Big Stack MTT or SNG

I usually play $3 - $5 SNG or MTT on full tilt. My usually plan is to play very tight up to first break then losen up a bit and get more agressive as the tourney moves towards the bubble. Following this stratagy I usually find myself with less than the average (unless i get lucky) chips at the break, but enjoy comming from behind and following a TAG style

Today I found myself as chip leader in a 45 man $5 tourney, at the break, not only was i chip leader but i had 50% more chips than the guy in 2nd place ( I had a very good run of cards) . I then proceeded to loose them all and finished just outside the money, the reason I think is because i didn't have a plan and had never been in this position before, I made some stupid calls bad reads and tried to bully people and it just didn't work.

Does anyone have a stratagy for playing as chip leader?

Find the weak players at the table and bully them, add to your stack. Do not pick fights with the people that play back at you.

Actually I suggest trapping people that play back at you.

You can usually tell who's trying to make the money...these are your targets. Raise their blinds from any position with any hand that'll give you odds to call if they get brave and go allin.

Avoid the stacks that can hurt you unless you have a premium hand.

Brann

This may sound like a silly question but.... can you please describe a trap that you may use? thanks

Oh wow, sorry I misread this when I first read it, must of been tired or drunk, but anyways, in my opinion, When you are a chip leader, depending on the table you should loosen up or tighten up. I mean there are so many things to cover but I will try to get the most I can think of right now. Certainly there is nothing wrong with limping in with suited connectors from late position, ok wait let me back up for a second because I missed the key concept. If you are a good experienced post flop player, I would loosen up with a huge chip stack since you can create a loose image and that will help you build an even bigger stack.

Now creating a loose image is a bit tricky and takes some skill, you have to be willing to lose few chips ( few small pots, like 300-400 chips), by making silly bluffs or something like that, or making weak calls, the other players will see that and think you are a donk, now when you get a big hand, you will make all of those chips back and more, you may wonder how do I not make it obvious that I have a hand? well most beginners that try this make a basic mistake, when they are creating that image, they bet, and then when they get a good hand they do the good ole check raise, which looks strong in some people's eyes, so the key is to play your strong hands same way you played your really weak hands earlier, make them not believe you and hand you their chips.

Ok that's one way to play with a big stack, but if you are multi tabling or just not experienced enough to make those laggy plays, then I suggest tightening up. If you are holding a hand something like AT, and a player in early position raised, what do you do here? well my answer is I suggest folding, those are the hands that will get you in trouble, you hit your ace, you wonder if someone has a higher kicker or not, you hit the T, now you are worried that someone might have an over pair or maybe even a set. Now this is a very common mistake beginners play but you have to realize your mistakes and fix them. I won't lie and say I never mistakes, in fact we all make mistakes, even the pros, do you think they were born pros? no, they learned from their mistakes and some still do make very silly mistakes, which sometimes I'm surprised how they are a pro and I'm not. lol .

Well also, its a good idea to post hands that you had trouble with on here, and even look over them yourself, a lot of players make up excuses, oh the donk got lucky on the river or the donk hit a 2 outer w/e blah blah blah, I'm not saying it never happens, ( I myself sometime tend to b**ch about stuff like that) but, you have to go over the hands, and say what did I do wrong to let him see that river, I bet the flop, ok, I checked the turn after villain checked to me, ( oh maybe it was my mistake after all), you know what I mean?. Sorry I think I might of got carried away with this, lol. I hope this helped you understand a fairly good idea of how you handle situations like this, and if you have any more questions, you can reply here, or just pm me, pm'ing me is a better idea since I might forget to check here.

Thanks Bob

Nice Bob.. I like the way you broke that down.

thanks