There are a very wide variety of Sit and Go Strategy guides out there. For the most part, they are pretty much the same thing. A lot of them actually will even cost you money. We are going to give you a free sit and go strategy guide. Make no mistake, we are not claiming to make you thousands of dollars like some people do; but this may be a big help for you. We tried to make it as simple as we could without writing a book or making things confusing - keep it short and simple.
Goals
Obviously the number one goal is to make more money then you lose over the long run. In order to break even, you must cash 50% of the time, assuming that you place 2nd every time. The real goal is to take 1st 2 out of 10 times and take 2nd 3 out of 10 times. Anything better is just a bonus and will probably even out in the long run. If you can achieve your goals then you should be able to make money playing a sit and go over a long period of time. In fact, you should be able to make a lot of money.
This sit and go strategy guide is broken up into 3 different phases. Within each phase, you will have a different strategy.
Phase 1 (Level 1-4)
In the first phase of the sit and go strategy guide you are going to play very tight. The game of choice is a $20+$2 buy-in Turbo Sit'n'Go on Pokerstars. It has to be a turbo for you to really get the best results. Make sure you do not forget that. In the first phase you should fold as many possible hands as you can. The only time you should play is when you have a very premium hand and when you have great position for a cheap price. We will explain the strategy and why it works at the end. For now, just keep that in mind and understand that the more you fold in the beginning, the better. This is actually the opposite of what some sit and go strategy guides will tell you. Phase 1 should go on from level 1-4; which is the first four levels of blinds.
Phase 2 (level 5-7)
For the second phase you are going to play tight/aggressive. You are still going to fold as many times as you can, but when you do play you go all in before the flop. This will allow you to pick up a lot of blinds. When you are called, you will still have the best hand. In this phase you will probably get a caller every once in a while desperate with an Ace 3 or something like that. This is the phase where you will really focus on building up your stack for the end of the tournament. Remember that there are only 5 other players, so your stack is never really as bad as it seems.
Phase 3 (level 8+)
The third phase of the sit and go strategy is the very best phase of all. This is usually the phase where there are only about 3 players left and the one that goes out will end up losing on the bubble. Nobody wants to be the guy who doesn’t make any money. That is the guy who sat there for 45 minutes for nothing at all. You are going to take full advantage of that and turn it up a couple notches.
In this phase, stealing the blinds is the key. You can usually get away with doubling the blinds or making your bet 3 times bigger than the blind and get the blinds. Every time you steal blinds you are making a huge increase in your stack. At this point the blinds are a lot higher then everyone stack. Once again, remember that there were only 5 players besides you. That means that pretty much everyone is going to be in bad shape. At worse, you might be an underdog by 5:1 in chips, which still isn’t that bad.
Be aggressive at the right times, with playable hands. At the same time, you still want to let the other players battle it out when you have a chance. Do not raise every time, only when you feel that it is right. After you start playing you will understand what I mean. People really play like they are scared and they will be glad to give away their big valuable blinds. You just have to be careful of a real hand every now and then. That is just part of the game; and also why you will lose half the time. That is okay though, because you will still end up making money in the long run.
Conclusion
You will definitely have to adjust accordingly. There might be times where your phase 3 will come earlier then you expected. If 3 people get knocked out in the first hand then you will probably have to go straight to the 2nd phase. For the most part, the blinds are really what make the strategy work. That and the pure fact that people are afraid to go out in 3rd place.
