Check-raising the flop

In this lesson

• Build a check-raise range of strong value hands and good draws.
• Find the boards where the caller holds more sets and two pairs.
• Use draws as raises because they keep equity when called.
• Check-raise more often against small c-bets.

Read first: Defending against a flop bet · Advice, not a lock: every lesson opens.

Concepts used: Check-raising, Nut advantage

What a check-raise is for

A check-raise does two jobs at once. It builds a big pot with your strongest hands, and it takes the pot away from a wide betting range with hands that have equity when called. Without the first kind it is a bluff anyone can call down; without the second it is a sign that says you hold the nuts.

In Rail's flop tree the raise is half the pot after the call: against a third-pot bet of about 1.8 bb into 5.5 bb, a raise to about 6.35 bb. As a bluff it needs about 46.5% folds, so the hands that raise as bluffs want equity for when they are called.

Which hands raise

• Value: sets, two pairs, straights, and often the best top pairs.
• Draws: open-enders, combo draws and the strongest flush draws raise a lot; gutshots raise some of the time.
• Not: weak top pairs and middle pairs, which call; and no-pair hands without a draw, which fold.

Which boards

In Rail's solves the big blind check-raises most on low boards, paired boards and middling connected ones, and least on ace-high and monotone boards. The reason is the top of the ranges: on low and connected boards the big blind holds many of the sets, two pairs and straights; on ace-high boards the button holds more of the strong aces, and on monotone boards a raise folds out little and gets called by better flushes.

Against small bets the big blind raises more often than against big ones: a small bet leaves more weak hands in the button's range to punish.

Practising it

The split puts your whole big-blind range facing a small bet on one of the library's flops: put each class into fold, call or raise. Then the drills deal single hands from the same spot, chosen where the solve mixes.

The split and the drills come from Rail's flop library. Your own hands on flops it did not solve are read from the nearest solved flop by hand category.

Rules of thumb

• Raise strong hands for value and good draws as bluffs; call the middle.
• Raise more on low, paired and connected boards; less on ace-high and monotone ones.
• Raise more against small bets than against big ones.
• A raise bluff wants equity when called.

When they break

• Against players who fold too much to raises, raise more of the weaker draws.
• Against players who never fold an overpair, raise fewer bluffs and more thin value.

Example hands

Practice

The lesson is mastered when every exercise below that Rail can grade is passed. Missed items come back later as review cards.