The World Series of Poker is just around the corner and if you haven't begun trying to qualify, it's high time to start thinking about it. One of the best places to start - "steps" tournaments.

Steps tournaments are essentially a series of sit-and-gos. You win your way from the first level to the last, where eventually the winner of the final sit-and-go takes a WSOP Main Event prize package.

If you want to cut the process short, you can also choose to buy in directly at any step along the way, including the final tournament.

Steps tournaments are probably the most secure bet in online poker to win your way to the Main Event. As an example of a good WSOP Steps program, let's use Full Tilt Poker as a base.

Here's the setup of the Full Tilt Poker Steps tournaments:

Step 1 $3.30: 1st and 2nd advance to Step 2, 3rd through 5th remain on Step 1, and the rest receive nothing.

Step 2 $8.70: 1st and 2nd advance to Step 3, 3rd and 4th remain on Step 2, and 5th gets sent back to Step 1.

Step 3 $26: 1st and 2nd advance to Step 4, 3rd to 4th remain on Step 3, 5th is sent back to step 2, and 6th and 7th are sent all the way back to step 1.

Step 4 $75: 1st and 2nd advance to Step 5, 3rd and 4th stay on Step 4, 5th and 6th go back to Step 3.

Step 5 $216: 1st and 2nd advance to Step 6, 3rd and 4th remain on Step 5, and 5th and 6th return to Step 4.

Step 6 $640: 1st and 2nd move on to step 7, 3rd stays on step 6, 4th and 5th go back to step 5, and 6th and 7th go back to step 4.

Step 7 $2,100: 1st place wins a $12,000 WSOP Main Event Package, 2nd and 3rd stay on step 7 and 4th to 6th are sent back to step 6.