Running Cold

I've been playing some high limit SNG's ($200-500) and running cold. I broadly see 3 "phases" in these tourneys. Phase #1 is "early play", which tends to be ultra-tight in higher stakes SNG's. Phase #2 is when blinds start to become an issue, around 75/150 level because the average stack is ~10x the big blind. This phase is characterized by frequent all-ins and a lot of coin flip/race/suck-out situations. Phase #3, which is the bubble/final is self-explanatory.

My strategy has been to play relatively loose at the beginning, trying to steal blinds and check-raise or steal/continuation bet from position. The idea is to go from a starting stack of 1,500 to 2,000-2,500 chips in 9-ways during Phase #1. Then, switch gears, tightening up in Phase #2 to opportunistically take out small stacks as they become blinded out. The reasoning is that in my experience, most SNG's of this level are so ultra-tight early, that it's easier to pickup "loose change" and give yourself a better opportunity to race against smaller stacks in Phase #2.

Phase #3 strategy requires a further shifting of gears. What has been working is opening up a pot with only 2 to 2.5x BB raises. This coaxes players into re-raising to steal back from you. I create a pattern of folding to these big bets, showing discipline. Even if I pick up AK or a big pair, I only raise 2 to 2.5x the BB and find that I will often get an inferior hand re-raising me all-in frequently enough to make it profitable. Also, you tend to pick up a lot of blinds with only a small raise to keep you afloat, offsetting the dsiciplined folding to all-ins (as noted above). Unless I am short-stacked, I rarely move all-in to open the pot, even if I have less than 10x the BB.

So, the results have been fairly positive in the early and middle phases. I've routinely gotten down to 4-5 players with average or above-average stacks. The problems have come in Phase #3. Most of the time, I'm calling all-in's after small lead-out raises with my exit hands, but losing the races. I went back to my logs and here are the last 8 SNG's I've played and the exit/final hands:

BK vs. Donkey, result
AA vs. K4, lost (finish 3rd)
99 vs. A6, lost (3rd)
AQ vs. AJ, lost (2nd)
AA vs. A3, lost (4th)
KK vs. 9Ts, lost (4th)
AK vs. TT, won (1st)
KQ vs. KJ, won (1st)
KK vs. Q6, lost (4th)

What is not included above are hands earlier in the tourneys that were race situations won, but it's encouraging that the exit hands were all >50% probabilties. Comments welcome.

Online bankroll: $4,930