Most important of all is know when to quit! You should always be sharp and focused when at the betting table. Fatigue leads to mental errors and ends up costing you money. Frustration is another sign that you are ready to call it a night, or at least take a break. Play smart and you will win smart.

With that in mind it is important to play aggressively once you get a hand that you are confident in. Remember, 70% of the time other players are ready to fold in search of a hand that they think favors them! Be ready to force the weak players out with your aggressive bets. If you are confident you have the strongest hand in the game, raise the bet! The main reason for being aggressive is to have those with weak hands fold early on, as some tend to hang on looking for the miracle draw to win the hand. By forcing their hand early you are lowering the chance of those miracle hands and also ensuring you win the pot. It is always better to win a smaller pot than take a chance that another players draws that miracle hand late in the game.

Time and money considerations
There are two important differences you need to be aware of when entering a re-buy tournament. Firstly and obviously, it requires a greater investment, on average. Sure, with some luck you can double up early and play the whole tournament on just one buy-in. But you shouldn’t count on it. Refusing to re-buy will decrease your chances compared to those of players who re-buy more liberally.

Secondly, a re-buy tournament lasts longer than a freezeout tournament with the same number of entrants. First of all there is the obvious extension caused by the re-buy period at the start of the tournament. On top of that, however, after a lot of re-buys have been made, the freezeout part of the tournament will often start at much deeper average chip stacks than a regular freezeout tournament, which makes it last longer.

Consider this when planning your poker session, or you may find yourself pretty exhausted next day at work!

Buy-in, re-buy, and add-on
For apparent reasons, this kind of tournament is called a re-buy tournament. The time period during which you may re-buy is called the re-buy period.

Mostly, the right to re-buy is coupled with some kind of condition regarding your chip count. Either your stack must be below a certain value, for example, the number of chips you started out with, or you must be out of chips completely. The cost of a re-buy is often identical to the original tournament buy-in, and the number of chips received when re-buying is often identical to the number of starting chips, but these things may vary.

At the end of the re-buy period, players may be given the right to buy an add-on, that is, yet a number of chips at a certain, pre-defined cost. The add-on usually is not connected to any chip count requirements, but is open to all remaining players.

Adjusting to ever changing situations
As the relation changes between stacks and blinds, a strong tournament player must know how to change strategy. When stacks are deep, you can play a wide selection of starting hands and try any creative plays you can think of. When stacks are short, on the other hand, any kind of action tends to put players all in, so you really need to be selective about what hands you play.
Another important factor that changes during a poker tournament is the number of players around your table. Depending on the number of eliminated players and how tables are re-balanced, you may have to play against nine opponents for a while and then against seven or six or even fewer. Before winning a tournament, you will have to fight one single opponent in a heads-up match.
Tournament play is varies from minute to minute, and you have to move along with the changes.

Elimination is definite
The main characteristic of a freezeout tournament is this: When your chips are gone, so are you. The tournament continues until one player has won all the chips from all the other players. That is, until all players have run out of chips, except one.

Freezeout tournaments start with all participants buying equal stacks of chips for equal amounts of money, called the “buy-in”. Players are randomly seated around the table, or tables if there are more than ten players, after which the game starts out just as a regular poker game (cash game).

Who says you cannot buy new chips
Next on our list of tournament poker types is re-buy tournaments. Re-buy tournament poker is set up in such a way as to permit players who have lost all their chips to re-buy more chips and continue in the game. Re-buy tournament poker players play more aggressively due to the fact there is not the same risk of elimination. This type of tournament poker can make for a bigger prize pool because of the re-buy factor.

Satellites – your way to the stars
Satellite or mini tournament poker occurs before the main event. The combined buy in amount from the players is almost always enough to cover a berth at the next big tournament. The end result is that the winner of the satellite game wins a seat at the main event for considerably less than the major event’s buy in price.

Different kinds of tournaments
Tournament poker comes in different variations. The most common form is the elimination tournament. In elimination tournament poker, all of the players start out with the same amount of chips. Elimination tournament poker reaches its conclusion when one player has accrued all the chips. Even though there is one specific winner to elimination tournaments, other players may win their qualifying rounds as well. How is this so? Well, the final table, as it is called, will consist of several players whom are rewarded with prize money; the amount of the prize money, of course, directly corresponds with how successful they were in tournament play.

When you play cash games you can always reach in your pockets for more money if you lose what you have in front of you (depending on how deep pockets you have). But in a tournament it is devastating to lose your stack. Once you are broke you are gone, so you should do all you can to avoid it. Try not to commit a lot of chips in close gambles if you do not have to. Even if this is profitable in a cash game, you have to protect your chips more carefully in a tournament.

Early Stages

Early in a tournament the blinds are low in relation to your stack. This means that you can play a lot of hands as long as you get to see the flop cheaply. Small pairs and low suited connectors are good hands to try to limp in. You risk a small portion of your stack for a chance to win a lot if you hit your hand hard.

One of the advantages of poker tournaments is that they give you a chance to win a large sum of money for a relatively small fee. You also know in advance how much money you will put at risk. The proper strategy in tournaments differs from ring game strategy. While the object in cash games is maximizing your profits, your main objective in tournaments is not to be eliminated.

Be Prepared

Before you enter a tournament, be sure to get all the relevant information about it. Is it a freeze-out or a re-buy tournament? How many prizes are paid and how is the prize money distributed? It is also important to know the blind structure, how fast the blinds increase and how long the intervals are between each raise. All this information will affect your overall strategy.