WSOP +R Turbo

Seats to next level:

1 for every in the prize pool

Are you looking for the craziest route to the WSOP? Because this is about as loose as Abi Titmuss and nearly as much fun. It’s cheap (just over a pound to enter), it’s turbo (which means the blinds go up quickly), and it’s a rebuy. Add these together and you’re left with a field of maniacs.

The great thing about this tournament is that (presuming you don’t keep getting busted), it’s a lot of fun. And the only strategy is to get busy, get hyper-aggressive and hope you get lucky. If you do manage to double or treble through, you can sit back and pick your spots with more care and avoid the maniacs. If you can get to see a flop without gambling all of your chips, and, more importantly, make a hand then you can expect to be paid off with interest.

As soon as the first break arrives (after an hour), you can add-on for another , and then, thankfully, the play tightens up somewhat, although the blinds are huge by this point, so if you start getting short-stacked you’ll need to pick a hand and move all-in. The good news is that with all the rebuys and the add-ons you can expect a fair few seats to the next level. There were 64 available in our tournament, which, with shrewd play, you should hit with ease.

Difficulty rating: ♥♥

The rebuy #2

PokerStars: WSOP +R Turbo

Seats to WSOP:

One for each ,000 in the prize pool (one guaranteed)

A much more serious affair. With a starting stack of 1500, the opportunity for unlimited rebuys in the first hour (again you can opt to rebuy an additional 1500 as soon as you start), and a 2000 add-on after the first hour, this can be an expensive way to try to qualify, although it feeds directly to the Main Event.

There are two ways you can go about it. You can be super-strict with yourself, and limit yourself to a single rebuy or add-on. This is going to mean playing premium hands only, and attempting to double through on more aggressive, deeppocket players. Be prepared to grind it out, and spend a lot of the first hour dodging bullets as the more aggressive rebuy veterans bombard you with chips.

And that’s the other way for you to go. You need to budget, but if you give yourself a few hundred dollars to play with you can play looser and attempt to build up a decent stack of chips to put yourself in a seriously strong position after the break.

There’s a guaranteed single seat to the Main Event up for grabs, but at a rebuy you’re not likely to get many more – you’ll need 400 people who all rebuy at least once to get another. And that makes it exceptionally hard to win, especially if you take the former, thrifty approach. To give you an idea of the amount of luck you’ll need if you don’t get aggressive, after 10 minutes the largest stack was already 10,000. Still, if you’ve qualified through the turbo rebuy, at least you won’t have spent too much cash.

Difficulty rating: ♥♥♥♥