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People occasionally complain that (for example) $35 is a lot of money to spend on a poker book. My stock reply is that if you learn JUST ONE THING from a book that you subsequently put into practice, then you have almost certainly got your money back. If you learn dozens of things from a book, then… well, you do the maths.

We would like to thank Lew, who has written in explaining how a D&B book made him (or perhaps more accurately, saved him) a decent sum of money in a cash game. Being a sensible sort of person who likes to work on his poker game, Lew has read Jonathan Little’s Mastering Small Stakes No Limit Hold’em and was struck by a piece of advice on page 175, “As when deep stacked, when the initial raiser is tight, you should play a snug strategy. There is no point in trying to bluff someone who has an overly strong range because they will not fold.”

Lew recounts the following hand played at $1/2 with an effective stack of $200.

“The villian is an older gentleman, very tight. He opens my button to $8 from mid position. He folds frequently to three-bets so, with 7♥6♥ I raise him to $25. He calls and the flop comes 5♦J♠2♠. He checks, I c-bet $20 and he calls.

“The turn brings (5♦J♠2♠)T♦ and we both check.

“The river is the 9♠, so now we have a board of 5♦J♠2♠T♦9♠. Everything got there! Flushes, straights and probable two pair hands. The tight gentleman checks to me again.

”So, he has now checked to me three times and there is a very scary run out. I would normally consider this to be a home run bluff but, right in this moment, I thought back to the foresaid quote in Jonathan Little’s recent book. “Can I really get him off an overpair?” I ask myself.

“With the pot at approximately $100, I need to bet big to maximize my chances of getting a fold. But Little’s words kept stubbornly coming back to me… “When the initial raiser is tight, you should play a snug strategy.” After a pause, I check. He shows red queens and I muck. He then turns to me and says “I didn’t want to call, but I sure as hell wasn’t folding!”

WANT TO WIN A $30 VOUCHER TO SPEND ON www.dandbpoker.com ?

All you need to do is tell us about a piece of advice from a D&B book that you can identify as specifically having helped you to improve your game:

• Maybe it helped you to make a better decision in a cash game? • Maybe it enabled you to go deeper in a tournament? • Maybe something else…?

Tell us: 1) Which book it was and the piece of advice. 2) Describe the hand or situation where it helped you.

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Simply send your email to: [email protected] and put ‘ADVICE’ in the subject header. We look forward to seeing your contributions!