I thought I'd do a post about how I view the racing the night before racing and show you my ramblings about each card and what my views are.
Ayr is a weak meeting from a stats point of view, however it looks that Richard Fahey has a few lively ones and an inspection of the markets tomorrow morning should indicate which ones to side with. The two that catch the eye are Dutch Heritage and Cosmic Moon. They both have good bookings with their jockeys and the combined strike rates look to be the market play. Look for any value in the morning for two good bets.
Lingfield is an extremely dissapointing card and offers no interesting angles. However Saeed Bin Suroor's Mizbah in the 1710 looks to be a good chance with Dettori booked to ride. 11/4 at the time of writing looks a massive price about a horse that has shown not a lot on previous form apart from last time out, being very unlucky in running but ran on well to come second behind Enery. My tissue states anything above 6/4 to be a good bet.
Yarmouth has nothing to work with.
Wolverhampton only has the one eye catcher and that's the top weight in the 1900. Almaty Express from the John Weymes yard, who boasts a 15% SR at the track with a fairly impressive £63.50 profit to £1 level stakes. The horse loves it round here with no less than 17 wins and several placings. The handicapper may have him in his grip but 5/1 looks too big about a course specialist. Horses for courses as they say!
Uttoxeter shows nothing of interest.
So there you have it. I will now spend a few hours constructing a tissue about each race of interest and any horse that is a bigger price than I anticipate, it becomes a bet and a tip.
Any questions or views, please leave a comment and I'll respond as soon aa I can.
Regards,
Ed
A place to find the musings of a professional gambler who makes his money from finding value in the Horse Racing markets.
Sunday 29 July 2012
Thursday 26 July 2012
A Day In The Life Of A Professional Gambler
In today's post, I thought I'd give you a perspective into a day in the life of a professional gambler.
So to begin, I want to explain that it's not an easy profession and is fraught with psychological pitfalls and is not as glamorous as people first think!
I start the day with breakfast (not unusual I hear you cry!) like most people. After a usual start to the day, I then sit down at my computer and the hard work starts.
Firstly I have to go through all the various selection processes I use with various systems. This can take up to three hours in itself and consists of running through the cards repeatedly looking for qualifying bets. Once I have all the data collected I then have to start reading the form of every horse in every handicap and then construct my own tissue and compare this with the morning markets. If I find a horse, I believe to be over-priced then it becomes a bet.
Then I post these value bets for my subscribers over at Value At The Races so they can benefit from the early prices.
So we're now around the 1100am mark and all the day's information is laid out in front of me. The next hardest task is to now try and get my bets on. Not as easy as you think!
Most Bookmakers have closed my accounts or limit my bets to a minimum, so it's a constant cat and mouse game I have to play. I obviously use the exchanges a lot as this makes my life easier but sometimes there isn't enough liquidity in the morning to place a large bet so I have to use a bookmaker. I have a few contacts who can place these bets for me and they are then paid a commission. Sometimes I'll even go into a shop and use cash, although nowadays it is easier to keep everything on-line.
Once the day's bets have been placed, I'll have some lunch and go for a walk or a swim. It's important to take your mind off racing and get some exercise as it helps to keep the mind focused.
Back to the afternoon and it's about trading through the various races and finding over-priced horses that I think will be over bet come the off. I'll back the horse at the over-priced odds and then lay them off to create a green book. In other words no matter what the outcome, I make a small profit. Do this on every race and it soon adds up!
It's very hard to stay focused throughout the afternoon and manage your time constructively but my wife does a good job of keeping me in check!
I still work part time for a large bookmakers which I thoroughly enjoy. I won't tell you what I do but I quietly work behind the scenes making sure bets are legitimate and we don't lose too much money.
Once the day's racing is over, which can obviously run into the evening, I then tally up everything that has been bet and work out my profit/loss for the day. Every single bet has to be recorded with explanations as to why they were placed and notes to be made about any future bets on the horse. I then kick back and relax for a few hours and then it's another day.
I do try to take one day off a week but invariably this type of work goes on for 7 days a week and consumes your whole life................. Good job I love it!!
Any questions then leave me a comment and I'll get back to you.
Regards,
Ed
So to begin, I want to explain that it's not an easy profession and is fraught with psychological pitfalls and is not as glamorous as people first think!
I start the day with breakfast (not unusual I hear you cry!) like most people. After a usual start to the day, I then sit down at my computer and the hard work starts.
Firstly I have to go through all the various selection processes I use with various systems. This can take up to three hours in itself and consists of running through the cards repeatedly looking for qualifying bets. Once I have all the data collected I then have to start reading the form of every horse in every handicap and then construct my own tissue and compare this with the morning markets. If I find a horse, I believe to be over-priced then it becomes a bet.
Then I post these value bets for my subscribers over at Value At The Races so they can benefit from the early prices.
So we're now around the 1100am mark and all the day's information is laid out in front of me. The next hardest task is to now try and get my bets on. Not as easy as you think!
Most Bookmakers have closed my accounts or limit my bets to a minimum, so it's a constant cat and mouse game I have to play. I obviously use the exchanges a lot as this makes my life easier but sometimes there isn't enough liquidity in the morning to place a large bet so I have to use a bookmaker. I have a few contacts who can place these bets for me and they are then paid a commission. Sometimes I'll even go into a shop and use cash, although nowadays it is easier to keep everything on-line.
Once the day's bets have been placed, I'll have some lunch and go for a walk or a swim. It's important to take your mind off racing and get some exercise as it helps to keep the mind focused.
Back to the afternoon and it's about trading through the various races and finding over-priced horses that I think will be over bet come the off. I'll back the horse at the over-priced odds and then lay them off to create a green book. In other words no matter what the outcome, I make a small profit. Do this on every race and it soon adds up!
It's very hard to stay focused throughout the afternoon and manage your time constructively but my wife does a good job of keeping me in check!
I still work part time for a large bookmakers which I thoroughly enjoy. I won't tell you what I do but I quietly work behind the scenes making sure bets are legitimate and we don't lose too much money.
Once the day's racing is over, which can obviously run into the evening, I then tally up everything that has been bet and work out my profit/loss for the day. Every single bet has to be recorded with explanations as to why they were placed and notes to be made about any future bets on the horse. I then kick back and relax for a few hours and then it's another day.
I do try to take one day off a week but invariably this type of work goes on for 7 days a week and consumes your whole life................. Good job I love it!!
Any questions then leave me a comment and I'll get back to you.
Regards,
Ed
Tuesday 10 July 2012
Finding The Value
I thought I'd give you an idea today on how I arrive at my selections that are tipped on my service Value At The Races everyday.
By browsing through the posts on this blog you'll see my interpretation of that elusive "Value". All my selections are tipped as I believe they are over-priced. To date my selections have beaten the market 86% of the time.
Our current strike rate is 28.87% and the average odds are 9/2 with the average SP returning just over 7/2.
So I'm getting the Value bit right but how do I arrive at my selections?
Over 3 years ago now I read a book by Dave Nevison and I was fascinated by his approach to creating a "tissue" This meant pricing a race up with my own odds and then if the market was bigger than my price then I had found a bet.
Every evening or morning I select the handicaps I will be tackling and start looking through each declared runner. I break the race down into form reading, trainer and jockey strike rates and general trends from the last 10 years. Each horse is then given a rating and with this rating I then go about pricing up my book.
As long as I think the horse has a good chance of winning and the market is bigger than my "tissue" price then it becomes a "tip"
As an example I thought I'd run through my reasoning behind the 2035 @ Southwell this evening.
Selection: Beachwood Bay @ 4/1
The horse likes it around Southwell with three wins, a second and a third under his belt. Although not having won in a class 5 on this occasion I feel that it shouldn't be a problem having been fairly treated by the handicapper.
The trainer Jo Hughes is in terrific form at the moment with a 33% SR in the last 14 days. That's 2 winners from 6 and an overall, impressive 23% SR overall on the all weather. Delving a little deeper, Jo is showing a 15% SR with her horses over 6 furlongs which is a good SR in my book.
From looking at the other horses, I believe that Clear Spring to be the main danger but at the time of writing, 9/4 is way too short in what could be a fairly competitve affair. Using the above and implementing statistics with all the other horses I then arrived at the below "Tissue"
25/1
Now if you add all the percentages up on the above tissue you will notice that it's very close to a 100% (102.12%) . This is because I've not included an over round into my calculations like a bookmaker would. As you can see, I fancy Beachwood Bay and believe that the horse is a 3/1 shot. Having looked at the market this morning, I was able to get on at 4/1. I now have a value bet and we should get a good run for our money.
Any questions then please leave a comment below and I'll answer as soon as possible.
Regards,
Ed
By browsing through the posts on this blog you'll see my interpretation of that elusive "Value". All my selections are tipped as I believe they are over-priced. To date my selections have beaten the market 86% of the time.
Our current strike rate is 28.87% and the average odds are 9/2 with the average SP returning just over 7/2.
So I'm getting the Value bit right but how do I arrive at my selections?
Over 3 years ago now I read a book by Dave Nevison and I was fascinated by his approach to creating a "tissue" This meant pricing a race up with my own odds and then if the market was bigger than my price then I had found a bet.
Every evening or morning I select the handicaps I will be tackling and start looking through each declared runner. I break the race down into form reading, trainer and jockey strike rates and general trends from the last 10 years. Each horse is then given a rating and with this rating I then go about pricing up my book.
As long as I think the horse has a good chance of winning and the market is bigger than my "tissue" price then it becomes a "tip"
As an example I thought I'd run through my reasoning behind the 2035 @ Southwell this evening.
Selection: Beachwood Bay @ 4/1
The horse likes it around Southwell with three wins, a second and a third under his belt. Although not having won in a class 5 on this occasion I feel that it shouldn't be a problem having been fairly treated by the handicapper.
The trainer Jo Hughes is in terrific form at the moment with a 33% SR in the last 14 days. That's 2 winners from 6 and an overall, impressive 23% SR overall on the all weather. Delving a little deeper, Jo is showing a 15% SR with her horses over 6 furlongs which is a good SR in my book.
From looking at the other horses, I believe that Clear Spring to be the main danger but at the time of writing, 9/4 is way too short in what could be a fairly competitve affair. Using the above and implementing statistics with all the other horses I then arrived at the below "Tissue"
Punching 11/1
|
Salik Tag 8/1
|
Clear Spring 5/1
|
|
Bay 3/1
|
Elhamri 20/1
|
Ace Of Spies 14/1
|
Tunnager Grove 5/1
|
Gracie´s Gift 10/1
|
Now if you add all the percentages up on the above tissue you will notice that it's very close to a 100% (102.12%) . This is because I've not included an over round into my calculations like a bookmaker would. As you can see, I fancy Beachwood Bay and believe that the horse is a 3/1 shot. Having looked at the market this morning, I was able to get on at 4/1. I now have a value bet and we should get a good run for our money.
Any questions then please leave a comment below and I'll answer as soon as possible.
Regards,
Ed
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