Wednesday 3rd January 2007

I had a dual role today and racing had to take a back seat as alongside being a sports trader I was also the proud father of my 6 year old daughter, Zoe, on her birthday. Zoe had invited her best 10 friends for a party and I had to do most of the preparation and organisation of the party.

I only managed to trade in 4 races and my first was the 12:20 at Wetherby, where I backed All For Luck for £50 @ 1.10, whilst well in the lead and in the last furlong, to give me a profit of £5. My next trade was in the 13:15 at Kempton. Here I backed Earl Kraul for £135 @ 1.25 just after he had swept to the lead with one furlong to go, to net me another £34 profit.

My third racing trade of the day was in the 13:25 at Wetherby and here I laid Ellway Prospect for £3 @ 20.00 with two hurdles to jump when being ridden hard to stay in the race. I also backed the winner, Smoothly Does It, for £100 @ 1.01 just before the line to give me a £4 profit. My last race of the day was the 14:30 at Wetherby where I backed Tabora for £135 @ 1.35 with two furlongs to go and when well in the lead. I did lay off @ 1.12 to net me a profit of £31. So I had finished my very short racing day with a profit of £74.

Tonights televised football match was the game between Grays Athletic and Gravesend of the Nationwide Conference League. I backed the under 2.5 goals market for £200 @ 1.80 just before kick off. I then started to lay off in £25 lots from 1.68 down to my 7th lot of £25 @ 1.27 just before the 1st goal was scored in the 41st minute. So I now had a liability of £25 and backed the unders again for £195 @ 1.74 as soon as the market was reformed. I laid my first £120 off at 1.62 and then laid off in £25 lots from 1.53 down to 1.30. I then started to green up with lays at 1.25,1.21,1.16 and 1.10 to leave me with a profit of £87 whatever the result. I also had a little dabble in the correct score and backed the 1 - 0 scoreline for £127 @ 1.21 with four minutes on the clock. I managed to lay off £122 @ 1.16 within two minutes and then the second goal came to leave me with my only loss on the day of £5. The total result for the match was therefore a profit of £82 and this left me with a profit from all trading on the day of £155.

I have now had over 10,000 visitors to this blog since I started it back on the 13th November 2006. I would like to thank everyone that has visited and hope that you have managed to gain something from my daily ramblings. I do have some very regular readers and they come from at least 25 countries all over the World, as you can see by clicking on the visitor location map, on the right-hand column of the blog. I have tried to make this blog as interesting as possible but am aware that on my quieter days it can read a little boring, so if you have any suggestions for added content or new links that could make this a better experience please just send me a comment and I will try to include your ideas.

I have achieved what I set out to do with this blog, which was to try and build a group of good friends and colleagues that have a place to interact with like minded people and have the ability to bounce ideas off each other. For this I am very grateful.

Comments

[TraderinOz]

Hi Ray,

Congratulations on reaching the big 10k mark. Don't worry, I have been reading your blog religiously for a couple of months and have never found it boring.

A quick question regarding the STW software. I downloaded this last night and had a play for a good few hours. Found it to be pretty good, though the lack of Australian events (and wallet) and the charting facilities were still a little disappointing. What I wanted to know though is, do you know if there is a way to see exactly where your order is in relation to the rest of the market? By this I mean, if you put a back of $100 in at 2.01 and after woods it indicates that there is $240k waiting at 2.01, can you see exactly where abouts in the queue your $100 is, thus seeing how far away you are from being matched?

Hope that make sense. Good luck and happy trading

TraderinOz
http://www.traderinoz.blogspot.com

[Ray]

Hi TraderinOz,
It's good to see your trading is going well. I don't think that it is possible to see where your order is in the queue, but I will check it out for you and let you know. Thanks for your comments and I hope your trading continues to go well.
Ray

[ASA]

Hi Ray.

Firstly, I'd like to congratulate your little girl's birthday and wish her the best.

secondly, thanks because of your comment on my blog.As you said, I also trade on the under/over markets, but a in a little different way. When I had above EUR 1000 in my account some weeks ago, I was usually laying the under 2.5 goals option when about 35 - 40 minutes had passed.Since most of the goals are usually scored in the 2nd half, there's a nice probability to have an over match, even when the 1st half has ended 0-0.But after I withdrew most of my money during the last 10 days, now I usually trade on the "under 4.5 goals" market and/or "X goals or more" market.Now my aim is to make EUR 600 until mid February and therefore making EUR 20 a day is enough for me.But soon I'll deposit about EUR 3,000 into my account and I think that after this, I'll follow your technique and test it.

Kindest regards.

[mick]

Hi Ray
10000 is a cracking number. Out of interest are you making more money from racing or from football? Also I note in your blog about 3 days ago you said you had started to trade too early in races. My computer system is not as fast as yours so I have been trying to simply back what I think will be the winner from just before 3 fences out - not so good in the valuable races but seems profitable in the smaller ones. You seem to leave your trades later than this - have you found your system enables you to do this easier? Just wondered.
Mick

[Ray]

Hi ASA,
Good Luck with your trading. It's good to see so many people trying so many different ways of trading the markets as it all adds to the totall liquidity. If you haven't already, give Betdaq a go on the football markets as you will find prices and liquidity pretty good.
Ray

[Ray]

Hi Mick,
I make most of my profit on the horses with football coming a close second. What I find with horse racing recently is that often the leader runs out of stamina in the final couple of furlongs and this is where I have been caught out. It is almost certainly down to the very soft going conditions at the moment. Good Luck.
Ray

[Tom]

Ray,

I've been reading your blog for a few weeks now, and thoroughly enjoy it, but have a couple of questions.

Don't you find trading the unders very stressful? I've just been giving it a go using your methods and I always feel that it could fall apart at any moment through a couple of quick goals. I guess this is countered by the fact that there are very few games with 3 early goals, and even if you get the odd large loss, it'll be countered by the accumulated smaller wins?

Secondly, are you concerned that you're losing a bit of your edge by detailing your methods on unders trading? I'm sure I'm not the only one who's jumped on the bandwagon!

Cheers,
Tom

[Ray]

Hi Tom,
I used to find trading anything quite stressfull. Over time and when you have past results to look back on your confidence grows and the stress tends to subside. It is one of the reasons I always advise people to trade with in their comfort zone. I tend to think that trading on over 2.5 goals is a lot more stressfull simply because untill a goal is scored the odds are going against you all the time, where with the unders the price is going in your favour from kick off so you can get out if you are worried about your exposure. A lot of people say that I will lose my edge by detailing the way I trade. I don't think so as there is a lot of liquidity about now and a few extra traders will add to that liquidity even if they are looking to do exactly the same as I do. In reallity I trade slightly differently every time, it all depends on what the odds are at the time. I just want to encourage more people to trade and there by increase liquidity even more. Good Luck with your trading.
Ray

[ASA]

Hi again Ray!

Inspired by reading of your blog, I joined Betdaq 10 days ago and deposited EUR 100 into my account.But after few days I withdrew all the initial deposit plus about EUR 20, which I had made through trading on a soccer match. ( Man Utd v Reading).The reason is that the liquidity on Betdaq markets is too low for a trader and this can put any trader in trouble, specially those who play with big money and just aim to make quick ticks on every match.Anyway, I like to see Betdaq improving, since as you said, always competition is better!

Kind regards.

[ASA]

To Tom!

I'm one of the guys who trade the under/over market in exactly the reverse trend.I used to wait until the 30 min and if the score is still 0-0, I back over 2.5 goals at a very high price or lay the under at a very low price (usually between 1.4 and 1.5, depends on the kind of match and the rivals).Then when a goal is scored, I take advantage of the illogical over-reaction and drifing of the over odds and lay the over or back the under to guarantee a profit whatever the result.

Good luck.

[Ray]

Hi Asa,
All it would take is for 10 - 20 extra traders to make Betdaq very liquid and that will benefit everyone including staunch Betfair users as when Betfair see they have some real competitors do you not think they will then start to offer all sorts of inducements to keep and attract back traders. Good Luck.
Ray

[humble]

Well done on the success of your thread ray thats a lot of views in such a short time,i am sure a lot of people like myself have learned from your posts thanks for the effort you put into it.

[Ray]

Hi Humble,
Thanks again, I hope I can help more in the future. Good Luck.
Ray