No Limit Texas Holdem Tournament Strategy - Poker Tournament Fundamentals For the Winning Player

Winning in poker tournaments requires understanding several key fundamental principles. First of all, you must survive against the newbies before you get to play the "real" tournament. Then you have to make astute observations and notice play tendencies to give you an edge. Play a tight and aggressive style for the best chance to win, while being able to switch your tactic to a looser and even more aggressive style late game.

Survive Early to Play the Real Game

The objective early is to not get knocked out. The first few blind raises of a tournament can be something of a hurricane. Newbies will go all in on hands they have no business being in. It's your job to stay out of their way.

Don't get caught up in raise wars with loose players. Play extremely, extremely tight and just hold on until most of the players left are at least moderately skilled.

Look for Tells and Take Notes

If you're playing online poker, this is easy. Just take notes under that player's info. If you're in live person tournament, make mental notes about each player.

What is their play style? Do they have any tells?

Do they tend to make a certain play over and over again? For example, do they try and steal from dealer+1 almost every round? Do they bet the flop every time they raise pre-flop? Notice these play tendencies and you may be able to profit from them later.

Tight Aggressive Early, Loose Aggressive Late

In the beginning, the goal is to play tight and conserve chips. Don't even bother stealing blinds until later in the game. Once the blinds become worth stealing, steal chips when you can but play a generally tight aggressive style.

As the blinds rise and chip stacks shrink, you'll need to get more and more aggressive to stay ahead. Loosen up and steal as many blinds as you can. Re-raise people who're trying to steal blinds. Play hands that you wouldn't otherwise play in a cash game.

A good rule of thumb is that when your stack gets to less than 15x the SB + BB, it's time to loosen up. If your stack gets to less than 10x the SB + BB, loosen up a lot and get a lot more aggressive.

If you get to 5x SB + BB, go all in when you think you have the best hand you'll get before the blinds hit. If you're at 5x, go all in when you're under the gun no matter what hand you have, even if you have 72o. Never take the blinds when you have just 5x SB + BB left.

This is the fundamental strategy of succeeding with poker tournaments. Survive early, get an edge on other players, play tight aggressive and loosen up towards the end.