Advanced Poker Strategy Articles
Popular Advanced Articles
Building Bluffing Ranges Like the Pros: A Guide to Smarter 3-Bets
Today, solid preflop strategies are part of the tournament poker zeitgeist. (Don’t worry—set-mining doesn’t make you a fish.) That said,…
How to Play Flush Turns After Check-Raising (Advanced Strategy)
As you probably know, having a well-balanced check-raising range makes you a really tough opponent to play against. The reason…
5 Advanced Poker Strategies & Tips To Supercharge Your Poker Wins
Ready for some advanced nuggets of poker wisdom that will help your game? For today’s article, I dug through Upswing’s…
All Advanced Poker Articles
Lose Less, Win More: The Fundamentals of Big Blind Defense
When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. And in tournament poker, there are a lot of lemons. Being card…
Stop Playing GTO Against Blinds That Fold Too Much
Contrary to popular belief, preflop No-Limit Hold’em is not “solved”. Not in the sense that we don’t have GTO sims…
Single Board Bomb Pots – The Complete NLH Strategy Guide
On this page What Is a Single-Board Bomb Pot? Where You’ll Find Them Why Bomb Pots Play Differently Flop Strategy:…
3 Common Spots Where Poker Players Aren’t Aggressive Enough
Passivity gets a bad connotation in general, and it’s for a good reason. Passivity means accepting what happens without active…
3 Hidden River Mistakes That Are Costing You Money
The river is the street where the gap between what you see in GTO models and what happens in reality…
Garrett Adelstein’s 5 Live Poker Tips To Boost Your Win Rate
Do you play live poker? Then this one’s for you. Garrett Adelstein is the most feared livestream player of all…
Sneak Peek Inside Destroy Live Cash by Garrett Adelstein
Most live pros wait for the fish to make a mistake. Garrett Adelstein attacks the whole table. Here’s how he…
3 Flop Mistakes You’re Making Without Knowing It
The flop is the second most common node you will play (after preflop), and decisions here have big ramifications for…
Why Garrett Adelstein’s “I’ve Got It” Speech Play Backfired
This hand comes from Garrett Adelstein’s book, Beneath the Cards, which was released today, September 1st! The memoir goes beyond…
Garrett Adelstein Had the Perfect Bluff-Catcher. He Folded Anyway.
Garrett Adelstein had reached the river with Ks Jc on Jd 2d 2s 9h Kc and bet $25,000 for value…
Aces vs Kings, 500 Big Blinds Deep: Can Garrett Get Away?
By Duncan Smith · Online Cash Game Pro Garrett Adelstein has Kh Kc in a 4-bet pot; the flop comes…
Too Weak to Call, Strong Enough to Raise: Garrett Adelstein’s $60K Bluff
By Duncan Smith · Online Cash Game Pro Garrett Adelstein had already become one of the biggest winners on Hustler…
Garrett Adelstein Was Sure His Opponent Couldn’t Bluff. He Was Wrong.
By Duncan Smith · Online Cash Game Pro Garrett Adelstein had already become one of the biggest winners on Live…
How Garrett Adelstein Used a Weak Player to Bluff Patrik Antonius
By Duncan Smith · Online Cash Game Pro Garrett Adelstein had not played poker in more than a year when…
Garrett vs Dwan: 4 Lessons From a High-Stakes Cash Game Hand
By Duncan Smith · Online Cash Game Pro Garrett Adelstein recently broke down a fascinating hand against Tom Dwan from…
Why Milestone Satellites Require a Different Poker Strategy
Moneymaker. The Poker Boom. Do you know what they have in common? Satellite tournaments. Moneymaker’s historic run began in an…
3 Times You Should Bet Big on the Turn (And 3 Times You Shouldn’t)
Sizing your bets optimally on the turn can help you win more money when you are ahead and lose less…
3 Cash Game Exploits That Print Against Today’s Regs (Backed By Data)
I shouldn’t be giving this away for free, but you’re getting lucky today. If you want to make money playing…
Mystery Bounty Strategy: How to Attack Once the Bubble Bursts
A sigh of relief. A thrill of hope. Could this be the day? That’s how surviving a money bubble can…
Garrett Adelstein Breaks Down His $390K Payback Hand Against Dylan Gang
By Duncan Smith · Online Cash Game Pro Some poker hands become memorable because of the money. Others stick around…
Unlocking the Mystery: Early Stage Mystery Bounty Tournament Strategy
Over the last five years or so, Mystery Bounty tournaments (MBs) were introduced to the live poker ecosystem. They continue…
Daniel Dvoress Wins Three Triton Titles as Modern Tournament Mastery Launches
Daniel Dvoress picked a pretty good time to have one of the best tournament runs of his career. With Modern…
How to Defend Against Large Flop C-Bets in Poker Tournaments
By Leo Song-Carrillo · MTT Pro Being on the receiving end of a large flop c-bet can feel intimidating in…
Sneak Peek: Modern Tournament Mastery w/ Tim Adams & Dan Dvoress ft. Stephen Chidwick
Tournament poker has a way of making every serious player feel behind at some point. You can study for months,…
Timothy Adams Breaks Down ChatGPT’s Poker Logic
Timothy Adams and Mike Brady recently sat down to review a handful of hands played by Mike’s friend Stu, and…
How Timothy Adams Attacks from the Big Blind (And Why Most Players Don’t)
One thing that becomes very clear early in Upswing’s Modern Tournament Mastery is that while the course is built by…
How Timothy Adams Approaches Deep Stack Tournament Poker
Timothy Adams has spent years playing the toughest tournament fields in the world, and one thing comes through very clearly…
Four Doug Polk MTT Hands Reviewed by Two of The Best Tournament Players Ever
Doug Polk built Upswing Poker, but he’s still best known as a heads-up cash game specialist. That’s what makes his…
Garrett Adelstein Analyzes a Massive Bluff Gone Wrong
In today’s article, we’re going to get Garrett’s perspective on a hand he played on High Stakes Poker against and…
Sneak Peek Inside Crushing PLO Tournaments with Dylan Weisman
PLO tournaments are still one of the softest formats in poker. The fields are weak, the prize pools are huge,…
ICM vs Chip Leader: How Dylan Weisman Navigates a Tough PLO Final Table Spot
In this preview from his upcoming Crushing PLO Tournaments course on Upswing, Dylan Weisman walks through a hand from a…
Play More Hands, Win More Pots: 5 Tips for PLO MTT Success
Pot-Limit Omaha (PLO) tournaments are a completely different animal from No-Limit Hold’em. If you try to carry over your standard…
How Double Board Bomb Pots Actually Work (And Why Most Players Get Them Wrong)
Bomb pots have become a staple in modern poker. Whether you’re playing in private games, apps, or live settings, you’re…
Inside a $30K CGWC Pot: TaxHere vs Jasamgale Hand Analysis
The 2025 Cash Game World Championship (CGWC) has provided us with many jaw-dropping hands, with players taking lines with hands…
5 Things You Should Be Doing BvB (But Probably Aren’t)
In poker, particularly online, where blind-versus-blind (BVB) situations arise frequently, developing a strong BVB strategy is essential to maintaining a…
When Betting Bigger Is the Solver-Approved Play In Tournaments
Big hand. Big bet. Usually. In the pre-solver era, continuation betting for half pot was fairly common, if not the…
Inside a Championship Hero Call: A Street-by-Street Analysis from the 2025 CGWC
In this article, I am going to break down a big hero call that went down in the 2025 Cash…
The River Block Bet: Why Small Bets Can Be Your Biggest Edge
The river block bet is a solver-derived discovery that revolutionized poker strategy. I will break down why that is and…
5 Situations Where C-Betting Is a Big Mistake in Poker Tournaments
C-betting is super effective in MTTs, so it’s no surprise that it happens so frequently. On average, after you open-raise,…
The Next Step After Range Checking: Turn Strategy (Part 2)
In the previous article in this series, you learned that low, connected boards are best played by checking your entire…
How to Play the Turn After Range Checking the Flop (Part 1)
Some time ago, I wrote about a few spots where checking your entire range on the flop is the right…
3 Concepts That Should Shape Your Postflop Strategy
Are you familiar with positional, range, and nut advantages in poker? These concepts will help you shape your postflop strategy…
From Satellite to Chip Leader: A Day 1 Among the Poker Elite in a $26,000 Event
I am a mid-stakes MTT player. Frankly, I have no business going toe to toe with the poker elite. But…
3 Reasons Solvers Check Top Pair Out of Position in Tournaments
You flopped a pair. In fact, the strongest kind. Even the highest ranking. Now it’s time to work out exactly…
Mastering Preflop 3-Bets: Value, Bluffs, and Exploits
3-betting preflop is a fundamental strategy for winning at poker. Getting it right is also easier than ever, thanks to…
Slowplaying in MTTs: Three Spots Where It Prints Chips
Slowplaying a big hand isn’t optimal… usually. When you have a big hand, you want to make the pot big.…
MTT Survival Guide: The Right Way to Defend Against Turn Probes
Well, you checked back the flop like an intelligent, disciplined, strong poker player. But now they’re reaching for chips… They’re…
PR0DIGY vs Riggedeck: A $35,000 Hand Breakdown from the Cash Game World Championship
As we steam ahead with the 2025 Cash Game World Championship (CGWC), I am going to break down a hand…
LLinusLLove vs Kevin Paqué in a CGWC High-Stakes Showdown
We got a blast from the past in this article. Well, it’s not quite so far back in the past,…
Check-Raised the Flop? Here’s What to Do When the Turn Pairs
In the previous part of this series, we looked at how to approach unpaired brick turns. Now it’s time to…
We’re Cutting Prices for Cyber Monday (25% Off Everything)
The 2025 Black Friday / Cyber Monday Sale is over. We’ll see you 2026 with more sales and more killer…
5 Situations Where C-Betting Will Burn You
C-betting is a fundamental part of playing good, solid, winning poker. There are many situations where c-betting frequently is the…
Unleash Your Potential with Lucid Poker
This will change your poker game for the better. Lucid Poker Version 3.0 launches on November 10, offering a faster,…
5 Solver Strategies That Crush in Theory (and Crash in Real Life)
If you’ve spent any time studying with solvers, you know how powerful they are. Tools like Upswing’s Lucid Poker can…
Outplaying the Reckless Player: Mastering Turn Probes After Missed C-Bets
In the first part of the series, I covered the most common opponent type – the risk-averse player profile. In…
The Hidden Mechanics of C-Betting: Lessons from Phemo
What Is a C-Bet? A continuation bet, or c-bet, is a follow-up bet made by the player who took the…
What to Do After You Check-Raise the Flop and the Turn Bricks Out
In this part of the series, we’re going to cover how to play on blank turns. We’ll start with the…
MTT Preflop Strategy: Turning Flat-Calls from Leak to Weapon
Most losing players aren’t bleeding money because of massive, obvious mistakes. It’s the small, repeated errors that make or break…
Your Opponent Checked Back—Here’s How to Capitalize (Part I)
Over the years, I’ve mostly focused on how to play as the aggressor, particularly on the flop. That stage is…
Check or Bet? How to Build Strong Flop Check-Back Strategies in Tournaments
Let’s face it. Checking back stinks, doesn’t it? It can feel even worse than folding — the most cowardly act…
Poker Training Course: Upswing Lab 2.0
Enjoying the free strategy articles, but want to take your game to the next level? Upswing has a poker training path for you in the new Lab 2.0, the Mastery Path has advanced curriculum from some of the world's best coaches including Uri Peleg and Qing Yang. Lab 2.0 gives you a clear path to sharper and more profitable play.
Enjoying the free strategy articles, but want to take your game to the next level? Upswing has a poker training path for you in the new Lab 2.0, the Mastery Path has advanced curriculum from some of the world's best coaches including Uri Peleg and Qing Yang. Lab 2.0 gives you a clear path to sharper and more profitable play.