Are standard pre-flop raises effective in Turbo SNG’s?

As a regular player in the low-limit Turbo Sit and Go games at Full Tilt, I often see players making standard raises and getting 3-4 callers. Is this a symptom of the accelerated environment or simply bad players that don’t respect standard 3X-4X raises? The short answer is no, or yes depending on who you ask or when you play in one of these games. The full answer, like most answers to poker strategy questions, depends on many factors and without a crystal ball it’s almost impossible to discuss every situation that you may see at one of these tables.

Inexperienced players in Turbo Sit and Go tournaments will often play too many hands and as a result, call too many raises pre-flop in the hopes of getting lucky and busting someone. The downside to this is that they will ultimately look down at their chip count and see that they’ve bled off a quarter of their stack without winning a single hand. So how do you combat these players to keep them from chasing poor hands? There are a number of techniques but in reality you do want them to call your raise pre-flop if their tendency is to do so with poor starting hands. What you DO want to avoid is getting 3-4 callers and the best way to do that is make larger than standard raises. My experience has been that a 5X-6X raise is appropriate, especially early in the SNG.

Of course this becomes very difficult when the blinds are 100-200 and you have 1,700 chips. You’re essentially committing the rest of your stack by putting in a pre-flop raise of 1,000 chips (5X). With this in mind you should be ready to push and pray if you really like your hand. In the Turbo SNG events you must make this adjustment to your game play. The games are designed to encourage quick play and a fast conclusion so actually this strategy isn’t unusual at all. So the next time you play a Turbo Sit and Go at a site like Poker Stars, keep this strategy in mind and just be prepared to make a quick exit or a quick win in the process!