Polarized Ranges vs Linear (Merged) Ranges Explained

If you’ve been around poker for a little while, you have probably heard the terms “polarized” and “linear” when referring to ranges. These are key concepts to know for those who want to crush poker. In this article, you will learn the answers to the following questions: What is a “Range”? What is a Polarized…

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[QUIZ] Can You Ace These 10 Fundamental Preflop Decisions?

preflop fundamentals quiz

Ready to put your preflop fundamentals to the test? This quiz was made with relatively new poker players in mind, but anyone could benefit from a refresher on basic preflop decisions. For each of these questions, imagine that you just sat at a new cash game table with a 100 big blind stack and no…

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Bizarre Multiway Pot Between 3 High Stakes Regs ($28,350 Pot Analysis)

zas vs luckycps vs stefan11222

Nosebleed online poker has been active in 2021. We’ve been tracking some of the craziest hands, as you can see with our first, second and third installments of this four-part series on the craziest cash game hands of 2021. The final hand of this series is a particularly weird one (definitely not solver approved) between…

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3 River Bluffing Tips That Will Help You Smash Cash Games

river bluff tips

Bluffing is the most fun part of poker for some people. For others, it’s the most terrifying part. On the river, when the pot is at its biggest, it can be especially hard to pull the trigger. But you can’t let the fear of getting called deter you from bluffing the river altogether. In order…

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Why You Must Embrace Variance to Succeed in Poker

embrace variance

Nothing invokes larger emotional response to poker players than the word variance. What is Variance? Defined simply as the expected fluctuation of the average result, variance is meant to quantify the uncertainty around a typical outcome generated by the luck of the draw. Stochastic events (such as expected amount of money won, number of times…

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How Would You Play This 6♦ 5♦? (Pro Analysis)

65s how would you play it

Have you ever asked yourself something like… Would a top-level pro have played this hand the same way I just did? If you’re like most poker players, you probably have. Whenever an Upswing Lab member finds themself in a pickle, our Upswing Poker Engage Facebook group is there with like-minded players to help them find…

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Why Was This Pot So Small? (Limitless vs Stefan11222 Analysis)

limitless vs stefan11222

2021 has had some intense high stakes action. This is the second installment of an article series covering the craziest hands since the year began (see part 1 here). Today we’re going to look at another nosebleed hand that took place at the “modest” stake of $50/$100. It’s from a heads-up battle between two high-stakes…

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How to Print Money on Paired Flops as the Preflop Raiser

low boards

Playing well on paired boards is crucial in order to maximize your win-rate. To help with this, cash game pro Fried ‘mynameiskarl’ Meulders launched a learning module in the Upswing Lab course, focusing on how to play paired flops. In this article, you will learn some of the basic principles from this new lesson. I…

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Heads-Up for €29,620 — Should David Lappin Call with Jack-High?

lappin vs sinclair

For my fifth strategy article, I thought I’d put myself on the chopping-block and breakdown a hand from the 2018 Irish Open. I made the final table of the ‘JP Masters’, eventually finding myself heads-up against breakout poker star and WSOP Main Event 8th place finisher Jack Sinclair. The hand is the poker version of…

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This is When (And Why) World-Class Players Overbet the Turn

turn overbetting

I think we can all agree there isn’t anything sexier in poker than a big overbet. (If there is, let me know what in the comments below.) From the early days of high stakes online poker, the overbet was first popularized by online legends like Tom Dwan and Dan “Jungleman” Cates. The strategy behind overbetting…

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Doug Polk Flops a Straight vs Phil Hellmuth — And Lays It Down?!

Last week, Doug Polk was the talk of the poker world for making a massive fold in his debut on High Stakes Poker on PokerGo. Squaring off against the legendary Phil Hellmuth, Polk mucked the second nut straight on the flop — a play that many players wouldn’t even consider. The Hand Blinds: $200/$400 Big…

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You Should Feel Pain While Playing Poker — Here’s Why

If you’re like most poker players, you’ve felt legitimate pain while playing the game. Such pain is usually caused by bad luck, which can come in many forms: Getting the money in as a favorite and losing; Having a long streak of unfavorable results to no fault of our own; or (even more subtly) Running…

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The Craziest High Stakes Online Poker Hands of 2021: Part One

berri sweet vs makeboifin 1200x800-no-read

There has been some crazy high-stakes action since the beginning of 2021. No Limit Hold’em end-bosses have been throwing money around, trying to prove who reigns supreme on the felt. And many of these crazy hands have been anything but “standard.” Because relatively few people have seen these hands, we’re going over the wildest ones…

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