Laddies finally get Betdaq!

Well, well, well. Ladbrokes have finally acquired Betdaq. The questions is, will this change P2P betting as we know it? There are plenty of differing opinions on the BF forum (as you would expect) and to be honest I haven't got a clue. The thought of high liquidity markets and a much lower commission rate does give me an instant hard-on (I'm easily pleased) but whether or not things will improve, or even get worse, is anybodys guess.

Does anyone out there have any opinions as to where this may lead?

As an additional point, the only fucking advert that I ever see for BF is for 'Betfair Casino', and there was me thinking that the PC was supposed to help fund the drive to get more users on the exchange, not the fucking BF Casino! 

As for my progress, well I'm running in quicksand right now. It is true that the weather has decimated the racing over the last couple of weeks, and this had probably affected the markets. I'm still having a bash at the pre-race, with varying results, but my IR game seems to have picked-up (maybe because I've upped my stakes).

The short term weather forecast looks a bit better so maybe the racing and markets will return to normal? I have noticed that Lingfield AW has been unplayable this week so the track mongrels are probably out in force.

In my spare time I've been getting stuck into 'Trading in the Zone'. It does start to get a bit heavy and repetetive at around the halfway mark, and as it gets later in the evening it gets more and more tempting to ditch the book and watch silly videos on YouTube instead. The basic thrust of the book is to make the reader realise, and accept, that the way that the market moves (and I'm applying this to pre-race markets) is totally random.  Then once you've discovered your edge, through market analysis, spottting trends etc, you can then confidently trade the market, with pre-defined exit points, and not be affected by short term results (as you accept the randomness of the market) as you know that your proven edge will make you a winner in the long run, much like a casino or a traditional bookmaker.

If anything this has had more of an affect on my IR trading, as I'm no longer doubting my initial observations and getting involved when I see the opportunity, and not worrying if I have a losing race or losing day, as I have a proven edge which has served me faultlessly over the last 5 years.

So keep an eye on the BF share price and get ready to man the lifeboats!

28/01

It's been pretty quiet with regards to progress in the pre-race markets. I did have a small play in the IR win market at Cheltenham on Saturday, albeit for tiny stakes, but managed to win a few pennies in the six races that I traded. I recorded my trading and Jack is going to post the videos on the TFF website.
We only have 2 AW meetings this afternoon so I'll be back in the place market trying to nick a few quid.

30/01

Feeling really depressed and fucked off today. Poxxed about trying to put 2 new batteries in my car this morning and as usual nothing goes to plan and spent 2 hours fucking about, getting greasy and fucked right off! Also checked my P&L for January last night and that fucked me off as well, so in a nutshell I'm well and truly fucked right off.

31/01

Had a right fucking miserable day yesterday. Fucked my car and fucked my P&L. Going to trade today and then go out and get wankered tonight. Then in February I'm going to smash the fuck out of the market.

My car antics above reminded Steve (showing his age) of a classic comedy moment from a few years back when we were all nippers.

Let's Smash this Fucker!

OK. I've served my apprenticeship in this pre-race malarkey and now it's time to win a few shillings. I'm starting to grasp how the markets move and react in certain conditions so now I need to up the stakes and start getting involved!

PS It's my birthday today!

I'm burying myself practically 24 hours a day in watching how markets/selections move and thinking about the reasons that cause these moves and subsequent reactions. I literally plonk myself in front of the PC with a cuppa in the morning and just watch markets move. Then in the evening I do the same, but maybe with a Hoegaarden instead of a brew. Then when I hit the sack I don't spend hours making long, hot, passionate and totally fulfilling love to my wife (even though she's always gagging for it!) ...

.... oh no, I lie there thinking about price moves and graphs and how to win loads of cash!

I've recorded most of the races where I traded today. So it's off to the TFF webinar for a couple of hours followed by a marathon session watching my performance today and seeing what I did well, where I went wrong, and looking for more opportunities.

One more thing ..... judging by Adam Heathcote's progress chart if you can average £3.34 per in your first month of pre-race trading then after 4 months you could be averaging over £100 per day and after 6 months you could be averaging over £200 a day! Let's have it!!
 

15/01

I've been drinking tea and watching endless recordings of my recent trading sessions. It does fry the old brain cells somewhat, but it's good when you start spotting things and learning how to react to certain moves. I suppose it's a bit like the in-running where there's no real substitute for time spent watching thousands of horse races.

My P&L is still looking like a bag of shite as I'm still only on relatively small stakes but I'm moving up another level today, so if all goes well then I should be playing with decent stakes by the end of January.

16/01

Blimey it's freezing out there today!

Tried to get stuck in yesterday but really didn't play that well. However, I did record most of the races and spent a good 4 or 5 hours last night just watching the markets all over again and spotting the opportunities that I missed. In most cases I was just a bit too slow to react and I've also found that I've pretty much abandoned scalping altogether, which is not a good idea. So today I'll be looking to be more decisive and speedy, so we'll see how it goes and I'll report back later this evening ....

17/01

Fuck my old boots it's even colder than yesterday! Traded Lingfield AW and Newbury yesterday and fell into the old trap of trading Newbury the same way I would trade the AW ....WRONG! I find that the markets are completely different, so you have to trade differently!

So it was back to watching my screen recordings for the day to see where I went wrong and work out a way to trade these differernt types of market. I noticed that there seemed to be fewer spikes in the price movements and less movement in general. I also noticed that any moves seemed slower but maybe stronger, in that there were less reversals of any note. So in general the markets at Newbury seemed to be much tighter and stable, which is no surprise really as the racing is much higher quality and therefore the form is more stable.


19/01

How time flies since my post back in February 2012 titled 'I Fucking Hate the Winter!'. As if it wasn't hard enough already this poxxy snow, ice and rain looks set to fuck the racing for the next few days. Two meetings have survived today so we'll have to see if we can pick up some scraps of cash in order to pay the gas and electricity bill!

The good news is that Steve managed to get me a copy of 'Trading in the Zone', and judging by the first 40 pages it's going to be a cracking read and provide some much needed help in changing my psyschology and how I approach trading.

 

Well that didn't quite go to plan ...

So where did it all go wrong?

Well looking back at January it didn't seem like a bad start at all. It seemed that most days I was winning maybe £100+ and ended up winning nearly £4k on the month. So not a bad start at all.

I had 1 or 2 interesting days in February, losing a record amount of £1035 on the 21st and winning £752 on the 24th. The snow and ice did little to help matters, and it was in fact during March that I predicted that in-running was set to become a lot harder as it seemed that we were getting further and further behind what was happening live. I suppose it may also have been due to the increasing number of track players snaffling all of the prices before we even had the chance to see what was happening?  So due to these factors I only managed to get just under £5k over the 2 months.

I think that I also drank loads of beer and ate many kebabs during February and March and therefore probably spunked most of my winnings instead of being a tight fisted fuck and putting it into the bank.

I didn't really spend much time on my blog in April or May and for the life of me I haven't got a fucking clue what I did during those few weeks .... probably drunk more beer and didn't bother to save any of the £7.5k that I won.

The weather in June was crap .... I remember that! Obviously the racing picks up during the Summer and I didn't do too bad, but still somehow managed to spend more than what I earned! I managed over £11k during these months and probably should have had a lot more but spent most of it on more beer and trips to the coast!

... and yes, it was 09:05 in the morning!



In September I decided to get involved in the pre-race trading game. I think that I was beginning to sense the end of the place market as the liquidity seemed at an all time low. Things must have been bad as I'd only won £1.5k halfway through the month and I didn't even remember to download my monthly P&L at the end of the month!

October saw the wheels come flying off in spectacular fashion.

Just about scraped over the £1.4 mark for the month and realised that now something was seriously wrong, so decided to abandon ship at the exchange and start playing from home using BF live pics and RUK.

Spent November and December trying to master the pre-race game and seeing exactly how much I could still get from the place market playing from home. The answer: not a fucking lot! In fact I only managed to get just over £1.4k.

So the question is: where the fuck do I go from here? The first thing that springs to mind is the local Jobcentre. However, all is not lost ..... well hopefully!

The Plan for 2013

The place market is pretty much fucked, especially over the jumps, I know that. So the only option is to dive head first into the win market with all the big boys. I think it's just a case of sorting a few strategies and getting used to the price movements and playing differently on Gruss.

I am also going to combine the IR trading with the pre-race trading. I thought that I was making progress during November, albeit for small stakes, only to encounter a wobble during December. I think that I'm back on the right track and we'll just have to see how I progress over the next few weeks. I think that I'm going to play safe during January while I'm learning the ropes and I'll be happy if I can get £1k by the end of the month. Once I get up to speed just using smaller stakes then I can gradually up my stakes back to somewhere near normal when I feel that I know what I'm doing.

I must admit that life has been somewhat stressful over the last few weeks and I have turned into a right miserable fucker. I know that there are much more important things in life than money but it's still hard to come to grips with the fact that things have changed so quickly and it's a lot harder to just sit down and win £100+ every day. My missus has borne the brunt of most of my frustration and we've indulged in 1 or 2 tasty arguments since I've started working from home. She also didn't take too kindly to me likening her to a sloth in one of my previous posts (I suppose that's not really going to help matters). However, she's a diamond and I love her to bits.

 
I still want to move to the coast, and I still believe that it's possible to win big amounts of cash, it's just that it's a bit harder these days, but hey, that's life!


09/01

Fuck it! I thought I'd put my ugly boat on YouTube. I've had 75 trades over the last 3 days and only had 2 losses so I'm feeling like a dog with 2 cocks. I felt suicidal in December so I'm gonna bounce back in January and tell the world just how fucking good I am at this game.

10/01

Had 32 trades today and only 2 losses, so I'm feeling quite happy. Will probably up the stakes slightly tomorrow and crack on! And here's more words of wisdom ....

11/01

Another day where the strike rate was good so really need to start getting a bit more aggressive on the staking. Saturday tomorrow so should be an ideal day to up the stakes and see how I progress.

... and yeah I was a bricklayer. Still get the urge every now and then to throw down a few bricks but my trowel is rusty and my expensive Stabila level got bent by someone hitting it with a mallet (cheers Mike!).


12/01

Well the fact that Betfair went tits up just before 15:00 didn't exactly help things! Traded OK and a bit more aggressively but made a basic error in one market where I expected a reversal just before the off but got involved way too late when there was no real time left for a bounce back. Really need to gradually up the stakes and see how things progress.

13/01

Today was the day when I felt like everything was starting to come together with regards to the pre-race trading.

Just felt as though I was spotting moves and in many cases played the markets correctly. Did spend a lot of time in the evening just watching recordings of previous markets and trying to gain an ever greater understanding of what the fuck is happening each time a market goes bonkers.