Originally Posted by VegasGambler

1. Congrats!

2. Yes, SDCs. For flights with many options I like to book the cheapest flight of the day and SDC to the most convenient flight of the day. Don't forget to include co-terminals in your search! Eg, SJC-LAX is often dirt cheap, while SFO-SNA is pricy. Check the fare rules for a full list of co-terminals.

3a. General flexibility. I managed to score a cheap round trip to OGG this coming weekend. But hotel prices were through the roof (Valentine's day friday; presidents day Monday): over $1000/night everywhere I looked on Maui. No problem... I kept looking for hotels every day and yesterday someone cancelled a standard room at Hyatt, which I was able to book with points. If that hadn't popped up I would have just cancelled the flight for no fee on Friday night.

3b. General flexibility; award edition. You can build trips with stopovers 1 segment at a time as the segments become available. Same with round trips (eg KE awards). Similarly, I booked a first class trip to Tokyo, even though I couldn't find a return. A month later I found a return I liked (using a different mileage program). If I had never found a good return, I just would have cancelled the outbound.

4. No real strategy here but the 100% mileage bonus is huge!