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Pre Race Trading.
5 Things That Annoy You When Trading the Horses.
When trading the horses there will be a number of events that can happen that will heighten your emotional…
Pre Race Trading.
Spotting Real Money When Trading On Betfair.
Spotting the real money hitting the market when trading on Betfair can be an easy way to make a profit.
Pre Race Trading.
What is Swing Trading on Betfair.
How do you perform swing trading on Betfair? Well, in principal it’s actually pretty straightforward . The idea is to place an…
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How To Handle Market Manipulation.
There are many forms of Market Manipulation; it’s pretty much rampant across horse race trading. At times it can be…
Pre Race Trading.
One method I use to make a few ticks is with Front Runners. This entails placing a back bet on a horse whose form says that they’re likely to…

Pre race trading strategy

Trading for me is very profitable and it is now my sole profession the journey to get to this point has not been smooth and certainly not a journey I would like to embark on again.
I was introduced to trading by my accountant who had a client earning in excess of £200,000 per annum by arbing on the exchanges a young guy and ex accountant I thought this guy must be worth speaking with, I managed to speak with him and he did explain in broad terms how it works but never revealed in detail and so long the journey for me began.
My first move was to open a Betfair account and I stuck £100 into it, this happened on Derby Day in 2006 and having played about with the standard interface I managed to get the hang of how to lay for the first time, so feeling that this is simple just find something that’s no hope of winning and take the money and that’s what I did I layed the weak horse in the betting and by the end of the afternoon I had turned my £100 into £185 then the inevitable disaster the next lay wins at 15/1 – Bank gone.
Next arrived videos on Betangel’s website and then RacingTraders and suddenly I felt I knew what I was doing and ready to have a go at my new job.
Many, many, many mistakes followed and costly ones at that very costly but the turn around for me came when deciding to go on Betangel’s trading course then held at Kempton, I often speak about my light bulb moment and this was when I realised that my trading was still a form of gambling I felt that this horse should drift and that horse should shorten but this was all based on my opinion and from what I read in the paper but I learned that day that you react to what’s happening on the screen and not what you think should happen, this was the day life changed for me !
I continued to lose money but I was confident that gaining a better understanding of the timings and trend in the market that I would crack it and crack it I did.
I believe now looking back at my journey in trading that losing money is almost a pre requisite to becoming successful at trading, I have been asked many times how do I discipline myself and the answer is very simple – if you are trading for a living if it is your sole source of income and all the bills rely on you making a profit at the end of the week then you will be amazed how your discipline improves. First off its capital preservation then its cutting losing trades quickly and then its knowing when a green trade is going to max out and needs to be closed, get these correct and your “discipline” is no longer an issue.
Letting trades go in-play seems to be every traders gremlin and I believe from my experience writing my blog and answering s and comments that the one reason most traders fail is because of this, the temptation to try and green up in play is very high but whilst it may work on some occasions it only needs to fail once and you are going out of business, when you take away the ability to trade in-play your mindset with regard to cutting red trades changes and you start to use stop loss aids and concentrate more on your entry and exit points and why you should not enter at this point and should at this point etc. If you keep making the same mistake with allowing trades go in-play then maybe its time to give up and save yourself pain and financial loss! I mean this sincerely as its best to quit now before you do more damage to your finances.
Getting the correct mindset for trading is often written about but what is the correct mindset how do you know if have the mindset for it, well I am not an expert but here is my story.
I grew up in a family where horse racing is the sport of choice always spoken about always a Sporting Life broadsheet or latterly the Racing Post in the house, my Sundays as a kid were largely spent at Point to Points and various race meetings around Ireland, and as you hear all the jargon such as “he needs a trip” “he bursts” “needs to be switched off” “roll along at the front” “wrong ground” “needs a wind op” etc you begin to form your own opinion on what you read in the newspapers and all of a sudden “you” in your own mind think you know what you are doing, I am going to lay that because he doesn’t jump or like the ground and this thing is a certainty sure AP wouldn’t be on it if it wasn’t off today - and all that crap ! and when you translate opinion into trading then the prognosis for long term success is not good.
When I started trading this was my biggest mistake having an opinion as to what would win or lose and take a position based on this opinion and when the trade wouldn’t move the way I felt it should I would let it go in-play because in my “opinion” x and y should happen! But of course this isn’t the case and things needed to change.
I was watching a BBC documentary about people trading the stock market from home in America and this is where a realisation came about for me, one guy being interviewed was asked what he based his trading decisions on and asked if he reads and carries out a lot of research on the stocks he gets involved in? and he answered “No” “I just follow the money” “large companies have very clever people doing all this research and their traders work to those guidelines I just pop in and out in front of them for small profits”.
In other words what we know as scalping with the weight of money in your favour.
The trouble with me was I would have an opinion and fall in love with my trade and not want to let it go and when it was against me I still couldn’t accept being wrong and let it roll! then bang – bank begins to disappear, So for me the correct mindset is having an open mind and not forming an opinion as to the outcome but instead reacting to the on-screen live movements, this is easier said than done but when you focus all your concentration on this and forget about who is going to win or lose you begin to see patterns and trends at particular times and in particular markets and this for me is the correct mindset for a trader.
Reasons for lack of success.
Holding out for that last tick.
I still do this every day and scold myself everytime but I am getting better but not sure if I will ever be cured. Here is the scenario you lay at 3.2 with £500 and I am glad to say you called it correct it begins to drift to 3.4 , 3.6, 3.8 and then it holds at 3.8 but you think I reckon its going to go more and it does it goes to 4.0 but you think to yourself its going to hit 4.2 and then I am out , now at 4.0 your are looking at a greened up profit of £100 but no I still believe the 4.2 is coming and guess what a blast of other traders hit the “current close” button and the price falls in and now backers and other traders think this is steaming and all of a sudden belts past the 3.2 to 2.88 and you need to red up now because the last one has loaded and you are looking at an across the card loss of -£55.56, as I said I still do it every day but now I begin to reduce my stake at intervals on the way up for example I might shed £100 at 3.6 and 3.8 and maybe some more at 4.0 so even at 2.88 I am not taking to much of a hit, but the great thing about betangel which I only recently discovered but use all the time now is you can now do a right click stop loss so follow the price out with your stop loss and if it reverses the software cuts you out.
We have plenty at our finger tips from to phones , kids , kettles etc and maybe some people can deal with distractions and not have it effect their trading it kills mine, I used have my Dad come and trade with me on a Monday afternoon but I had to stop it as everything would go wrong for me and I cant explain why but it wasn’t working out I have ven had a friend or two want to come and spend a day trading with me and its always ended in a losing day for me. So no distractions and the other thing I do is not have the volume up on the tv listening to some of those racing pundits, this is another blight of traders listening to some ones opinion and maybe effecting your decisions instead have a nice bit of music playing in the background.
Becoming a form student.
I use filters to help me understand mostly if the favourite is very strong and I then I concentrate on the traded range for my postions or if the favourite is weak and I then look for the point of bad value and lay to back after a few ticks, (all filters explained later) but becoming a form student is a different business requires a different strategy and a different size bank etc, if you begin studying the form then you begin to form opinions as to the outcomes and you are then likely to fall in love with your trades as I have done and this will not be good. If you want to work in this way you need to consider rolling losses and stopping with a winning sequence and resetting for new sequences etc which is a very different business to pre-race trading.
Watching the races.
The TV pictures for you as a pre race trader are there for two reasons the first reason is to keep you up to date as to the likely start time of the race and the second is for you to react to a horse which is acting up, for example running freely to the start or sweating heavily or maybe after getting loose, these are the only reasons you have TV pictures by yourside because if you are looking at the races you are not studying the next market and these markets have a habit of catching you out if you are not up to speed.
This is probably the biggest or most popular mistake new traders make and I have gone into this in more depth in the trading section of this manual , basically in a nutshell you have three maybe four markets within a market the pre 10 minute traders and the 5 to 10 minute traders and the 5minutes to the off traders all those times produce different patterns and trend and trying to trade in the pre 10 minute zone and then close in the 5minute to the off zone long term does not work very well and will cause you to lose money.
6. Getting sucked in by spoofers.
Done that and bought the T-shirt probably a Versace one at that ! spoofing basically is where a trader or traders stack up money on either the lay side or back side depending on which way they want to play which gets people then thinking that the weight of money means its going to drift or shorten and start jumping in ahead of this money pulling the price with them and when the spoofers money gets matched they pull it out the stacked money and the price collapses back and sometimes to make it go even further they will jump on the opposite side and stack it there getting an even greater return. Whilst at the beginning I called these guys many names now I seek them out and play with it particularly in a quiet market and mostly to be found on the second or third favourite markets.
Trading with no software is like driving with no brakes, it amazes me how many people wont pay for some software and think that they can trade using the betfair interface its impossible in todays market and maybe it worked in the early days but the market now is so much more advanced that you simply can not trade successfully with out software there are plenty of vendors to choose from such as racingtraders , betangel , gruss , and others if you just do a google search, I use betangel which I love and I also have racing trader on a spare laptop with a 3g card.
8. Trading too early.
Some people will disagree with me here but it is my experience that the earlier you open a trade the more in effect you are just gambling. Taking a back position on the favourite at 3.5 with £100 with 15 minutes before the start is madness unless you know for a fact that it is going to be heavily punted, At 3.5 it could end up not even being the favourite at the off and could be 4.5 by the time you decide to close your trade , instead allow the market to form and study the traded range and take a position based on this information rather than what the newspapers and opinion formers are telling you.
9. Trading on every race.
You don’t have to trade every race or on every couple of flies going up a wall – be selective and specialise in particular types of markets for example I started to really focus on races where the favourite was an odds on shot the real shorties and began to see patterns in these markets and trends with the timings before the off etc, once you master these markets you can move on to the next such as joint favourites or the top 3 in the betting are 3/1 ,7/2 etc and eventually you will have a good strategy for most markets .
10. Letting trades go in-play.
I have already spoken about this but it really is the single biggest reason why traders will ultimately fail and you need to avoid it completely if you are serious about making trading profitable for you.
When I began I just used my laptop and home internet connection which was fine until one day the laptop froze up (as they do) and I was unable to close a trade now this wasn’t a big deal as the horse that I had backed to lay actually went and won but this would always be the case and a more robust system was required. The way I looked at it was this if I was setting up a mobile car valeting business I would most likely not have much change from £20,000 to £30,000 after investing in a suitable van, sign writing, marketing material, uniforms, steam cleaners, vacuum cleaners, polishes and insurances, accountants fees and so on, so to invest in a powerful PC and and back up laptop was not a luxury or an extravagance in my mind, After attending Peter Webbs seminar I asked if he could send me the specification of his set up and I purchased accordingly, so what I use is as follows.
1.An Advent Core 2 Duo with no software other than betangel and internet explorer on it.
2.A quad display (four monitors) stand from ergotron.
3.Four HP 20” monitors.
4.A quad card from matrox which is installed in the back of the pc to power the four monitors.
5.Two Toshiba 20” TV’s – one for ATR and the other running RUK.
6.A basic laptop (sony) with racing trader on it and a 3g mobile broadband for use in the event of emergency with my main connection been lost etc.
7.Wired key board and wired mouse –
8.A UPS running on the main pc (uninterrupted power supply) which is basically a big battery in the event of a power failure or surge.
9.A laminated sheet with my betfair tan number and phone numbers for “if all else fails” scenario.
10.A big desk and very comfortable chair.
11. Sky multi room subscription and RUK/ATR package – two for the reason of races overlapping on busy days.
12. Ipod and speaker for good up beat music.
13. Large bottle of water.
Systems and Secrets.
I will have mentioned before that when I started trading there was very little information around no blogs, forums or videos like we have now and gaining knowledge was difficult you really had to search hard for it. But there were a lot of secret systems around which could be purchased in ebook format or special software, I bought a lot of these I reckon I probably spent £1000 or so on various systems and most were crap , but one or two were actually very good and from these I was introduced to terms such as weight of money, scalping, and so on and from one book introduced to the betangel website and Adam Todds racing traders website from which I gained a lot of knowledge by reading their articles and then to my joy videos were introduced and you could see how their trading took place and they way they reacted to the market.
But what I have learned is that there is no secret to successful trading or any particular system, success really comes from understanding the markets and really taking your time to learn and familarise yourself with trends and patterns and all this comes from experience and hard work. People feel that trading is easy but it is stressful and the amount of nervous energy I experience on a afternoons trading must be similar in energy used to working a 15 hour shift in a normal job, every fraction of a second is important every little blink of the screen could mean a profit or a loss , success or failure.
What I am saying really is that if you are looking for that secret you wont find it success is a combination of many things:
All of the above are pieces in the secret jigsaw to trading successfully and one isn’t enough without the other but the good thing about that list is they all are achieveable and can be obtained if you are dedicated to making the exchanges work for you.
In 2007 I read an article about the time differential between the pictures we get at home from ATR/RUK and bookmakers receive from SIS and now also Turf TV and how some entrepreneurial people had some up trading rooms where you can go and rent a seat for the day and take advantage of the faster picture feeds and quicker internet connection.
After some investigating I found that elitebet had such a set up in London and at the time I was living in Surrey so promptly got on the phone and booked myself a place, A train to Waterloo and a couple of tube trips got me to Highgate in North London where I met with Harry the owner paid my fee for the day and was lead to my desk shown how to work the kit, remote for the TV etc and introduced to Gruss software, the tea and coffee facilities are here said Harry and there is a shop and Chinese takeaway up the street on your left.
So I sat down popped open my can of diet coke and said right todays the day , as I had got there early and was first in the room I made my first error by thinking the seat up the front would be the best being closer to the big screen etc but soon realises as every one started coming in as the start of racing got closer that I was in fact in bad position and promptly moved myself to the back row now sitting alongside a chap called Ming, Ming introduced himself briefly but soon got to work and silence befell the room as racing started , even though the commentary was loud and London ambulance was doing its best to get through the traffic outside I felt as though a cough at the wrong time would have meant disaster and could cause so in-running player to make a mistake, The first race came and went and I didn’t play then the 2 nd and 3 rd and I quickly realised that I just didn’t have a clue what I was doing I really didn’t. So I went out to make a cup of coffee and Harry the owner was there are he politely asked how was it going I replied Harry I just haven’t a clue what I am supposed to be doing it sounds obvious but I really cant figure this out just yet, To my great delight and I will be always grateful to him for this he asked Ming would he give me some advice and take me under his wing to which he did and then started a great time in my trading career.
Setting your software for in-running trading, As in-running is all about speed of reactions and taking advantage of time differences the settings for your software are very important. In betangel go to manual bet tick the box that says set all odds to and in the top box type 1.01 and in the next column tick the box for stake all with and place whatever amount you want to play with for example we will use £100, so every horse in the selected race should have odds set to 1.01 with the stake column set to £100.
So the race starts and the leaders show on the final bend and AP McCoy is travelling up on the outside with both hands full of reins and the others have now come of the bridle and looks the most likely winner you hit your back button the computer has been preset to £100 at 1.01 but because the still have two fences to jump when your order hit the market at 1.01 the horse was trading at 1.57 so you got matched at the best available odds at that time and are looking at £57 profit if he continues on to win, he now jumps the second last fence looking the winner and you hit the back button again getting matched this time at 1.18 and over the last you hit the back button three more times getting matched at 1.03 , 1.01 and 1.01 , in the net stake box you have placed a bet of £500 and in your profit section you are delighted to show £80 as AP gets called the winner passing the line.
Summary : This sounds fool proof but with all these things it isn’t in my first week there this is all I did and it worked ok on the jumps but I saw one chap start off with a £1000 bank playing the first race at Lingfield on the all weather for the horse looking highly likely to win get done by a fraction on the line by Jamie Spencer coming out of nowhere.
The chap quietly switched off his PC packed his shoulder bag and left , later revealed that he had hit the back button on ten occasions to show a measly profit of £50 (ten £100 clicks at 1.05) to end up losing £1000 by a fraction in fractions.
The real pros at this use Gruss software where you can have up to three I think preset keys with different values so for example if a horse with 3 fences to go looks to be travelling well you can hit one button which might have say £100 and then with 2 fences to go and still looks likely to win the next button which might have £200 preset and then coming up to the last fence you can hit the green up button and you are out and in profit.
The key skills to this are faster TV pictures, quickest internet connection, excellent and I mean excellent race reading skills and lots of homework on the way horses are ridden, knowledge of camera angles, and so on.
This is a pretty well known method and one which I have never had the patience for I guess mainly because there isn’t any skill to it other than being the fastest finger on the buzzer if you like!, Its laying the field and many variations of this can be adopted and adapted to suit , it is I guess pretty low risk if as I said you have quick fingers and a very fast internet connection is vital.
For example you can lay the field at 1.01 in running for £100 which is putting at risk £1 if the horse wins and giving you £100 profit if the horse loses and if more than one get matched you are guaranteed a profit, now you are saying that when a horse hits 1.01 its won anyway but you will be amazed how many 1.01 horses get beaten, I know a chap that does this at around 1.10 for £1000 so he has his manual bet tab open on betangel with odds set to 1.10 and stake set to £1000 the minute the race is suspended and put in play he hits the lay all button in order to be as close as possible to the front of the que in the hope that the horse touches 1.10 and then goes on to get beat, and they do every week you will see this happen the horse falls at the last, spooks at the big screen, ties up and gets collared by a late flier on the line etc, this happens a lot at particular tracks for example I see it quiet a bit at Lingfield it seems to take some horses along time to get up to top speed and when they do just catch the 1.10 cert on the line, A staking plan and discipline are required here and of you are risking £10 to win £1000 then you can lose one hundred times or at 1.05 two hundred times, some of the real geniuses at this have rolling strategies or maybe a scale is the better way of describing it whereby the start off higher lets say 1.47 and scale down the odds but scale up the Lay value in sequence until one clicks and then restart the sequence again, Big banks are needed for this and it’s a strategy that I never bothered with as I never had a fast enough connection or the bank available to be good at it and maths was never my thing and with this I feel you need to be able to think quickly, However it works and guys do well from it but I also assume others don’t so beware!
I never tried it so cant give you a personal experience report but I know of guys that do well from it, again like all these strategies paper trade first however in this instance you need to take into account that whilst in-running these figures might be touched it doesn’t guarantee that your cash was matched as large sums are queued waiting before you by people with serious software and mega quick connections and also SIS and TURF TV would be an important consideration.
This was my favourite in-play trade and one that I would have continued to use if having access to SIS/Turf TV and fast internet connection.
Backing odds on shots in-running to lay back , for example : a 7 furlong race at lets say Brighton with Seb Sanders on board a very well fancied horse with the next in the betting 5’s or above, in this instance most of the money is focused on one horse and once the horse comes out of the stalls ok and settles into his/her position the price tends to continue to drop up to the half way point, at the half way point two things are happening the in-play backers are going to be either satisfied that the horse is travelling comfortably and still looking the winner or Seb is just beginning to niggle the horse on a bit or maybe its become evident that he is not in such a good position and possibly will get blocked in at which point the horse will drift out slightly, Now the play in these races is as follows you can do two things 1. Back the horse before the off but risk him not coming out of the stalls quickly or not settling and pulling like a train to which the price will drift and the horse maybe has blown his chance or wait until he comes out of the stalls and settles to which the odds are going to be shorter to reflect this. 2. You can at the half way point exit with a profit or a loss but most likely a profit or you can let the trade roll until closer to the finish for a bigger profit or bigger loss, my preference was to back out of the stalls settled and then green up or red up at the half way point.
Now lets suppose its all going wrong, and the first horse costs you and maybe the next trade costs you well this will happen and you will have days like so but a strategy has to be adhered to and religiously stuck to – yes you will green up and the horse continues to win and you feel crap I should have let that role or maybe you red up at the half way point and the horse continued to win which will really wreck your head but you have to understand that for every one that goes on to win plenty will also falter and capital preservation is the secret to this business for long term proftability.
If you having some losing trades you may need to roll up your losses and required profit into the next trade or trades but don’t do this by looking for a larger spread i. e from back ing at 1.84 to laying at 1.24 instead stick within a sensible and likely range for example 1.84 is likely to trade at 1.64 at half way if as I said the horse broke well settled in a good postion , the stats on odds on shots are something like 40% of them win so if you are good at maths and can work out a staking plan for yourself and adopt the old stop at a winner method and mould it to suit the modern way of betting then this is a good niche and one which worked for me – however word of warning when I returned to Ireland and set up my home office with ATR/RUK and my standard BT connection I began to struggle with this system as simple as it sounds I feel it relies like most in-running systems on connection speeds and fast TV pictures I couldn’t understand why I wasn’t getting matched for my hedge or exit like I used to before moving to Ireland but quickly realised that a 4 or 5 second delay in picture speeds is like an hour in the world of trading in-running.
I can’t do this anymore but I still love to watch it in-play and trade it in my mind to see if it still works and in my mind I would be doing well.
As much as I love this system and its flexability I feel it important to warn you that unless you have the equipment, discipline, and ability to race read you will end up losing.
Finding the loser, one reader of the blog does really well from this instead of looking for the winner he looks for the loser and lays accordingly, What will you look for well a dodgy jumper is always a good start something pulling like a train and not settling in a 3 mile chase is another place to look, not travelling on the ground getting pushed along another and days when you have ground changes and question marks before the race as to whether or not the horse will get this trip and go on this ground are others to watch.
The rules with this type of laying for me are as follows always green up or red up never let it role to the end as for every one that works out you will have two more that don’t , play for small profits if you are looking to make £30,000 a year then £5 a race is more than sufficient never go for gold because you will not be in business for long, I was once told by a very shrewd pro the problem with most punters is they want to make too much too fast it’s a marathon and not a sprint ! .
This will suit some people and at the beginning of 2009 I made a software settings error which cost me £650 of my £1000 bank well by playing this method as well as pre race trading I managed to get it back to level within a few days but boy was I wrecked at the end of each day the nervous energy associated with in play for me is just knackering and this method is twenty times harder for me on the flat I am better atuned to it for jumps but horses for courses again if you play this method try and have your position closed at the half way point and go for smaller profits ( again pictures a massive advantage)
Laying odds on shots take a trip to flatstats. co. uk and you will read very interesting material compiled by them on winning favourites, beaten favourites, beaten 2 nd favourites etc but one of the interesting stats for me based on a laying strategy and more over so the fact that laying odds on is the cheapest form of laying and taking into account that 58% of odds on favourites win this also means that 1 in 3 lose based on statistics over the last 10 years, you can further bring the stat more in your favour by being more selective of the 2 nd or 3 rd horse in the betting’s odds so if you are going to take on the favourite you need something else in the race to have a realistic chance and if the next horse in the betting is less than 4/1 then 58% begins to reduce and you are getting into 1 out 2 territory or pretty close, so taking into account these stats and understanding that a rolling loss strategy and staking plan need to be taken into account you end up with a nice simple to follow method that’s not reliant of fast connections or fast TV pictures but instead a plan that you follow without waiver , here’s an example.
Race 1. Horse is priced at 1.75 – you lay for £100 (risking £75 to win £100)
The horse wins you lose £75.
Race 2. Horse is priced at 1.75 – you lay for £175 (risking £250 to win £175) The horse wins you lose £250 plus the 75 from the first race = £325.
Race 3. Horse is priced 1.75 – you lay for £425 (risking £566.67 to win £100)
The horse wins you are happy the horse loses you have to go again, bank permitting but this is where a staking plan is vital, now I know this has very little to do with trading or in-play for that matter but it highlights how stats and old backing/laying systems can be integrated into todays methods and help in improving your trading and profitability, just looking at the numbers sometimes is like the wood from the trees scenario however overlay that with a plan an entry and exit a rollover some stats and suddenly instead of just taking a chance you are working to an end goal, I know in football stats are something given plenty of importance and with simple laying or backing stats are the punters friend.
In running is as you have probably come to understand by now much more difficult and if I was to be honest and say what works in in-running for the everyday trader I would say not doing it at all. if you have excellent race reading skills then add the necessary tools and you might be good enough to make it, but many, many fail and it can hook you in which is very dangerous and can lead to disaster. Even the trading rooms have competition now with guys at the track using their laptops, all you need is three or four guys to chip in for a simple box at a low level track which will be cheap, plug in and play.
Pre race trading is now my bread and butter and I enjoy it , but it has been a long hard road one of which if I knew beforehand how hard it was going to be I may never have started the journey but that’s the past and today we are wiser and more experienced and understanding of situations comes more fluently to me but that is a result of having to go through what many of you may have already found out to your cost a right of passage, what I mean by this is I am sure we all started by someone telling us or reading about a simple thing called trading you find a horse that will shorten in price and back it and once it has shortened in you lay it – your back bet minus your lay bet is a free bet which you can then divide by the available odds and lay back the divided amount to give you a guaranteed profit!, and you think sh*t that’s so easy so you get over to betangel or racing traders download your software watch a few videos get a bank in place and off I go to the promised riches but as we all know now that’s not the case, trading is hard at first you are not sure when you should enter and when you should exit will it shorten of course it will but it doesn’t it drifts will I hedge no I wont its drifting “they” know it wont win I will let it roll …………… I left the previous space because we all know what happens next and its not pretty, but other people are making this work so why cant I and so the trading bug catches and you either continue to fight the market or you work with the market one is failure the other is success.
Fight the market or work with the market.
I have mentioned in the blog that my light bulb moment was at Peter Webbs training day when I realised as the day went on that I had being going about this trading all wrong I was still looking at the market as a punter and not a trader I would look at a race and read the racing post , I would read the comments on all the horses the spotlight verdict etc and take a position based on what I thought was going to win the race and expect it to shorten based on this which is completely the wrong way, I would base my position on this and place my order as early as possible thinking that the early price is going to be the best because as people start to back the horse he is sure to shorten obviously this didn’t work and then I switched to finding a lay trade as I read on the internet some guy making gazillions laying horses so I felt this must be the way to go ! but I continued to lose and lose and really became disheartened about it and my confidence was shot, But now at Peters course I am beginning to realise that to forget a punters view but see it as a trader and a trader and a trader reacts to his market and takes positions based on what the market is showing – but of course the next big question is how do you know what the market is going to do and when will it do it and why, and so begins the road to success at last.
I came away from Peters course with a much better understanding of the software but more importantly for me having spoken to him at lunch and during the coffee breaks it was obvious that he is no professional gambler or bookmaker just a guy that understands the various markets that get presented every afternoon and built a product to help him take advantage of the volatility to make excellent profits and seeing the P&L’s he put up was all the motivation I needed to get my act together.
I began by not buying the racing post anymore and I also muted the volume on the TV’s instead some nice music on the ipod, all the other stuff just clouds your judgement. Market timings became very important to me and I began by not trading just logging prices at 10minutes to go 9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 and the off and then grading the information in time banks so 10minutes to 5minutes and then 5 to 3 and 3 to 1 and the off then worked on the pricing of horses and how the market reacts to a short priced favourite as opposed to a 3/1 or above favourite and when putting all this together it then got me thinking as to who is involved in forming this market so for example pre 10 minutes what person or persons are backing or laying here and from 10 to 5 and then 5 to 3 and 1min to the off who! or why do the leave it so late and I began by writing down the different what I call components that I thought would be involved for example:
Follow the money punters.
Stick a pin - in punters.
Wait and see punters.
It’s a long list and I am sure many I missed off but when you look at all those individuals they will have different requirements for the exchanges and will enter at different times and with different volumes or amounts,
So having listed out the people I felt would be using the exchanges I then began to match these with the timings noted from pre 10 minutes, to 10 minutes to the off and gradually the market began to unfold for me, instead of taking a postion at the 10 minute mark with the plan of closing at 1 minute I realised that within those 10 minutes many little individual markets are happening and if I could narrow those markets down and group them together I would be in a much stronger position I guess more confident and add to this knowledge - stop losses and other safety features suddenly you begin to trade carefully and trade profitably. You now have expectations of what should happen and when it should happen and if the signals are correct you enter if they are not you wait and you wait until the time is right and if you cant see them you move on to the next market.
Once I got this mastered I then moved on to specialise on particular moves so for example one of my favourite trades in the early days was to wait for the second or third favourite which was out of favour with the market and lay to back and whilst studying this particular trade I discovered it to be full of spoofers which at one time in my life I hated their guts but after studying this for a while I now love them because they are taking the risk and doing the hard work I just need to spot them and move with them and this can be very profitable – its also a good place to start for new traders I believe because the movement isn’t as volatile or fast as with the main favourite .
I then moved on to the short priced favourites and the characteristics and patterns to this type of market and moved through the other types of markets until I eventually settled on two types which I now trade every day and only really play this type of trade and they are as follows:
I have two types of trade that I use everyday one is my bread and the other my butter hence bread and butter trading, the bread trade is very simply a swing trade and only a lay first back later and only on horses priced less than 3.0 because at this price level the concentration of money is far higher, for example a favourite trading at 2.74 with the next horse in the market at 4.7 at the 10 minute mark is either going to go up or down and to take a position at this time is effectively gambling because we cant or don’t know for sure , however as the time clicks buy you will begin to see the trading range unfold the trading range is available on betangel/ladder interface/enhanced ladder/full market depth, you will see money matched at various prices and various amounts on the right hand side this for me is the single most important item available from betangel without it I would struggle to make this pay I know people swear by graphs and candle graphs etc but for me with this information in front of you and taking into account the different people entering at different times its possible to make consistant profits. Trading without the trading range is now gambling for me maybe I have become lazy maybe a one trick pony but it works and I live by it now.
A few things to bear in mind :
1.Backers are prepared to go to a point but will then retreat.
2.Layers are prepared to go to a point but will then retreat.
3.Bookmakers want to make a profit and will hoover up price disparacies.
4.Arbers want to make a profit and will also hoover up price disparaceis.
Our job as traders is to work within the parameters of the above listed players for example for most horses shortening there comes a point where the horse is just bad value it has shortened too much and backers are not prepared to go any further and pull back at this point, the layers see the horse as good value and buy up the bets available pushing the price back out – my days work now is to wait for the moment when I feel that backers are beginning to pull back and I enter the market and immediately begin exiting as the horse drifts back out – sometimes I get one run and sometimes two but it is important to begin exiting as the horse wont drift off into the distance it will hit another point of resistance ie the layers begin to pull back and you could at this point scalp but it mostly fails for me at this point as you will find you are almost certainly at the off time.
How do I know that backers are pulling back:
1.The flashing lights on your screen red for shortening , yellow for current price and green for next price up – if yellow and green and green in particular are the more prominent colours then its time to get ready you should also at this point be trading at the bottom of the traded range (ie the lowest traded price) this is very important and waiting for this moment will never lose you money and the amount appearing in the last traded box reducing from four figures to three figures etc and then hopefully disappearing as the move upwards begins, at this point it is very important to place your stop loss a couple of ticks under the price you entered at just in case a last minute wad of cash arrives and shoves the price down but in the majority of cases people have now backed the horse and the move out begins – it wont drift out forever remember and again watch the previous traded range to see where the majority of money was matched and try to be exiting within this range.
For example if I entered at 2.74 for say £1000 lay I would be backing in increments of £100 at 2.76,2.78, and so on and after 4 or 5 ticks dumping the remainder if possible I would also be moving my stop loss upwards following the money as my trade enters green territory.
Mistakes and lessons.
When I first discovered this niche the biggest mistake I would make would be holding out for the last tick enter at 2.74 and place close bet at 2.80 the market would move up to 2.78 and stay there for ages I would hold out saying it will get matched John its coming now and then with the last horse to load have to move it to 2.78 only to find that probably a dozen other guys are doing the same and then having to exit red at 2.72 or something all because I wanted that last tick ! the lesson learned is begin to hedge off some of the trade close off say £200 and then another £200 if you really want to hold for the last tick at least you have some profit now in the bag, but the longer I am at this the faster I am to take a profit and if it drifts off into the distance so be it I am happy for the guy that held on.
When this strategy doesn’t work and how to minimise your loss.
Obviously this doesn’t work for every race and 100% success is not enjoyed, there will be plenty of occasions when the money begins to dry up and the green light is flashing the weight of money begins to build and you enter the market then a pile of cash arrives on the back side and a whole new traded range appears, this happens and some times its because you are entering too early I find the best time for me is with three minutes to the off all skeletons are out of the cupboard the gambles if any have been revealed , horses acting immature should be at the start and I find it a safe time zone to play within “No Surprises” which is the way I Like it.
But recently the very clever money where a gamble is taking place happens so close to the off that it can really catch you out and the importance of using stop losses is paramount now, betangel have a fantastic new facility where you can just right click with your mouse on the price that you are happy to be cut out at and if you want to move it up or down you can just right click again on the new price and the old stop loss is cancelled , this little gimmick has changed things for me I am now able to trade on another horse at the same time in the knowledge that if it goes against me I will be cut out on my original trade, I was never a fan of the global settings on betangel but this right click method is simply fantastic.
If you have layed a horse and it begins to act up you are smug in the knowledge that it will drift significantly but likewise if you have layed your selection waiting for the move upwards and for example the next horse in the betting begins to act up then your selection may reverse and shorten further blasting past the previous low and if no stop loss is in place you will be looking at a big red figure, similar if a last minute gamble appears on another horse in the betting you are sitting pretty but if the powers that be still believe the favourite is the winner and are waiting for the price to drift out and then hit it hard – no stop loss equals a bigger redder figure, and in my experience this is where all the trouble starts most of are happy to take £20 loss or £30 (obviously depending on your stakes) but if this is more like £50 or £60 it can be tempting not to take the hit but to let it roll and take your chance, or the back the horse back or lay back in–running is tempting because lets face it a lot of favourites do lose so the statistics are in your favour – except when you decide to let it roll take my advice if you lay the favourite and let it roll it will win and if you back the favourite and let it roll it will lose – The Trading Gods ensure that this happens to punish us for being weak, just take the hit go away have a cup of coffee and start again. You can also look at it like this to valet a car costs £30 or so – so to take a £30 or £60 hit is one or two cars to valet and we know that’s hard work, but to let it roll and maybe lose £200 or £300 that’s going to be a lot of cars and a lot of elbow grease so if you look at it that way you are actually taking the easier option by redding up or greening up.
1.Horses priced 3.0 and under with preferably the next horse in the betting 5.0 or more.
2.Follow the traded range where was the majority of money matched and highlight for yourself the resistance points both from layers and backers.
3.Timing is very important and entering the market too early is really just gambling – try to work for this strategy within the three minute to the off zone.
4.Dont hold out for the last tick begin reducing as the price moves in your favour and green up.
5.Always have a stop loss in place and always place the stop loss first before your lay bet.
6.I always lay first to back later – its my preference but I know backing first will be preffered by others.
7. Be aware of possible late gambles or the next horse in the betting beginning to act up or sweat heavily etc.
9. Don’t be greedy the price in most cases will not continue to drift so be professional and take the easy exit option.
10.Dont enter too early sometimes you will be correct and sometimes you wont but let the skeletons in the closet expose themselves first so that the market is as clear as we can expect it to be.
Attached are some screen shots in a 5 minute lead up to the off, you can see the favourite been backed in then the second favourite been backed and the favourite drifting back out – the rule is for something shortening another is drifting and been aware and finding the said horse is to trick to this game.
I filter each race every morning it’s a habit that I have got into, part of my routine if you like and its very simple to do, what it gives me is strong favourites and weak favourites and highlights the races where a lot of money will trade and these are the important ones because a lot of money generally means overshoot either shortens to much or drifts too much but as traders these are our bread and butter. The filters work as follows:
A. Racing Post Forecast.
1.Selections tab if more than 50% 2 points.
2.Spotlight verdict selection 2 points 0 if not.
3.Course and distance winner 1 point 0 if not.
4.If ran in last 11 days 2 points if 12-21 1 point if more 0.
5.If it won its last race 2 points if 2 nd or 3 rd 1 point.
Now in some instances one horse will have maybe 8 points and the rest scraping together a few each this is obviously a race where all the money (most likely) will be focused on one horse and you can study the traded range and take earlier positions in the lead up, in other races you will see 5 or 6 all have similar profiles and these are very open and can go anyway so in these cases I just trade in the last time slot for me which is 3 minutes to the off, at least at this stage the market has exposed itself and any horse that is fancied by the owners/trainers will highlight itself and you can trade accordingly.
Now these filters are purely for guidance and not anyway a system or method for trading but it helps to have highlighted 5 or 6 races in the afternoon where you intend to trade strongly and it also helps to have knowledge as to why you think this is happening, in the weaker races I tend to look for the drifters rather than the steamers and this is my butter trade which is coming up.
Also attached is a list of racecourses I got from a retired bookmaker where he studied favourites and there likely success in various races and tracks, I have never really used it but it may be of use to you. It lists racecourses and the type of races where favourites do not fair so well, I though it might be handy to know if bookmakers were likely to be hedging off on betfair close to the off but I never really bothered to use it afterwards.
Aintree handicap hurdles.
Ascot hurdle races.
Cartmel hurdle races.
Cheltenham All races layers paradise.
Chepstow All races.
Fakenham handicap chases top weight.
Leicester all races have potentially false favourites.
Ludlow handicap hurdles.
Market Rasen handicap hurdles.
Musselburgh non handicap chases.
Newbury handicap chases.
Perth handicap hurdles.
Stratford handicap chase and hurdles.
Taunton handicap chases.
Wetherby handicap chases.
Ascot all non handicaps.
Brighton non handicaps.
Folkestone all races, form races, do badly and can be oppoesed.
Hamilton form horses/horses stepping up in distance do badly.
Leicester non handicaps.
Newbury all races potentially have false favourites.
Newmarket non handicaps.
Pontefract non handicaps.
Ripon all races potentially have false favourites.
Southwell all races potentially have false favourites.
Thirsk non handicaps.
Warwick non handicaps.
I talk about timings a lot on the blog and the reason for this is understanding timings was probably the single most important thing I learned and from that understanding my trading changed and my success rate rose sharply I guess timings have been the difference between profit and loss for me and I believe its important to add a section about it in the manual.
First off you have to understand who you trade against , now we cant say for sure who is at the other end of every mouse click but in my mind this is how its pans out in the lead up to the off:
Night Before and early morning – Market makers, people trying to profit from having made their own tissue prices and asking for value with the view of trading out at a later stage.
Also you will see stacks of money at 1.01 and 1000 waiting to be matched and on various price points out of the actual trading range, these guys I call the fat finger merchants , they are basically waiting for someone to make a mistake by placing a decimal point in the wrong place or hitting the key on the keyboard etc, and it must happen because if you switch on your pc now and select any race on betfair money will be sitting there patiently waiting for some victim.
One to two hours before the start.
I reckon this time is made up of the elevens’s coffee break , having a read of the paper and sticking in a couple of bets for the afternoon, stable staff back from the gallops and sticking a few bob on their horse but more so tipping lines – tipping lines are big business every where you look from websites to newspapers to billboards at racecourse tipping lines are big and I assume carry a large patronage, when I started trading first my plan was to join these tipping lines be as quick as possible to phone and to back the selections rapidily on betfair to lay back later in the day as the other customers phoned up and got the information but as maybe many of you have tried and found out this is not a good plan, But I believe a lot of the early morning money is made up of tipping lines, stable staff, people with information trying to get the early price and also traders who enjoy the simplicity and stress free time to play the market to suit them the volatility is not going to be as high and the opportunity to move the price to suit you with some spoofing is going to be available.
Half hour before the off.
This time zone fascinates me you can so often predict from this time zone and the traded range what will happen in the final minutes, if you study this you will see the favourite shortening suddenly then reversing suddenly then staying stagnant for a while then another breakout then back again, and I assume it consists of people waiting for the move the happen but been boxed in by the professional layers at home and professional backers at home who have a price range worked out that they are happy to work within so the pro backer wants 3/1 minimum and waits for the price to move out to that before snapping it up and likewise the pro layer happy to give 5/2 but pulls back at 3/1 and so the see saw effect continues up to the 10 minute mark.
10 minutes to 5 minutes.
The traders begin to arrive and some take speculative positions out of the money to capitalize if it moves in their favour others begin scalping and on some horses the spoofers are confident they have chosen the weakest link and begin running that show confident that no professional money will ruin their game plan and so the market begins to flourish.
5 minutes to 3 minutes.
The traded range has now formed and backers are backing layers are laying and traders happy in their zone , this is the critical time as this is where a sudden move can take place the horses have at this stage left the paddock and if any are acting up or bolting to the start this is the time zone it will happen in, also and more importantly owners, trainers, paddock watchers, professionals, have left the parade ring and headed to the betting ring and any gambles that are going to take place begin now the real market if you like begins to show and if no change is to take place its happy days you just trade along in – out scalp a tick here and there but if a move is coming you need to be ready because on course bookies will be hedging in larger amounts and the price followers will also jump on the band wagon and that nice tight traded range that you have worked out go out the window and this is where some traders have a smile on their face and others horror not because they were clever but because they were lucky, the ordinary trader cannot predict what is going to happen here just guess but the clever traders are not in the market here at this time just in case a gamble does develop but instead will allow this time to unfold and once it out in the open then you trade gain comfortable in the knowledge that the market you are now looking at is the correct one and you trade accordingly.
3 minutes to 1 minute.
Here I like to think that professional layers have arrived and likewise backers you have guys backing that play the stop at a winner strategy on favourites, bookmakers arbing between the price they are offering and taking a profit from a higher price on betfair and plain and simply normal punters and layers also . What tends to happen here aswell is if the favourite is being backed the price tends to shorten to its lowest point and this is where I like to enter the market by laying at this low price and as the price begins to move back out and settle I exit .
1 minute to the off.
No great secrets at this stage all gambles are out in the open horses that bolted to the start are either at the start or withdrawn, horse that were paper favourite’s and drifted are exposed and this is my favourite trading time it is possible to work with the weight of money at this stage to scalp a few ticks and as some shot way past their true price adjustments are made and the fact that the traded range is plain to be seen you can make a judgement at this stage as to whether or not it will return to its true price and profit accordingly.
A word of warning here – I have noticed recently and in particular on all weather and evening meetings the tendency to hold any gambles to the very very last minute – presumably shrewd money waiting and waiting for the price to rise and then hitting hard and as they do so bookmakers etc hit betfair hard in the very last moments trying to rectify their positions quickly, moral of the story have your stop loss on a at all times !.
Patterns and Trends.
After studying the markets for a while you will begin to notice and then expect certain patterns to materialize in particular markets, for example a short priced favourite with no competition in the betting shortens a lot up to the 10 minute mark then they seem to drift out and then plunge in as the off gets closer , I find that on the last plunge inward the price tends to over shoot the runway if you like and I wait for the lowest traded figure and enter with a lay hoping for a move back out a few ticks and close, obviously days come and go when this doesn’t happen as you expect them to but if it happened everytime exactly we would be millionaires now – but the vast majority of the time this trend occurs and its my favourite trade because the stake you can use is much higher therefore I don’t need a big drift to get a good green profit.
The next market to watch out for is two horse betting markets for example two horses priced under 3.0 and the rest of the field 10/1 bar.
On these markets it’s a will he wont he scenario which one will be favourite and which will drift and very often they flip flop as favourites as the market develops , I play a similar strategy here I try to wait for the lowest traded price on either and pop in for a quick few ticks, this can happen two or three times in the lead up to the off and profit is there to be taken. Trying to back one as it shortens in always catches me out and I now only lay first to back later but it all comes down to personal preference. The importance of stop loss here again is vital and it’s a great habit for people to get into.
The next market is an open race typically a handicap and most likely three or four horses fighting for favouritism , dangerous races for trading in my opinion and only scalping opportunites apply for me in this case, sometimes a horse shortens in suddenly and I then expect it to drift back out a tick or two and play accordingly, but very difficult markets to understand and plenty of whispers and winks in this sphere and again best to leave the market unfold before playing too heavily, as I said it’s a scalping play for me in these markets either way (back or lay) and weight of money at various points can be a good help if you are in a postion to work with it, be careful of your time entering the market if you are playing try and be closed out with five minutes to go leave the market unfold a bit more up to say three or two before taking a position again, as you become more experienced at trading you will see opportunities as second nature but if you are learning just play safe .
Maiden races and bumpers are full of danger for us, because most horses in the race are unexposed and any knowledge is derived from stable information whereby a trainer will know from the work the horse does at home with possible other stable winners as to his/her ability and even then they can run so green from inexperience that a certain chance of winning on ability can be thrown away by running too free or running left or right towards the finish , trying to duck out for the stables etc, and in these markets the newcomer can be heavily punted but also the horse with previous experience can see some money so I tend to play the experience horse they get backed a little and then drift a little but the volatility in these races is huge, it is very important to have your tv pictures for these races because bolting to the start and sweating heavily feature regulalrly in these races and this obviously gets reflected in the market.
Being aware of possible greenness is a big advantage to some traders who work with a paddock watcher for information on how the horses look and behave in the lead up to the start , so right from the saddling boxes to the parade ring and down to the start they have real time information which is a great advantage, I am aware of a group living not to far away from me now that operate as a four person outfit, two at the office trading with the pc’s and two at the various race meetings watching for any little tell tale that might make the horse drift , they also relay live commentary via their mobile phone and binoculars back to the office as the race is in play, they specialize in photo finishes and laying at very low odds , I have been to see them in action and its not for the faint hearted if one gets the name or colours wrong it can be cataasrhphic, but it just shows how competitive this business is getting any little advantage is now exploited to its full.
The only way to understand patterns and trends is to study them for yourself, create a page and note down ten minutes to 1 minute and write in the price the horse trades at (The favourite), then group the times into ten to five minutes and five to three minutes and three to one and one to the off, carry this out on every race and then grade the races into price so horses priced under three group them together and three and over together , carry this out for a week and if you are goo with spreadsheets or graphs have a play it is amazing how similar these markets are and you will see trends very clearly. My experience of these trends has led me to play the lowest traded price strategy as my main niche but I am sure you and others will see various other opportunities that I have missed.#
My Butter Trade.
My butter trade is the next niche that I focus on and it compliments the swing on short priced favourites perfectly for me because plain and simply I seek out the out of favour horse and lay to back, how do I know or find this horse well certain signals point to them firstly on the website thebettingsite. racingpost. co. uk the horse who’s various prices begin to turn blue is a signal, I then look and see how much has been previously matched on him/her and where the price is now, if it’s a the top of its range I sit and wait if it’s at the bottom then I check to see what is being backed and try to be as sure as possible that this is going to drift , the second thing you need to watch out for are the spoofers if they are here then its happy days because you just watch them either push the price in or out for their money to get matched and then watch them push the price in the opposite direction to suit, I try to watch for them and see where the resistance comes for them so if the horse is trading at 5.5 and they are trying to push it to 6.0 but have to pull their money back at 5.9 then we now know where they will finish the next time likewise as its pushed downwards maybe they need to stop at 5.2 etc, so I just try to get matched at 5.3 and if the move takes place close out at 5.6 or 5.7, its important more so in this strategy to have your stop loss in place with these so if you are entering at 5.2 then I would put a stop at 4.9 to allow for a bit of jumping about, if you set your stop loss too tight you will end up been cut out too often and it becomes frustrating,
The important observations to make with this trade are as follows:
1.The favourite or favourites are been backed.
2.thebettingsite. racingpost. co. uk shows this horses prices as blue or turning blue.
3.The traded range is light so not much money has been seen for this horse.
4.Before entering your trade ensure its at a low point and not at the top of the range.
5.Look out for spoofers and be aware of the range they are playing within.
6.Ensure the use of stop loss and do not have it set too tight.
7 Use the stop loss feature to follow your trade up as it becomes green by right clicking and following the move to ensure profit if the move reverses.
8 Keep an eye on the other horses by using the ladder with the available three horse ladder.
9 Try to be closed of your position with a minute or more to go in case of power cut or freeze, be aware that you are laying at high odds and safety is paramount.
10. Try not to wait for that last tick – take your profit and be safe.
Important Knowledge to have.
Scalping is always best in a market with low volatility and weight of money needs to be in your favour, checking for spoofers is a must and trading within the traded range is very important you would mostly only use scalping when you just cant see a swing possibility therefore as with swing entering at the bottom or top of the range with scalping the security of the centre of the range is best, speed in and extra speed out is vital, scratching losing trades has to be adhered to and using too big a stake can end up in you pushing the market against yourself. Evening racing seems at times to suit scalping with the liquidity being low etc , and look out for the flashing lights remember red is shortening, yellow current, and green drifting so depending on which way you decide to play ensure the colours are also in your favour.
Swing trades are my favourite and I specialise in that area now, the important factors here are once again the traded range is my map it shows me the resistance points from backers and layers and the amount of money matched , if you are not familiar with this facility on betangel you really need to get to grips with it. The previous traded range gives you a guide but you also need to take into account other horses being backed or not, any horses acting up on the way to the start or previously in the parade ring antics from horses tends to be reflected in the price very quickly and traded ranges are often passed and a new range formed, gambles can change everything and whilts the principles of swing trading are simple you lay at the lowest point or back at the highest point of the range any activity on other horses will be reflected in yours very quickly for every horse shortening something else needs to lengthen in price and if bear this in mind and watch carefully for it and use all tools available you should get to grips with swing trading add to this understanding of timings and in the lead up to the off and your strike rate will improve greatly.
You just have to use this in todays market or be extremely quick on the mouse to protect yourself from prices shooting off into the distance, you can set the global settings on betangel to help you and trailing stops and other fancy facilities are available to us, but I use the new facility of the right click it gives far more control and the ability to trade one or more horses at the same time which has helped my figures.
At least when using a stop loss the emotion of taking the loss is removed and temptation to let it roll.
Difficult to say with the various time zones and different style of markets but in general I do not enter unless its at the bottom or as close to the bottom as possible, How do I know that’s the bottom well besides the traded range stopping there the money begins to slowly retract so instead of a four figure sum waiting to be matched it’s a three figure sum or better again appearing and disappearing, lights flashing yellow and mostly green are good signals and this entry for me will be happening with less than three minutes to the off, I don’t call it correct every time but that’s what a stop loss is for and if I have it wrong I might cut and look to enter at a lower point or I might just wait and let it return if I feel its just a big bet trying to hoover whats left and once matched the price will return to normal.
In certain races such as bumpers and maidens the later you leave it the better, however in handicaps and some novices the form is plain to see and the horses behave well so the trading can be fruitful from 10 minutes to the off as the market is pretty often stable.
But with so many markets to trade the perfect entry point is an impossible indication to give however from my experience the later I leave the better I do.
I have spoken about holding out for the last tick and how that very often goes against you but the traded range is the most obvious point of exit for me once the price rises to the last price where volume was matched what I mean by this is four or five figure sums I begin to exit the remainder of my trade I will most likely at this point have shed some of the stake on the way up to protect myself and to ensure a profit.
I would like to thank you for purchasing my manual and I hope you find at least one little nugget of information to help you in your trading sometimes its just that little piece of the jigsaw that we miss and once we find it everything can change for the better, you have probably come to realise by now that I am not a very adventurous trader I like to play safe and stay within my comfort zone, I have in the past tried using larger stakes but I just haven’t the nerve for it and my current rules are odds on £1000 max , 3.0 and under £500 and anything above I start with £100 and if its working I may add to it.
I avoid trading on Sundays and in the evenings as I find the markets far more difficult to play and I really have a limited period of time where I can concentrate enough for trading, It has taken me a long time to get to a point where I am comfortable in the knowledge that I will earn a good salary every week and be in a position to enjoy a nice lifestyle, I wish you every success in your trading and I hope in the purchase of the manual that you will save yourself the time and money in getting to your end goal.
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Pre race trading strategy

Caan Berry trades betting exchanges for a living. It wasn't long before he quit his day job to pursue the dream of betting for a living. Already generating profits that exceeded his day-job of an evening and weekends it was the natural choice to make.
Within one year results had rocketed, Betfair themselves contacted Caan to take part in their #betfairtraders campaign you may have seen in 2014. Now he can be found trading the markets and blogging here at caanberry. To find out more about Caan's background check out the about me tab above.
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As with any form of gambling, Trading has risk. Past performances shared within this website are not a direct indication of future performances. We are legally required to state that there is no guarantee of specific results and resources provided are for informational purposes.

How to trade the horses pre race as a beginner.
So last week I reviewed Caan Berrys pre race trading guide and gave it a recommendation.
Last week the football schedule was pretty lacklustre and I decided to delve into the horse markets.
I don’t like horse racing to be honest I find it very boring however as a trader I can see that it is probably the market with the most opportunities for trading.
Now I have tried to trade these markets two or three times before but it had always followed a similar pattern.
Win a little lose a lot more then I’d won and say to myself “f*** these stupid markets its impossible to trade them.”
This week I approached the markets with a different mindset and some help from Caan Berrys pre race trading guide and things started to click. I was making money cutting my losses earlier and starting to read the movements in the markets much more clearly.
results were consistent and stayed consistent.
Top 5 tips for new traders approaching the horse racing markets.
1. Don’t go in to a market expecting to make money.
If you go in with this mindset it will be hard to accept a red should you need to, often this will lead to a bigger red.
Go in with the mindset that you will look for the best opportunities and take advantage of them if you see them. If you can’t see them that’s fine there are plenty more races to come.
2. Make notes and review your performance.
Don’t rush from market to market take a step back and note down what you learnt from the last race market.
When did the big money come in? what happened to the favourite that had steamed in under 2.0 with 5 minutes still left? Was the market steady or volatile? ask yourself a few questions and write down the answers is there a pattern?
The horse racing markets move quick and you can get flustered, pissed off or bewildered. Its important to clear your head from time to time. Before a race or even mid race if I am struggling I will take a few deep breathes to regain my focus and slow things down.
Honestly in all of my trading/betting activities this has helped me the most. Removing the fog and retaining clear thinking throughout the day has been a huge factor in becoming a profitable trader.
Sounds obvious but at this stage of your development as a trader you want to remove the stress and allow yourself to learn from the markets. It is a lot easier to keep this mindset when the losses are in pence rather then pounds.
Give yourself time don’t expect too much to soon. You might not see results straight away but don’t give up it is often just a case of persistently gaining experience combined with persistent analysis that leads to becoming a profitable trader.
Smart Sports Trader.
Ryan Bruno is a former mixed martial arts and kickboxing competitor. He loves sports and making money online. After finishing university he played online poker and taught English for a living in Thailand for a few years. Upon returning to England his focus has been on making a living from sports trading, betting and arbitrage.
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Ryan Bruno is a former mixed martial arts and kickboxing competitor. He loves sports and making money online. After finishing university he played online poker and taught English for a living in Thailand for a few years. Upon returning to England his focus has been on making a living from sports trading, betting and arbitrage.
Caan Berry Trading Guide Review – How To Trade The Horse Racing Markets.