Big freerole or tourny Strat help

Im not bad at these things but im not as good as I want to be. My best places are 12th on a 10,000 Poker stars tourney and a few 1st's on the full tilt 315 people freeroles.

The part i always have trouble is the beginning. People limp in every hand that is played. You try to raise and you will just get all calls or some all in guy.

The thing i have found that works best is just waiting for group 1 or 2 cards and playing them hard. But this still does not work out many times and you will sometimes find your self up vs multiple all in's or calls.

when it gets down to the people who know what they are doing is when i start to play well but i always find myself trying to play catch up at this point.

What should i do at the beginning of these tourneys? I have been trying to play good solid poker but this is just not the case when trying to play in these freeroles. Any suggestions or strat you guys use?

Thanks!

I think you got it right. Freeroll or money tourneys. Except for some bizarre fascination to gamble big early in the freerolls, they play the same after several levels.

Personally I avoid anything less than QQ to enter any hand before the 3rd level. And I don't like QQ that much then. The beginnings of all MTT's anywhere seem to be the same. After the 3rd level most of the gamblers are sitting on the rail.

I have not yet played a live MTT, but will guess it might be a bit tamer, but don't expect it to be noticably saner.

I don't have any problem playing TAG most of the way to the money if necessary. The other day in a 45 seat sng, I won 3 hands, and made the final table. Terrible cards that day.

As for being behind in the early stages. Ignore that thought. It changes amazingly fast when you wait for the gems and then play them hard.