The Polarised Range

No Limit Holdem / Marcus Bateman / 18 February 2011 / Leave a Comment

Like most poker skill, the reality of analysing polarised ranges lies in the exact same place that all good poker ability lies in – solid player and board analysis.

This is perhaps an overused term in modern poker, but one that frequently comes up in big bet analysis, and one it is important to be familiar with if you are to get maximum value out of your marginal hands. The term 'polarised range' simply refers to a situation where you believe your opponent can only have two possible ranges of holding - total air or a very strong hand.

This usually comes about in pots where your opponent has made a sequence of very strong moves, moves that would make little sense if they were holding a marginal hand that had some showdown value, and only really tells the story of a huge bluff or a big hand. In such spots, any hand of any-kind of decent strength has quite a lot of value for you, as we know from the action that we are probably very far ahead of a decent part of their range (the air part).

The downside of course, is that we are very far behind the other part of their range (the monster part), and consistently paying off players with big hands is clearly a pretty bad idea in the long run. So what are we to do against this mysterious juxtaposition of hand strengths? Like most poker skill, the reality of analysing polarised ranges lies in the exact same place that all good poker ability lies in - solid player and board analysis.

A very tight player who seems virtually incapable of three barrel bluffing for example, does not turn up with polarised ranges very often - they just have the goods over and over again. However, a tricky and thinking loose aggressive player will regularly be creating frequent polarised spots, as their style is dependent on getting action constantly through their habitual bluffing style - something they have to do with air as they are good enough to utilise the showdown value of their marginal hands.

The key area of skill that separates weak players from good is in how much money they win (and fail to lose) with marginal hands. Polarised range spots are a classic example of situations where strong players will frequently win big pots with weaker hands, simply through close observation of the story being told and the player type. Often in poker the action dictates that a player has to either have a huge hand or have nothing, and working out when it is the former and when it is the latter is essential to beating big bet games.