Raising like a maniac.
 

It was in the middle (~600 players left) of a $100 freeroll with a new level every 3 minutes. I'm new to tournaments (and NL, but I have played about 20k hands limit) and I considered it pure practice. My personal goal was to reach the final table.

Hand 1
The blinds where 75/150. Villain had 4865 (chip leader) and I had 1240. I had seen him played about eight hands and he entered half of them playing them quite passively.

Villain limps from UTG+1 and I raise to 400 with A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] from MP1. He calls and the flop comes 3[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]9[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]5[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]. He check/folds my raise to 500.

Hand 2
The hand after I raise to 500 with AJo (now from UTG+2). The blinds have raised to 100/200. I get raised all in by a 1k stacker and I call. He lays down AJo and we split the pot.

Hand 3
The next hand I manage to put an opponent all in pre-flop with KK and win another thousand.

Hand 5
Two hands later I'm the big blind with pocket dueces (I now have 3190). UTG+3 (1k stack) limps (to 200), the small blind (1.1k) calls and I raise to 1k. The limper calls and loses when his A9s doesn't improve.

Hand 6
The next hand I'm the small blind with A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]K[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]. The chip leader (4615, the same player as in the first hand) limps from CO and I raise to 900. The flop comes 8[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]5[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. He checks, I raise (1500), he goes all in and I call. His 7[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]6[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] catches a 4 and I'm out.

I felt like a maniac when playing these hands, but I guess it was just a run of good cards... Was it strategically incorrect to play this aggressively? Did I make any technical errors when playing the hands?

Re: Raising like a maniac.
 

I guess most of the play was ok. The levels are so quick you have to gamble every time you get a decent hand. If there was more time for maneouvre then I probably wouldn't have raised the 22, maybe folded it. And yes you had a nice run of cards, pity about the str8 hand.


Jon

Re: Raising like a maniac.
 

Given how terrible the tournament format was, you played all of these hands ok. Try out pokerstars, and enter some of their freerolls. The structure is flat out the best on the internet.