New software

Bankroll $147,09

I've decided to give BetTrader a spin. It looked good on the video's and they have a really good deal for only GBP 50,- for 6 months.

My slight drop in bankroll is of course complete the fault of BetTrader. Couldn't be anything else.

Kidding! I played Aussie markets for a bit again and this time the slowness of the entering and exiting the market (which is just as slow in BetAngel) did it to me. Yet another reason not to do Aussie racing anymore. I did the smart thing and quit for the day. It's just so hard if you're doing the US races and are having fun and the last race ends and there's only Aussie races left and you don't feel like bed yet. But it's got to stop. The slowness is starting to cost me and it's silly. Do any other Euro's play the Aussies and do you cope?

Back to BetTrader.

Disclaimer! I have only tried it for a couple of hours and I might be wrong with some (or most) of the things I say, if you spot a mistake feel free to correct me!

I really like the intuitive feel of the software. It just feels easier and friendlier then BetAngel does. I can't really trade well on my laptop with BedAngel and BetTrader makes much better use of limited real estate. But the other way around is true too. On my desktop computer I have a 24" widescreen and BetTrader leaves a lot of empty screen while I could think of quite some stuff I'd like to fill it with.

Big plus over BetAngel is that I can have all the horses on the left side of the screen, and have three ladders next to it. Even on a smaller screen. Very easy to put a horse in the slot you want, smart GUI work there.

Big minus is that there is no full market view. You can only see the first three backers and layers. Also that you can't see the matched amounts right next to the odds on the ladder makes it a lot harder to see what's going on. Those aspects of BetAngel make it easy for me to see what's going on without a graph and BetAngel has excellent graphs and allows you to pop up the Befair graph and autorefresh it. BetTrader graph (unless I didn't find another option??) is inferior, can't see the prices just the downward or upward trend starting from when you open the race. So I have no clue where the price was coming from when I first open a race. Also with BetTrader the Betfair graph isn't autorefreshable, or able to pin it to the front (so the huge empty bit of BetTrader won't go over it when I click on it) and I found that it doesn't work more often then it does in the first place.

I have read on BetTraders excellent forum (www.racingtraders.com) that a lot of these things will be taken care of in an upcoming upgrade so that would be great. I really use that full market and the matched bet amounts on the side a lot and I feel a bit lost without them. But there seem to be quite some guys who really know their stuff and are doing really well without it so maybe I value it too much.

Hedging is also different between the two. On BetAngel you don't get to see the amount all the time. Only when you have a position open. If you have no position open and you want to see what you can green up for you have to click to grid view and then click back. With BetTrader you just see the number on top all the time. But! Really big but!! I think BetAngel offers you a more realistic hedge price, especially when there are gaps. Once again, I think! Because I was messing around with it for the first time and I'm still learning too. Let's say you place a back bet that get's filled. The way I see it BetAngel quotes you a hedge price based on the best lay available then and BetTrader quotes you a hedge price based on the best back price available then. Especially when there are gaps that's not good for two reasons.

1. it simply isn't a true price yet as there is no market there. if no one is buying it, it's not a price.
2. it doesn't instafill! Most of the time I hit hedge I just want out and move on, not speculate.

Also I thought BetTrader didn't cancell my unmatched bets and made a bit of mess of the bets with the hedge bet in the middle of it when all I wanted is just get out entirely. BetAngel does cancell anyting and offer you and almost instafill.

Somehow I can't imagine that I'm right with the above and I will test this further tomorrow and report my findings. Surely this must have come up more often on the forums if I'm right.

After reading back what I just wrote I realise sounds all a bit negative towards BetTrader but it really is a great piece of software, I'm just overemphasizing (sp?) some small differences that I noticed in the first testing but there are a lot of little things that just look, feel and are more logically done in BetTrader and with the update coming up (June'ish I believe) I hope they improve without losing what makes it such a nice program now.

If you're a new player on a budget I'd go for BetTrader now anyways. GBP 50,- for 6 months is a great deal. Better be quick, runs to the 13th of march or so! You can also download a trial that goes for 200 minutes or so.

A bit of redemption

Bankroll $150,75

With a bit of healthy paranoia in me I got stuck into the US horse racing. The market I believe I have the most feel for.

I didn't trade every race. I got out as soon as the market went differentely then expected, and took small losses. I scratched some bets. I made sure I got my profit in instead of continuously trying to get more out of a bet.

In the end I had a good run with the right mindset. I wish I had that mindset a couple of hours earlier I would've been closer to my goals.

But it was a good learning experience and a rather cheap one.

I think I have to say goodbye to the Aussie racing. They are simply too late for me and I blame the losses for being too big on tiredness and passiveness. I simply don't care enough when I'm tired. This sucks as I'll have to do the KYC thingy with someone signing the copies of my passport to get my money out. (I saw the unavailability of it as a way of saving) Of course after doing the KYC I can transfer the funds in and out as I please so maybe a good idea anyways as I have sometimes problems with laying although my total funds would cover the liability.

On that note I've noticed that the question if you should back or lay first is asked quite often on different forums. I don't always do the one or the other. It differs per situation as I try to get in on a spot where I have the biggest margin on a price movement before I go into a loss. This is more important when trading with gaps then one tick trading I suppose. Although still would people who always back only trade when they think the price will go down? Waste of the times you're sure it'll go up!

The doggies stung me today but I think it was my being greedy, sloppy and stupid. If it were so easy that I could easily make money on it on autopilot after just one session everyone would be doing it. So I'll have to get stuck in again and I'll use minimal bets for a bit until I get the feeling that I know when to hold'em and know when to fold'em. The timeslot is just too convenient for me to pass up on them. I can play them almost every day and some sort of steady flow of money from them would be welcome.

Tomorrow I'm swamped with work so no playtime.

Humble Pie

Bankroll: $141,70

As you can see on my new bankroll total, this wasn't my best day trading ever..

I lost some last night on the Aussie markets. Then I got slaughtered on the dogracing and to top it of I turned a small loss on the UK horses this afternoon.

Good news is that it was all my own fault and I have plenty to think about that I can then work on. It's easy to blame external factors but that won't get you any further. I think I had a classic case of invulnarability complex. Some of the losses I took were just silly. And I'm not talking about entering the market, my stop loss was crappy today. Thinking, even willing against better judgement for the market to come back up/down. Instead of just accepting the fact that it went against me and trying to execute an optimal exit strategy.

So lick my wounds and get stuck in it again. The money doesn't mean anything to me, it's the ego that needs mending. I even considered (for a splitsecond and then I chastised myself for it) not posting about this until I had fixed the bankroll but that defies the purpose of this blog.

I like the muts and I cannot lie.

Bankroll: $157,28

Had my first go at dogracing today. It's something I can do for a quick hour before I'm off to work on days I have the early shift. Seeing as there's no horseracing going on then it's a great filler of that timeslot.

First impression: Love'em!

Nice and jumpy, fairly agressive but still lot's of gaps. Probably more volatile then the horses as the liquidity is lower and a lot of people try to get all of it in in only a couple of minutes.

I bet on 6 races giving me 5 wins and 1 loss. And as you can see on my new bankroll total an overal small profit.

The one loss made me wonder once again if doing some sort of homework up front would be a smart thing to do. One thing stopping me from even looking into it is that I have a strong feeling that not having a vast knowledge on how to process the information will do me a lot more bad than good. What happened was that the money started pouring in and suddenly the favorite turned out to be not the favorite at all. The price soared up, and I mean really soared and I had backed it so I was in the kaka. Got out in time but it went from around 2 to well over 7. Something must have happened there. Maybe the dog wasn't a favorite in the first place and traders were trading on it because they all felt it was and when the punters started getting there money in it went up to it's true value. Or something happened on the track and other people knew stuff I didn't know.

So my idea of the homework would be to find out who are the top 3 for every race and have some sort of website, stream or internet radio thingy that can keep me up to date on stuff goin on on the tracks. Also I'm wondering if there's some way to find out what the price will start around initially as I can see profit in knowing where it will aproximately settle once the gap closes in back and lay. Maybe checking out the other bookies and see what there lines are.

Once again, these are some very basic ideas forming in my mind which I'll be carefully looking into later but I can also think of quite some reasons how this could work against me. End of the day ignorance might be bliss and best results might be had by just having a feel for the actual real time market and act upon that.

Moving on up

My bankroll is at $156,15! So I've moved up to $15,- stakes. Next stop is $20,- stakes at $200,- or back to $10,- at $125,-

I was over $162,- but when I checked my profit/loss what was up it seemed I lost over $6,- on a race. I must have made a mistake somewhere because that's a huge amount to lose with $15,- stakes. At the end of a session I always remember the big wins and losses I had and I certainly don't remember taking this hit. Maybe I forgot about a bet that was partially matched and I didn't green/red up before the start. But it seems like a weird double mistake to make.

It was an Aussie race and they are late for me so maybe I was tired, I just wish there was some way to replay your actions and see what happened. Recording every session with Camtasia just in case is something I'm not going to do though. Unless freak losses like this keep popping up, then I'll have to make sure it's really me doing it.

I had a go at the placed UK markets this afternoon and I feel those will suit me much better for the time being. More then enough liquidity to easily match my stakes, and I can probably double them at least 2-3 times before they get too high to get matched. Nice gaps. I like gaps. Gaps are good.

Hopefully I'll have some time tomorrow to spend on the UK horses.

Catching on

I've been having continued succes with the Aussie and US horses. My bankroll is increasing in a satisfying rate compared to my stakes.

When I started this blog my bankroll was $125,- it now stands at $149.27 I've been using $10,- stakes and will move up to $15,- at $150,- If I fall back below $125,- I'll go back to $10,- If I go over $200,- I'll move up to $20,- etc etc. I believe this staking system will make it really hard for me to go bust and always have plenty of funds vs stakes to be comfortable with them.

My stake for the UK horse races will continue to be $4,- until I get a grip on that and start making money there. I have more time to play later at night so I haven't had the opportunity to suss them out yet but wednesday and thursday I'm start work late so I have the afternoon to try some stuff.

I am still learning loads from each session and I don't expect that will lessen any time soon. Hopefully I'll find out how to make money on the UK markets soon as that is where to money is. US and Aussie don't have the liquidity to sustain my stakes for too long shamelessly assuming I'll keep inproving and growing.

Confidence boost

Today I've had two more sessions that ended in profit.

This afternoon just quickly on 2 races, one US and one UK.

And I've just been betting on the Aussie horses for two hours after work. (I own a bar/restaurant so I'm home late) I bet on 7 races of which 5 were profitable and 2 turned up a loss. Best thing about the night though is that only one of the profitable races made less then I lost with the losing ones. So I've managed to cut my losses quick and make the most out of the good situations.

I fully realise that my sample size is, and will be for quite some time, far too small to say that I'm now a definite winner or loser but at least it feels good to have a couple of positive sessions in a row.

Tomorrow afternoon the wife (not married but it wouldn't make a difference) and kids are of to the inlaws which means I can do the UK races with some peace and quiet around me. Yay! Would be nice to be able to have a winning UK session with quite some races that I've bet on.

My tactic is going to be to green up well before the 10 minute mark and move on. I might even move on to the next one at 20 minutes but we'll see how it goes. Also if I feel up for it I'd like to try to have a couple of horses (who are in the same race ofcourse!) next to each other and see if I multitask it. I've always multitabled poker so I should be ok and it's a good opportunity to get some experience under my belt with the 2nd and 3d favorite. I might find out that I prefer betting on them for the time being but we'll see tomorrow.

Past bedtime once again, I'm off!

Yes we can!

I had some fun with the US horses last night. Plenty of gaps and not too bad luiqidity. Well plenty of liquidity to cover my measely little bets.

One thing to reckon with though with the US horses is that the starting times Betfair posts isn't always the exact time the race starts. So I green/red up well before the start not to get caught.

Last night my gap tactic worked like a charm and when it does it really feels like easy money. Of course there's always the chance of a major wipe out as someone might come in with a wad of money and change the odds by a ridiculous amount of ticks. Myself I'm not going for one tick either, I'm trying to make use of the full range of the gap.

So in any event a nice confidence booster!

By the way, I can't click my own pictures to enlarge them. Is that me or can no one else click them either? I looked at other blogs and they seem to use the blogger uploader just like me but theirs are clickable. I suppose that if you can't enlarge them you can hardly see the numbers and it's all a bit pointless.

Self Fulfilling Prophecy

As I've said before, I'm doing better on the Aussie markets then on the English horse racing. So I kind of doomed myself into todays result.

I simply have no clue what the market is up to with the English horses, especially not when the big money hits the market and the price just goes haywire. If it would go up and down a lot that would be great and easy money but I have this nack of getting in at the wrong moment and the price zooming the other way. And then I decide to bank on that and it turns on me again. I should have zigged when I zagged!

I have to rethink my strategy on the English horses and I have two possible solutions and maybe I should do them both:

1. Trade up to 10 minutes before start and then move on to the next as the big money arrives and things start getting erratic and I start losing money

2. Don't trade the favorite but another horse with a bit less liquidity and a stabler pattern.

Probably the thing I need most is hundreds and hundreds of more bets under my belt.

Here is my profit & loss for English and Aussie horses for today:

Good news is that I'm in no rush and enjoy doing it!

Of to bed now, tomorrow is another day.

Back in the saddle again

No more Mr Pacif Resistance! Time to get at it again.

Due to the hours I work I can't do the English daytime horses everyday. I either start work at 13:00 CET or 19:00 CET. Obviously when I start 19:00 I can do the British horses, otherwise I give the Aussie horses a shot.

So today I worked the day shift so I've been trying to make some profit on the Australian horses. Downside is that Betfair or BetAngel was really slow, not even letting me put in bets in the end. At least I hope that showing "placing" bet for over 20 seconds and then not showing a bet anywhere means I didn't place a bet. I did double check in Betfair I had no open bets but otherwise I just hope that whatever I bet the horse does ;-).

I'm playing with 4$ stakes which I will up to 10$ if I consistantly win for at least a week straight and feel that it was based on some sort of skill and not 7 days of dumb luck. My bankroll is 130$ at the moment with another 100$ at Pokerstars which I could move to Betfair if things start to get going as I'm not playing poker at the moment anyways. I am very conservative and disciplined concerning bankroll management though so I'd like to have at least 10x my stake in bankroll and preferably 20x. I can just deal with profit and loss in a lot more relaxed manner if it doesn't affect my bankroll too much either way. I think keeping a level head is important in this game.

Here's my P&L of last night.

Nothing fancy ofcourse but for me the main thing is that I can keep on finding profitable situations.

I like playing the markets where there are some gaps and I can go for the bigger swings. I seem to have a slight grasp on it. The English daytime markets are a bit manic and cloudy to me at the moment but with all that money there it is of course the place to work towards to.

On a side note I have to do some smaller goals before I can do the Peter Webb course. I'll list them, I'm sure they make sense :-)

1. Dishwasher. Our old one broke down and the best way to not only get my better half of my back, but even have her being supportive of this new obsession is by buying something usefull for her first. I did the same when I started to play poker. First thing I bought with my profits was a good dryer which she really wanted badly as she was about to have our first (of 2) daughter. (so lot's of clothes to wash and the climate here isn't fit for drying stuff outside) I almost got bullied into playing poker whenever I didn't feel like it after that!

2. I bought a 2 month subscription to BetAngel which will need to be renewed within the month. I'm also contemplating giving BetTrader a go just to see how that feels. It seems to me that I prefer some parts of their layout but maybe BetAngel has the same functionality but I haven't found it yet. What I do appreciate about BetTrader is their forum and the community they build and as I read it everyday and post every now and again I'm inclined to give something back by using their software. Doesn't have to be the one or the other as I can think of some situations where I'd like to have both running at the same time or have one package if the other decides to break down.

So once I've got those expenses out of the way I can start concentrating on getting enough profit for a nice trip to England!

Still sick :-(

Have had the flu for 2 weeks now, is driving me crazy.

I went to the doctor on tuesday, seems that this 14 day flu is going around and there's nothing else to do then to sit it out. It was the first time in 20 years I've been to a doctor so go figure! Normally when I'm sick I can feel it coming and simply deny it's existance until I have a day of and then succumb to it and I'm back in action again the next day Not so lucky this time around.

I tried doing some trading but I really didn't have the right mind for it and I was not having any fun doing and losing money so it seemed like a waste.

Monday I'll be back in the thick of things again though!

I did do some thinking about what appeals to me in the Betfair trading business and although I can see how horses are the best way to get a stable (additional) income it also seems a bit mechanical in the long run to me and I'd like to have a look at other sports too just as a change of scenery to keep things fresh. So I'll be looking at football (soccer if you're across the pond) and probably tennis too.

I personally like MMA a lot too but I guess betting on that would need more handicapping skills then anything else as you have no clue how long the fight will be in running. Well the maximum time is pretty clear but it could be over any second after they start. I'll have to have a look at how the prices act getting close to the match and see if there's an edge to be found there. I do have the feeling that the favorite tends to get a bit too much love in general.

I suddenly have two people following this blog! No clue where you came from as I haven't advertised it anywhere as far as I know but welcome! :-) Bit intimidating, was expecting to be alone here for a bit longer but I hope my ramblings are worth your while. Comments are always welcome and I encourage you to be frank!

Sick :-(

I've been sick for the last two days so I haven't done any trading. Just feel really really miserable and I'm wallowing in self pity. Something I'm very good at when I'm sick :-)

The good news is that I've finally found a forum with loads of good posts and a couple of people on it that really seem to know their stuff:

http://www.racingtraders.com/

I'm in the process of reading every relevant post I can find and there are quite some threads so it's keeping my busy. It does get me thinking about a lot of other strategies and maybe also branching out in some other sports over time.

Another, although less active, forum that has some little gems is: www.bettingtraders.com