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Thread: mathare's gamblog

  1. #151

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    7th March 2010
    The year is still quite young but already I have been forced to re-evaluate a few things. I have had too many painful losing days of late just to let things carry on as they are. While I am not working I need my gambling portfolio to be capable of providing a reasonable income, or least be sufficiently profitable for my banks to build to a level where they can then provide said income. I'm after organic growth; I don't fancy pumping more money in to the banks in order to get them to the point where they should generate a nice income if they maintain their ROI mainly because I don't have the spare capital to increase the banks sufficiently. However, I do have the support I need if I can prove that I am building the banks fast enough to have that income in the not too distant future. Things just aren't playing ball though and little is going to plan, hence the need to re-evaluate where I stand and where I am going. This is not a knee-jerk reaction to a bad day, although it partly feels that way. The pressure has been building for a while and if I am not going to make it in this game it is best that I admit that as soon as possible, come to terms with it and move on in whichever way I decide is most suitable.

    The biggest question to address is the obvious one: give it all up or carry on?

    It's a tough question to answer objectively. I reckon that anyone can make some profit from gambling given the right advice and if they adopt the right attitude. The key is what their expectations are. Are they happy with a small regular profit each week or are they looking for a second income? Why are they gambling? Do they understand that most gamblers have a small ROI and make profits through a large turnover? I maintain that my portfolio is in better shape, in terms of balance if not profit at present, than it has been at probably any time before and I have been going five or six years now. My attitude towards the game is more mature. Losses still hurt but to adopt a poker expression I don't really tilt or steam. I don't just shrug off a bad day like perhaps I should but neither do I ignore them or dwell on them. I think back to see if there are any mistakes I made that contributed to the loss or whether it was all out of my hands. When I have a good day I don't go and blow all the money, it's all rolled back into the relevant bank to build the stakes and safety levels for future bets. I don't think my portfolio is too wide of the mark and my mindset is pretty professional so I don't see why I should give it up on that basis. That said, if I am struggling to make any money then what's the point? Why put the effort in for little or no reward?

    Let's look at this from a different angle: if I wasn't gambling how else would I spend my time? I've been gambling for years now and it's become habit. There are two situations to look at here - when I am holding down a regular job and, as now, when I am not. Let's consider former first. At my old place I would run and update Auto-Sys sometime in the morning as my workload allowed and then in my lunch 'hour' I'd enter all the bets into my spreadsheet before putting them all on with the bookies or exchanges, where I'd mostly leave orders one tick above the current best price (so a back order at the current lay price and a lay order at the current back price). Then I was done. If I got chance in the afternoon I'd update some of the results as I went along and check a few orders and amend them as necessary, again, if I had time. Often this meant my lunchtime was over an hour but the sort of industry I work in usually adopts a flexitime approach and I don't mind staying on a bit later than normal if I can get my gambling in at lunchtime. This approach has some drawbacks, mainly if some people from the office go down the pub for lunch. If I go too then obviously I have much less time to get my bets on. That would be less of a problem at the minute though as I can't drink alcohol for medical reasons. Anyway, I've developed this approach over a few years and it has always worked quite well for me in the past. Once I am home from work my evenings are my own and would often be spent playing poker or developing various ideas for gambling systems and software.

    Now let's consider the other scenario, the one where I don't have a job which is where I find myself at present. This is not a situation I am in out of choice, more necessity as I am not well enough to work. Abdominal pain that has gne undiagnosed for over a year now - isn't the NHS wonderful at times? Anyway, I now have a lot of time on my hands so how best to spend it while still generating some money? I have built my portfolio up a bit over the past six months or so taking on some new systems to add more balance, including a number of sports systems to counterbalance things a little as my portfolio was heavy on horse racing before that point. Horse racing is an excellent gambling medium (the sport has no meaning without someone punting on the outcome) as it takes place every day (excluding a few days around Christmas) in the UK, weather permitting of course. With a good number of horse racing systems on the go that means that there are best every day so no day is wasted in that quest for profit. This daily grind is supplemented by sports systems chipping in a few times a week but mainly at weekends plus things like poker. With more time available to me I am more inclined to put the bets on race by race, or perhaps a few races at a time rather than all in one go at lunchtime. I like to spend my mornings getting up to speed with a few things, running Auto-Sys, catching up on email and perhaps doing a bit of research into various ideas before getting on with the horse racing bets and poker in the afternoons.

    If I am not fit enough to work and give up gambling how would I spend my time? I am addicted to being online and gambling is such a part of my life now that I would find it incredibly difficult to give up. Unless it gets me into serious financial difficulties (which it shouldn't do with proper bankroll management) then I have no reason to stop gambling. So that answers that one really. I'm not going to cut off my nose to spite my face and give it all up as I don't want to and unless one really wants to give something up the temptation is always there, always calling and usually calls one back in to whatever it is they were trying to give up. So I'm going to carry on gambling.

    The next big question: is my portfolio suitable for the job in hand?

    I'm not looking to add more systems here. I have taken on more recently and think I have enough on the go now, especially as I have to think that at some point, probably in the not too distant future I am going to have to go back to work and can't then have a portfolio that is too large else I'll never get all the bets on around work. So I guess the question really boils down to whether any systems I am currently following should be ditched. For a system to be dropped it needs to have shown that it is not up to scratch, either a losing system or one that is not contributing very much to the bottom line. And this needs to be proved over a significant number of bets. So far this year the flat laying systems (CD Lays, Lay'em) and almost all the NH systems I follow have struggled and are in the red but that's not a reason to ditch them unless these losing trends are repeated over a much longer period. For example, the Lay'em has proved profitable over several years so to ditch it after a poor run this year would be stupid. Ditto NHPM and many others. Have any of my systems shown sufficient evidence that they are not going to cut the mustard? I confess I harbour doubts about the long-term profitability of one of my football tipsters (Sports Investor) but I am prepared to see how that one turns out. What else? My overall stats suggest I should lay off the spread bets (have done for a couple of years anyway) and the no-limit hold'em cash poker too. Hmmm. I'll come back to that one in a bit.

    If the make-up of my portfolio is OK (and as nothing stands out as needing to be dropped) then it's time to look at the second part of the problem - staking. Am I using the right staking plan for each system? To answer this properly would mean undertaking full staking reviews for each system, which I'm not going to do at this stage. Instead I am going to focus on the systems that are struggling most of late, especially compared to their long-term prospects, and make sure they are being staked correctly. Comparing this year's stats so far with long-term figures gives me a shortlist of systems to look at, namely Ladies Lays, NHPM, Lay'em, CD Lays and HSR (a non-W2W backing system). I won't go into details of the staking reviews here, just give the results.

    CD Lays - currently £50 fixed liability - OK
    Ladies - currently £5 fixed stake - OK
    Lay'em - currently £10 fixed stake - OK
    NHPM - currently £100 fixed liability - reduce to £75 for safety
    HSR - currently 3% staking - OK

    My staking is fine then which generally means the losses I have been experiencing are down to the horses themselves and it's poor fortune for all the systems to have hit a bad spell at the same time. The whole idea of having a portfolio spanning many systems and several sports is to avoid having all my eggs in one basket but that in itself doesn't prevent lots of the eggs from getting broken, which is what has happened of late.

    I have established (to my own satisfaction at least) that there is little I could have done to have mitigated against the recent losses. I'm carrying on in the game with only one staking change and with my full portfolio in tact and hoping that a corner is turned soon. However, when one needs to start making profits that will build banks and earn an income time isn't something that one has in abundance. I therefore have to consider how best to spend the time I do have. I am almost certainly going to have go to back to work whenever I am fit to do so, I've come to accept that, so with that in mind I think a few routine changes are in order unless I can earn a reasonable hourly rate without resorting to a 'proper' job. How could I make such money?

    Poker is obviously one way. Anyone who has been reading my poker diary will know that I have been playing the micro-stakes Rush Poker tables on Full Tilt with some success. Not a lot, but some. I have been playing a few hours most days recently. I could extend those playing hours to fill most of the working day but what good what that do me? Let's say I play two tables at once and average 400 hands per hour per table. If I can get my win rate up to 2BB/100 (which is probably reasonable) then I am earning $0.40/100 hands or around $3.20 an hour! That's equivalent to about £2 an hour and I am not going to be able to live on that. Poker, at this point in time, can only be a part-time gig while I build up experience that will allow me to up the stakes and thus my hourly rate.

    Reading books, watching films and so on isn't going to make me any money so I can forget about that how ever much I would like to do that.

    I could try picking my own horse bets (method bets) and hoping I make a few quid that way but bearing in mind I barely know one end of a horse from another and don't have follow horse racing that much I am going to be up against it from the start so this hardly seems like a good way to go.

    I could spend the time researching football betting systems looking for profitable angles. This is going to be a lot of hard work for potentially little reward, at first at least, as the bets are only likely to come once or twice a week and I will be starting with small stakes while I ensure the system works in the real world. There is also not that much of the football season left so this is more of a medium-term propostion. It's probably worth doing though as even though it's more systems (something I said I was looking to avoid for now) they will be of my own making so I can't blame anyone else if they do go south, and can take the plaudits if it all goes well.

    I think the best way of occupying my time though is going to be the continued development of Project X. I think it could be back on again after I bought a new book recently that should help me overcome a number of the problems I was having. It's still early days on that front yet but I am hopeful. Getting Project X off the ground would be fantastic. I know what I am like and if I can get it started it will become all-consuming and I will want to work on it as often as I can which ought to help getting into a more mature state that bit more quickly. And the sooner I get it operational the sooner I can use it and start making money from it. I ought to work through this book and identify what other problems I will face before I get too excited but I think it's time to take Project X seriously and treat it as work.

    With all that in mind I plan to go back to a lunchtime-only approach to my betting on the horses rather than putting the bets on one race at a time. That frees up more time (and brain power, concentration etc) for this task and hopefully means I will get on with it faster. I'm going to balance this with some poker though and try to strike a nice balance between the two. I can always use Rush poker as a 'treat' as I can easily play short sessions at those table without feeling I am not going to get the real benefits. Session length at Rush doesn't matter much at all, unlike a proper cash game or tourney play for example. I said previously I had a fairly professional mindset when it came to gambling and while that may be the case it's time to take a proper professional approach to everything I am trying to work on and to balance their needs accordingly. If I am going to be back at work in the not too distant future it's best I get my main gambling activities back into a lunch hour so I am in the habit by the time I start work again. Then when I do start work I just swap Project X and the poker tables for the office and everything else can pretty much stay as is. Project X and Rush Poker can be evening and weekend activities.

    I'm happy with that plan. Now to kick it into action and more importantly stick to it...



  2. #152

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    mathares gamblog

    Hi mathare your above makes an interesting read and i am sorry to read of your current dilema,to me you may have answered your own question concerning recent losses by referring to the downside of operating multiple systems in order to spread risk.The theory is good but as is often the case in racing the practice can hurt when all or most systems in the portfolio simultaneously go through a down turn.

    It would appear from your above that you are on top of the situation,which means to me that you are at least half way towards finding what for you will be the correct solution.

    My advice would be to consider for a while risking your cash on only the most profitable of your systems,this could give you a breathing space while still generating some of the income you need.

    I think that the majority of backers who have worked hard to learn enough to win long term fall away on the journey because they are under capitalised at the start.

    Every month i withdraw a months wages from my betting capital when i have a good month i still draw the same amount which facilities doing the same after a losing month, but i have this money covered a year in advance and so do not have to touch any profit accrued from the current years bets.

    And when betting is your sole or main source of income the above can prove very useful during a lean or losing spell,because it takes away many of the stresses and worries which can effect your judgement.

    Anyway i wish you the very best what ever route you decide to take.



  3. #153

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    19th March 2010
    I haven't updated this for a while so let's quickly trot through where things stand at present.
    • I've had a decent Cheltenham festival with a good return from my False Favs and also from the method backs that I have spent so long putting together so it's very satisfying to see a decent return for my hard work.
    • Things are still up and down with my portfolio but that's part of the game and at least I know my staking is appropriate
    • I haven't been able to stick to the "all on at lunchtime" plan quite as easily as I had hoped for one reason and another. I must try harder with that.
    • I have spent some time working on an under/over 2.5 goals system for the English football that seems promising and has had a good start. It's a very simple idea, as many of my system ideas tend to be, but I am hopeful for some decent returns from it even though I am likely to only paper trade till the end of the season.
    • My False Favs are in a rich vein of form and doing really well, especially since I added the 3/1 to 13/2 price filter and I am making a few quid back on those. The bank is growing nicely and I may have to look at increasing the stakes in time to help that bank grow bigger as it looks like I have stumbled across a good thing here.
    • Project X hit yet another major stumbling block but I am hopefully able to work round that now, although it has added quite a bit to the expected duration of the project. I have also been re-thinking my approach to this somewhat and may yet end up with a slightly different end product to that I had originally envisaged but time will tell. Big thanks to CrazyBadger for helping me out with this
    • Poker is going pretty well although I haven't played for a while. I'll update my poker diary with more on that shortly.
    • My testing and reoptimisation of the Paul Steele football systems has stalled as other ideas cropped up and I found myself with limited time. Hopefully I can get back on this now the festival is over.

    I think that brings things more or less up to date. I'm sure I will think of other things in time but they can't be that important if they don't come to mind right now.



  4. #154

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    Quote Originally Posted by mathare View Post
    Project X hit yet another major stumbling block but I am hopefully able to work round that now, although it has added quite a bit to the expected duration of the project. I have also been re-thinking my approach to this somewhat and may yet end up with a slightly different end product to that I had originally envisaged but time will tell.Big thanks to CrazyBadger for helping me out with this
    No problems mate. Feel free to email me if you need more help/advice on it.



  5. #155

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    Hi Mat

    i thought id wait for Cheltenham to end before i asked this, i dont know how well today went but youve had a good week of method bets already, so will method bets be replacing the system bets in the coming months?

    Matt

    Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.


  6. #156

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    Quote Originally Posted by Mattw07 View Post
    i thought id wait for Cheltenham to end before i asked this, i dont know how well today went but youve had a good week of method bets already, so will method bets be replacing the system bets in the coming months?
    Oh hell no!

    I was using the RP Cheltenham Festival Guide for all the stats and trends and similar guides aren't available for other meetings outside the major festivals so I'd be flying blind on that front. Add in the fact that it was taking me between 45 minutes and an hour to analyse each race and organise my thoughts and you soon realise that to use the approach I was using would become almost a full-time job. I would obviously have to specialise rather than going through every race but I just don't have the desire to spend the time devising method bets at this stage.

    I'm also very much the kind of person who would rather put in the work upfront and reap the rewards later down the line which suggests a systematic approach to betting. I spend time analysing football data looking for potential systems so I can then just apply the rules week in week out to pick the bets rather than having to study team news, injuries etc. Where possible I automate things, which is how Auto-Sys was born so I don't have to remember all the system rules and can just click a button instead. The spreadsheets I use for my football systems are another example of this "invest effort now, benefit later" approach as many of them automatically download the fixtures, results, odds etc and can output all the stats at a click of a button. Minimal effort to use and maintain.

    That doesn't really fit with method betting where one would need to be on top of the racing news, familiar with most of the horses in the field one has chosen to specialise in etc. I'm happy that when push comes to shove, if I have all the information available, I can pick a few winners but I don't plan on producing method bets on a regular basis.



  7. #157

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    25th March 2010
    And still things refuse to go to plan. Why is nothing I try to do as easy as I hope it will be?

    I mentioned Project X again the other day and that I had hit a major stumbling block that I was hopefully going to be able to work round now. It's good to have hope but not so great when it is misplaced like this seems to have been. The stumbling block has become a wall I am repeatedly banging my head against. SQL Server 2008 Express is seriously doing my head in

    I don't have all the skills I need to develop Project X but I am more than happy to learn what I need to know. I've taught myself Visual Basic which is what it will be written in and am now trying to learn about databases before moving on to the technology that will link the VB with the database. SQL Server 2008 Express seemed a sensible place to start as it's free Microsoft software, like Visual Basic 2008 Express which I have been using to learn VB so should mesh nicely with VB Express. It probably does, if I can get it working!

    The installation seemed to work OK but when I try to connect the SQL Server Management Studio to the server (all of which is running on my PC) I get an error telling me it can't connect. I have no idea what's wrong so have issued a plea for help on the SQL Server forum in the Microsoft community. Hopefully the guys there can sort me out and I can actually get beyond chapter 1 of the SQL Server 2008 Express book I have bought.



  8. #158

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    25th March 2010 (part two)
    If you bang your head hard enough against a brick wall something has to give, either your skull or the wall. And today it's the wall. I have got SQL Server Management Studio to connect to SQL Server. I am back in the game



  9. #159

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    30th March 2010
    Having got SQL Server working I promptly shoved it to one side and started attacking the poker tables with gusto. Unfortunately that was an utter disaster and poker is very much on the back burner now, which means other projects have come to the fore once more, including SQL Server. That said, I am doing some work on Project F and a prototype version of Project X instead at the minute as they make me feel like I am actually achieving something. I can see spreadsheets filling with numbers which represents tangible progress and is rather satisfying. It's also just what I need at the moment, to prove that I can get somewhere with the various projects I have in the pipeline.

    The gambling has been a bit of a mixed bag this month as you may have seen from the various Daily Waffle threads. One thing I have done this month is split out my False Fav qualifiers in my spreadsheet such that the new system I started last month using the 3/1 to 13/2 price filter are no longer mixed in with previous selections to give me a better idea of how the new filter is working out for me with real data. The results are incredible and it's probably time I reviewed my staking on this system so as to make more hay while the sun is shining so brightly. I will be doing my usual monthly review in a couple of days so that's something I will look at then.

    One thing my betting records spreadsheet lacks is an overall ROI, and that's something I wish to address in the next few days. I have a ROI for each system both on a per calendar year and overall basis but I don't have a ROI for my portfolio as a whole. I know how much profit I would like to make on a monthly basis (on average) but by not knowing my ROI I don't know by how much I need to increase my turnover to get to that point. The overall ROI is an important figure in my opinion and I can't believe I have gone so long without calculating it. Time to set that right I think...



  10. #160

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    6th April 2010
    What was the last thing I said? I want to update my betting records spreadsheet with an overall ROI figure so I had a much better idea of how much I needed to increase my turnover by to generate the sort of profits I would like to see. Have I done that? No!

    Instead I have started up a number of new projects. Le's call them Project W and Project H for now. Did I need to start more projects? No. Have I finished all the others I was working on? No. Have I finished any of the other projects I was working on? No. Is this normal for me? Unfortunately, yes.

    I don't know if any of you have ever done a Belbin personality test. It's designed to tell you what role within a team you are most suited to. See here for more on the individual roles. Somehow, in my professional career I have ended up as a "completer finisher". I'm a software tester (and part software engineer) by profession so it's my job to ensure that before my company delivers anything it is subject to all sorts of quality checks. I polish the end product, basically. Yet in my personal life, well in my spare time at least, I am not that role at all. I rarely get a final product ready to be polished, and QC'ing one's own work is notoriously difficult anyway. In my own work I guess I am more of a "plant", the ideas man if you like. I come up with numerous ideas and for each I tend to work it up a little to see whether it is feasible and by then something else has usually come along and I have started working that up. I have notebooks and a hard drive cluttered with partially completed projects and it's honestly about time I finished a few of them. Fortunately I have a bit of a plan...

    I can't switch of my ideas brain, that just doesn't happen. I have my best ideas at odds times, such as in the shower or just as I am settling down to go to sleep (which is why I have a notebook by the bed). I'm not going to stop showering or sleeping so the ideas will keep coming. The trick is to break these ideas down into more manageable chunks and try to complete some of these chunks. It should work but only time will tell if it really does.

    And so we come back to the new projects I have started. Project W is still very much in the ideas phase but I have done some initial research into the feasability of it and it should be very much possible. It's going to take some work on my part and requires me to learn some new skills but if the end result is anything like I envisage it then it will be worth it. It's not a huge project either, at least not in the initial stages, so I should be able to crank this one out in a reasonable time if I put the effort in. I'm not going to say any more about Project W at this stage but I will do when it is up and running.

    But Project W is behind Project H in the order of things at the minute and the good thing is I am most of the way through Project H and should have it completed in the next day or two. It's required no new skills, just the dedicated application of well-worn skills. It's actually the sort of thing I enjoy doing every now and then too as it's a nice bit of brain exercise that's not too challenging and I know the rewards will be worth it, even though I don't gain from it at all really. What is Project H? The H stands for 'help' as I have been helping another forum member sort out their betting records and get them into some sort of proper order so they can better evaluate their portfolio and work out how best to proceed to avoid some of the frustration they have been experiencing of late. This has involved taking their existing data, completely reformatting it and then writing some code to fill in a lot of the gaps, such as automatically adding all the SPs for the selections to allow overbet calculations. It's not a quick job to do all this so it's not a service I offer to many people but this particular member (who I won't embarrass by naming) was in desperate need of my help and I am happy to help where I can. The more I can educate gamblers to the importance of full records of all bets and an array of statistics than can then be calculated the better armed they will be in the fight for profits and I can sleep soundly knowing I have done my bit to help.

    So Project H has a day or two left in it, then I can start to work on Project W and Project F in parallel somewhat. I think I need to put the effort into completing those before I bring Project X off the back burner which means my SQL Server education will just have to wait for now. And as for that overall ROI figure - who knows when I will get round to that!



  11. #161

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    7th April 2010
    I'm getting there. Project H is now done and out the way, although it may generate a few little bits of follow-up work but they will just slot in here and there as they will only be minor work packages.

    Unfortunately my health still isn't 100% and has dipped a little recently so I may take a short break before getting on with the next project. That said, Project F requires quite a bit of computer processing power before human brain power needs to be applied so I could probably get on with that for now.



  12. #162

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    11th April 2010
    I still haven't got any further with that overall ROI figure that I said I wanted to add to my spreadsheet and to be honest it is dropping down my priority list somewhat. What would I do with such a figure once I have it anyway? I could use it to work out what my turnover needs to be to generate a desired profit level but how would I increase my turnover to reach the required level? I'm very much in favour of organic bank growth as that proves systems in my book so unless banks grow how can I increase turnover? By increasing stakes and sacrificing bank security - which I am certainly not going to do. Also my portfolio contains a good number of lay systems which will drag my overall ROI figure down. Not that I know what I expect my ROI to be or what I would like to make it. If I knew what it was I would try and maximise it but I feel it is better to have a balance of systems in my portfolio rather than trying to maximise certain related figures. And because of that my focus has turned instead to my the make-up of my portfolio and ways in which that could be improved.

    I have noticed from the stats sheet in my spreadsheet that I probably have staking issues. I am experienced punter who has been gambling for a number of years now. This is both a good and bad thing. I know what to expect from day to day and can handle losing runs pretty well. I can also recognise danger signs and potentially spot when things are going sour with certain systems. But it also means I tend to assume I know what I am doing and that a "one size fits all" approach will work, whereas that's not necessarily the case when it comes to staking. For example, I start all backing systems on a 3% percentage staking plan with a £200 starting bank and tend to just let them run, tweaking the staking only now and then and only when I have built up enough data to make trends more apparent and significant. Is this the right approach? For some systems, maybe. For all systems, almost certainly not. And so it is that I will spend this afternoon conducting a number of staking reviews with a view to improving the returns from my portfolio.

    Since I introduced a points profit column to all my system results I can see at a glance how each system has performed over the years and what my returns have been in both cash terms and in points. It is this that has led to this review as I can see now that several systems are showing a cash profit that is significantly out of line when compared to the points profit. Take my 45 Males bank for example. A loss of 7.38pts from 220 bets is what it is but this system is one that's on 3% staking from a £200 bank and in cash terms I have lost £74.73 on this system, equivalent to more than £10 a point. How is that so when I am betting to 3% of a bank that started at £200 giving me an initial stake of £6 and when my average stake is £4.93? And this bank is not one of a kind either. My SixPlus Loser bank has a cash loss of £46.50 but a points loss of 2.61pts, equivalent to nearly £20 a point but again it's staked to 3% of a £200 starting bank. My Trainer 3 bank is in profit to 5.84pts overall but shows a cash loss of over £30. Go figure! My spreadsheet is littered with examples such as these and it's high time I conducted a number of long overdue staking reviews to revise my staking and prevent this pounds-points discrepancy from occurring.

    I don't want to prejudice the results of these reviews but I suspect I will be switching to level stakes in a number of places so that will be one of the main areas I will be focusing on. However, it is important to note that I am looking to see how best to improve my staking going forward rather than necessarily selecting the plan that would have done best on the past results. I am also keen to keep my staking simple so some of the more complicated staking plans won't even be considered. I also want to look at longest losing runs (LLRs) to help me decide on how large a bank, in points terms, is required and thus help set my future stakes. As part of this review I will also be reviewing my bank barrier settings and updating them as necessary.

    45 Males
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -74.73
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): -7.38
    Equivalent £/pt: 10.13
    Actual Average Stake (£): 4.93


    It's clear from the figures above that percentage staking isn't really working for this system. The average stake is £4.93 but the loss is equivalent to a staking level more than double that. When it comes to simple alternative staking plans level stakes is the obvious choice so is that a better plan here? The Staking Machine (TSM) certainly thinks so, with a smaller loss and a less negative ROI for level stakes than percentage stakes. That makes the decision to switch to level stakes a pretty easy one then. Conventional wisdom says a betting bank should be double the size of the longest losing run. With an LLR of 9 but an ELS (expected losing streak) of 12.5 that means I should be looking at a bank of 20-25pts. The bank stands at just over £125 in cash terms so a new level stake of £5 ought to be suitable for this system. My bank barrier is set such that I only have 1 point at the new stakes before the bank would go under the barrier so the barrier level will be adjusted downwards to give me a bit more breathing room, say a total of 9 points at the new stakes, equivalent to my LLR so far. That ought to be sufficient wiggle room while still securing a reasonable portion of the bank.

    Mark Johnston
    Total Profit/Loss (£): 1099.37
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 149.75
    Equivalent £/pt: 7.34
    Actual Average Stake (£): 14.68


    My staking for this system has varied throughout the years, starting at 3% but that percentage being reduced as the bank has increased and I have taken measures to protect more of the profits as well as reduce the stakes to stop this one system having such a massive impact on whether my days would end in profit or not. It's interesting to note that I have made nearly 15pts of profit but that each point is equivalent to only half my average stake, indicating I have missed out on quite a bit of profit. TSM confirms that level stakes would have been the better plan to have used. My LLR is 29 but the ELS is 38.9 based on the actual strike rate of the system selections. That would make for a bank of somewhere between 60 and 80pts. The system bank is a few pence under £1300 which means each point would be worth anything from £16.25 to £21.67. I'm after nice round numbers to make life simple here so £20 per point seems like a sensible stake. That gives me around 12pts before the bank barrier kicks in. I'm happy with that for now and can always review my bank barrier as and when.

    LTO3
    Total Profit/Loss (£): 125.50
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 35.51
    Equivalent £/pt: 3.53
    Actual Average Stake (£): 6.26


    The figures above suggest that level stakes would have been a better staking plan than that I employed as shown by the difference by the last two figures (the equivalent £ per pt value and the actual average stake). After all, at that average stake of £6.26 and a profit of 35.51pts I should have a profit of around £222, nearly £100 more than I have actually made. TSM once more reinforces the superiority of level stakes here. The LLR is 11 with an ELS of 16 which doubles to 32 making a point worth £10 as the bank stands at £325.50.

    Michael Stoute
    Total Profit/Loss (£): 103.94
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 34.59
    Equivalent £/pt: 3.01
    Actual Average Stake (£): 11.22


    My actual average stake is close to four times greater than the £/pt equivalent again indicating a lot of lost profit. TSM agrees once more that I should be on level stakes. The LLR here is 17 and the ELS is 19.1 so we're looking at a bank of 34 to 38 points. The betting bank for this system is £303.94 which means each point equates to somewhere between £8 and £9 or thereabouts. In the interests of bank security I'm going with the lower figure so this system will switch to £8 level stakes. The bank is currently just under a barrier but I think it's fair that I give the new staking a fair crack so I will drop the barrier by 10pts to see how that goes.

    SixPlus Loser
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -46.50
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): -2.61
    Equivalent £/pt: 17.85
    Actual Average Stake (£): 5.46


    Another significant discrepancy between my actual average stakes and the £/pt equivalent. Spotted any patterns yet? This time the actual average is much smaller than the calculated equivalent points value because the system is showing a loss. This means I am losing at a much faster rate than I would be at level stakes. Does TSM confirm this finding? Of course it does. What stake should I using instead then? The bank is around £150 at present. According to the LLR (11) and ELS (13.5) I should be looking for a bank of between 22 and 27 points. At £5 per point I would have over 30pts in the bank so I can afford to go a little higher. Let's go to £6 per point, in keeping with the system name. I will also downgrade the bank barrier slightly to allow a few more points of breathing space for the new staking to take affect. I've allowed a little over 9pts, that ought to do it.

    Claiming Jockey
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -7.84
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 0.67
    Equivalent £/pt: N/A (-11.73)
    Actual Average Stake (£): 5.63


    The equivalent £/pt value here is negative, and thus meaningless, as the system is profitable in terms of points (just) but not in cash terms. If it's profitable in points then I would have made a small profit using level stakes rather than the small loss I am currently showing. It's still early days for this system but again TSM points me towards level staking so that's the way I shall proceed. The LLR and ELS figures suggest a bank of around 20pts and with the £200 starting bank almost all intact I may as well go with £10 a point. That gives me plenty of space with my current bank barrier figure so no adjustments required there.

    Double Top
    Total Profit/Loss (£): 412.59
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 136.87
    Equivalent £/pt: 3.01
    Actual Average Stake (£): 6.59


    I started this system on very low stakes to start with which will affect the figures somewhat but even there shouldn't be such a disparity between the last two figures so my staking seems to be in error here too. When the profits peak percentage staking is very much the better plan but generally speaking it's level stakes that is delivering the goods and seems to be where I should be for this system. I need a bank of around 32 points for level stakes with an LLR and ELS of 16. The bank stands at around £500 giving me a point value of around £16. I don't have much in the way of margin for error with my current bank barrier settings so they will be adjusted to give the new staking plan more of a chance. 10pts ought to be enough for this system.

    First Timer
    Total Profit/Loss (£): 33.02
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 6.04
    Equivalent £/pt: 5.47
    Actual Average Stake (£): 6.66


    Another system for which I have little data but already the two most important figures above are diverging and TSM would have me switch to levels for this one too. The LLR and ELS are both 6 but with so little data for this system I would want a bank bigger than the 12pts these figures suggest. In fact I am going to double that again (more or less) and start the new staking plan at £10 per point. The bank is nowhere near the barrier and I have around 10pts before the bank would switch to paper trading so I am happy with those settings.

    Info Rated
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -24.69
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): -0.33
    Equivalent £/pt: 75.04
    Actual Average Stake (£): 5.23


    I'm losing at a rate that's over 14 times faster than I would at level stakes. That's a slightly artificial as the system is still quite immature with only around 100 selections but even so, something is wrong. I think now that I should be on levels and of course TSM agrees. My bank should be somewhere around 20pts too which works out at around £9 per point but I am prepared to take slightly more risk in exchange for numbers that are easier to work with and will opt for £10 per point. I am a long way above the bank barrier here so no further adjustment needed in that department.

    NH Media F/c
    Total Profit/Loss (£): 51.56
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 17.08
    Equivalent £/pt: 3.02
    Actual Average Stake (£): 1.46


    This is another of my systems that I started on very low stakes which explains the low averages. This is perhaps the only system whereby my equivalent £/pt figure is better than the actual average stake though. That suggests my staking has been better than levels but TSM isn't convinced, but then again TSM is applying the same staking plan to all my data whereas the first chunk of data for this system was all to low stakes levels anyway. TSM reckons levels are the best way forward and I am inclined to agree. I need a bank of between 26 and 28 points according to the LLR/ELS figures. With my bank at £251.56 I am prepared to accept a bit more risk than normal and use a £10 stake to keep the numbers simple. My bank barrier levels are OK too so again no adjustment required there.

    PP Free
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -20.61
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): -3.22
    Equivalent £/pt: 6.40
    Actual Average Stake (£): 5.54


    This is another system I don't have much data for but again I would be better off to level stakes already. TSM suggests a bank of 20pts for this one which means £9 to £10 a point but I am not so sure about this system given the lack of data I have at present so I am going to downshift my stakes to £5 until I can be more sure about how it will work out. Because of the small stakes the barrier is at an acceptable point and needs no adjustment.

    Trainer 3
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -30.65
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): 5.84
    Equivalent £/pt: N/A (-5.25)
    Actual Average Stake (£): 7.64


    This is another system that should be profitable for me (based on the profit in points) but isn't, resulting in a meaningless £/pt figure. All other systems have headed off towards level stakes, is this one the same? Of course! With an ELS of 13.9 and an LLR of 11 I'm looking at a bank of between 22 and 28pts so if we split the difference and look at a 25pt bank we'd have a level stake of £6.77. That can be rounded up to £7 bearing in mind I have shown this system to be profitable in terms of points and the bank should be safe enough anyway. My bank barrier kicked in a few days back even though the system is in profit in points terms, which seems odd now. So I am resetting the barrier level to allow at least 10pts of space for the new staking.

    HSR
    Total Profit/Loss (£): -57.88
    Total Profit/Loss (pts): -3.32
    Equivalent £/pt: 17.44
    Actual Average Stake (£): 5.32


    I always assumed that with a decent SR (up around 45%) that this system would suit percentage staking but that's not what the figures above, or TSM, are telling me. So we switch this one to levels too making it all systems that were on the percentage staking plan switched to level stakes. Hmm, interesting. The LLR and ELS figures suggest a bank of between 14 and 20pts to be sure of surviving the losing runs which means I could go for £10 a point where I to use the smaller bank figure but I prefer a bit more safety than that and will go for £7 instead. I am also reducing the bank barrier level to give the new staking a chance else it has just one chance to find a winner before paper trading kicks in.



  13. #163

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    14th April 2010
    One of the sports services I follow is a football tipping service I trialled for a month or so last year and found it to be reasonably good. When I was offered the chance to subscribe for a year for £95 I figured it was worth a go, an extended trial if you like.

    Some people have far more patience than I and would use this extended trial as exactly that by paper-trading the service for a few more months. Not I. I dived straight in with real cash, albeit to fairly small stakes of £2 per point with bets staked from 1pt to 10pts with the occasional double maximum bet at 20pts.

    Alarm bells should have gone off at the start when their website failed to offer a full results history and no recommended bank size information, no historical strike rate and no ROI indicator. I requested this information from their customer services department a few times and eventually I got a few answers. The service started in September 2008 and didn't have a losing month till this year. The suggested bank size is 20 times the maximum bet so 400pts. The long-term SR is 35% with a profit of 256pts to advised stakes.

    Yesterday the system had it's fourth double maximum bet of the year and like the three before, it lost. That's 80pts down on those bets. Overall I am down 110.70pts to advised stakes, a ROI of -12.42%. It took me a while to get that recommended bank figure of 400pts out of the guys running this service and by this point I had smashed up one 100pt bank. I adjusted it to 250pts figuring that if it can't survive on that then I am not interested. But now, with nearly half that bank gone and some poor results so far this year I am wondering how long I should persevere. I am paid up for the year so when do I stop putting real money down on the tips and paper trade? And if I do that will I miss the recovery?

    Instead of thinking too deeply on those fronts I want to consider level stakes rather than suggested staking to see what difference that makes. With odds ranging from 10/11 to 100/1 (correct score bets) it seems somewhat odd to consider level staking but let's go with it all the same. 192 bets means 192 points staked, obviously. And interestingly enough, assuming my maths (well, spreadsheet formula) is correct, which it seems to be, level stakes shows a profit of 7.98pts for a ROI of 4.16%. OK, that's not a return to be hugely proud of for a backing service but it's a whole lot better than the losses from advised stakes isn't it?

    The key question is what to do with this information? Had any of those double maximum bets gone in then I may not even be writing this as the figures would be a lot better. For example, last night's double max was Macclesfield to beat Burton which I got at a tad better than 6/4 so instead of costing me 20pts that could have won be 30pts, a swing of 50pts almost halving the current loss. On level stakes though that would just have been a 2.5pt swing. If the big bets start coming in then the losses could be wiped out quite quickly.

    I have just been over the staking again and it seems that bets in the 5-9pts range are performing poorly but the rest are doing OK, with the aforementioned exception of the double maximums. I don't know how the staking is arrived at so it would be wrong of me to go changing the advised stakes (halving the number of points, for example, or knocking a couple off the bigger bets).

    This system is one of the biggest red figures in my portfolio in cash terms, and points terms actually, but what I have done through this mini-review is convince myself that it ought to be given more of a chance. If those double max bets come good then the losses can be quickly trimmed back. Perhaps the service has been somewhat unlucky, who really knows, but I feel it deserves a proper chance even though I was close to throwing in the towel last night when then double max failed to come good, again.



  14. #164

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    15th April 2010
    I'm losing track of the various projects I have on the go so it's about time I took stock. It may also be the time I split this thread into two and used one for general gambling chat and the other for project-related updates but as most, if not all, of my projects are ultimately gambling related then perhaps such a split is somewhat artificial.

    Anyway, I think the main projects I have mentioned over the last few weeks are:
    • Project F - a football system research project that has been going on for several months now in one form or another. I think I have started to get a much better handle on this recently as I am much closer to having all the necessary data in one place, and in the right format. I have been overworking my poor CPU to get there but I'm just about done. It hasn't helped that once or twice I have uncovered flaws in some of the data on which many of the calculations are based so I have had to start again with some aspects of the data processing but hopefully this time I've got it all sorted. There is still some way to go before I can actually sit down to use all this data as part of the actual research part of this project but I am making steps in the right direction. This project could run for quite a while yet. I'm hoping the database I am compiling will allow me to debunk a number of popular football theories as well as uncover a few decent football systems.
    • Project H - this was the help I was providing a fellow forum member to sort out their betting records and that's all now wrapped up.
    • Project P - poker! That game of cards that I have had such a love-hate relationship with over the years. This project was very simple - play poker and make money. Sometimes it all went exactly to plan but at other times the plan went out the window my money was going down the drain. If I am brutally honest I have yet to work out which form of the game suits me best. Should I be playing tourneys or cash? I don't know. I have toyed with both and have certain amounts of success at both but nothing so consistent as to persuade me that they offer the best prospect of profits. I said in my poker diary recently that poker has dropped down my list of priorities and when I do clear the decks sufficiently to allow poker back in I will be trying out a few different variations again to see what I prefer and where my strengths truly lie. I admit I have a habit of throwing my toys out the pram after a few losing sessions and switching to a different game. I want to find a game I can play profitably and focus on improving my skills for that game, but that's one for the future.
    • Project R - R for ratings. I don't think this got too much of a mention at the time (a couple of months back) and I'm sure I didn't declare it a formal Project but it effectively is one so I may as well regard it as such. The ratings in question are those in Paul Steele's Profitable Football Betting and I am looking to re-optimise them for my own purposes. I started this, and got as far as optimising a couple of them but that was back in February or early March and I haven't been anywhere near them since. I need to get this done before I can get into the meat of Project F really as I think these ratings may prove useful in certain circumstances. I'm quite cross with myself that I forgot about these for so long as this is exactly the sort of task I could have fitted in here and there over the past few weeks. Oh well. It's come back to the fore now so I can set about plodding my way through it.
    • Project S - S is for SQL Server, something I want, nay need, to teach myself in order for me to progress with various other projects (including Project X) but I have put other projects ahead of this one in terms of priority as I wanted to clear my plate a little, finish off some of the work in progress so that when it comes to working on Project S again it can seque neatly into work towards Project X. That means this project is right down my priority list at present, perhaps even as far down as second from bottom.
    • Project W - you may have gathered by now that the nomenclature I use for my projects relates to their subject matter. R for ratings, F for Football and so on. What then is Project W? Is it about researching systems for WWE wrestling? No. Racing at Wolverhampton? Nope. I am trying to put together a website. I have an idea for a website (at least one in fact but for now Project W concerns just one site) that I would like to get off the ground. I've never developed a website before but as a former software engineer and programmer it should be easy enough. I have consulted a few experts already and got a reasonable idea of the way forward but I just need to find a block of time, probably a few days, to work through all the information and research a few things prior to actually coding the site. I'm really looking forward to getting this up and running though, it's really quite exciting.
    • Project X - the biggie! This one breaks my naming convention to but it does so for a good reason. It was the first project I named in this style and while the project itself has a proper name it is one of the best things about it and I am keen to protect that name so I am not publicising it at this stage. That's partly because I don't want the name to be stolen from under me while I try to get this project going and partly because I don't want to attract too much attention to something that may be a couple of years in development. When it's close to being ready then I will unveil the true identity of this project but not before then. If you've been following this thread for a while you will know that a massive database lies at the heart of Project X, which is why it depends so heavily on Project S. I have bits of the GUI sketched ou in my head and a few on paper but nothing more concrete than that. I want to get some of the database written first so I can be sure that the data elements I want available via the front-end are doable. This project is very much on the back burner though. This is my long-term plan and the more I can clear the rest of my projects out the way the more time I will have to work on this one.

    In terms of priorities I think the order of the above is R & W ahead of F, then S and finally X. What about P? That will fit in as and when I have time and am in the right mental state. I need a break from poker still but I don't know when I will feel ready again to tackle the tables so I am not assigning that a priority. Projects R and W are both important to me at present and to some degree can be worked on in parallel. While my computer is crunching data for Project R I can be working on Project W.

    To the list of projects above I would also like to add another: Project A. This is a recurring project that comes up every month at present (and long may it continue to do so) and when it occurs it immediately jumps to the top of my priority list. A is for articles, in this case the football articles I am writing for the Secret Betting Club newletter on a monthly basis. I have just completed the research for my third article for them and submitted the initial draft. I am expecting to have to rework it a little once I receive the feedback from the SBC guys but their comments help improve the quality of my writing and as such are most welcome. I am getting a lot out of this experience too, and really enjoying the work too. So most of the hard work is done for this month leaving me free to work on other projects, such as those above.

    Unfortunately one of the projects I may have to start on soon will consume a lot of my time in the future. The Department of Work and Pensions have dismissed my claim for Employment and Support Allowance so despite the fact I am still suffering with my health I may have to start Project J - find a job! That will certainly limit the time I have available for my other projects but hopefully it will spur me into using the time I have available now better and making real progress on some of these tasks I have started but not yet completed.



  15. #165

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    5th May 2010
    A few weeks ago I set about putting all the projects I had on the go in some sort of priority order, and the good news is I have pretty much been able to stick that order. Most unlike me!

    It's (almost) all been about Project R and Project W recently. I have made quite a bit of progress with the ratings although I would have liked to have got further than I have at present. I was hoping to have it almost completed by the time I go on holiday (tomorrow) but that's not going to happen. I could perhaps have got them done had I not started Project W a few days back for a change of scenery. That particular project has taught me a lot already and I am finding it slower going than I had hoped but ultimately I know I am doing the right thing taking my time to get the website and the contents right and fit for public consumption rather than rushing things out there. SO while I haven't made the progress I would have liked I know I am going about things in the right manner.

    I have also done quite a lot on Project A over the past few weeks, leading me to re-evaluate a number of systems I was developing but ultimately I should end up with a more robust approach to football betting as a result, and that can only be a good thing. Once again I am learning a lot from this project and improve several skills so it's all good.

    And now I get a holiday! I can't wait to get away, quite honestly. I am starting to feel a bit rundown and burned out so the opportunity to get away from it all is most welcome. OK, I admit it, I am going to miss my PC and the daily betting a bit but I know not taking the laptop is the right thing to do if I want a proper holiday. Are you reading Keith?



  16. #166

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    19th May 2010
    The holiday is very much over and it's right back to business for me now. Only I am finding it a bit harder than I had hoped to find the motivation to pick up some of the projects I was working on before I went away. I'm slowly getting there but things look like they will drag out more than I had hoped they would. Oh well.

    While I was away, and for a couple of days after I got back, I thought about some of my daily figures from the start of this year and also about the portfolio and staking changes I had made. I wanted to answer the ultimate question: am I making the best of the opportunities that are coming my way? In short, am I making as much profit as I 'should' be? It's a tricky question to answer as it boils down to maximising overbets, minimising overlays and looking at ways to maximise profits while minimising costs and losses. Where does one start?

    I'm happy enough with the balance of my portfolio now, happier than I have ever been I think. That's not to say it's perfect by any means but it suits me. If anything it's slightly lay heavy on a daily basis but that's not a bad thing as laying suits my mentality better than backing in many respects. I like regular small returns rather than the occasional big win punctuating a string of small losses. During the week it's mainly the nags I am betting on but I do have a decent number of sports systems on the go too so I am not too dependent on any one sport, which is a position I wanted to get in so I am pleased that is the case.

    Is it working though? Are the changes I made having the desired effect? Perhaps the most effective way of answering this question is to monitor changes in my ROI, a figure that I can also use to work out how far away I am from being able to use gambling as a primary source of income. Once I know what my ROI is and my average daily turnover I can work out daily expected profits and extrapolate that up to a weekly/monthly/annual income and at least know then where I stand.

    So I have set about updating my spreadsheet with daily turnover and ROI figures so I can at least start to see if things are heading in the right direction. It feels as if they are as I have made a profit every month so far this year but these profits are not big enough for me to class myself as a full-time professional so I need more figures to work out how far away that dream is. I'm getting there though...



  17. #167

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    21st May 2010
    I have just done something that feels very odd - I have voluntarily closed an account with a bookmaker. It was done out of necessity more than anything else. Whenever I tried to place a bet online with Boyle Sports it was rejected by their risk control system even though I am an overall loser with them. Weird. But if they aren't going to accept my bets online then I am not interested in doing business with them so I have closed that account. It feels wrong to limit my options and to have fewer bookies available to me but I know it was the right thing to do.



  18. #168

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    mathares gamblog

    Hi matt this appears to be an ever increasing occurrence,and if more people closed thier accounts,and informed as many others as possible it might give some of these people who call themselves bookmakers pause for thought.

    If i had an account with the firm you mention i would be pleased to inform them that they would no longer receive my bussiness because of the way they treated you.

    If enough people got involved in this way it would be most interesting to observe the reaction.



  19. #169

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    25th May 2010
    Just when you think you have everything set up just the way you want it someone comes along and throws a spanner in the works. Today that someone was Betdaq.

    When I started using betting exchanges I began with the biggest, Betfair. They began to introduce changes to their commission structure and various other charges that I felt were somewhat unfair so when Betdaq offered me an incentive to switch I did so. I think they were offering to match (or better, I forget which) the commission rate on Betfair and then freeze it for a set period. Ah no, that's right, they said you could move your Betfair points to Betdaq and have the equivalent commission and as the two exchanges use different points structures this was a great deal so I jumped ship and went purple. At several points I compared Betdaq and Betfair to make sure I was still on the right exchange and each time it pointed towards me sticking with Betdaq. Towards the end of last year I reckoned a switch to Betfair was in order so that I could get better prices due to the greater liquidity, and that's where I have been for a while now.

    This afternoon I got a phonecall from Betdaq asking why I hadn't been betting with them recently. I told them I had moved to Betfair for better liquidity. They then told me that their liquidity is greatly increased since they started offering existing customers a special deal, a deal they would like to extend to me. They offered me a commission rate of 2.5% fixed for six months plus for every £100 I give them in commission they will give me a £50 free bet. Sounds good, doesn't it? But how good does the deal need to be to take me off Betfair? Is this enough? That commission rate is very appealing but what does it mean at the end of the day? That's what I am about to look at by crunching the numbers through Excel...



  20. #170

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    25th May 2010 (part two)
    A quick bit of dirty maths suggests that the Betdaq deal may not be quite as good as perhaps I first thought.

    I have managed to get my Betfair commission down a little, to 4.70%, since I switched back there in December 2009. I have been there around 6 months then and only taken 0.30% off the base commission rate. On that basis a rate of 2.50% represents a significant drop in commission so is enticing.

    Consider though the commission alongside the overlay. What use is a lower commission rate if I am not getting prices that are as good? My ROI would drop off despite the fact I am paying less in commission. So how much worse can I afford my overlay to get before the drop in commission is no longer worth it? If my average overlay on lay systems with Betfair is around 10% then I can afford a 13% overlay at the lower commission rate with Betdaq. That's not as big an increase as I expected so I need to seriously think about a switch to Betdaq now.

    I have monitored a couple of markets on both Betdaq and Betfair to see if the liquidity on the former really is better than it used to be. I'm not convinced, you know. Betfair always has significantly more matched than Betdaq on the horse racing markets I have looked at (the main win markets for several races shortly before the off).

    Another factor to consider is Betfair SP. I don't lay to SP and I try not to back to it either as I prefer to know what odds I am matched at but I do use it as a safety net for some of my backing systems, especially at bigger odds. I put in an order for a price that is bigger than that currently on offer and set the order to use SP if unmatched by the off. That's a little trick that was mentioned to me a while back and works really well for those horses going off at decent double-figure prices.

    I don't know what to do. I have checked my Betdaq account and it doesn't seem as though they have applied the new comm rate yet anyway so for now it's a moot point. Maybe I need to sleep on it and see if I can come up with any other reasons why I should (or shouldn't) swap exchanges again.



  21. #171

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    Quote Originally Posted by mathare View Post
    25th May 2010 (part two)

    I have monitored a couple of markets on both Betdaq and Betfair to see if the liquidity on the former really is better than it used to be. I'm not convinced, you know. Betfair always has significantly more matched than Betdaq on the horse racing markets I have looked at (the main win markets for several races shortly before the off).
    Im not sure where the better liquidity is either, i havent noticed any inprovement on the horses in the last 6 monthes.

    Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.


  22. #172

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    30th May 2010
    Project W is done and live!

    And I have learned quite a lot in getting it to that stage. I used a site builder (RV Site Builder) to get most of the structure etc in place and also wrote a lot of the content in that. However, the site builder had a number of limitations that stopped me from getting the site exactly how I wanted it so after publishing the site via the site builder I downloaded a copy into Dreamweaver and made a number of changes that way.

    I'm pretty pleased with the way things have turned out though. It's not going to win any awards but for a first go I am really pleased with it. I have had a good trawl over all the links etc this afternoon and ironed out a few teething problems. No doubt there will be more issues to resolve as time goes on but a few friends have had a look and reckon it does what they'd expect so I can't be too unhappy with that can I?

    Now I just need to get some traffic going there



  23. #173

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    1st June 2010
    Another month passes by and it's been another profitable one, thankfully.

    Some systems haven't performed to their potential and have had a poor month. In particular I'm thinking of Easy Money Lays when I say that but other systems have continued previous poor performance levels, including SixPlus Loser, Double Top, NH Media and Trainer 3. I have looked at my staking for all of these and for now at least no changes are required but some of them are on a watch list and if they continue as they have been the stakes will be cut.

    Other systems are absolutely flying, in particular lay systems such as CD Lays, Lay'em, my own Classic Lays (ex-False Favs) and the NailedOn lays. Between them these systems have put on over 90pts in May - not at all bad bearing in mind I was away for 10 days of the month. A couple of backing systems also had a really good month, Progeny and HSR in particular and as a result I have increased the stakes on both of these.

    I checked over all my banks and these were the only changes I felt were required at this time. Let's hope for continued good results on these systems and an increase in profits as a result.



  24. #174

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    5th June 2010
    Over the last couple of days I have been rethinking my approach to staking for various systems in my portfolio. The reason is my overall ROI. Including the years spent following systems that didn't really work for me and were dropped my total ROI is low, much lower than I expected and hoped it would be. It's around 0.40% in fact. Things are better for this year, my ROI for the year to date is a little under 2% which when you consider that the majority of my betting is lay betting is alright. I'm happy enough with that sort of figure, especially as it's heading in the right direction - upwards. My average absolute daily profit/loss is heading upwards nicely too which means I stand to win/lose more on a daily basis. You can't always win at this game and I accept the larger losses as part and parcel of making greater profits. My average daily liability is also on the way up nicely, which is to be expected if my ROI and average profits are also increasing as the three are connected.

    Anyway, in an attempt to help improve that ROI I have been looking again at my staking and how I can better use my spreadsheet to help me with it. I've set up some rules in Excel to conditionally format cells to show me when a bank becomes a candidate for increasing/decreasing stakes. I have also reworked all my bank figures to show them in terms of points for the current stakes and added (where necessary) a column showing the suggested bankroll for a system, again in points. It's hard to believe it has taken me this long to put these measures in place really but there you have it. I've done it now anyway.

    I have also scrapped bank barriers. For whatever reason they just hadn't been working out for me and in the long run had actually cost me a bit of money. Perhaps I wasn't using them right, not setting the barrier levels to the right point or whatever. But they weren't doing it for me and I have happily dropped them. I haven't come across them outside of this forum either, and while that doesn't mean they are not a good idea it does mean that they are not that widespread so I feel I am better off sticking to more normal methods of bankroll management. This meant a few updates and tweaks to my spreadsheet too and hopefully I have made all the changes correctly and not broken anything! I did take a backup first though, just in case :)

    All of this has resulted in the staking for a few systems coming under review. SixPlus Loser is one that needs the stakes decreasing it seems. My bank has been suffering for a while now, not that it ever really got going (a high of 125% of starting bank was achieved July '09). It had been under a barrier but I will now reduce the stakes for a while with a view to ditching it if it continues to disappoint.

    Two of my own laying systems (Classic and Premier Lays) are due for a stakes increase though. I am confident they can thrive on higher stakes so I will make that change soon.

    My Max Lays bank is in the right ballpark staking-wise but the performance of that system is somewhat disappointing compared to my other lay systems. The overlay is significantly higher this year than for other lays and the bank has been dropping steadily for a little while now. It's in no real danger but it's gone up a bit then down a bit without ever really threatening to take off and make a real profit. I will be looking at this system in a bit more depth soon to see whether it is worth continuing with it to maintain turnover and thus help reduce my Betfair commission or just drop it from my portfolio to help improve the bottom line.



  25. #175

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    6th June 2010
    What did I say yesterday? "You can't always win at this game and I accept the larger losses as part and parcel of making greater profits" - on a day that would become my 10th worst of all time. Oh the irony!

    Still, onwards and upwards.

    Today sees another change to my gambling activities - I'm giving up poker for a while. I have just posted in my poker diary the reasons for this but the long and short of it is that I can't give it my full attention when I am playing, for whatever reason, and as a result my game and my results are suffering. If I can't give the game the attention it needs then playing is just going to cost me money in the long run so it makes sense to give it up until such time I can play with the blinkered approach to the game that it requires. I don't know when, if ever, I will have such focus but I certainly don't have it now so there is no point wasting the time and money on the poker tables.

    Instead I am going to throw myself into what I hope will become my magnum opus - I'm going to crack football betting. In a big way too, I hope. I plan to thoroughly dissect the game and all the data associated with itm, examine it from all angles and perhaps even put the pieces back together in a strange order but one that will hopefully work and will spit out several profitable, reliable football systems. That's what I am after. That and a deep understanding of football markets, how matches are perceived by the general public, how this affects the markets and how I can profit from that. I'll be looking at various rating systems, examining relationships between various aspects of games, looking at conventional wisdom to see whether it is based on myth or fact and so on. In short I plan to become an expert in football betting. It's a grand aim but I think I can do it, given time. And the only way I can get the time I need is to give up playing poker.

    A lot of what needs to be done at this stage is number crunching. Compiling spreadsheets and databases, devising and tweaking algorithms and calculating huge amounts of derived data. That's something I can do on and off, which is how my time presents itself most afternoons.

    I check my bets on a race by race basis making sure I have them all matched and that my prices are OK and so on. I like to keep my results up to date race by race too where I can, or at least update them several times throughout the afternoon. It suits me to do it that way, but I have found that poker doesn't fit into that way of working very well. Poker demands my attention all the time and I can't do that. This football project can fit in the gaps between races perfectly.

    Cracking football betting is something I have had in mind for a long time now, and finally I think the time is right to have a bloody good go at it. Time to dig out the spreadsheets I abandoned several weeks back, months back in some cases, and refresh my memory. Where was I up to and where was I heading with it?



  26. #176

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    15th June 2010
    It's taken a bit of time but I think I am back up to speed with my football betting stuff now and have started to dig deep into the data to look for potential system ideas. I have calculated and derived well over 300 bits of information about each and every match in the English League covering 9 seasons (I had more seasons covered but without odds information for the earlier seasons the info is pretty much useless). I ought to expand this to 10 seasons by adding in the data for last season but I haven't got round to it yet, and it took me ages to calculate everything for these seasons so if I want to get anything done before the new season kicks off I'd better work with what I have for now at least.

    Picking out systems from this lot is going to be a long drawn-out process and to be completely honest I'm not entirely sure of the best way to go about it. I have had a bit of a dabble and one potential system has already dropped out. It has a 7% ROI and was profitable in 8 out of 9 seasons so on the surface it looks reasonable enough but I will need to do more digging to be sure of it before I decide whether to carry it forward to the next stage of the process (whatever that may be).

    Once I have finally cracked football betting I can start on the horses



  27. #177

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    18th June 2010
    I've spent a couple of days adding in the data for last season to my footy spreadsheets and using that raw data to calculate everything else I need. I've also extended the number of data items per match to over 350 with ideas for more to add too at some stage. This has meant I haven't really done much in the way of researching actual systems but the one I thought I had found the other day isn't actually that great, but a variation on the same theme leads to a decent-looking system with a double-figure ROI but as before I need to dig a bit deeper to make sure it all holds up and makes sense before I dive in with it.

    I am currently compiling a list of football betting angles I want to investigate too. Whether this list leads to anything remains to be seen. Some of the ideas are just thoughts I've had, general interest items really, ponderings if you like. Others are well thought out avenues that could lead to real profits. But we'll see how far I get with those.

    With the horses kicking me hard in the wallet this month my motivation is somewhat lacking. That seems counter-intuitive in many ways, things are going badly so I should be looking at ways in which I can diversify and hopefully improve things overall but I seem to be more motivated when things are going well. Which they aren't at present. But there's not much I can do about that. I have faith in (almost) all the systems I follow so it's just a case of letting them do their thing and taking the rough with the smooth I guess.



  28. #178

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    25th June 2010
    I have a gift for you. It's football system that has dropped out of my analysis this evening. It's a pretty quiet system with just 317 qualifiers in 10 seasons but that averages out to something like 1 bet per weekend during the season doesn't it? Enough to generate a little bit of interest, surely.

    The stats? OK, here you are:
    317 bets
    137 winners
    43.22% SR
    37.13pts profit (to 1pt level stakes)
    11.70% ROI

    Not too shabby I'm sure you'll agree.

    The profits breakdown such that the start of the season and the very end are the best but there is no significant reason why this should be so I don't recommend backing the selections only at certain times of the year. In terms of breakdown by season, it got off to a pretty shabby start but has been profitable 6 years oout of 10 and last year it made 30.83pts profit with 15.36pts profit the previous season.

    The rules are nice and simple:
    Back Premiership teams playing at home who have scored no more than 4 times in their last 6 home league games.

    That's it. Check how many goals each home team in the Premiership has scored in their last 6 games at home and if it's 4 or less then back them. What could be easier?

    Why am I giving this away when I could build it into a portfolio of mini-systems (which is what I hope to do with the results of this analysis, coincidentally)? Because I don't understand why those rules should produce a profit so I am throwing it out there to see what you lot think. Is this system data-mined? It kinda feels like it but if I tinker with the variables slightly (change the number of goals, for example) then it still works but isn't as profitable. This reduces the fluke potential a little at least.

    Why could this system work? Well, what do we know about the teams it picks out? They are doing poorly at home, generally speaking. They could be unbeaten, theoretically but in actual fact no team that meets the rules has amassed more than 12 points in their last 6 home games. So the teams are unfancied, basically. A home win is somewhat unexpected due to the paucity of home goals. This is going to built into the odds which will be pushed out more than one would expect for an average home team. But a goal drought can't continue for too long. Teams feel the pressure, especially at home where their fans get on their backs. The players know they haven't been doing that well and owe the fans. Plus there is a degree of regression to the mean - a team doing badly will do better soon such that its results start to average out in the long run.

    Look at the SR of the system - 43.22%. The average win rate in the Premiership is 47.16% over the last 10 seasons so despite the fact we're picking out goal-shy teams we still have a decent chance of a home win it seems. Away wins happen 30.91% of the time so it's still much more likely that we'll get a home win than an away win, on average, despite the goal-shy nature of the teams we're backing.

    So on that basis I can justify all the rules except one: the fact that it works in the Premiership only. This one really puzzled me for a while and I think I have finally got a handle on it. And it's a slightly weird one.

    The bookies see a lot more money for the Premiership than the other English divisions. That's fact. The Premiership is televised more often, has better players and attracts far more interest generally as well as from the betting public so turnover on the games is higher. Because of this the markets for Premiership games get more care and attention from the odds-makers than other games would. Again, that's only natural. Bookies are making sure they don't make a mistake on their main markets else they'd be left open to large liabilities from clued-up punters. So when a poor-looking home team is playing the bookies shorten the odds on the away team as the weight of public money will likely come down on the side they think is more likely to win - the away team. This lengthens the odds on the home side and gives us a value bet. The average odds of a qualifying team for this system is 3.15. In the Championship the odds average out at 2.36 while it's 2.37 for League One and League Two. That's for teams who have scored 4 or fewer goals in their last 6 home games. These figures are a massive 0.70 above the overall average for the Premiership but only 0.25 greater than the average for the other divisions.

    Put simply: goal-shy Premiership teams are available at much longer odds than they should be when playing at home.

    The figures I have quoted are average odds. If you are able to get the best odds on each and every bet your ROI goes up to 20.25% (64.19pts profit). If you get the best price some of the time (which I model by taking the average of the best price and the overall average price, meaning you're getting better than the average in the long run but not as good as the best price on each bet) your profit is still over 50pts with a ROI just a touch under 16%.

    And I'm giving this away for free...



  29. #179

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    4th July 2010
    Things like this happen to me a lot. I think I have found something that looks promising and get excited about it only to dig a bit deeper and find it's actually a bit crap. But if I keep looking I normally find something else that is bigger and better than the first thing I found.

    And so it is with football systems. Back in the middle of June I found a trend that was profitable and had a 7% ROI. At the time I was amazed to have found anything that was profitable and the fact that the ROI was only 7% didn't bother me. Then over the next few days I found a variation on that system that seemed much more promising. Hurrah! A week or so later I was back with a system I was giving away for free. Why was I doing that? Because I didn't fully understand why the trend existed and by trying to explain the system to you lot I found myself understanding the reasons behind it better.

    But I was still happy for it to be out there in the public domain because at the end of the day it's not that good really is it? A profit of 37 points in 10 years and the last two years between them have produced around 46pts profit. That means it was losing up till two years ago, right? A loss of a tad over 9pts in the first eight seasons - that's rubbish! Who would still be following a system with those returns?

    I accept that and fully agree with this criticism (which only I have made so far). So did I give up and throw in the towel? Or did I go digging around and unearth a massive number of other profitable trends? I think you know the answer...

    I have thrown away the least profitable trends and many of those whose profit breakdown across the seasons just isn't up to scratch but even after all of that I still have 183 profitable trends to play with. And all that has come from looking at nothing more than the last 6 games teams have played, and only then in terms of goals and results. I haven't used shots, corners, bookings etc - just basic data and still I have found nearly two hundred profitable avenues.

    The question now is what to do with them. I will be playing with these 183 systems more to work out what the best thing to do with them is but right now I am toying with the idea of creating a number of portfolios from them using these trends as contributory mini-systems to form bigger portfolio-based systems. I don't quite know yet how to structure the portfolios. Do I go for one based on home wins, one on draws, another on away wins etc? Or use a risk-based split - one low-risk, a medium-risk portfolio and a high-risk system?

    How I combine these profitable trends isn't important right now. I still have another six weeks or so before the season kicks off and I have only analysed a small portion of my data. If I can find 183 profitable trends looking at just a team's last six games how many will I uncover when I look at ratings or the various figures I have derived and calculated for each match?

    Things are only just getting started on the football front...



  30. #180
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    Quote Originally Posted by mathare View Post
    4th July 2010
    Things are only just getting started on the football front...
    It will be interesting to see what you come up with Mathare. Football systems is an area I have a big interest in and have dabbled with in the past. It was a painstaking process though having to sift through all the data and I just got bored quite quickly. Reading your blog has got me interested again and I might just have a go again while I have some time on my hands.

    Ħuʍop ǝpısdn sı pɹɐoqʎǝʞ ʎɯ


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