One step forward, two steps back

Bankroll: $ 148,73 Added $ 45,- which I had doing nothing on Neteller so now it's: $ 193,73

I just realised after typing the titel that I'm showing a higher bankroll then last time but it's been some ride!

Quick P&L since of the differen't markets since my last post:

Greyhounds : - $ 7,68
UK & US horses : $ 2,70
Aussie horses : $ 6,96
Football : - $ 4,-

The random football bet was just trying out laying the 0-0 and planning to get out after 20 minutes. And seeing as it was Liverpool - Real Madrid you can see how that went wrong. I do want to add more sports to my toolbox at some point. Probably when I have a bigger bankroll and don't mind losing a bunch of minimum bets.

Greyhounds are killing me. My dog is lucky I don't take it out on the complete species :-) There's nothing left of my initial confidence that it was easy money. I checked my profit and loss on the dogs since I had that first good session and I've lost over $17,- to them. That's including those initial profits. Problem is that I can see the profitability just staring me in the face. I think I'm having trouble with it being a less then three minute window where I have to learn to trust my instincts and insta react. And to have instincts that are good I need more practice. So I'm at peace with the fact that them mutts will surely cost me some more before they start making me some.

Most of my money earned on horses is from the US horses as I can, and do, play them almost every day and I'm starting to get to know the markets pretty well. Mostly when I lose money is because it's not a good night to bet on them due to liquidity etc and me really wanting to have a go as it's 99% hobby and 1% possible additional income to me. (which doesn't mean I'm not fanatic about not losing) So biggest challenge is not trading when the markets aren't optimal and I'm sitting behind my computer eager to go. Any new trader looking for a start. Just check out the favorite. See which way the market is going (in time it get's easier and easier) and abuse the gap. Because of the gap it's much easier to see which way the market is truly going as one side is rather still and the other side is moving towards it. Then you have to think which side you want to bet on first. Very important! I got killed today by a race starting 2,5 minutes earlier then Betfair thought it would and thus suspending betting while I still had a back (thank god for that!) bet matched but not layed yet. And of course the bloody horse didn't win so I lost $5,- So when you are betting US horses beware! There are sites out there that give correct times. Check www.racingtraders.com for that as I saw it mentioned in one of the treads on the forum.

Aussie horses are fine providing there is liquidity and the response time is doable. Sometimes it's just too slow and you put yourself in bad spots because you can't place/cancel bets fast enough.


One last tip when doing gap trading. You want to make the most out of the gap as bets coming in on either side will swoop outstanding money on a couple of ticks quite often. So what I do is if I have for instance backed for $15,- I'll put in three $5,- lay bets at different points. So 1/3 is matched quickly, 1/3 is matched when there's a nice heave of the market and the other 1/3 is best case scenario. If the 2nd and 3d don't get matched within reasonable time and I have the feeling the market isn't going the way I'd like it to go I quickly bring them to the front. Try it as it will give you a significantly higher return instead of putting the whole 15$ in front and then kicking yourself as a bet gets put in swooping away 12 ticks. This also shows the downside of US markets, someone can come in at any time and swoop away a huge amount of ticks the wrong way leaving you in the kaka.