GTO LAB 26 Day Training Plan Review

There’s a version of studying poker that looks productive: watching videos, nodding at solver outputs, maybe running a few hands through a trainer. And then there’s actually getting better. The gap between those two things is usually structure, accountability, and a systematic method for turning theory into real-time decision-making.

GTO LAB 26 Day Training Plan was built to close that gap. Over 26 days, three expert instructors — Nicky P, Ben, and Dan — walk you through the full tournament poker skill stack: from preflop range construction at every stack depth, through the complete postflop fundamental system, into ICM adjustments at the bubble and final table. This is not a collection of concepts. It’s a day-by-day bootcamp with specific sims, training packs, and drill assignments built around each lesson.

This review goes inside the actual course content. Every section below is sourced directly from the modules — no summaries of summaries, no paraphrasing of marketing copy. If you want to know what you’re actually getting, read on.

You can get GTO LAB 26 Day Training Plan at up to 97% off the original price — with a forever license, no subscription — right here at Elite Poker Guide. Check our current coupons page for the best available discount.

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The Course Architecture: What 26 Days Actually Covers

The training plan divides into two major blocks. Days 1–11 are preflop, covering chip EV ranges from 100BB down to sub-25BB, unequal stack dynamics, ICM pressure at the bubble, and final table adjustments. Days 12–26 are postflop, covering c-betting fundamentals in position and out of position across all major position pairs, 3-bet pot strategies, and the mechanics for building a complete flop-to-river game.

Three instructors teach the course. Nicky P (the primary voice, referred to throughout as “ChippyP”) handles most of the preflop and postflop fundamentals. Ben handles final table ICM content — both long-handed and short-handed. Dan steps in for specific spot analyses throughout.

The defining structural feature is the integration of GTO Lab’s trainer and aggregate flop reports directly into each lesson. You’re not just watching — each day ends with a drill assignment using actual solver sims, and the videos teach you specifically how to use the tools to extract patterns rather than memorize individual answers.

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Block 1: Preflop Mastery — The Foundation Everything Else Rests On

The Central Thesis: Preflop Is the Cornerstone of Postflop

Nicky P opens the preflop section with a statement that frames the entire bootcamp:

“Preflop is the cornerstone to becoming a great postflop player. Every time I study, I visualize the preflop range. I force myself to recall it. I ask myself what the prominent offsuit combos and pairs in every range are. That pattern recognition is what unlocks my ability to go postflop and make sense of what I’m seeing.”

This isn’t an abstract philosophy. The course operationalizes it with a specific mental drill: before every postflop study session, close your eyes and visualize the opening range from a given position. Start from the left side of the grid — ace-x offsuit — then move to king-x, queen-x, pairs, then suited hands. Ask yourself first: am I playing this hand? Only after answering that do you ask whether to 3-bet or call.

The practical example from the course: the hijack opens the offsuit 10. The cutoff opens the offsuit 9. The button opens the offsuit 8. These are the bottom of each position’s offsuit opening range — the boundary line that unlocks bluffing logic. If you’re 3-betting from the big blind versus a hijack open, you want your 3-bet bluffs to have a kicker below the hijack’s bottom offsuit pip. That’s why jack-8 suited becomes a premium 3-bet bluff from the button versus the hijack: it’s targeting hands that dominate the hijack’s bottom-of-range opens when he continues.

100BB: Deep Stack Errors and the Mix Problem

At 100BB, the course identifies three population-level leaks:

Early position over-widening. A common mistake is treating under-the-gun-8 and low jack as the same range. Deep stack, those bad offsuit hands — king-jack off, ace-10 off, low suited connectors — compound into trouble spots on high-SPR single-raised pots. Under the gun at an 8 or 9-handed table means playing by the rules. Button means you can exploit population passivity by opening wider.

Missing 3-bet mixes. The most expensive preflop leak isn’t always folding — it’s always calling the comfortable hands. Players consistently call king-10 suited, queen-jack suited, pocket eights because they’re comfortable, and then 3-bet only obvious value or obvious bluffs. The result: when you do 3-bet and have to barrel off, you run out of bluffs by the river. Boards that run out 7-6-5 find you with no coverage. The course states it directly: “If you didn’t start three-betting your 4-5 suited, 6-5, 7-6 in all these different mixes, you’re going to have a lot of problems on a lot of different runouts.”

Big blind under-3-betting. The course emphasizes that the population significantly under-3-bets from the big blind — especially the suited Broadway hands that feel comfortable as calls. At 100BB, the BB’s 3-bet shape is more linear (suited Broadways, suited connectors) because those hands have postflop playability in a 3-bet pot at depth. As stacks get shallower, this shifts toward offsuit garbage with kicker clearance.

Squeezing frequency. A dedicated section covers squeezing as a leak that costs players significant EV. The mechanic: suited Broadways and pocket pairs that need to fold-or-jam are often much higher-EV as squeezes than overcalls. The course is explicit: “A lot of times it’s either slightly or significantly higher EV versus the population to make these squeezes or squeeze jams.” Why? Because players struggle to respond to squeezes with enough aggression — especially when getting shallower and the defense involves jamming ranges.

50BB: Polarity, Stack-Off Thresholds, and the Offsuit Shift

Moving to 50BB introduces the critical SPR mechanic that reshapes preflop construction. As stacks get shallower:

• Suited connectors lose value — they need SPR and multi-street flexibility to realize their equity; a 4-5 suited in a 3-bet pot at 50BB with SPR ~2 has nowhere to go
• High cards gain value — flopping top pair is worth more at shallower SPRs
• 3-bet ranges go more polar and more offsuit — bluffs need kicker clearance, not board coverage
• Stack-off thresholds fall — you’re happy to get it in with hands you’d never stack off deep

The 50BB big blind 3-bet shape versus a button open shows this clearly. At 100BB, you 3-bet suited connectors as bluffs for multi-street playability. At 50BB, those same hands become pure calls (too good to 3-bet-fold, too weak to 3-bet-jam), and your bluffs shift to offsuit garbage — queen-nine off, king-seven off — hands that satisfy the kicker clearance rule and are happy getting jammed on, because they’re never getting it in at depth anyway.

The course identifies a specific population error: players calling queen-jack suited, king-10 suited from the big blind at 50BB because it feels comfortable, then 3-betting only aces and air. The result — no bluffs on certain runouts, opponents who know your 3-bet range eventually stop paying you.

25–40BB: The Jam Region and High-Card Prioritization

At this stack depth, two things happen simultaneously and reinforce each other:

First, raise sizes shrink (2.15x at 30BB, 2x at 25BB). This means the big blind gets a better price and defends wider. If you’re not adjusting your defense versus small raises, you’re folding equity you’re supposed to realize.

Second, jamming ranges expand dramatically. At 30BB from the button, king-10 suited is a jam, not a 3-bet. Jack-10 suited goes in. The course lists the criteria: “Am I going to make a hand that has pretty good equity if I get called? Am I going to make the opponent fold ace-10 off, king-jack off, king-queen off? Those are the big wins.” That clearance mechanic drives jam selection at every shallow depth.

The RFI shift: early position opens start incorporating ace-10 off, king-jack off — hands that were dangerous at 100BB become fine openers when you’re prioritizing top pair value over postflop playability. Meanwhile, low pairs and suited connectors lose ground. On the button at 30BB, you’re still flatting 6-7 suited, 8-9 suited — the price justifies it — but the mental model shifts from “I’ll barrel this off” to “I’ll flop something and navigate a shallow pot.”

Sub-25BB and Unequal Stacks: The Depth Leverage Principle

The final preflop modules introduce one of the course’s most valuable and underappreciated concepts: opening into deeper stacks as a short stack is an advantage, not a disadvantage.

When you’re sitting on 18BB and the blinds are 50BB+ deep with each other, they’re handcuffed. The small blind can’t 3-bet jam you loosely when they’d be going all-in against the big blind if the big blind wakes up behind them. This suppresses their 3-betting frequency, which means your min-raise range can expand significantly — hands you’d never open-jam equal-stacked (queen-jack off, king-eight suited) become profitable min-raises because you simply don’t have to fold-equity them away.

The course puts it cleanly: “If we take a look at the 18 big blind button strat opening into stacks that are over 50 big blinds deep, we see that we are getting to VPIP a lot, and mostly by raising. The same would not be true for everyone being 18 big blinds deep.”

The reverse also applies: when a very short big blind (under 5BB) is at the table, your opening range contracts sharply. You can’t limp-fold against a micro-stack jam. The limps disappear. Ranges tighten. Knowing when you’re the leveraged party versus the constrained party is a tournament-critical skill the course makes concrete.

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ICM Modules: Bubble Play and Final Table Dynamics

The Bubble: Short Stacks Tighten, Big Stacks Exploit

Ben joins for the ICM section with a clear framework: “It all boils down to how good of a hand you need to get it in preflop. That threshold is what dictates all of your strategy.”

At the direct bubble (150 players cash in a 1,000-player field), the dynamics are stark:

• Short stacks tighten RFI dramatically — their job is to min-cash, not accumulate chips. Opening from early position drops from 16% in chip-EV to single digits on the stone bubble
• Big stacks exploit this — button open frequency rises to 60–66% on the direct bubble, specifically targeting stacks that care about cashing
• Mid stacks must navigate both pressures — tighter versus covering big stacks, but still attacking the short stacks that won’t fight back

The critical counterintuitive point the course makes: short stacks still need to fight back against wide big-stack opens. When a chip leader opens 66% from the button, the big blind can’t just fold everything — they still jam suited Broadways, ace-x offsuit, pocket pairs. The course shows exactly: “When you have the squeeze opportunity, you still need to be jamming ace-jack suited, king-jack suited, pocket nines. Not doing so is where you leave money on the table and let big stacks run you over.”

Long-Handed Final Tables (6-9 Players): The Cooperative Passivity Mechanic

Ben’s final table modules introduce the concept of cooperative passivity between big stacks — one of the most missed adjustments in tournament play.

At a 9-player final table with two chip leaders, they’re competing against only 7 other players for pay jumps. Busting each other is expensive. The result: a big stack that would 3-bet small and linear at the bubble now flats more, uses smaller sizes when 3-betting, and slow-plays hands like kings that it would commit with freely in chip-EV play. The course example: at the final table, kings sometimes flat a 3-bet — something that would never happen in chip-EV at the same stack depth.

Conversely, the shortest stacks at the final table actually loosen up relative to the bubble. At the bubble, a short stack is trying to outlast players at other tables. At the final table, there are no other tables. The only way to ladder is for one of the few remaining players to bust — and that player is most likely the other short stack. So both short stacks are incentivized to gamble with each other, not fold into oblivion.

The heuristic: “How much do they cover me by — and how much do they cover me by?” A chip leader with 3x your stack plays differently than a chip leader with 10x your stack. Stack ratios at the final table matter more than raw chip counts.

Short-Handed Final Tables (2-5 Players): When Game Approaches Chip-EV

As you approach heads-up, ICM pressure progressively diminishes because you’re competing against fewer players per pay jump. A 3-handed final table plays closer to chip-EV than a 9-handed final table, even though the absolute dollar amounts are higher.

The course illustrates with a 3-handed sim: a chip leader with 59BB against opponents at 34BB and 27BB opens at nearly chip-EV frequency from the button. This surprises many students who expect the chip leader to go wild — but the math is clear. With two opponents still alive, you’re 50% of who either of them is competing against for the next pay jump. They’re much more incentivized to fight you than at a 9-handed final table where they’d just wait for others to bust.

The actionable takeaway: stop over-adjusting for ICM when you’re 3-handed. Play poker. The money is in the top spots, not in the differences between 3rd and 2nd.

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Block 2: Postflop Fundamentals — The Range-First Method

The Postflop Philosophy: Every Decision Starts with the Range

Nicky P opens the postflop section with the core method that frames all 15 remaining modules:

“Pre-flop is the cornerstone of post-flop play. Every single postflop video I’m going to start by comparing preflop ranges, because that is what drives the postflop strategies. You have to think: what is my range made up of? What is my opponent’s range made up of? That pattern recognition is what gets you from ‘I’m in this spot’ to ‘this is what I do.'”

The practical framework built around this: before analyzing any flop, identify the range imbalance. Who has more offsuit combos of what? Who has more overpairs? Who has the sets? What does the opponent have a lot of that you don’t? Then ask: what does betting accomplish given that imbalance?

The tool the course teaches for this is GTO Lab’s visual range comparison — a side-by-side view of both ranges at any postflop node, broken into equity tiers (90-100%, 75-90%, 50-75%, 25-50%, under 25%). When you can see that you’re crushing the opponent in every tier — more of the best hands, more of the near-nuts, less trash — that’s the green light to bet big and bet often. When the tiers look similar or worse, you’re in a check-heavy or small-bet spot.

C-Betting in Position vs. Big Blind: Board Identification System

The c-betting modules cover three opener positions (UTG-7, hijack, button) against big blind defense at both 50BB and 30BB. The teaching method centers on what Nicky P calls board identification — a three-step process for any board:

Step 1: Where do you check the most? Boards where the big blind has a structural advantage — connected low-to-mid boards like 7-6-3, 8-7-4 — where offsuit connectors the big blind calls pre smash the texture. These are the boards where your wide range from the button meets a surprisingly strong defender.

Step 2: Where do you never check? Paired boards, high-card boards, three-Broadway boards — anywhere your tight early-position range just crushes the big blind’s wider, weaker defense. On ace-king-five from UTG-7, the big blind has almost no aces, fewer kings, and a lot of junk that auto-folds to any bet. Range-bet for small.

Step 3: Where do you bet big? Connectivity between the middle and bottom card is the trigger. Jack-7-3, 9-7-3, 8-5-3 — boards where the big blind has a lot of gut shots and straight draws that you want to charge. The big blind can’t just call small and realize equity cheaply; you force the decision now while your overpairs are still live.

The positional adjustment: as you open from later positions, your range gets wider and weaker. From the button opening 53% of hands, you check more (up to 30%), use small bets more frequently (more middling hands in range), and bet big less often (less of the powerful nutted-range advantage). From UTG-7 opening 16%, you check less, small-bet less, and big-bet far more — because your range is loaded with overpairs and big top pairs the big blind simply cannot have.

At 30BB, the main change is on ace-high boards. The big blind dumps more of their ace-x preflop (jamming it instead of calling). As a result, when an ace flops, you’re massively dominant on that texture — ace-high boards at 30BB versus the button become large-bet, high-frequency situations rather than the small-size range-bet they’d be deeper.

C-Betting vs. Small Blind: The Condensed Flatting Range Problem

The small blind modules reveal one of the most practically valuable insights in the course: playing vs. a small blind flat is fundamentally different from playing vs. a big blind flat, and most players don’t account for it.

The small blind’s flat is one of the tightest ranges in the game. Against a hijack open, the small blind is calling primarily with pocket pairs (twos through eights, primarily) and a selection of offsuit Broadways. They’re not calling king-seven off or queen-four suited. That condensed range has a major structural property: when it hits, it hits hard. When it misses, it misses completely.

The consequence for the c-bettor: on certain boards, the small blind has crushed you. Queen-jack-nine from the button after a small blind flat — the small blind’s range, which is dominated by pocket pairs and the few Broadways they called with, actually smashes this board. The course shows the equity calculation: the button’s range advantage, which is enormous versus a big blind flat, essentially disappears on high-card coordinated boards against a condensed small-blind range.

The adjustment: on boards where the small blind connects strongly, check more. On boards where they miss (three low disconnected cards, paired boards), bet more — because their range of pocket-pair-heavy hands folds heavily or is easily dominated.

The course makes the comparison explicit: button opens 53%, small blind flats with ~15% of hands on some sim. On king-queen-eight from the button: small blind has more top pair, more second pair, more third pair than you do. Your overpairs are good, but you have a lot more king-high and ace-high garbage. This board is a heavy-check spot for the c-bettor — counterintuitive until you account for the range mismatch.

Defending the Big Blind and Small Blind: The Stickiness Principle

The defensive modules cover both stack depths and multiple board textures with a recurring theme: most players are not sticky enough on the flop.

Ben (on the big blind defense modules) frames it this way: when you face a c-bet with a hand you’re going to continue with on most runouts anyway, the question isn’t whether to continue — it’s whether to continue aggressively. The course shows that a king-seven on king-seven-deuce rainbow against a button small c-bet: you don’t just flat, you’re supposed to check-raise with significant frequency. Not because you have the nuts, but because your entire continue range is actually strong enough to play aggressively once you’ve removed all the obvious folds.

The key pattern: on dry boards, float freely. On dynamic boards, raise for protection and value with hands that look uncomfortable. The course example: on king-seven-deuce rainbow vs button, second pair (sevens) check-raises for protection, not because it’s a monster. When you check-call instead, you put yourself in a position where you get barreled off on turns without good equity, or you check down to a river where you have no legitimate bluffs.

At 30BB, the aggressive threshold lowers further. Ben notes: “The disadvantage of being out of position is reduced as you get shallower because there’s less money to go in on future streets. The SPR is shorter, so the IPR is shorter as well. Folding to their turn barrel isn’t as catastrophic.” You can check-raise wider, stack off lighter, and build your range around the assumption that getting all-in is not the catastrophe it would be at 150BB.

3-Bet Pots: The SPR Is the Strategy

The 3-bet pot section (Days 21–26) introduces the concept that defines all decisions in these spots: at 50BB in a 3-bet pot, SPR is approximately 2.3. Everything follows from that.

Dan walks through the implications systematically:

• Pot control doesn’t exist. All the money is going in over 2-3 streets regardless of what you do on the flop
• Stack-off thresholds are low. You don’t need a strong hand to commit — getting all-in with top pair is often unavoidable
• The key strategic implication: slow-play your very strong hands, fast-play your medium-strong vulnerable hands.

The reasoning: a set on a dry board at SPR 2.3 doesn’t need to raise a c-bet to get stacks in. There are two streets left, easy enough to get all-in. But jack-10 on a connected board — vulnerable, beatable, but ahead of a lot of bluffs — needs to raise now, because if it doesn’t, it’s getting stacked on turns where it’s often no longer ahead. By raising, you protect, you define, and you build the pot on the street where you’re still most likely to have the best hand.

The most common 3-bet pot error the course identifies: players face a c-bet, call with kings (trapping), and then get into a three-street guessing game where they never build the pot correctly. The correct play — calling kings and raising jack-10 — feels backwards until you internalize the SPR mechanic that makes it optimal.

As the 3-better (small blind), the c-betting strategy shows four board types: heavy check (connected mid boards — you’re setting up favorable SPR for overpairs, not playing defensively), small bet (high-card dry boards — you dominate, charge draws cheap), big bet (boards where the opponent is inelastic to bet size, best to front-load value), and complex (everything mixed, difficult to execute, advanced only).

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The Training Method: How to Use the Course

The bootcamp’s design philosophy is explicit throughout: you are not supposed to memorize solver outputs. You’re supposed to build pattern recognition — the ability to look at a position pair, a stack depth, and a board texture, and quickly reconstruct what the ranges want to do without consulting a sim.

The three-step process Nicky P repeats at the start of every module:

1. Preflop range imbalance. Visualize both ranges. What does each player have a lot of? What are the key structural differences in offsuit combos and pairs?
2. Aggregate flop reports. Use the built-in tool to find: where do you check most? Where do you never check? Where do you bet big? Don’t memorize specific boards — find the patterns that explain the groupings.
3. Board identification drill. Pick 3–5 boards, run through the equity tier comparison (use the hover tool to see both ranges visually), and ask: what am I accomplishing by betting? What am I targeting? What does the right amount of money look like with this range?

The aggregate filter tool gets specific instruction: how to cross-check two stack depths by filtering for board type (ace-high boards, straight-completing boards, board pairs) and directly comparing the strategy output. When the outputs look the same, the stack depth change doesn’t affect that board type — move on. When they diverge sharply, that’s where your study attention belongs.

The course explicitly warns against one failure mode: getting obsessed with specific percentages. “If you’re starting to look at these little percentage differences and you’re just like ‘it’s telling me I’m making a mistake because I bet quarter pot when it wants me to bet 40%’ — that’s the trees. You’re missing the forest. The forest is: understand range interaction, understand what your range wants to do for sizing and frequencies.”

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Who Is This Course For?

The 26 Day Training Plan is explicitly designed for tournament players who have foundational poker knowledge but are not yet fully systematic in how they study or play. It assumes you can navigate a solver interface, understand basic range concepts, and have played enough live or online tournaments to recognize the spots being discussed.

It is not an intro course. Players who are still working out what hands to open from which positions will find the preflop content useful but may need supplemental foundational work first. Players who already have solid range construction but lack postflop structure — specifically around the range-first method and board identification — will find the postflop block immediately applicable.

Tournament players will get the most out of this course. The ICM modules, final table dynamics, and short-stack theory are MTT-specific. Cash game players can extract the preflop and postflop fundamentals (which are mostly chip-EV based), but the course is built for the tournament structure.

If you’re building out a broader GTO study program, the 26 Day Training Plan pairs well with:

• GTO LAB MTT Poker Coaching — for personalized feedback on specific leaks the bootcamp surfaces in your game
• GTO LAB Tournament Savagery — the aggressive push strategy complement to this more fundamentals-focused plan. Read the Tournament Savagery review for a full breakdown

Browse the full GTO LAB course library to see how the 26 Day Training Plan fits into the broader curriculum.

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Where to Get GTO LAB 26 Day Training Plan

The retail price of this course through the original publisher runs into the hundreds of dollars. At Elite Poker Guide, you get the identical full content — forever license, instant download, no subscription, no recurring fees.

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