HPD study room · Courchevel rules
Courchevel rules: see one flop card before preflop betting
Mara lifts the corner of a cloth, and the HPD spade leans in with a magnifying glass. A little early information is worth noticing. Courchevel gives everyone that early look: the first flop card is exposed before the preflop betting round. You still receive five private cards, and your final hand must use exactly two of them with exactly three community cards.
Mara is our teacher. She will take you through a complete deal, then six paper exercises about the mistakes this game invites. Ace has already volunteered to use every card in sight. We will politely stop him.
The examples use a standard deck and invented hands. Any chip amounts are classroom units with no cash value. The illustrations tell the story; the card lists and tables carry the exact information. You can do every exercise with a pencil, without joining a game or spending money.
Jump to the deal, two plus three, using the exposed card, full houses, board straights, high and Hi/Lo, or pot-limit sizing.
The first card belongs to the flop
Courchevel has five community cards in total. The early face-up card is the first of those five, not a sixth card, a private bonus card, or an extra betting street. After the opening betting round, two more cards complete the three-card flop. The turn adds one card and the river adds one more.
The opening round is still called preflop even though part of the flop is visible. That name can feel odd on your first hand. Read it as “before the complete flop.” There are normally four betting rounds if the hand reaches the river: opening, flop, turn and river. A hand can end sooner when everyone but one player folds.
In a game with three or more players, the opening action starts with the active player clockwise from the big blind. On later streets it starts with the first active player clockwise from the button. Heads-up has its usual blind-order exception: the button is the small blind and acts first before the flop, then last afterwards. A face-up card does not move the button or change whose turn it is.
Here is a complete teaching runout. The five private cards stay the same throughout: 9♣ 9♦ A♠ K♣ Q♥. A means ace, K king, Q queen, J jack and T ten. The suit symbols are ♠ spades, ♥ hearts, ♦ diamonds and ♣ clubs.
| Moment | New public cards | Public cards now visible |
|---|---|---|
| Before the opening betting round | 9♥ | 9♥ |
| After the opening betting round | 6♠ 2♦ | 9♥ 6♠ 2♦ |
| After flop betting | J♥ | 9♥ 6♠ 2♦ J♥ |
| After turn betting | 4♣ | 9♥ 6♠ 2♦ J♥ 4♣ |
Before the opening action, your pocket nines match the exposed nine. That is useful information about a three-of-a-kind structure. But you cannot yet lay out a complete legal five-card Courchevel hand: only one community card is visible, and a completed hand needs three. Avoid treating a promising beginning as a finished result.
Exercise 1. After the opening round, how many new cards complete the flop? At the river, select the best legal five-card hand from the private cards and the full board above. Does the private ace become your kicker?
Reveal exercise 1: follow the deal, then choose the kickers
Two new cards complete the flop. There was already one card on the board, so the public total becomes three. The later jack and four bring that total to five.
The river hand is 9♣ 9♦ from your private cards plus 9♥ J♥ 6♠ from the board. That makes three nines with jack and six kickers. On the flop, the same private pair used 9♥ 6♠ 2♦. The turn improves a kicker, and the river changes nothing about this player’s best five.
The A♠ cannot join the pair of private nines. That would use three private cards. Choosing the ace instead of one nine is legal, but gives up three of a kind and produces a weaker hand. A card being the highest in your hand does not guarantee it a place in your final five.
Choose two private cards, then three board cards
Five private cards give you ten possible pairs to try. On a complete five-card board, there are ten possible groups of three community cards. That means 100 legal two-plus-three selections to compare. You do not need to count them during play. The count explains why a quick glance at the prettiest-looking cards can miss the answer.
For paper practice, make two separate rows. Keep your five private cards in one row and the board in another. Circle two cards in the first row, then three in the second. Only after that should you name the hand. If you cannot point to both private cards and all three board cards, the claimed hand is not ready to compare.
This selection rule also applies in five-card Omaha. The distinctive Courchevel lesson is when you first see a community card. Learning that timing matters just as much as remembering that five cards were dealt to you.
A flush is a good place to test the selection habit. A board full of hearts looks persuasive. The board cannot lend you a fourth heart, though, because your final hand uses only three board cards. You must contribute two hearts from your private cards to make a heart flush.
| Private cards | Complete board | Question |
|---|---|---|
| A♠ K♦ Q♣ J♥ 9♣ | 2♥ 4♥ 7♥ T♥ 6♠ | What is the best legal high hand? |
Exercise 2. The spade points to J♥ and all four board hearts and announces a flush. Check the card sources before accepting the announcement. Then find the actual best hand. This is a high-only example.
Reveal exercise 2: one private heart is not enough
The proposed J♥ 2♥ 4♥ 7♥ T♥ uses one private card and four board cards, so it is illegal. There is no second private heart available. No legal selection makes a flush.
The best high hand is A♠ K♦ with T♥ 7♥ 6♠: ace high, followed by king, ten, seven and six. There is no pair and no legal straight in this deal. The queen and jack in your private row cannot both be added to the ace and king just because they are higher than the board kickers.
Write the answer as “private A♠ K♦; board T♥ 7♥ 6♠.” That short audit trail is more useful than simply writing “ace high.” It shows why the hand is legal and where a tempting alternative went wrong.
You may leave the early card out of your final hand
Everyone sees the exposed card before acting, but nobody must use it at showdown. Its special role is the timing of the information. Once the full board is dealt, it is one of five community cards from which you choose three.
Keep that distinction in mind when a later runout changes the hand. The card that caught your attention at the beginning may be irrelevant to your best five at the end. Conversely, an ordinary-looking first card can become part of a strong hand once the other board cards arrive. Do the final selection again rather than preserving your opening story.
| Part of this deal | Cards |
|---|---|
| Private cards | A♠ K♠ Q♦ J♣ 9♦ |
| Exposed before the opening betting round | 2♦ |
| Remaining flop cards | Q♠ J♠ |
| Turn | T♠ |
| River | 3♣ |
Exercise 3. Can the player make a royal flush even though the exposed 2♦ is not a spade? Choose the exact private pair and the exact board trio. Then explain what would be wrong with insisting on using the first card.
Reveal exercise 3: the first card is optional at showdown
Use private A♠ K♠ and board Q♠ J♠ T♠. These five cards are an ace-high straight flush, commonly called a royal flush. The selection uses exactly two private cards and three community cards.
The early 2♦ and the river 3♣ are both left out. Nothing about the first card’s timing reserves it a compulsory place in the final hand. Forcing it into the selection would needlessly replace one of the three useful spades.
The player still had to make earlier decisions with the information available then. Seeing the completed answer does not tell us that every earlier call or raise was good. This exercise settles hand construction, not the profitability of an action taken before the turn arrived.
A paired board still needs a legal full house
A full house contains three cards of one rank and two of another. In Courchevel, the source of those cards matters as much as the shape. A paired board can help a private pair become a full house, but the phrase “the board paired” does not by itself describe your hand.
For this exercise, keep the private pair of aces together while you look for three useful board cards. Then try another private pair and see what you lose. This slow comparison is a good cure for choosing the largest individual ranks without checking how they work together.
| Private cards | Exposed first | Full board |
|---|---|---|
| A♠ A♦ K♣ Q♣ 7♦ | A♥ | A♥ 8♠ 8♦ 2♣ 3♥ |
Exercise 4. Name the best high hand and list the five cards. The spade says “I have three aces, so my king is the kicker.” Is that an accurate description of this finished hand? This deal is labeled high-only.
Reveal exercise 4: aces full of eights
Choose private A♠ A♦ with board A♥ 8♠ 8♦. The result is aces full of eights. The three aces are the three-of-a-kind part, and the two eights are the pair.
A full house has no separate kicker. All five cards are already occupied by the triplet and pair. The K♣ is unused, and it cannot break a tie between two otherwise identical full houses.
If two players have full houses, compare the rank of the three-of-a-kind part first, then the pair if needed. Do not compare an unused private card. The same habit applies throughout these exercises: name the five-card hand you actually built, rather than the best-looking card left beside it.
A straight on the board does not promise a split pot
Hold’em players sometimes look at five strong community cards and assume everyone can share them. Courchevel does not allow playing the board. Each player must replace the idea of “what the board has” with a legal two-private, three-board selection.
Consider a board that displays an ace-high straight. One player can rebuild that straight legally; the other can make only a lower straight. They see exactly the same community cards. Their private pairs produce different results.
| Item | Cards |
|---|---|
| Complete board | A♠ K♠ Q♥ J♦ T♣ |
| Player Rowan’s private cards | A♣ K♦ Q♣ J♥ 2♠ |
| Player Ellis’s private cards | 9♠ 8♠ 7♦ 6♣ 5♦ |
Exercise 5. Does the board force a tie? Build Rowan’s best five and Ellis’s best five. Put the private pair first in each answer so you can see whether either player accidentally used too much of the board.
Reveal exercise 5: ace-high straight beats queen-high straight
Rowan can use A♣ K♦ with Q♥ J♦ T♣ for an ace-high straight. There are other legal selections that make the same ranked straight, but one clear example is enough to establish the result.
Ellis uses 9♠ 8♠ with Q♥ J♦ T♣ for a queen-high straight: 8, 9, T, J, Q. That loses to Rowan’s ace-high straight. Ellis cannot claim the five community cards as a hand because that would use zero private cards.
For these two complete holdings, Rowan wins the high pot. This does not say that any player with an ace automatically wins on this board. The second private card and the three selected board cards still have to fit. Always finish both five-card constructions before comparing them.
Read both labels: betting structure and high or Hi/Lo
“Courchevel” names the card game. “Pot-limit,” “fixed-limit” and “no-limit” describe the betting structure. “High” or “Hi/Lo” tells you how winning hands divide the pot. These are separate questions. Do not infer a low half from a small exposed card, and do not infer unlimited betting from the number of private cards.
In high-only Courchevel, the best high hand wins at showdown, with ties sharing the relevant pot. In standard Courchevel Hi/Lo 8-or-better, a qualifying low can take half. A low needs five different ranks no higher than eight, with aces low. Straights and flushes do not spoil a low. Without a qualifying low, the high hand takes the whole pot.
Build high and low separately. Both must use two private cards and three board cards, but the chosen cards can differ. The best low is A-2-3-4-5, called a wheel. To compare other qualifying lows, sort them from highest card downward and compare at the first difference; the lower rank wins. A qualifying low is not automatically the sole winning low.
| Item | Cards or amount |
|---|---|
| Complete board | 3♣ 4♦ 5♠ K♥ 9♣ |
| Player Leah’s private cards | A♥ 2♦ K♠ K♣ Q♥ |
| Player Nico’s private cards | A♠ 2♣ 6♦ 7♦ Q♣ |
| Pot to divide | 120 classroom units; two eligible players; no fees |
Exercise 6. Work out each player’s best high hand and best low. Then divide the 120-unit pot. Leah has a wheel for low and a private pair of kings. Does that mean she wins half, or is there another claim on the low half?
Reveal exercise 6: a tied low can leave you with a quarter
Leah’s best high is the five-high straight A♥ 2♦ with 3♣ 4♦ 5♠. Her private kings can make three kings with K♥, but a straight ranks above three of a kind. Leah’s best low uses the same wheel cards.
Nico’s best high uses 6♦ 7♦ with 3♣ 4♦ 5♠ for a seven-high straight. His best low uses a different private pair, A♠ 2♣, with the same 3♣ 4♦ 5♠ board trio. Both players therefore have the same best possible low, while Nico wins high.
Half the 120 units is 60. Nico gets all 60 of the high half. The two players split the 60-unit low half into 30 each. Nico receives 90 in total and Leah receives 30. The check is 90 + 30 = 120.
Leah is quartered in this example: she receives one quarter of the pot. The example does not assume what either player contributed earlier, so those receipts are not their net profits. In a high-only version of this same showdown, the low hands would award nothing and Nico’s seven-high straight would win the entire pot.
Pot-limit changes the legal amount, not the card rule
The exposed card does not create an extra pot-limit allowance. For a maximum raise, first account for the call, then count the pot after that call. The raise portion can be that size, subject to the available stack and the rules governing whether you may raise. A “pot” button is a sizing control, not advice about what you should do.
Take a fresh betting round with 40 classroom units in the pot. One player bets 20. You have put nothing in on this round, have enough chips, and face no reopening restriction. There are now 60 units in front of you. Calling 20 would make the pot 80. You may then raise by up to 80, so your maximum total contribution on this round is 100.
| Step | Classroom units |
|---|---|
| Pot before the opponent’s bet | 40 |
| Opponent bets | 20 |
| Pot currently visible | 60 |
| Your call would add | 20 |
| Pot after the hypothetical call; maximum raise portion | 80 |
| Your total for a maximum raise: call plus raise | 100 |
After your 100 goes in, the pot is 160: the original 40, the opponent’s 20, and your 100. The opponent would need another 80 to call. If they call, the pot becomes 240. Keeping “raise by” and “raise to” separate prevents an 80-unit raise from being confused with an 80-unit total.
For other sequences, including money you have already put into the current round, use the pot-limit maximum raise lesson. Minimum raises, short all-ins and reopening the action need their own checks. Do not use this single worked sequence as a ruling for every betting situation.
Make your next practice hand easy to audit
Mara gives the spade a smaller notebook. “One hand per page,” she says. That is enough room if the record is clear. Write the game label at the top, then all five private cards. Put the early exposed card on its own line before adding the two remaining flop cards, turn and river in order.
At the end, record the exact private pair and board trio for the best high hand. If the game is Hi/Lo, add a separate low line, even when it repeats the same cards. If nobody qualifies for low, write that explicitly. Keep any chip calculation beneath the hand construction so a correct pot total does not hide an illegal hand.
When you get an answer wrong, name the particular mistake. “Used four board cards” tells you what to fix. “Bad at Omaha” does not. Other useful notes are “treated the first card as compulsory,” “used a third private kicker,” and “forgot the low was tied.” Repeating one corrected selection slowly is better practice than rushing through a page of guesses.
The HPD spade is pointing toward the HPD info and tools library for your next paper exercise. Keep this lesson’s two checks together: see the first flop card before the opening bet, then build every completed hand with exactly two private cards and three board cards.