Have you had an opportunity yet to be a part of major online poker tournaments (or one in a casino)? The ones that start with more than 1,000 people? I have, and I can tell you from experience there’s a whole lot of action faster than you can click to keep up with it.

What do you do in this situation? It’s very easy to get caught up with the momentum of the FullTiltPoker.com tournament, even your individual table. But my advice is to resist the temptation. I don’t care if you’re sitting on pocket Aces (OK, that might be an exception, but you get the idea), play tight. Don’t bluff, don’t worry about situational betting, just sit back and watch the betting patterns of others around you. Learn the table a little. Odds are by the turn of the hour, half the players will already be out.

See, in these big tournaments, players are looking to stand out. It’s easy to get lost in the pack and find yourself “stuck in the poker mud” so to speak, so anxious players make moves outside of their comfort zone and common sense zone to try to double up early in an attempt to bully others off their table and out of the game. This allows them to progress easily to the next table. They figure with so many people in the tournament anyway, the odds that they’ll win by playing slow or their regular game are so slim it’s worth the risk to take the chance.

There’s actually some validity to this statement. However, for every one guy who’s going to be in a better position than you on FullTilt after a while, there’s three that’ll wish they’d had your patience. Plus, you won’t exactly be standing on your last leg. If you know how to stand up to a bully, especially an online bully, you can take the next step after an hour or so and begin to play your game. You’ll also have a good idea of how the bully bets outside of his “one big move.” This will give you the advantage, because you’ve been playing your own cards close to your chest, and the bully was probably worried more about making his big kill than exposing his betting patterns to the rest of the table. His loss will hopefully be your gain.