Recent Articles
Anniversary
It’s was a year ago today that thanks to an unfortunate accident I couldn’t sleep and rose early. In an early morning blur I thought I would give Aussie racing a hack and in one of those great twists of fate, I discovered another new market to trade.
While it’s not as rewarding as UK racing and involves an early rise if you want to participate, it has certainly produced rewards over the last year. I had tried Aussie racing …
A busy day
I haven’t chosen a good week to get the flu, it was such a busy day today. I really only performed at a fraction of my true capacity. The football was good last night and the golf but I watched little of either. My golf position will not mature till the end of today’s round so I will have to rise on Saturday morning to close that out. Fantastic to see Tom Watson move from odds of 1000 to just …
Europa league
I am suffering from ‘man flu’ this week so it will be an early night for me.
A tricky start to Aintree left me feeling I needed an early night rather than work through the Europe league this evening, but here are some thoughts for you. This competition has provided plenty of decent opportunities this year and both ties with the English teams involved are set up nicely. Given Fulham’s performances so far in the competition you really feel the …
US Masters
Picking a winner in any major golf tournament is a very, very tricky task. There are only a few strokes between the top of the leader-board and being out of contention. Any body who has played golf will know that a few strokes difference is only a hook, slice or shank away.
Anybody who has been on my course recently should know the angle I will be taking on this event. But the great unknown here is how Woods will …
April fools day at Folkstone
Ahh, you can tell the flat season is back. How? Well, when you get days like the one we had this week at Folkstone!
As flat races are over shorter distances all horses have to be loaded into stalls. Well I say all horses, sometimes a horse just wont go into that big metal thing in front of them. Typically it is a small percentage of races, maybe about 1 in 20 where a horse refuses to load and gets …
Cheltenham – Post-mortem
OK, it’s been a little while since Cheltenham finished, but I’ve been very busy on other projects and I have also been having a bit of a break before the start of the flat season proper.
Lets start from a top level. Measuring the activity to post time in the markets, a total of 26 races generated matched bet turnover on Betfair of £84.3m this year. In 2009 it generated £83m, so overall the matched bet turnover was up about …
Lacking inspiration
Had a good look at the champions league this week, but just lacked inspiration to do or say much about it. The markets were pretty much spot on with their pricing and with the matches being first leg matches, I just couldn’t muster up any wisdom or opportunities. The second legs will provide more interest and hopefully more opportunities.
I’d like to say something, but making up something for the sake of it isn’t my style and it may be …
Made in Dubai
Well I did say it was probably worth doing! I managed to get slightly more than the £50 I managed last year, but was helped by a number of favourable mitigating factors and a bit of luck. Sometimes you need that to pull out a good result. The race itself must be one of few where the prize money dwarfs the turnover on Betfair. It was a great race as well, probably the most expensive photo finish in racing history. …
Much fun was had
I found myself at the new Wembley stadium yesterday, the first chance I have had to go. It was a useful coincidence as the match was on a Sunday, my usual day off, and it is my birthday this week. So it seemed a good chance to ‘go large’ and have a decent day out.
I took my eldest daughter and my son with me as well so they could experience the occasion. It was great and well worth the …
Richest race in the world
Today sees the worlds richest horse race take place at Meydan, the Dubai world cup.
I’ve dabbled on the Meydan markets this year and they have been just fine. A very useful addition to the P&L during the tough winter months. Therefore I’d recommend a dabble in these markets if the volume is holding up and there is no clashing with other races. The world cup stands out on it’s own as a race later in the day so that …
Betfair extend cross matching
Betfair today announced that they had extended their cross matching algorithm to include a trail on in-running horse racing markets. Full announcement is detailed below: –
Improved bet matching algorithm trial on today’s in-running markets at Carlisle and Sedgefield
For the win markets on today’s cards at Carlisle and Sedgefield we will be improving our bet-matching algorithm to include cross-selection matching (‘cross-matching’). Cross-matching will only be activated after the markets are turned in-play. Please note that this is just a …
Even odder
Thanks for all the people that emailed in about the Chievo vs Catania match. Many different views and opinions on this match. Also thanks to my Italian friends that got in contact to talk about this particular game.
No surprise that the match ended up 1-1 as strongly predicted by the market. 95% of all the money on the match was traded on the draw which is pretty much unheard of in a soccer match. There is vigorous discussion on …
Very odd
Not often I talk about Italian football but this one can’t go by without comment.
Chievo vs. Catania
Cheivo are 3.15 to win this match, nothing unusual there. But the really unusual thing this that the draw is priced at odds on. You don’t see that very often, in fact, you never see it. Draw’s occur fairly randomly and the odds for the draw is one of the easiest things to predict. I’ve never seen fit to predict a draw …
Cheltenham day three
That’s more like it! Today was easily the best day of the week so far, but not without it’s cock ups.
In the first race I was pushing for a decent total, but successfully went in-play, again, when I forgot to SP my final orders in the market, Doh! I had some frantic sorting out to do, but escaped. It was entirely my fault and I felt a bit of a wally. Things got better from there though and I …
Europa League
More fun planned this evening with an infinite range of permutations available on each match. But the two English matches do look the most interesting.
Fulham are 3-1 down, but a home goal would create a massive difference to that score line and you get the feeling anything is possible with Fulham. I wouldn’t bet against Fulham pulling it off this evening. The match is priced for 2.6 goals with a slight advantage to the home team. I think that’s …
Cheltenham day two
Well I don’t think I will reach last years peak after another tougher than average day. I think I have too much ground to make up now in the remaining days. But it’s still going to be a good week, just not as good as it could have been! You can’t win them all.
The difference between yesterday and the Tuesday was that I really struggled to get any traction in the markets. By traction I mean you need to …
Cheltenham day one
Well that was interesting to say the least. Half an hour before the first race of the day my internet connection suddenly goes down. Up till that point it was a carefully planned day, but with that, a chaotic period ensued. The internet going wasn’t a major problem as I have back up plans. I have a laptop with mobile broadband, just in case. But I also have back up locations I can switch to. The chaos was simply that …
Cheltenham
Well it’s here again, but what does it hold in store?
To be honest I have no idea and I try my best not to set any expectations ahead of an event, I just try do my best. It’s nice to have a few clues as to how you are going to trade something, but these big events come around so infrequently you only really know how it ‘s going to behave when you are actually in the thick of …
Broke it like Beckham
It was sad to see Beckham break down in that match last night. The good news for England fans is that it doesn’t seem to have affected the odds on England winning the world cup. Though at 7.00 these seem pretty short I think!
I really felt Beckham’s pain last night because I have suffered the same injury, I hope his doesn’t have the impact it had on me. I used to be very sporty and where ever I went …
The birth of a strategy
I’m always on the lookout for something new, preferably complimentary, to what I already do. But the path to a new strategies always starts with low expectations and its often a bumpy path. I think it’s probably the same for people starting out. In fact the first part, low expectations, is probably essential.
I recently headed off again down the path of blind alleys but on this occasion the blind alley turned out to be a new path and the …
Madness and wisdom
Are the racing markets becoming more or less volatile?
I can answer that with a definite YES. Yes they are becoming more and less volatile. Let me explain.
A few years ago I could pop an order in the market and wait for it to get filled. Now, if I go into a weaker than average race, like many this week, that doesn’t happen in the same manner anymore. If I get my staking wrong, the market takes one look …
Backhim?
2-3 is an interesting score line for Mr Beckham to bring to Old Trafford. I thought Beckham was anonymous in the first match. I am sure he will want to do better in this leg. Two away goals is a killer for AC Milan and therefore Man U are at very short prices to qualify. Milan need a clear two goal win to stand any chance so they must score.
The market is pricing in just short of three goals …
Return of the hulk
I like this stage of the champions league. Something has to happen for a team to go through.
Arsenal are priced to beat Porto but there are many permutations available which mean that both sides have a big incentive to score. The market has been pretty accurate as a reflection of that. It is pricing in just under three goals with nearly a goal advantage to Arsenal. Usually you would expect these to be tight contests, but an early goal …
Classic set up
A wonderful set up occurred in the FA Cup clash between Reading and Aston Villa this afternoon. Against the odds, Reading took a 2-0 lead againsts premiership outfit Villa. The teams went off for half time in distinctly different moods. A break in play is the perfect opportunity for teams to turn things around and that Villa did. Rejuvenated from their half time talk it wasn’t look before Villa were suddenly 3-2 in the lead. You could have backed them …
Greener grass?
For some time I’ve watched the Aussie horse racing and admired that they seem to often do a better job than the UK. Then of course the weather, it’s just so much better down under. It’s enough to tempt me to head out to Aus during the winter and work from there for a little while. I had thought about doing that this year, but circumstances dictated otherwise.
This week has been a little different and three meetings have been …
February
Spring is in the air and not a moment too soon! Those bleak winters months are almost behind us, the garden is starting to bud and the birds are munching through the feed faster than I can replace it. March brings us Cheltenham and that is always interesting, to say the least.
It’s difficult to accurately compare last month against previous years as I wasn’t really around much last February. But overall I was above my previous best Feb by …
At the adverts
Hmm, since Monday At The Races has not been showing extended coverage behind the red button. This is a real pain as the coverage from ATR is sketchy at the best of times, hence the title of this post. If they have decided to stop this coverage then ATR will be useless for a lot of people. As most people who are involved in racing know, getting a good look at a horse before it runs is a damn good …
When a negative is a postive
No this isn’t a maths questions, it’s about horses ! See a horse playing up and most people will lay it, feeling that it’s chances of winning the race are decling. That’s probably correct, as a horse that is not behaving itself before the start is unlikely to perform better during the race. That re-adjustment of opinion though is a huge opportunity for the astute trader. Look at the following graph from a race at Southwell last week. As they …
Day of the drifter
Sounds like a documentary of some sort, but this was the predominant feature in Monday’s horse racing markets.
In our etenral quest for knowledge, we run strategies in the back ground all the time. These can be to test new ideas or simply to explore certain aspects in the market. One of the strategies we often run is to test how ‘swingy’ the markets are. It’s simple, every minute from four minutes out we pop an order in the market …
Mercedes unlikely to win first GP
Anybody who can remember my ‘We are not competitive’ tip for formula one last year may be interested in the following article coming out of the Mercedes camp at the moment. Full story here: –
https://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8539826.stm
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