This section is all about how and why you should or should not time the blinds in an online no limit texas holdem tournament. Usually when you are playing in an online no limit holdem tournament you have access to a lobby area where you can see how many players are left in the tournament and when (in minutes) the blinds increase (and to what new blind level). This information is vital to you as a player since you always want to know your position in the tournament relative to your opponents and more importantly you want to know when the blinds are changing and where you will be seated at your table when those blinds change.

Like most players in a no limit holdem tournament you will spend most of your time folding. In an online no limit holdem tournament you can fold by simply checking off inside a little box before your turn to play when you want to fold and when your turn arrives the software will automatically fold your hand. I do not support the use of automatic decision making options in order to play a tournament. If you have ever been at a table where 6 people in a row fold in rapid succession you have just witnessed the speed and ease at which the auto fold function can be applied. Please do not use this auto fold feature if at all possible. The reasons behind not using this feature are two fold:

1 – other players will know that you use the auto fold and perhaps auto bet or auto check feature and they will alter their betting patterns against you based on this knowledge. In other words the use of the auto play function is a tell and you really do not want to give your opponents information on how you play (even when you fold) if at all possible.

2 – the use of the auto play function eliminates your ability to influence the time it takes to play each round. If you have 12 minutes total in each level and if you have 20 seconds to make up your mind at a table of ten players then in fact from the button you can burn 160 seconds or 2 minutes and 40 seconds off the clock while folding before you reach the big blind. This maximum time you take to play a hand from the button and the big blind may be the difference between the blind changing on you in the BB or on the button (when you get there). Clearly if you use auto play functions you take away your option to impact the time it takes to complete each round.

Most great players do not argue the fact that early in an online no limit holdem tournament you do not want to get involved in marginal hands or really bother with any pots other than your big and small blind hands. Some players even stay "away" until the third or fourth round. This is considered the best strategy right up to the point where your chip count divided by the sum of the blinds (commonly referred to as your “M” value) goes below 15. In other words you don’t need to participate in a hand in approximately the first four rounds of play. As you may notice after you have played several online no limit texas holdem tournaments that few online texas holdem players have the patience required in the initial stages of a tournament to last past the first break. It is in the initial stages of a tournament where you want to reduce your chances of getting beat for all your chips while your initial investment in any given hand is small in comparison to your total chip count. This is why in most small online no limit holdem tournaments usually half the field is gone in the first hour of play.

Statistically the good players should never be out of the tournament in the first hour and should not even have risked much of their chips. Ideally the good players will wait until the blinds creep up to a level where the big blind represents approximately one 15th of their total stack before they start to play. It is only when the sum of the blinds are relatively important in terms of your chip count that you will be able to make serious moves with good starting hands and even make a few bluffs at pots that you will be able to play your best against other good players. In fact some expert online poker players have suggested to me that any play in the first hour should only be defensive. In fact if you charted the most successful online poker players in terms of their position in a tournament and their chips risked at any point in time you would note that they aggressively go after pots after most of the weak players are out of the tournament and they never worry about being relatively short stacked in any phase of the tournament. As a matter of fact most good players prefer to play short stacked since it allows them to play with the aggression required to accumulate chips rapidly and to eventually win tournaments.

How the aggressive behavior relates to blind timing is very interesting indeed. Timing your blinds requires patience while playing no limit holdem requires the willingness to be aggressive with your chips. In fact all the best players who do not consider the timing of the blinds at one point in the tournament or another will fall victim to the blinds. The basic reason why timing the blinds becomes important goes back to the ratio of your chip count to the total blinds. Imagine for a moment that you have 6,000 in chips and the blinds are about to change from 400/800 to 500/1000. Let us also imagine that once through the blinds you will get a wonderful hand that will allow you to double up against an opponent with more chips than your holdings. In scenario one you make it through the blinds at 400/800 and in scenario number two (where you do not time the blinds) you go through the blinds at 500/1000.

The resulting difference in your chip count will be only 300 chips however the impact on your chip count given your willingness to gamble at some point before the next round of blinds will be 600 chips or more. As a percentage of your total chips prior to this exercise you can estimate a net loss of at least 10% of your current chip count by not timing the blinds. To complete this example your total chip count would go from 6,000 down to 4,800 and then up to at least 9,600 in the case where you timed the blinds whereas your total chip count would go from 6,000 down to 4,500 and then up to 9,000 in the case where you didn’t time the blinds. So by timing the blinds you have gained at least 600 chips in this scenario.

Now for arguments sake let us assume here that on the subsequent round you also missed the blinds or hit the blinds again and then engaged your chips so as to double up again. Now this difference would expand from 600 chips to 1,800 chips (or the value of the increased blinds). So in fact if you didn’t play a hand for a round you would be just as poorly off as if you didn’t even time the blinds at all. Now that 1,800 chip difference (16,200 less 14,400) would expand even more if you continued to disregard the blind timing as a part of your tournament strategy. It is important to note this difference expands geometrically depending on your circumstances in the tournament.

The point here is that if you fold every hand for the first four rounds and then you correctly time the blinds on every round after that you will have saved yourself (and earned yourself) thousands and thousands of chips by the time you reach the final table (assuming the field is sufficiently large). Course you still need to play the game itself very well and you need some sort of lucky break or two to reach the final table. This luck factor aside the timing of the blinds is something you can do without any regard for the task at hand (that is to win the tournament) that will keep you focused on your game and not on any other external distractions.

Now when I say time the blinds I mean you arrive at the theoretical dealer position (known as the button) when the blinds change. In fact if you are really good at timing the blinds you will arrive on or one to the right of the button every time the blinds change throughout the entire tournament. Of course when a player is busted out on your table or if you get moved to another table you have to recalculate the time required to get to the button when the blinds change. Having said this you need to figure 30 to 45 seconds per hand.

Now you can add 0 to 30 seconds a hand onto that figure by playing fast or by stalling. In the event that you get moved to another table in between blind changes and you have calculated that it is impossible for you to time the blinds then you have to try to time the next blind at the same table. Yes you lose one blind but you will make up for it on the next blind. As the blinds continue to rise throughout a no limit tournament the need to time the blinds increases (ie it becomes more important). Of course at the same time as you are doing this you still have to play the game carefully and aggressively.

The fun part about timing blinds is that in the period of the tournament when you get 93os or 72os or similarly unplayable hands you just sit back and focus on the clock. It keeps you in the game while your cards are pathetic.

Few appreciate the value of timing the blinds throughout a tournament. I can tell you even if your cards run cold to the extent that you are forced all in on the big blind at least you know that you saved three or four rounds of play during the tournament and this additional savings could result in your cashing versus your finishing just out of the money.

This article is the first in a serious of topics geared towards online texas holdem game and specifically no limit texas holdem tournament play that nobody wants you to know – or at least I think so since I have never heard or read about this subject matter in any book or magazine or web site.