A beginners guide to winning poker.

My name is Johan Sunnanängs and I have played poker professionally for fifteen years. The majority of my winnings comes from tournaments and sit and go poker. In this post I'll share a poker strategy for beginners.

I'll use the most popular poker format Texas Holdem as an example in this post. But most of the strategy tips apply just as good to other poker formats also.

Let's start!

My sit and go winrate

1. Play tight poker
Most new poker players make the same big mistake. They play too many starting hands. In order to become a winning poker player you should be very selective about what hands you enter a pot with. That will increase both your win rate and it will also make it easier for you to make the right decisions later during the hand.

Very tight opening range

2. Act last (play in position)
Another very common poker mistake is to not take your position at the poker table into consideration. By playing fewer hands on the worst positions at the poker table (when you act early) you will face much more easy decisions throughout your hand.
You should play most of your hands from the positions called cut off and the button. This is the two spots that act just before the blinds.

By acting after your opponents in the poker hands you will get an advantage over your opponents. Then you have more information every time it is your time to act.

3. Play aggressive
Playing tight poker is a good start. Though you won't become a really great player if you don't also apply a really aggressive playing style. This means that when you play a poker hand you should often also be the aggressor and be in charge of the action. When entering a pot you should most often raise instead of limp. And after the flop you should most often do a continuation or raise your opponents bet most of the time, instead of just calling.

By being the aggressor you have two chances of winning the pot. The opponents could either call and end up showing the best hand. But they could also be folding directly to your bets since they haven't made their hand.

If you instead usually were playing passively and being calling other players raises you can only win the hand in one way. And that is showing up with the best hand at showdown. That is a losing strategy in the long run.

4. Bankroll management
This tips about being patient also applies to bankroll management and how you handle the money you put aside for poker. In order to not play to higher stakes you have to be patient and play the right stakes in relation to your bankroll. You should always have 100 buy-ins or more for the stakes you play.

So if you play 10$ Sit and go's as an example, you should have at least 1.000$ on the best poker sites you play on to merit that.

6. Table selection
This tips applies to the games you are playing. Look for poker games where players are playing the opposite to the poker tips I have stated above in this post. If you see opponents playing really passive poker and playing too many hands you know you are playing good games with poor opponents.

If you, on the other hand, notice that your opponents are playing tight and aggressive poker then you are probably better off looking for other hunting grounds.

7. Bonus tips
If you are really new to the game and don’t want to put your own money at stake yet you can play freerolls and play without risk. On the site PokerFreerollPasswords.com you will get exclusive access to freerolls on many different poker sites. Without any charge.

What´s your best advice?

What is your best advice to new poker players? Please leave a comment if you found this article interesting or if you want to learn more about poker.

See you at the tables!

Best regards

Johan Sunnanangs, founder of PokerCoachO.com.