No Limit Texas Holdem Poker Tournament Strategy - Starting Hands That Make Winning the Pot Easier

The way you choose starting hands in the three phases of a tournament are all completely different. The three phases are beginning, middle and end game.

In the beginning, you want to either play very tight and let the beginners knock themselves out, or you can try and get a fast double up before the blinds get too high. Mid game is generally when you're playing position and decent hands. Bubble game is when you should get aggressive. "In the money" game is very dependent on the feel of the table.

In The Beginning

You can choose either to play extremely tight or extremely loose. Note that even if you choose to play loose pre-flop, you should still play tight after the flop no matter what. Don't go chasing overcards just because the blinds are low.

The idea is that if the blinds are low enough, you can call sub-par hands pre-flop and hope to hit a jackpot flop. This strategy can work great, but it can also eat away at your chipstack. Beginners may often be tempted to chase at this point, which is generally not a good idea.

A more consistent strategy is to just play tight and let the beginners knock themselves out. In any given tournament, there are usually beginners who'll go all quickly and get knocked out fast. During this phase, just play tight. Play only AA, KK, QQ, AK and AQ, plus JJ in position.

Middle Game Starting Hands

In the middle game, the starting hands you choose to play have a lot to do with your stack size. If you're getting low, you'll have to take more aggressive risks. If you're sitting on a fat stack, you could afford to play tight and steal blinds.

This is the part of the tournament that feels most like a cash game. Play good hands, ditch those that aren't. If your chip stack gets below 15x the multiple of the BB + SB, start loosening up. If you get below 10x, start playing very aggressive. So if the blinds are 100 + 200, if you have less than 3,000 chips, play aggressive.

Late Game

There are three parts to late game: Bubble game, Post-Bubble Game and final table game.

Bubble game is when most players are playing tight to try and get in the money. At this point you should loosen up and steal as many blinds are you can.

Post-bubble game is the first few rounds after the bubble bursts. Most players will play much looser in this period, especially if they're low on chips they're likely to go all in. Play tight here if you can and avoid getting in all-in fights.

Final table game is when everything's settled. This part is where most decisions are made based on chip stack, position and reads. Unfortunately, every situation and tournament is different at this point so giving starting hands wouldn't make sense.

However, if you can consistently get to this point in the game using the strategies we've discussed so far, you'll do very good.