In Place

Decent day today and nice to see Saturday being successful.

A rare winning Saturday for Systematic was great to see, as was a good profit from Market Examiner which have finally turned the month into profit! Could I see my first winning month with Market Examiner this month? Here's hoping!

Slightly frustrated with my 4PA bets in the main race at Cheltenham with My Shamwari finishing 5th - and usually I'm very careful with checking place terms on these races but I missed the bet365 5 place offer and put the bet through Ladbrokes instead. So a £40 loss registered rather than a small profit on the bet.

Lets hope the good run continues.

Flatline

Well the title and graph says it all - since 30 June 2011 I have chugged along winning some days, losing other days, winning some weeks, losing some weeks and 4 months later the vicious circle continues.

Why is it happening??

Well i'm often criticized for having too many services so I did some quick analysis tonight on what would have happened if i hadn't been following one particular service over another and while there has been progressive growth with some services like Equine Turnover and Northern Monkey the remainder of services have pretty much flatlined at best since the turning point of the year. This surprised me - I'll be honest I thought Systematic Betting was the cause of the flatlining and while it has contributed to it - it's not the only service that is treading water at the moment. So unless I'd just followed Equine Turnover and Northern Monkey through pure chance then any mix of service would've delivered similar results.

Certainly a few services are due a change of fortune - Systematic, Piecost and Market Examiner are delivering plenty places that surely will bring wins instead over time but other services haven't performed - SLH, Equine and 4PA have all been below par for a long period.

So where do I go from here? How long do I wait for everything to turnaround - whether it is fortune, statistics or performance?

Answers on a postcard...

Weekly Update

A slightly later than planned weekly update for last week.

Overall. A disappointing week with a loss of £569 posted. Only 2 small winning days out of 7. So not a good week and certainly one I was getting thoroughly fed up with - so not a good start to the month of November. Clearly not helped by missing 3 bets on Saturday - all of which won and 3 winning bets from Mr Gekko Bets midweek. That cost me £300 and I only have myself to blame but it's a great example of how luck plays its part.

No excuses for missing the MGBets - I just forgot, but Saturday was an example of luck and also how difficult it is to have a normal life and try to run a portfolio. I was out and about with a few friends at the football and I simply couldn't get the bets on as there was no network data coverage in the ground. I gave up because I actually wanted to watch the match rather than try to get bets on!! Typically they were 2 of the 4 winners from Systematic and the 1 winner from SLH. Argghhhh... But c'est la vie - I've missed plenty losing bets so I presume it all evens out - just frustrating! Well at least Newcastle won and it was a great day out!

A good week for.... no one! Certainly not me. Although it's worth pointing out I use a service called "Racing Angles" for advice and I place small personal bets sometimes on the back of that info. That delivered the winner Zuider Zee in the November Handicap so that offset some of the losses as I had a fiver on at 14/1.

A bad week for... me! See overall!

Other news. Other than the whole thing hacking me off at the moment... I have switched my betting on the Market Examiner to e/w - evidence suggests that a large number of horses place so I'm going to see if it's worth pursuing. Certainly worked today with one place and one winning bet increasing profit.

October Review - Part 3

Final service to review for October;

Piecost Premium Selections -42.33pts (-£212). Dreadful start to my piecost subscription with the service suffering a 2nd hefty losing month in a row. Missed the first month so started October with anticipation that profit will be forthcoming... timing is everything!! An email from Piecost has reassured me that losing streaks are within parameters but the service does need to turnaround if it isn't going to wipe out the 150pt bank that is recommended. I'm only playing Piecost on Betfair as I don't want more cash going through my bookies for now and as I'm taking early prices I'm only 97% off the recommended price so seems to be working ok from that respect. Not sure of the BOG impact though although the service officially lost 35 points so doesn't seem to be that much. Here's hoping November turns things around.

October Review - Part 2

Apologies I have neglected the blog recently for a variety of reasons but am back in business and will complete the October review finally!

Systematic Betting -38.65pts (-£773). A miserable month for Systematic Betting which has is part of a long period of treading water. Since the beginning of June I've made £468 on this service which isn't enough to justify the sub cost for me. Clearly if I was playing to higher stakes that would be fine but I'm not. Admittedly this has been a spell that hasn't been experienced before and the evidence is clear that the long term profit is there - would be nice to get back on the winning road though. There was a decent recovery at the end of the month - at one point the service was down a whopping 63 points on the month. Headline rate suggests a return of -18.4 points - a whopping 20 points difference to where I got to - which shows how difficult it is to get prices on this service (and that best price is often with shocking bookies like Stan James which one has no chance in hell of getting a bet on with). I'd be interested to see what the return of the service was if we took out SJ prices.

Mr Gekko Bets (-£71). I've not put a points figure here as the staking changed during the month following the pause in service. While I was getting frustrated with the service there is no doubt you have to give MrG some praise for taking things back to basics, re-evaluating the service and getting things back out there. The new criteria seem to be working and things certainly have picked up for the end of the month. Would be good to claw back the losses incurred quickly and start enjoying this service again. I changed my stake from £35 a point to £10 a point so will probably keep with £10 until Christmas and then re-assess.

Part 3 later.

October Review - Part 2 - the ongoing saga

I'm having a bit of a mare at the moment as I've lost my charger for my laptop so am now tapping away on my wifes netbook! But it does mean I've no access to my spreadsheets and data so I can't complete a full review of October and needed my stats to complete my thoughts on Systematic Betting in October so will continue with that as soon as I can.

Much apologies for those of you waiting for the update - been a frustrating week for many reasons!!

Looks like today was another losing day but only just. Treading water is probably the best way to describe things!

Nothing much else to report at the moment although the pressure of a full time job and trying to get the bets on has been tough this week and it all becomes a bit wearing when there's little progress in the profit.

October Review - Part 2 - Coming soon

Never got a chance to post last night as a quick trip to the pub ended up with a few pints of San Miguel being drunk! Never go near the computer if I've had a few drinks - would maybe make for livelier posts though!

A struggle today therefore so won't make much sense at this time of night tonight so will post further tomorrow.

November hasn't started too well and frustratingly missed the Mr Gekko Bets for Tuesday night - all three won so lost about £50 profit there. I suppose it is karma for the extra profit I made last week!

As a side note a healthy debate about the BetButler service on the smartsig forum has been keeping me interested over the last few days. Worth a read of the emails if you are a member.