Early Stage Freeroll Tournament Strategy
Chris Wheeler | September 16, 2011
The first thing you need to accept when it comes to freeroll tournaments is that nobody has anything to lose. Equally important, you need to realize that most people will walk away from this tournament without gaining anything, despite investing hours of play.
Given this, it should come as no surprise that many players will play extremely aggressive poker—sometimes even crazy, illogical poker early on—in an effort to either build a stack capable of giving them a real shot at playing for the cash or bust out and save themselves hours of folding and calculated calls.
On top of this, freerolls are training grounds for new players, meaning there will always be a decent percentage of any freeroll field who are inexperienced and unpredictable.
This isn’t to say that freerolls are simply lottery events because this isn’t the case. If you are prepared to play a tight game early on, you can be consistently successful in freeroll tournaments.
The key to success in these tournaments lies in breaking down your approach into early-game, mid-game, and late-game strategies.
Early stage strategy
When we talk about the early stages of a tournament, we’re typically referring to the period from the first hand to the first break.
As mentioned, early on in a freeroll tournament, many players look for a quick double or triple up. Many articles on freeroll tournament strategy will recommend you do exactly that—chip up or ship out. The reality is, if you want to do well over the long run, this technique won’t work.
Early on in a tournament, you might be dealt King of Hearts10 of Hearts in late position with four limpers in the pot. Maybe you flat call to see a flop or try to squeeze. Either way, you’re usually going to end up with more people in the pot than you’d like, and unless you flop a flush or a boat, you’re going to be concerned about what other players might have.
Even with two pair or trips on the flop, realize that no matter how you play the rest of the hand, there are likely going to be people willing to chase their flush draws, straight draws, and low pocket pairs all the way to the river to see if they hit. It won’t matter how much you bet—it’s a freeroll after all. They have nothing to lose and a big pot to win.
Early on in a freeroll tournament, restrict yourself to Ace of Clubs10 of Spades, Ace of DiamondsQueen of Spades, King of SpadesQueen of Diamonds, Ace of Any Color suited, and pocket pairs (though leaving lower pocket pairs until the mid-stages unless you can get into a pot for cheap is advisable).
When playing the hands mentioned above, you can hit either card and feel reasonably confident about your kicker (with the exception of Ace of Any Color suited).
With the blinds so low at the start of the tournament relative to your stack, you might feel like seeing as many flops as you can. This is a mistake. Sometimes you’ll flop a monster, but most of the time you’ll either miss or be taken for a ride after flopping a sub-par hand or a draw. At this stage in a freeroll, anyone can have anything at any given time. By restricting yourself to playing only premium hands, you greatly reduce the chance of being eliminated early on.
Early stage all-ins
Early on in a freeroll tournament, players will be pushing their stacks into the middle all over the place. We’ve already discussed why this is, so let’s address why you shouldn’t follow suit.
You shouldn’t even consider going all-in early on unless you have the nuts or truly believe you have your opponent crushed. If you’ve been hurt in a previous hand and really need to push your chips into the center, that’s a separate issue. But strictly speaking, you shouldn’t risk your tournament life this early on without the absolute best of it—you just don’t know what people will have or what they might be willing to draw to.
Raising each time you’re dealt King of ClubsQueen of Spades or Ace of DiamondsQueen of Diamonds, only to have the same opponent push all-in over the top, can be extremely frustrating. Don’t let it get to you. Keep your cool and wait for the right spot to get your chips into the middle.
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