I caught Matt's post about him specializing (making a living) off of heads up sit n go's and I had a few questions about his personal experience with such games.

Coincidentally, last month I decided to focus on this particular type of online poker format. I enjoy facing and dissecting only one opponent at a time (although it can be mentally draining after an hour or so).

So far I have played approx. 150 HU SNG ($10 buy in's) and am up 10 buy ins. During this time I have found myself down 4 buy in's in a row, only to come back and win 3-5 the next time. So even though my sample is VERY small, my experience has been positive (maybe lucky) and seems this type of game you can bounce back relatively quickly from a small loosing streak and doesn't have as much as a negative effect on your bankroll compared to 6 max cash games.

I prefer the new "deep stack" non turbo sit n gos at FT. I can find out more about my opponent with double the normal stack and the same blind structure (although my average finish time is approx. 30 mins)

I also have been watching "livb112" play when available as he has one of the best HU SNG stats I know of. Although he only plays $2000 - $5000 matches, one might think the way he plays isn't applicable to the smaller stakes we play but I don't think that is accurate. Since he is still only facing one opponent (could be just some rich guy who doesn't understand the game) I think everyone can learn from that the same way as if he was playing a $100 match.

I digress, he are some questions for Matt if he would be so kind as to share his experience/insight:

1. Which type of HU SNG's do you prefer and why (i.e. regular, turbo, ect.)?
2. What percentage of your bankroll do you risk?
3. How many buy in have you been down in row & up in a row?
4. When you have a 2-1 or 3-1 chip lead on your opponent, do you go in for the kill with any A, any K, does being suited matter to you or do you wait for something else?
5. Same questions as above but when your opponent has a chip lead on you and you are looking to double up quickly.
6. Do you multitable? (I tried this and found it too fast and hard for me to concentrate and make the right decisions)

Thanks in advance.

Hey Mark,

Firstly with regards to the 4 buy in swings etc, ye 4 is pretty typical of a downswing in hu sngs although occasionally this will go further. Just looking at my sharkscope now, my most consecutive losses is 11 and that has happened a couple of times.
However my most consecutive wins is 22. So whilst 150 buy ins is a very small sample size 4 buy in swings are reasonable and to be up 10 buy ins seems reasonable.

Liv is an exceptionally good player, I've played him a few times at the $200 level a while back and whilst I did get the upper hand in the 5 games we played, he would definitely not be one I chose to sit with in the future. Watching someone like liv play heads up in the big games can be beneficial but just be careful though. At the higher stakes a lot of these guys play each other regularly. You are going to see a lot more "fancy play" that just is not necessary to crush the low limits.

A lot of your questions will be answered in 100x more detail during the video series I am preparing, but in the meantime here is a brief answer for you.

1) I generally prefer turbo because my volume will obviously increase and regardless of what site i play on (either stars or tilt) the rakeback I get or player points etc increases too. However, your ROI will increase, if you are a competent player, at the deep stacked and "no blind increase" games, quite simply because the larger the stacks are, and the less time it takes to get to the shove-fold stage of the tournament (usually 50-100), the more chance you have to outplay your opponent. Basically, the larger your stacks, the bigger your edge.
I know guys who have a super huge ROI playing the no blind increase ones, but you do get matches that can go on for 2 hours+. All of this for $11 is pretty worthless. A good thing to remember is that whilst you might experience a bit less variance at the slower structured games, lets say you get 3 games in an hour and win 2, you are up $20. However even 1 tabling turbo games you should manage at least 5, obviously occasionally you may lose all 5, but in general it will even itself out and you should find that you are up 1 extra buy in.

2) Bankroll requirements for HU are not nearly as big as for tournaments and cash games. This being because of the variance not being anywhere near as high as there are only 2 players. And again, if you are only 1 tabling then this can go down slightly more.
However most people do tend to play 2 tables + so let me set out a little BR requirements thing below for all the turbo levels on stars (I would use the same for the non turbo's, just round it to the nearest game level)

$6 games - 10 buy ins
$11 games - 20 buy ins
$22 games - 20 buy ins
$33 games - 30 buy ins
$55 games - 40 buy ins
$100+ games - 50 buy ins

With regards to dropping down, I would usually do this after dropping back to 20 buy ins for the previous level. So lets say you have a bad run at $11s, drop back down and play $6s at $120.

3) Ye I outlined this one earlier in the thread but i've also won 15+ a couple of times too. Never lost more than 12 though, touch wood.

4) Your question is hard to answer and a bit bland. Really you shouldn't be looking at it in terms of chip lead size because of the blinds. For instance if I have 2200 vs my opponents 800 chips and blinds are 15/30, the last thing I want to do is start getting my chips in with random A's and K's without even seeing the flop.
This is probably the most important part of heads up poker.
As you go through the limits, you will find that more and more of your games get to the shove-fold stage, and knowing how to play that stage of the tournament with none or as little leaks in your game as possible is vital in becoming a solid winning player at hu sngs.
So all I can say at the minute is look forward to the video series for more about this.

5) Again as above, this is gonna be a big part of the video series.

6) Ya I multitable. Usually 4 at a time, it just takes practice to get there. If I am playing 4 mans I sometimes stretch to 6 whilst I wait for the other table to finish, but in general just 4.

Hope that helped.

Matt