Category: Horse Racing
St Leger Meeting
For some background to this meeting have a read of this wiki link.
I must admit, from a trading perspective, I haven’t got a great deal out of this meeting in the past. So I tend to not set high expectations only be disappointed. I tend to treat it as a decent meeting, but not something I expect to get anything stunning from.
My only advice, given the prior years, is to take things a little more gently. If …
Laying on the beach
Laytown – Sounds like a small town where people favour only one side of the book. But its actually a racecourse in Ireland. Since 1876 Laytown has hosted a single annual horse racing meeting on its beach – one of only a couple on sand (held on the beach) race meetings run under official rules of racing in Europe.
The BBC have made it the subject of a documentary, titled Racing the Tide, and have included passages in their …
All weather, all change
It’s the 1st of September and Monday evenings at Windsor and a thing of the past for another year. I mourn the passing of the summer, but it’s not all bad news on the racing front.
In the summer you will find that with so many races on the liquidity dilutes itself across many races. Therefore you can have days were the entire card is weak from a punting and trading perspective. Contrary to BHA opinion, more races doesn’t equal …
Marmite Monday
It’s that day of the year that you either love or hate. The August bank holiday in the UK brings a whole bunch of racing, all on the same day.
There will be lots of meetings on today and about a billion races. This may seem like heaven for some, but it’s a nightmare for others. Quite a few races will attract little liquidity, a lot isn’t of quality and many races will clash meaning that you can’t do much …
York Ebor meeting
Summer racing isn’t over quite yet and today kicks of the Ebor meeting at York. I’ve traditionally done OK at this festival each year so I am looking for something above average this week. Liquidity is usually quite good at York and I suspect I can get something decent out of some of these races.
Some decent races, some decent horses and a decent meeting should add up to a decent opportunity this week if you are trading.
Anyhow, Good …
Little and often
This is a phrase I’ll often quote when advising people on how to trade. I posted up a full list of results from yesterday and it got a fair amount of commentary because it illustrated exactly that point. More information further down this post.
It’s really nice to bang in some massive results now and again, but generally, that’s not what trading is about. Well. not 80% of the time on racing.
Most of the time I’m in a market …
Goodway
So Goodwood is underway and it’s performing more or less as I expected and, hopefully, set your expectations at.
In the first two days the biggest race reached £2.2m but the lowest was waaaaaaaaaay off that. Mainly thanks to clashing with other races. Attention is very firmly focused on the feature races and that’s producing the majority of the matched bet turnover so far, helping all markets reach £16m so over the two days. But curiously it doesn’t feel like …
Trading Goodwood
From a trading perspective I like multi day high quality meetings. They usually throw up some good opportunities and are a welcome addition to the month.
As you may know these higher quality meetings produce extra volume and that can change the characteristics significantly. But don’t let Goodwood fool you into thinking it’s the same as a Royal Ascot or Cheltenham, it behaves very differently. Goodwood benefits from decent volume but it’s not as much as some major meetings. Therefore …
Gearing up for Goodwood
I’ve been having a quiet week as you can probably tell from various social media bits. After fourteen years on the markets a really busy summer requires an effort to not completely burn out so I’ve been taking it a bit easier. Also my twins turned to teenagers this week, so that’s worth celebrating. You may have noticed that I still can’t resist a rock solid opportunity however!
In the Summer it’s possible to skip some sessions as you know …
Newmarket July meeting
Felt I should comment on the meeting that is taking place at Newmarket this week.
After a fairly long spell of indifferent racing we are treated to some quality for the next three days. So that should bring some focus to your trading. It’s not an amazing meeting but you should be able to dig out a few opportunities. The higher quality stuff should bring some much needed liquidity to the markets.
I’m off to a decent start, so hope …
It’s not just about the big stuff
OK, we are in the thick of some major sporting action at the moment. I’m soooo busy it’s difficult to know which way to look at times, but it’s great fun. I apologise if I’ve been a bit quieter recently, but I simply haven’t had the time to devote to updating the blog etc. I’ll be back soon, most likely after Wimbledon has completed.
But it’s important to reflect that it’s not all about the big stuff. Ascot is gone …
Gamble fail, trade win
A quiet end to Ascot week, but I’m relieved that I can now return to more ‘normal’ trading patterns.
I did OK on the day, but one trade stood out. The 17:00 at Ascot.
‘Absolutely So’ was gambled massively, more than any horses I think I’ve seen at Ascot. Widely tipped, It had a terrible race and finished 15th in the end. But it highlighted the beauty of trading. You could quite easily see it was being heavily backed, so …
Royal Ascot week
Thanks for the feedback on World Cup stats. Inspired, I’ve combined a general overview of Ascot with some data on previous years meetings.
Please see the embedded video further down this post.
It goes without saying that Ascot is big, but how big? What are the biggest days? That may surprise you if you are not into the detail of racing. The flow of the week is different at Ascot as well, so it’s worth being aware of that as …
Derby Day
A traditionally good day for racing traders today with the Derby upon us. We had the Oaks yesterday and that proved OK, if a little tricky in places. The market was flowing over with money and that made it hard to get a decent fill at the right risk. The overall turnover was only £2m vs. £2.5m the year before so that was disappointing. Overall there were four races that exceeded £1m for a total of £7.5m traded at post …
The Oaks – Betfair’s first ever market
So today we reach the Oaks and tomorrow the Derby, when the summer racing really starts to step up a gear. The start of June means Royal Ascot is just around the corner.
If you are a Betfair newbie you may not know that the Oaks at Epsom was Betfair’s first market way back when they started in June 2000. But it was a little later that year, on June 11th. Mark Davis reminisced on his blog about it. I …
York Dante meeting
After a successful Chester meeting last week we roll onto York for the Dante meeting this week.
The York card looks good, but the other stuff on the card is a bit testing’. I’ve never managed to consistently pull out any massive totals from this York meeting in the past, but today has got off to a good start so maybe this is the year!
As we move through the early part of the flat turf season the early part …
Chester draw Bias
Chester draw bias; an unbiased view by Proform
Given its idiosyncratic nature, a low draw at Chester provides a distinct advantage and with the Chester 3 day May meeting starting today, many race goers and punters will try to outsmart the general public’s perception of the draw bias and overlook the obvious to seek value elsewhere. Nevertheless, as shown by specialist tools like Proform siding against basic physics on this occasion may as fruitless as King Canute’s efforts in holding …
Chester May Festival
Chester May festival starts today and it’s a welcome addition to the card, but based upon previous years it’s nothing amazing from a trading viewpoint.
Obviously we all love some extra liquidity that the quality racing will bring, but it’s never been a meeting that I’ve got really good amounts from. By that I mean I’m not banging in three figure results a race. Just the odd one or two a day. The thing to note about Chester is its …
The first Classic of the season is here!
Jollygreen has provided an overview of this years race and you can see my own thoughts from the video I recorded earlier this week further down this post.
The racing fraternity in the UK always look forward to this day, the first of the Classics. I often find they are also pretty tricky to solve; unless Frankel is in the line up! From a trading point of view, paddock judges can have an influence on market movement. There is always …
Easter Bank Holiday Monday
You would think that perhaps lots of racing would be a blessing, but on day’s like this it’s a curse. I forgive racing for wanting to put on a show for punters, but it’s a mare for us on the other side. Just too much racing!
There are 705 runners today over 67 races, an average of 10 runners per race. If all races start on time, then there will be 24 clashes today. If races start on their average …
Racing makes history… and annoys families
So Racing has broken that taboo and Racing goes ahead on a Good Friday. Hmm, just got used to having the day off and so had the kids and suddenly I’m looking at trading instead of spending time with the family. No in fact, I’m not going to. I’ll switch on some automation and let it work (it’s magic?).
I understand Racing’s desire to be more appealing but this was one day, of few, of the year where I could …
Craving Craven
I prefer to know whether I’m in a good market or a poor one, but the Craven often sits in-between that. I know there’s quality there, but in terms of liquidity it often hasn’t delivered in the past and as a betting heat it doesn’t have the same importance as other nearby events. But it is better than the dross that’s often between Cheltenham and the Grand National though, it has to be said!
Winter is generally pretty tough and …
Aintree Grand National meeting
I’ve prepared a couple of videos for you to do with the Grand National meeting, see below. To get videos as they are released click on this link.
This is a curious meeting for me each year. It’s not on the scale of some of the really large meetings, but is still a decent meeting in it’s own right. The problem I have here is that I never seem to pull off anything spectacular from it. On a race …
The flat is back
Looking forward to the return of the flat turf season this weekend with the Lincoln at Doncaster.
We should rejoice at the return of the flat turf season. It’s return will herald less clashing and generally bigger fields. In the winter it can be a right pain when you have many cards and all the races and are falling all over each other. This will mean you should see better opportunities and more, just around the corner. I’ve produced a …
Cheltenham Day 3 & 4
We’ve teamed up with our friends at Proform to bring you one of their race cards at Cheltenham, for FREE! Download today’s racecard by clicking on this text.
Cheltenham day three
A decent day where I managed to pull out a number of good results across both exchanges. It was much more like Tuesday and completely different to Wednesday that threw a few curve balls! So looking forward to tomorrow and the Gold Cup!
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Cheltenham day two
We’ve teamed up with our friends at Proform to bring you one of their race cards at Cheltenham, for FREE! Download today’s racecard by clicking on this text.
Cheltenham day two summary
A really interesting day and one that produced many surprises in complete contrast to day one. It would have been nice to have two similar days so that we can take some of that forward to day three. As it is we have it all to look …
Excellent start to Cheltenham
We’ve teamed up with our friends at Proform to bring you one of their race cards at Cheltenham, for FREE! Download today’s racecard by clicking on this text.
Cheltenham day one summary
Well that went well.
Tuesday’s are always a day for experimenting and testing the market so I don’t usually get really stuck in, but I realised quickly today that the markets were behaving themselves so I got stuck in. I tried a number of strategies and they …
Free Proform Cheltenham racecard
We’ve teamed up with our friends at Proform to bring you one of their race cards at Cheltenham, for FREE!
If you haven’t checked out Proform yet, it’s one of the most capable pieces of software for looking at racing form. It’s contains a number of interesting features which you can check out by visiting their site. I first came across it when trying to find the reason for anomalies I saw in certain race types I was trading. …
Seasonality in Horse Racing
Winter racing markets can be a struggle and traditionally produce less opportunity than at other times of the year. This video discusses this.
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