Book Reviews: Harrington on Hold'em I & II

Bankroll: $2,557.80

Published on February 8, 2006 By PacDragon In Gaming

I had another good session last night. Won about $70 at $3/$6. I was actually down about $100 for a while, but then managed to win $150 off of just one guy in two hands. He was a total maniac and was capping almost every betting round. At the showdown, the person who made the last bet shows their hand first. The other players only have to show their hands if they can beat the first player. But all that information is stored in the hand history logs. I have some software that goes through those logs and displays their hand on the table for me, so I got to see that he called my final bets with absolutely nothing. That player really made my evening

Later, I won a $5 sit & go, which pushed me up to about $90 for the night.

Over lunch this week, I've been studying Harrington on Hold'em I & II by Dan Harrington. They really are phenomenal books. I read them both a while ago, before I got serious about tournament play, and they definitely helped me start off on the right track. Now that I have some experience under my belt, I'm studying them again to see if I can glean some more information.

Those two books are hands down the best tournament books ever written. Harrington is an amazing player, he won the WSOP main event in 1995 and got to the final table in 2003 & 2004. Each section in the books start off with some great advice, then list a series of poker problems for you to work through. All the problems are taken from actual games and cover the entire gambit of tournament skills. Some of the most valuable problems are where you get the right answer, make the right play, but still lose the hand (or get knocked out of the tournament). It really helps you break out of basing the correct answers on immediate results, instead focusing on making the right decision every time, regardless of the outcome.

The first book covers the skills you need in the early & middle stages of the tournaments. He covers live tournaments, online tournaments, sit & go's, satellites, and a few other tournament variations. Each one requires small adjustments and he teaches you how to make them. Best of all, he teaches you how to think about such things, so that you can make the adjustments on your own while you play.

The second book covers the end stages of the tournaments, like playing near the bubble, short handed play, and heads up play. His most controversial ideas relate to inflection points... the points in the tournament where you must make major adjustments based on the size of the blinds compared to your stack. This was by far the most useful information to have and I'm certain I couldn't have won any of my recent tournaments without that knowledge.

Anyone who is serious about tournament play must read these books. I know most of the players I've seen at the final tables with me have read those books, as they keep quoting things out of it. If you don't know how to adjust your game during a tournament, you'll be at a huge disadvantage against those who do.

I hear he'll be coming out with Volume III eventually, which should be mostly a workbook of problems. I'm eagerly awaiting that next chapter in the series.

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