So I'm back from a fantastic couple of days down on the coast with all of the family and come Saturday I'm right ready for action and looking to increase my pre-race trading skills. I've watched loads of training videos and read plenty of articles and I know that you have to be primed for action, almost like a tiger waiting to pounce on it's prey, all muscley, tuned and ready to spring into action like a greased bolt of lightening!
So I'm sitting in front of my monitors when the RUK bods interview George Margarson, the trainer of the favourite Lucky Kristale, and not only does he say that his beast will win but actually that it's going to win easily. Obviously this is a traders dream as the price is only going to go one way.
Here's what I was doing at that exact point in time ...
Yep, tucking into a plate of ham, egg and chips! What a pratt. Now as we all know (according to the women in our lives) men can't multi-task, so it was either the grub or the trade! I sat there with my gob full of munch and watched as the price took a nosedive and thousands were being matched. I coulda and shoulda won a nice few quid but then again I was fucking starving and nothing was going to get in my way of my next mouthful!
29/08
+£53.39. I actually felt as if I had won a lot more today.
As usual the racing was hectic for a Saturday and there was little
chance to get involved in the pre-race markets, but when I did I played
sensibly and cautiously.
30/08
+£114.66. Currently I'm trying to immerse myself in as much pre-race trading information as posssible. I've been studying Caan Berrry's video package material which explains his mindset, approach and demonstrates exactly how he trades. I've also been watching some of the material that is available on YouTube. I recently watched this one from Peter Webb a number of times and I think that you can learn a lot from this video, in particular the thought process behind the trade itself.
When watching these videos don't take everything for gospel and see if you can see any mistakes, errors of judgement or different angles of opportunity from those that are being presented!
I was chatting with my good trading buddy Andy earlier today and he mentioned the book 'Trading in the Zone'. I did read the first half when I last looked at the pre-race trading game and it contains some good informtion. However, the book that I really like is 'The Daily Trading Coach'. I must admit that it's been gathering dust since I last looked at it, but I'm sorely tempted to dust it off, stick it in my bag and head off back down to the coast on Tue-Wed for a couple more days. It would be foolish to waste any more nice days now that we are almost in September!
PS If you search the internet you might even be able to find some free PDF copies of both of the books mentioned above.
I'm sitting here scratching my head (and occasionally my balls) after another day of trying to work out the complexities of the pre-race trading game and a number of issues keep popping up in my noggin.
So what better way to spend a Sunday evening than listing them all down on here so that when I become the biggest thing since sliced bread in terms of pre-race trading I can look back and say 'that's where it all started'.
So below is the contents of my brain at this very point in time:
how important is the Betfair graph? It's not time sensitive and surely most of the left hand side of the graph can be ignored as pretty much fuck all gets traded between when the markets open and maybe 5 minutes before the off?
so if the BF graph is wank then is there a graph that can actually help? I currently have a 180 second streaming chart of the LTP at the bottom of my setup and I think that this provides more help in trying to determine the support or resistance for any selection?
what happens in those races where it seems that no fucker has an idea of what is going on and the prices are flying all over the shop in seemingly random directions?
is it actually slightly easier to trade with bigger stakes as you have more influence over the market if you are playing with hundreds instead of fivers?
is it really THAT important to try and identify which way the market is about to move? I pretty much think that no fucker can be absolutely certain, and if this is the case surely I should be concentrating on where to best place my entry points and more importantly what the fuck I'm going to do once my first positions have been taken?
how much can I learn from the various videos scattered about all over the internet (mostly on YouTube obviously)? I ask this as in many of the vids that I have seen the commentator often seems to be hanging onto trades whilst exclaiming 'oh come on pls', 'with a bit of luck I'll get this' and various other prayers and mantras. OK I know that this is human nature and that some of these guys are posting good profits but sometimes when I watch these vids I'm also on the edge of my seat willing the price to go in the right direction!
do I fancy another cup of tea or do I fancy watching some porn? (well I did say the 'entire' contents of my brain!)
I seem to remember that I did a similar exercise a while back on here so I'll trawl back and see if I can find the post and see if I was wafffling about the same shit.
24/08
+£78.81. We only had the four meetings today and although my total was nothing special I actually felt like I had a great day.
I was able to concentrate a bit more on my pre-race trading and put into practice some of the techniques that I picked-up from watching some of Caans videos. I really felt as if I had made a big step forward in understanding the markets and therefore making good decisions. There's no doubt that I still have a long way to go and will run across scenarios where I think 'what the fuck happened there!' but as long as I keep on learning without doing my bollox I'll be happy!
I decided to record the 15:00 @ Brighton today and post it on here so that I can look back in the future and realise what a novice I was! It might be good, it might be bad but will probably be very ugly. Here it is .....
Well I couldn't leave it there so I also recorded the 15:30 @ Brighton ...
And also the 16:30 @ Brighton ...
Might as well have the 18:25 @ Leicester as well ...
25/08
+£42.89. I didn't trade that many races today but nonetheless was chugging away until I knocked it all out in the 19:00 @ Ballinrobe.
It's slightly annoying when that happens! You start to think how you could have spent that £100 down on the coast (ideally beers and burgers) and the fact that you've been sitting there all day just gradually chipping away. A few expletives were uttered but then I managed to nick some back in the last which eased my pain slightly.
15:00 @ Chepstow ... close but no cigar ...
After posting my musings (see above) I received this reply from RFSports Trading on Twitter:
Betfair graphs - Caan uses Geeks Toy which has a function which allows all runners to be available on the same graph (Market Overview). You can see steamers and drifters together on the same graph. It updates probably every few secs so 180 secs is too long I'd say.
Chaotic markets - I think it boils down to the quality of the race which is likely to drive the level of liquidity. Better quality of racing and more liquidity provides smoother markets and so Brighton on a Monday afternoon is going to be pretty random I'd say. Have you got Caans pre race trading guide?
Big stakes - yes I think Monday Brighton race might get manipulated by a big player.
Market prediction - if you think about maximising profits and minimising losses it almost doesn't matter if you guess up or down in terms of price prediction. However if you have some reasoning i.e. the fav has drifted then maybe the another horse is shortening then this might help predicting the movement correctly.
Better quality races - I think the prices tend to be smoother and move in the same direction for longer.
Tea or porn - why not both?
I'd be happy to discuss any trading ideas just pm me. Re-read Caans pre race trading guide it has taken me a while to understand why race quality matters. Peter at Bet Angel always bangs on about quality of the race also.
It's always great to receive helpful advice from other traders and when I get the chance I will be adding to these points.
28/08
+£141.06. Just back from a cracking 2 days down on the coast with all of the family. The weather was typical English summertime ... gales, rain, hail with a few sunny spells here and there!
I had already purchased a windbreak and 2 beach shelters and I'd be fucked if I was going to let a little inclement weather spoil our fun. We set about smashing the windbreak firmly into the sand but unfortunately once we had it secure it was only about 2 foot high! Me and my youngest boy then managed to get one of my shelters erected and we both got in and zipped ourselves inside and had a bottle of Hoegaarden from my coolbox. So there we were, the waves crashing, the wind blowing, the rain falling and me and my boy zipped up in a shelter! We ended up as the only family on the beach, sharing 2 tents and a bottle of wine.
I did my child minding duties in the evening and took all of the grandkids along the promenade while the reamainder of my party had a munch in the local curry house. Once the grandkids had all crashed-out I began my assualt on the Hoegaarden and one by one my family members fell by the wayside and headed back to the Travelodge until I was left to fly the flag. Unfortunately I think that I may have over indulged! I probably got back at around 03:00 and felt like a sack of shite the following morning. I managed to get my ass out of bed and decided that a long stroll along the windswept coast would blow away the cobwebs. Well after about an hour of walking I felt like death ..... so I crawled back to the Travelodge and stayed in bed all day!
The remainder of the break was alcohol free and we all had a good time ... roll on the next one!
I couldn't wait to get back and crack on with the pre-race training but to be honest by about 15:00 I was feeeling pretty tired so I just concentrated on the in-running and managed to win back some of the cash that I had spunked down on the coast.
The weather looked set fair so once again I packed my stuff and headed for the coast! I
set off well early and was stark bollock naked on the beach by 07:30.
Once again I just lay there in the currant bun and did absolutely fuck
all (apart from having a couple of small bottles of Hoegaarden). There were quite a few more women on the beach this time around which made a change from staring at saggy old arses and wrinkly todgers all day (not that I stare at those of course!). I
stayed until just past midday and then made my way through the traffic
jams down to Ramsgate and was outside The Belgian Cafe at just past
14:00 whereupon I indulged in a few pints of Hoegaarden.
Sunday
night was interesting! The Belgian Cafe was pretty quiet up until about
23:45 whereupon it started to get pretty banged-out. I somehow managed
to get myself squeezed into a corner on a long table by five of Thanet's
finest females, the eldest being a self proclaimed 68!
I somehow knew
that it would be an entertaining night when the old dear suddenly stood
up out of her chair and proclaimed in the loudest, roughest voice ever
heard 'I'll fuckin 'av the black cunt' ... referring to some earlier fracas, followed by 'I'll fuckin 'av any cunt in here'.
She looked like a female version of Lenny McClean and I must admit that
it's the first time that I've ever seen a 68 year old granny want to
take on the whole pub! The remainder of the night saw drinks being spilt over the table at a rate of one every ten minutes, one of the other women trying to steal another guy's Guinness and plenty of very drunk people
failing at trying to walk in a straight line!
Fortunately Monday
was a much calmer day where I went to the local book shop and got myself
a couple more books and sat outside The Belgian in the sun. The evening
was strangely quiet (maybe most of last night's revellers were still
banged-up in the local nick) so I managed to work my way through Gary
Witshire's book 'Winning it Back'. Not a brilliant book, but interesting in
parts.
On Tuesday I did my usual morning/midday
session and read a bit more and twanged a guitar for a bit. I chatted to passers-by every now and then and even got chatting to one guy who suggested that we do a little jam session the next time that I'm down in Ramsgate. If you've ever heard me play then you know that wouldn't be a good idea! The seagulls would probably go fucking mental!
I had to
be sensible in the evening so I refrained from any more alcohol as my
body was showing signs of extreme alcohol abuse so I just strolled along
the front and enjoyed the pleasentness of the evening ... how sophisticated!
12/08
+£90.12.
A strange day where I started very poorly, didn't have many trades and
then had 2 nice wins late on to put me in front for the day ...
13/08
+£222.93.
A much better day today where I had a few more 'chunkier' wins which
saw me cruise past the £200 barrier. I pretty much needed a day like
that as I'm in the process of spunking all of my cash on days down on
the coast and numerous beers!
14/08
+£91.27. Fuck all trades today so I was happy to make what I did ...
15/08
+£52.13. I was chugging along at a slow rate of knots and then had a pants evening doh!
16/08
It was the wife's birthday today so we all went out on the piss and had a great time!
17/08
-£8.86. Today I decided to lose £8, have an afternoon kip and then go out on the piss with the missus again!
18/08
+£99.34. My general lethargy over the summer has meant that I'm winning fuck all and spending loads ... and also getting fatter again! Must try harder ...
19/08
+£277.44. A much better day today.
Now as well as my in-running endeavours I've decided to give the pre-race trading another crack. I've started to go through Caan Berry's video package and I'm going to do the sensible thing and concentrate mainly one one style of trading. My main reason for concentrating on one style is that it can be so easy to get caught up in the excitement of the day and start clicking buttons like a madman trying to convince yourself that you can click your way to success. Believe me, I've been there! It's like starting off with a pea shooter trying to nick a few pence here and there in order to build up a winning strategy and then something goes wrong and you're out with the Uzi 9mm trying to blast your way out of trouble!
I've had this before .. trading with £5 clicks in order to find my feet and find my way around and then all of a sudden a market goes against you! A wise man would quickly take the red and regroup. But oh no not me! I give the mouse a quick spray of WD40 and give it some of this ...
Before you know it you have hundreds in the market and some fucker is well happy as he scoops it all into his pot! Then, at the close of play you wonder what the fuck went wrong. If you happened to be pressing the mouse like a complete nutter (see above) then you can't even evaluate your day in order to try and deternine why you spunked all of your cash.
So it's one strategy for me, and that is trying to identify steady late moves (in the last 3 minutes before the off) and jumping aboard. Her's the reason why:
if you look at the top 4 runners in the market for each race then you will normally see at least one of them go on a long, steady, slow move (in either direction) in the last few minutes before the start of the race. This will happen in nearly every race (just check it out). Now these types of move present the opportunity of a nice trade eh? The only problem is deciding which horse to trade and also which fucking direction it's going to move in! Work in progress ...
like many people I have tried a scalping based approach and like many others I win a little, win a little, win a little and then lose a lot! I've seen Caan giving examples of scalping but fuck me you have to be as quick as lightening both in your noggin and on the speed of the mouse and to be honest I'm an old git with neither of these attributes!
if I can master the swing type of trading and correctly identify moves then I can always scalp (albeit at a more leisurely pace) on top of my swing trade as the price moves in one direction? Trust me, this will be the only time that I'm praying for one direction ...
20/08
+£43.05. Not too sure why but it was a bit pants today ...
21/08
+£54.65. I had my grandkids in the house for most of the day today so the
trading took a bit of a back seat as I nibbled at races here and there
...
So today's lesson learnt was
'don't try and trade meetings like Killarney and Wolves the same way in which you would trade races at the York Ebor meeting ... they just ain't the same!'
22/08
+£211.30. Saturday today ... check! 27 degrees on the beach ... check! Going to piss down for the next 5 days at least ... check. Sit indoors all day and trade the donkeys ... check! What a tosser eh?
Such was enthusiasm for cracking on with my pre-race shennanigans that I decided NOT to go to the beach today and instead sit indoors in the sweltering heat and watch the fucking donkeys again! Unfortunately it was one of those days where there seemed to be too much racing (not that I'm complainiing) but it definitely made it harder to get into a flow. I have to admit that I didn't pre-race trade that many races as I just didn't see any clear entry points. Additionally the hectic schedule meant that my IR activities left me with little time to get onboard for the subsequent race.
However, in the evening we only had 2 meetings so this was an ideal time to get stuck into the pre-race trading training. Unfortunately in one race I got involved way too early and a slow gradual move breezed past me as I sat motionless at my desk. The fortunate thing is that I immediately recognised my mistake and vowed never to do it again! In fact I regard the £5 lost in this race as money well spent. As I have said before, if you make a balls-up then at least make an effort to recognise why it happened!
So following that loss I had a much better feeling for the markets, and although I only won pennies I felt well happy that I was able to read a few moves and generally avoid making any silly mistakes again. One of my old trading colleagues from the exchange is also immersed in Caans package (titter ye not!) and we usually chat throughout the day on Skype. He has the IR game by the balls but is looking to supplement this with some pre-race skulduggery and seems to making a good fist of things.
So today's lesson learnt was 'don't get involved too early, but if you do then make sure that you have good ladder positions, good queue positions and know what to do when the money comes surging in your direction'
23/08
-£117.33. Pants Sunday! There I was chugging along and nicking a few quid here and there and then I had one of my most stupid trades ever and was actually lucky that I didn't lose more than £200! I suppose that I was feeling a bit tired and my grandkids were over again so I probably wasn't concentrating as much as I should. Even after all of these years it's still relavtively easy to make a balls-up!
I have to admit that my pre-race effort was also lacklustre. It was only when I got to 17:20 that I realised that I was cream crackered and was glad that the racing was almost finished.
PS The reason that I felt tired was probably because I'e been a right lazy fucker over the last few weeks and haven't been to the gym for ages. In fact I've replaced gym and fitness work with eating shit loads of crap! So it's back to the gym for me tomorrow ...
And as for the trading ... try again tomorrow ...
So today's lesson learnt was
'don't trade when you have a birthday party going on right behind you and when you are a bit tired and maybe lacking in concentration as you'll lay something to lose a grand and find yourself scrambling about trying to get out of a very sticky position!'
Yep it seems as though we're about to get a nice spell of warm weather, so it's time to make the most of it and hit the beach as much as posssible!
I must admit that I've been quite a lazy fucker over the last couple of months with regards to studying a bit of form and watching the replays etc. This has definitely had a negative affect on my profits but it's also give me more time to do things like go to the gym and beach.
On that point: if you have sent me emails recently or over the last few months and I've either missed them or just been to fucking lazy to reply then please send any questions again in my direction as I'm usually always willing to help or give advice if I can! So apologies if it seems as though I'm a lazy twat who never replies to emails!
So now that we have reached August it's deffo time to squeeze in as much leisure time as possible! I know that trusting the weather forecast is usually a complete waste of time but Metcheck has this for the next few days down at Ramsgate ...
... and surely they can't get it completely wrong?
I'd like to think that it's going to be a case of whipping out the SPF 50 lotion and hitting the nudist beach for a few more rays, followed by more binge drinking in Ramsgate? In fact we did have our first joint venture to the nudist beach last week and it's amazing how so many fuckers want to come over and chat about the weather when you're sitting next to a woman with her tits and fanny on public display! Credit to my missus, she styled it out, even when confronted with wrinkly old gits with their shrivelled todgers and ballsacks hanging there literally three foot from her boat! No one has ever wanted to engage in a convo about the weather when I've been sitting there on my tod!
So we had a great time together last Sunday and we even ventured for a naked paddle (not a sight for the faint hearted believe me). It was quite a laugh padddling about in the murky grey waters of The Swale estuary even though in the back of our minds we knew that we were probably sludging about in a mixture of untreated piss, shit and bath water!
As usual we had to have a least a couple of days together down in Ramsgate and we gave it a damn good shot on the drinking front and stayed out drinking to at least 02:00 most nights!
Pre-Race Trading
The thought of switching to pre-race trading is always in my mind and recently I have been giving it some more thought. I'm on the verge of paying the super premium motherfucker Betfair charge and the thought of giving them even more of my winnings gives me the right fucking arsehole! Additionally I've been speaking to 1 or 2 of the guys who previously traded in the exchange back in the day and they too are becoming more intrigued by the pre-race malarkey. In fact one mentioned recently that he always thought that pre-race traders were 'guessers' and that there was no way in which people could make money trading pre-race!
If you have followed my blog for a while then a) you must need psychcological evaluation and b) know that I have previously dabbled with the pre-race game on a few brief occasions. Well I have decided that I'm going to give Caan Berry's trading videos a go and see if I can have a crack on Betdaq. I'll probably scan through the video pack over the couse of August and then knuckle down at the end of the month as the evening racing draws to a close and gives me more time to study what the hell goes on in the pre-race market! I'm by no means a complete novice and I have also seen training material from Jack Birkhead (I haven't heard from Jack recently but I'm sure he's still around) and itsamugsblog so I'm hoping that by going through Caans training pack I will be able to glue it all together and make a jolly good fist of it!
30/07
+£136.17. Steady as she goes ...
31/07
+£35.34. Arrrgggh what a fucking day! We had planned to get away for a couple of days and things were going very nicely up until 20:28 where I had a meltdown to rival Chernobyl.
I managed to spunk £210 in just over 30 minutes! It's the closest that I have ever been to smashing my fist through one of my screens! The only good thing that comes with these type of losses is being able to immediately identify where the fuck you went wrong! In the first £80+ loss I clicked twice instead of once when I thought that I had not been matched and subsequently overstaked and wasn't quick enough to bail out of my position. In the second loss I played a sprint race all wrong and once again got stuck in a position and I couldn't get out.
01/08
+£251.68. I still had the raving asshole when I woke up and after some deliberation thought to myself 'fuck this I'm going to the beach and the trading can go fuck itself today'. So I sorted my shit out and sped down to the beach and got my kit off. Now although I was gradually chilling I still had that nagging urge to get back to my desk and smash the fuck out of the trading. So I though 'bollox to it' and after a few hours on the beach I jumped in the old motor and sped back to London! I'm glad that I did as I nicked a few quid spending money for the weekend!
02/08 - 04/08
Smashing it to pieces in Ramsgate!!
05/08
+£82.85. For some reason I only managed to trade a handful of races today so I suppose £80 wasn't such a bad result?
06/08
+£200.83. 27 trades and no losses means more beer tokens for this weekend!
