Many poker sites (Bwin or even PokerStars) offer free tournaments daily. On winamax, you will even find 12 freerolls per day, but not with large prizes. PMU sometimes offers very interesting ones, you can find them on bonus-malin.info. But, how do you best play these freerolls?
In fact, most of the poker strategies that can be read right or left don’t apply to freerolls, for one simple reason: the data is totally different.
If in the final stages of a tournament the strategies to be applied are exactly the same as in a classic tournament, in the first stages it is totally different.
Which strategies to adopt during a freeroll?
In the early stages and especially during the first hour of a freeroll tournament, a large number of players will take risks and move all-in recklessly. Simply because they do not play with their personal money, they therefore have no reserve strategy, they are totally indecipherable players.
On the other hand, you will have to be patient and only play strong hands like a pair of aces, or two kings, ace king and choose your spots wisely. The key word is patience, crazy players will kill themselves.
Second step, already many players will have left the tournament, you will be able to start playing on weaker hands with small pairs. Keep an eye on each player’s chip stack. Players with a weak stack will start to despair. You can bluff low-chip players and play it safe with richer players, it will pay off.
Step Three You are now in the middle of the tournament and half the players have already been knocked out, your goal now is to rack up as many chips as possible while limiting the risks before the blinds increase. You can take more risks, but don’t play weak hands at the start. The objective is to reach the “square” of players who are going to be paid. But beware of players with few chips, you have to face them with good cards because they are just waiting for a chance to go all-in.
The strategy for the final stages of a freeroll:
Remain the final stages where the strategy will be the same as in any classic tournament, and there your experience and your talent will speak.
In summary, we can say that in a freeroll tournament you have to let the storm of the first 10 to 15 hands pass and be content to limit the damage, because even with a good game at the start you risk quickly running into many players who are there above all to have fun and will push all-in all the way.