[ky70]

Great post and I agree 100% with the theme of your post.

FWIW, homepokertourney.com suggests the tourney will end when the big blind is between 6 - 10% of total chips in play. My personal experience says 6% is best estimate for my game and I use a range of 5 - 8%.

Here is my personal blind schedule with predicted end times/rounds:
Starting chips = T5000
Round Minutes Small Big
1...........20......$25.....$50
2...........20.......50......100
3...........20.......100.....200
Break......7.........Remove 25s
4...........20.......200.....400
5...........20.......300.....600
6...........20.......600.....1,200
Break......5.........Remove 100s
7...........15.......1,000...2,000
8...........15.......2,000...4,000
9...........15.......2,500...5,000
Break......5.........Remove 500s
10..........15.......4,000...8,000
11..........15.......5,000...10,000
12..........15.......6,000...12,000

6-7 players: game will generally end during round 7 (between 2:12 - 2:27)
8 - 13 players: game will generally end during round 8 (between 2:27 - 2:42)
14 - 17 players: game will generally end during round 9 (between 2:42 - 2:57)
18 - 27 players: game will generally end during round 10 (between 3:02 - 3:17)
28 - 33 players: game will generally end during round 11 (between 3:17 - 3:32)
34 - 40 players: game will generally end during round 12 (between 3:32 - 3:47)