Quiz 6 – A Level Exam 3

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Once again you will be seated at the table in an actual game and presented with a situation that has numerous possibilities and ways forward. For the purposes of this test, you do not know anything about any of the players as you have only just sat down. Cover the answers with a sheet of paper and rate your score at the end oh and by the way….good luck!

In this month’s exam, you are sat on a £10-£20 game of No Limit Hold’em and you have exactly £2700 on the table which is about an average sized stack for a cash game of this size. You are in middle position and you look at your cards to see two lovely red kings staring back at you. The player under the gun has raised to £60 and it is folded around to you, away you go tiger.

Anyone who only called, contact your doctor immediately because your head needs examining. Just what are you trying to do here? Do you seriously think that you are being cute by disguising your hand?. The deep stacks who are yet to speak after you can call with a wide range of holdings and they will have position over you.

There are just too many scenarios where calling with the cowboys can get you into serious trouble. Not to mention that if someone calls with an ace in their hand and an ace hits, you have just been out flopped. The original raiser could well put you on a hand much weaker than a pair of Kings. But even if you made the correct choice is re-raising, remember that this is No-Limit Texas Hold’em so how much did you re-raise? Take an extra 5 Bonus Points if you raised an amount that is roughly equivalent to the pot.

You decide to maximise the power of your kings so you re-raise to £250 (slightly more than the pot) and your opponent calls the re-raise. There is now £530 in the pot and just the two of you left. Your opponent has less than you in chips with precisely £1850 and you have £2450 left on the table.

The flop comes As-10s-8c putting straight and flush draws on the board as well as the dreaded ace over card. Your opponent checks, don’t let me down now will you?

Yes the ace is a scare card for you because your opponent was a pre-flop raiser and he raised from early position. But it works both ways as well, your re-raise will have planted the thought of an ace in your opponents mind as well and you are well placed to represent it. It would be very difficult for your opponent to call here without having at least top pair or some other strong holding. If you check, it is possible that your opponent may think that you are lying in wait trying to get him to bet with a monster it all depends on his mindset.

More likely that he will think that you are weak yourself and he may bet the turn. You realise what has happened now, your opponent bets the turn and you are not sure if he really has a hand or whether he is betting purely because he thinks that you are scared of the ace based on your flop check. If you bet the flop and are raised then you can simply lay the hand down. Your opponent may be putting a play on you but can you risk almost your entire stack to find out.

You have no information on the guy so it would be hard to tell at this stage just what he was up to.

So now that we have ascertained that you must bet, how much do you bet here?

All in, you idiot! He knows perfectly well that your pre-flop re-raise signals a monster and that you have likely connected with this flop. What if he is sat there with 10-10 or A-K. Betting half the pot or less looks like you are not confident about your hand and he could call on suspicion or try to take the pot away from you with a raise which would be a shame because he could get you to lay down the best hand (presuming that you are a good enough player to lay down the best hand that is).

Betting more than the pot is not a bad answer as long as it is not to much more. About two thirds to three quarters is enough to let your opponent know that you are serious about your hand. Beware though of getting into recognisable betting patterns with certain types of hand, your alert opponents will quickly cotton on to this. So you fire £400 into this £530 pot and your opponent thinks for ages before reluctantly calling the £400. The pot now stands at £1330 and you have £2050 left to your opponents £1450. The turn card brings the jack of spades to make a total board of As-10s-8c-Js. Your opponent checks again, come on Maverick!

Don’t be fooled by the reluctant call on the flop, this tends to be a sign of strength with many people. I mean just look at that board, even if he called with a draw then the jack of spades may have just put the boot into your chances of taking this pot as it has just completed many draws. You cannot really eliminate any hand from hitting him just because he raised from early position, remember that we don’t know anything about him yet. I admire your courage if you decided to bet here or were you riding with the six hundred into the valley of death. So we check it straight back and the river card brings the eight of hearts to make a final board of As-10s-8c-Jc-8h. Your opponent moves all in for his remaining £1450, is he bluffing? You have come this far, don’t spoil it now.

Your opponents play and actions indicate a powerful hand and your pair of Kings are looking a bit sick here. In fact they were looking distinctly under the weather when your opponent called the flop bet. His bet is not a bluff but he is hoping that you either think it is or you have a hand powerful enough to reward him with an extra fourteen hundred quid. He has put you to a test but your hand coupled with the play so far really should make the act of folding automatic. Just take the loss and use that £1450 wisely because you may just double up with that on the very next hand. You cannot double up with what you haven’t got.

You decide to wisely fold and your opponent very kindly shows you 10-10 for a full house, awfully nice of him but watch for him trying to move you off hands in the future now he knows that you know this.
55 What did you just say……..you play professionally!

45-54 Wow….That’s good!

35-44 Decent performance, you are nobody’s pushover are you!

25-34 I hope that this was because you were distracted

15-24 If you are trying to climb the poker ladder……keep working at it!

Less than 15 Are you still at school

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