Ticking Upwards / Trouble with Prices

With Mark from Systematic Betting on holiday it's been a quiet few days and has made me realise how much time I devote to Systematic tips!! But that's the nature of the service and I've just renewed for a further period as I'm still confident I can make it big with this service.

Good news though is the profit has slowly ticked upwards over the last few days with Equine Investments services doing the business and Tominator, a basic system bet with 4PA, landing the Northumberland Plate at 33/1. It's a shame they didn't put it up as a main bet as I would've had a lot more money on it but a decent return made.

There's a serious issue with prices on Equine Investments main account at the moment - Legal Legacy was the winner on Friday - I managed 12/1 on this horse but the price dropped like a stone as soon as the tip was put out. Not as bad as Racy, who was also tipped by Hugh Taylor and the price was gone within seconds.

On Saturday Silken Thoughts was tipped at 8/1 and by the time I got on to ladbrokes (2 mins) the price had gone to 6/1. It took Ladbrokes less than 2 minutes to drop the price.

I'm not sure how that happens but either they've got someone on the inside who's a member or they're reacting automatically to the exchanges. However it happens it makes it virtually impossible to get the advertised price which isn't good for me but isn't good for the service either.

To be fair to Equine they're trying to do something about it (although I'm not sure how much they can do) so we'll wait and see how that pans out.

Anyhow I'm off to Musselburgh tomorrow so will see if I can get some winners there!

Post Royal Ascot

Well Royal Ascot produced a decent profit over the 5 days - nothing spectacular with a rise of £231 in the overall portfolio - majority of the profit coming from 4PA and (would you believe), Steve Lewis Hamilton who picked a couple of winners in Nathaniel and Veiled.

It could've been a lot better with a couple of mighty odds horses coming close - Bermondsy Bob at 40/1 and Vocational at 20/1 both coming very close to a bumper pay out for me. However if you asked me whether I would've been happy with £231 over 5 days at the start of the year of course I would.

Have to mention that Roger Green Racing has a VERY good Ascot producing 55+ points profit, not that I had any money on... and there were a couple of close calls that could've sent the profit soaring. Fair play to them. Long term ROI much improved but still not of "Hall of Fame" standard - will keep an eye on how things progress.

Overall it was enjoyable few days watching the racing on the TV - although I have to say I find Jump racing far more interesting to watch - I've always preferred the jumps to flat - and Cheltenham for me is much better than Ascot.

Royal Ascot - Day 3

Disappointing day yesterday but didn't suffer too much.

A bit better today with 4PA producing the goods today with 2 big priced places and a winner in Brown Panther! Good day for Systematic which could've been awesome had Boomerang Bob won the first - managed to get on at 40/1 (set off at 20/1) and was beaten Bapak Chinta. Not too much pain as Systematic was also on that one as well - another decent forecast bet I missed!!

Been a couple of close calls on the big priced horses - maybe Friday will bring in a 40/1 winner!

Royal Ascot - Day 1

A decent days results on the first day of Royal Ascot so happy with the start. Winners from

2.30 - Canford Cliffs - Tipped in a double with Frankel by 4PA

3.45 - Frankel - see above

4.25 - Power - Systematic tipped at 5/1 (also tipped Roman Soldier at 16/1 who was beaten by a neck!!) Should've had a forecast on as well!

5.00 - Veiled - Steve Lewis Hamilton tipped at 6/1 - a winner on the flat for SLH!!

5.35 - Frederick Engels - won for Roger Green (who tipped at 4/1) - interestingly a 5 point bet winner and if I'd followed my own advice about 5 point bets from Roger Green I'd have put some cash on but I forgot!!!

Decent day overall with a couple of good winners elsewhere from Systematic and Northern Monkey.

Some big odds tips could've made it a bumper day - not often I get tips in for 50/1 and 40/1 shouts!

Anyway took the profit year to date to a new high. Hope for the same tomorrow!

Fazza-tastic

Well three of the tipsters tipped Fazza in the 2.45 at Carlisle and the horse duly obliged! Rare occasion when that happens.

Slightly dampened by the fact Systematic and Equine tipped within 3 mins of each other and the price had crashed before I got a chance to place my bets. 10.11am for Equine, 10.14am for Systematic. So I managed 5/1 best rather than the 8/1 quoted. Although Market Examiner spotted the trend and I picked that bet at the recommended price.

Not complaining but just shows the importance of being able to place bets quickly and not doing something else at the time. When you're working full time thats not possible.

Ascot tomorrow so hopefully not a big meet blow out. Working from home.... racing on in the background....

Roger Green Racing Review - Update

As regular readers of my blog will know I've stopped following Roger Green Racing bets at the beginning of May. This was after what's been a poor year for me following this service. I missed a winning streak in February which obviously made things worse but I don't see much improvement in the service despite that.

The results in the tables below cover all bets (including the ones i missed) from 10 December 2010 to 10 June 2011 and results are updated to the best of my ability - there may be one or two missing but not much more than that!

The first table shows breakdown by point.

Points	Number	Points	Profit	ROI
1 Point	7.00	7.00	-2.14	-30.57%
2 Point	176.00	352.00	-37.51	-10.66%
3 Point	26.00	78.00	1.75	2.24%
4 Point	70.00	280.00	-54.38	-19.42%
5 Point	21.00	105.00	71.06	67.68%
6 Point	2.00	12.00	-12.00	-100.00%
11 Points	1.00	11.00	-11.00	-100.00%
Total	302.00	845.00	-44.21	-5.23%

As you can see doesn't make happy reading across pretty much all bets apart from the 5 pointers. (Note the 6 pointers were 2 e/w bets and the 11 pointer was an ill-advised Yankee).

The next table shows split by month.

Month	Number	Points	Ave Points	Profit	ROI
December	30	70	2.33	-0.71	-1.01%
January	38	93	2.45	-27.14	-29.18%
February	48	135	2.81	62.66	46.41%
March	64	191	2.98	2.23	1.17%
April	53	138	2.60	-60.24	-43.65%
May	56	175	3.13	18.00	10.29%
June	14	43	3.07	-39.00	-90.70%
Total	303	845		-44.2	-5.2%

In the end I missed a winning month by not following bets in May but the profit was only made on the last day of the month with a 9/2, 4 point winner but June has started badly.

There's no doubt that things could turn around and rack up 100+ points in a few weeks but, that as may be, it's a service that's not for me anymore, it doesn't suit my betting anymore and I'm not happy waiting months to make a profit only to be well aware there's going to be long lean periods.

There could be an argument for just following the 5 pointers and I might just do that but will play that one by ear while my subscription runs out.

Hope the info helps

Market Examiner

After deciding I wouldn't join any more services, I read a review of Market Examiner in the SBC Racing newsletter last night and sounded pretty impressive and joined up for three months last night.

It's cheap as chips and performance looks excellent and the offer what looks like a great way of picking winners! They run a fantastic blog as well here: http://winningafortune.blogspot.com/

No winners today though so not a good start for me but past results look fantastic!

JP Update

Hi - someone posted a while ago asking me where the post from JP was on the SBC Forum - managed to find it - click here - http://secretbettingclub.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=385. If

the link doesn't work it's in a topic called "A Blast From the Past".

Worth mentioning there's a decent article regarding Steve Lewis Hamilton in the latest SBC newsletter as well that's worth reading.

You need to be a member to get access to both of these

May Update - Part 2

It's worth reflecting on what was the "turnaround" month of the year - apart from obviously the new stuff going on in my life it also was a real shift for performance. Interestingly enough the same thing happened last year - treading water at best through Jan - April and then a bumper month in May.

Couldn't have asked for better performance from the "big guns" - with Steve Lewis Hamilton, Equine Investments and 4PA all performing well. Hats off to Systematic Betting as well with a bumper month and providing me with over 50% of the profit for May. Special mention has to go to Northern Monkey - the subs are minimal - a fraction of all the big tipsters and performance is very impressive - since I've joined I've made 43 points profit and even at my £10 per point trial stakes it's very easy to make a profit. Obviously I've signed up for another 3 months and I'm considering upping stakes.

So why has May been so good? Well think there are three reasons -

(1) partly it has to be because the flat season starts to settle down and the weather gets better so it's "easier" to analyse possibly;

(2) I decided to ditch The Nagman (which wasn't adding value to my portfolio) and Roger Green Racing (which was destroying value). More on Roger Green Racing below aswell..;

and (3) I stuck with my convictions with the better services - a good example with this is Steve Lewis Hamilton - by all accounts had a poor 2010 (although did make a profit) - and 2011, while not been like 2009 - has consistently delivered month on month profit (except Jan). Also clear I made the right decision to renew Equine Investments and up stakes with Systematic Betting.

June has started well so hope the winning run continues!

One thing to note I got an email today from Tipping Legends saying that they are re-merging with Roger Green Racing which is quite interesting as the guys used to work together. Unfortunately despite some very good spells with them both, I've had some disastrous months - and lost significant amounts of money. I hope the merger works and they get back on track - I'll watch from the sidelines though.

I keep promising to do an updated review of Roger Green Racing before I stop tracking the service.

May Update

It's been a long hard slog getting my spreadsheets up to date after leaving them for a month. Thankfully now complete!!

Well May ended up being an excellent month - putting on a total of £1,981 bringing the year to date total up to a decent £1,415. Finally feels like I'm making some progress. I'll put some thoughts on how things have gone but stats only tonight

Totals for May are as follows;

Steve Lewis Hamilton - £302, +12 points

Equine Main - £360, +14 points

Equine Turnover - £-151, -15 points

Northern Monkey - £149, +15 points

Football Elite - £39, +1.6 points

4PA - £179, +9 points

Systematic - £1,055, +70 points

Mr Gekko - £11, +0.3 points

Others - +£36

So a positive month for all apart from Equine Turnover. It could've been better - year to date peaked at £2,107 on the 24th before dropping back quite sharply after 6 heavy losing days.

Graph YTD here;

More chat tomorrow but thought you might want to see the stats