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Ken Smith hosts the popular website www.BlackjackInfo.com as well as the online tournament community at www.BlackjackTournaments.com.  Considered one of the best tournament players in the country, he has appeared on TV in GSN' World Series of Blackjack 2004 and 2005, the Las Vegas Hilton Million Dollar Championship II finals, and is also featured in the upcoming Ultimate Blackjack Tour.  You can subscribe to his free email newsletter at http://www.blackjackinfo.com/news/ .

No matter how deeply you dig into this tournament topic of pair splitting, it seems there’s always more to learn. I began my exploration of the topic last month, and this time I’m going to start by extending my analysis to include the optimal play of soft hands after splitting. After that, I’ll show you which pairs should be doubled instead of split.

The question I reviewed last month was how best to play hands after splitting when the player must win both bets. It is also assumed that the player has no bankroll left to get a third or fourth bet on the table by doubling or re-splitting.

My first order of business today is to correct an error in last month’s column. I stated that the rule for optimal play on hand one of the split was simple: Stand on any stiff, except hit 12v7. When I looked back at research results I produced over a year ago, I found that to be incorrect. The 12v7 rule only applies when you’ve split tens, and even then it is incomplete.

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