Cheeky Reindeer

Well I'm no weatherman, but at this rate I can't see much end to the cold, snowy weather. Trading-wise, the first half of November was pretty stagnant and just as I was starting to find my way again, this cold front has put my comeback on ice.

I even thought about getting some seasonal work at Tesco or Royal Mail to tide me over, but instead I've just decided to watch my spending by cutting out non-essentials (veg and meat) and only buying the cheaper whiskey for the time being.

So with the racing on its knees, what better way to spend my days than dressing up as a reindeer and having a mate chuck hay all over my carpet...enjoy! :)

High on Meydan

Iron Maiden

I traded a South Africa Dubai race today - Meydan - just so I could indulge in the pun in today's title! Actually, I was prompted by the fact that Kieren Fallon's name came up on ATR. The liquidity was low, and the prices were very gappy, a bit like the dog markets in the last 30 seconds. It's not for me I'm afraid, but worth a sniff.

If there's a strong odds-on favourite and a bunch of outsiders, like in the first race at Wolverhampton this afternoon, I'll look to trade a few of the outsiders for a profit, using small stakes, and hedge in-play. It came good to the tune of 11 notes which is ok for little risk. It's nice to let some run anyway, as I still like a cheeky punt now and again.



Not a bad day but I find myself scratching around for a profit these days, whilst trying to stay out of trouble. I've run into a fair bit of trouble this month, and it's taken me over 2 weeks to claw back to where I was back then. I'm sort of getting a handle on things since the clocks changed so I'm just hoping things don't change again too much before the Spring - my nervous system can't take much more!!

Children in Need - traders unite!

That jolly good fellow The Geek is making a concerted effort to raise funds for Children in Need 2010.

The Toy has been free to use since its launch last year, and The Geek has pledged that this will continue throughout 2011 to users who at least pledge a minimum of £5 during fundraising events.

Not a bad deal for such a solid piece of software, which now features a plethora of ass-kicking charts.

The Geek's Toy - probably the best Betfair Trading Software in the world!


Following Children in Need, we then have Mets in Need, a fundraising effort to prop up my ailing PnL for November. Further details to follow...

Rude awakening

Well, bring back British Summer Time because I haven't managed to settle into any kind of groove since the clocks changed.


Curiously, I managed to cancel out my profit on four separate occasions, the fourth time being quite severe - a sort of subconscious self-sabotage maybe?

This week has seen more money flow out of my bank account than in.

"You mean you had a losing week, Mets?"

I prefer the way I said it.

Tunnel vision

Well I had a thoroughly crap afternoon and lost my money and my rag rather too frequently.


I thought things were pretty volatile today and I got smashed around like a young seal at the mercy of some rather large Orca types. And I haven't said that for a while.

A crumby start didn't help, and the amount of times I traded upto a tenner or so and then lost it and more beggared belief. I had a chance early on to get back to zero which I blew with one of those overtrades and things got a bit silly from thereon in.

I realised that I have a tendency, when I'm losing, to get a bit desperate and start focusing too hard on certain prices whilst failing to notice what's going on around me. I got done for -£30 at Wolves by a sudden drift when I didn't notice something else steaming in.

One thing The Badger said in that conference last week is that he's 100% certain he can make money from any horse racing market, although he admitted that it wasn't always the case. It's a good mindset to have and of course, with the correct decision making, we're all capable of making money.

You might wonder how I handle losing days. Not very well. Throwing stuff usually helps, as does using profanity. But typically I'll go and push some weights to get it out of my system.


The hardest part is actually walking away from the PC in the first place, as it's not always wise to walk away too early in case a comeback is on the cards.

I hate London

I think it was John Lennon that said "life is what happens while people are busy making plans" - or something like that. Well in London, life is what happens when people are busy trying to get somewhere. Where the hell are they all going exactly, scurrying around like rats....?

An so concludes my trip to the big smoke, lol!

I just got back home from my free Betfair Advanced Sports Trading Course. Actually it was more like a (deep breath) Betfair-endorsed-but-held-in-central-London-at-Centaur's-offices-and-presented-by-people-in-Betfair-clothes-that-don't-work-for-Betfair-type-thing. In summary, I'm not sure what to make of the day really.

I'm well aware of the whole Badger / Geek / Racing Traders saga having read some things on the Geek's Toy forum. So I turned up at this big building and was greeted by a chap from Betfair (ok there was one) although he didn't do anything expect skive off his day job to man the big fridge full of soft drinks and beer. Nice touch with the beer, by the way!


Big building

The conference soon got underway with Tony Hargraves and a couple of associates giving a presentation discussing aspects of trading psychology, software tools and in-game strategies. The content was fairly brief but sparked a good deal of debate amongst the trainers and the 26 or so that attended. Some of the attendees didn't pull any punches and were getting properly stuck into Tony et al! I think Tony wanted to punch the lady at the front that was talking a load of toss, and I did too because she was annoying (and really posh which was even more annoying).

In fact, traders are a bloody annoying bunch of know-it-alls. They can't wait to tell you what they know but don't have any listening ability. Worse than IT geeks even.

Tony discussed the 4 main players in the trading-tools market - BA, BetTrader Evo, Gruss and The Toy. The discussion inevitably landed at the door of BT Evolution and he demonstrated its various tools during a live trading session. The banter was fun and he made a few quid to boot. On his RT videos, Tony always gave the impression he was in control of a trade and he was equally cool in the live arena, albeit for small stakes.

After lunch - and I must say that the catering was excellent - we all each had a dummy Betfair account with a £100 to play with using Evo. Sitting there drink Stella and messing about with some play money on live races was quite a nice to spend an hour or so....until I got frustrated with Evo (cos it's rubbish compared to The Toy) and the fact I wasn't making any real money of my own.

I'm not sure where the whole Centaur thing came into it which is, by my reckoning, Tony and his chums trading with other people's money? And why were they wearing Betfair t-shirts when they stated that they don't work for Betfair? All I'm asking for is a bit of transparency. If you wanna flog Evo and slag all the other products off, do it, it's your course! It was funny the way Tony almost had to mutter The Toy under his breath. The bottom line is The Toy is free and better than most things out there. Did I mention it's free?!

According to Tony, a new version of Evo is coming out soon with the ability to simulate trades so you can just have a play without sacrificing any of your own money. Evo can't even display jockey names next to each damn horse for goodness sake!! Get that fixed first!!!

Anyway, I'm coming to end of my summary which is turning into a bit of a rant. But it's my party so I'll cry if I want to ;) All-in-all, I'm glad I went just to see what it was all about but having traded on Betfair for over a year now, it was a bit like teaching me to suck eggs.


The remains of the buffet - a trader's metabolism can't digest fruit, it's just there for show

Off to see the Wizard

Tomorrow I shall be venturing down to London to attend a Betfair-endorsed advanced trading course in the City. I've been led to believe that Tony Hargraves AKA The Badger will be doing some of the talking; Tony's video antics over at Racing Traders were one of the things inspired me to trade the horses in the first place.

It should be very interesting and I'm hoping to learn a few bits I might not have thought about before. Besides which, it will be nice to get out of the office for a day and see some different surroundings.




Didn't get anything out of today and ended up a few quid down. Tried a couple of evening races and one of my winning trades ended up getting withdrawn in the last. Just that sort of day really, where my mind wasn't in it and everything seemed such hard work. Was in that "chasing a deficit while trying not to make it any worse" mode - very frustrating.