AK 3bet preflop

[pokerroomace]

how do you play AK preflop?
do you play AKs and AKo differently?

if you bet preflop and someone then 3-bets. do you come over the top or do you call and see a flop?
he is an average player
you have an average image at the table
do you make a different decision if you have position preflop?

if you 4bet and he calls you're basically going allin preflop. he might not call but if he has 3bet you there is a good chance he will call the 4bet.

i just had AKo utg. bet to 4xbb. got raised to 13xbb from a player in middle position. i reraised to 40xbb. and he moves allin. i call.
he wins the hand. he has KK. i don't know anything about this player before the hand. this is at $25NL on pokerroom.
i think i played his hand very poorly. i should have just called his 3bet. see the flop and go from there.
the reason that i 4bet is because i didn't want to play the hand OOP and i was hoping he might fold.

also, if i just call his 3bet and i then miss the flop with no draw (eg J52r). what is the best play? should i just check-fold to a bet?

[martindcx1e]

most players (especially at low stakes) have very tight re-raising ranges. i generally fold when i get 3bet unless villain is a maniac. also, i think whether or not you 3bet AK yourself or not is just a personal preference. at low stakes you don't really need to worry about your 3betting range being too tight. just don't spew chips post-flop when you miss with your AK.

[Miffed22001]

unless a nit opens or sometimes if im in the sb facing an ep raise, i always 3bet AK.
I like to squeeze with it to after a raise and caller/multiple callers but i still have the yucky problem that people will always pay my hands off when i make a squeeze move (ironicallyi rarely squeeze in cash games without a grp1 hand)
At <200nl i hate AK to a typical reraise range, and quite often fold it unless it s lp battle or someone who activly defends their blinds by reraising AQ/99 type ranges (happens a lot at 200nl not so much at 100nl, but occasionally)

[flyingPenguin]

AK is OK to 3bet with preflop, but I'm folding it to a 3 bet without a read. It's dominated by most tight players reraising range at $25NL on pokerroom (AA, KK) and is still behind a more solid reraisers range (QQ, JJ, TT, AK).

If you have a read that you are ahead of their reraising range, by all means 4 bet. Just remember that AK is not a made hand, while JJ is.