the tournament.

Make sure you have a hoodie or something with long sleeves with you, as it can get cold with airconditioning working all the time.

You can find pictures of the one and only poker brat, Phil Helmuth, wearing different types of uncomfortable apparel in tournaments he played. Can’t imagine sitting in one of those outfits for days and be cozy, right?!

There is no better way to improve at poker, then making connections and surrounding yourself with people with the same interests. You can debate hands and share advice. If you look neat, approachable, and easy to talk to, it will be simpler for you to make new friends with the same passion – poker.

B) If you are playing in an online tournament, always be sure you have a back-up internet connection ready

You have done your daily run, took a cold shower, ate perfectly, and cleared both your schedule and your mind. You feel amazing even tho it’s 3 AM, and you have been playing for 10 hours straight. It’s the final table time. And all of a sudden, the internet goes down.

It can’t be emphasized enough; there is nothing worse when it comes to online poker. Bad beats, coolers, and downswings can be cruel, but disconnecting while thousand of dollars are on the line will stay with you for the rest of your poker career. So make sure you have some sort of back-up internet prepared when your first choice lets you down.

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