[zuluking]

I'm playing in a charity (United Way) NLHE tourney friday night and I need some advice. 40 tables, 10-11 per table to start. From what I'm hearing, about 200 will be first-time tourney players, another 150-200 will be the "usual fish" you might see in you favorite casino, and another 40-50 being what we (2+2) would consider a good player.

The buy-in is $30 which gets you T1500 chips. If you drop below T750 at anytime in the 1 1/2 hours, you can re-buy for $20 and get T1000 chips. At the end of the 1 1/2 hours, there is an additional add-on of $20 or $40 for either T1000 or T2000 in chips, your choice. But here is the kicker, the blinds start at 50/100 and double every half-hour in the first hour-and-a-half. So at 1 1/2 hours, the blinds are already sitting at 200/400.

I understand why there doing such high blinds to start, to get more people to re-buy and raise more money, but I need a strategy here. Besides the obvious $40 re-buy at the end of the 1 1/2 hours (is it obvious?) any sage advice would be greatly appreciated. Btw, the prizes are awesome:

1st place-A $5,000 ATV 4-wheeler from Honda.

2nd place-An all-expensive paid trip to Vegas with flight for 2, limo, a suite at the Bellagio for 4 nights, show tickets and more worth $3,000.

3rd place-A 5 night Carribean cruise worth $2,000.

4th-10th also get some prizes and they'll have the usual cheap door prizes throughout the night.

I look foward to the advice and thanks in advance for the help.