How to extract the most chips?

I don't think I optimized this hand in terms of chip extraction. Should I raise less preflop, maybe 500? Also, the flop was tough since I showed strength, and a check or small bet would be suspicious, but since he called the large preflop raise, the flop probably didn't help him and he is not likely to call a large bet. Thanks for any comments.

PokerStars Game #2821827732: Tournament #13543689, Hold'em No Limit - Level IV (50/100) - 2005/10/16 - 22:00:40 (ET)
Table '13543689 259' Seat #8 is the button
Seat 1: bigdaddyse (1735 in chips)
Seat 2: noclue760 (1115 in chips)
Seat 3: joe1003 (2305 in chips)
Seat 4: Dtownokie (1958 in chips)
Seat 5: playtag (5000 in chips)
Seat 6: 300 inch KW (1230 in chips)
Seat 7: TerryK71 (4245 in chips)
Seat 8: tlo(TEO) (7210 in chips)
Seat 9: goldyfishy (4110 in chips)
goldyfishy: posts small blind 50
bigdaddyse: posts big blind 100
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to goldyfishy [Ac Ad]
noclue760: folds
joe1003: folds
Dtownokie: calls 100
playtag: calls 100
300 inch KW: folds
TerryK71: folds
tlo(TEO): calls 100
goldyfishy: raises 500 to 600
bigdaddyse: folds
Dtownokie: calls 500
playtag: folds
tlo(TEO): folds
*** FLOP *** [4h 8c 3d]
Hero???

You've done fine so far. There were three limpers and you narrowed them to the perfect number for this hand (i.e 1). Too many people try to get cute with this hand and then complain they never win with it.

There is a rainbow, largely unconnected flop, perfect for our purposes here! I would make a 1/2 pot sized bet (about 800 here so it looks like a standard continuation bet, chances are you'll take the pot right here. If he pushes all-in (another 700 odd chips) you call in a heartbeat. If he got lucky on you then good on him but you've played this hand fine.

You ask about how you could extract more money out of this hand. Well, in my humble opinion it's generally not worth the bother. AA is a good hand but its only one pair. If you try limping in with it and checking flops you'll just end up losing your whole stack and complaining about it.

[Cactus Jack]

I'm delighted, as this is exactly the same thing I was thinking. 1/2 the pot and hope he thinks it's a continuation bet. The flop couldn't have helped either one of us. Perfect. Would that all hands would be this nice...for me.

CJ

[sunek]

Hi

I don't know what your table image is but I have sometimes been in similar situations and made a somewhat wussy bet like 350-400 to make him think that i missed the flop but wants to bet here to represent strength (an attempt to do some reverse psychology). Most strong players see this and just calls you or folds, bun many TAGs will not see the trap an will push their stack to force you out. It is fantastic when it works but sucks if you are facing a set.

Regards

sunek

[MrMoo]

bet whatever your normal size continuation bet is.