£25 a day - A beginner's journey

[Iron]

Foxwood

Let's take a horse at odds of 5.0. Your liability per horse is £100. Therefore, if the horse wins, you lose £100. If the horse loses, you make £25 profit, minus commission.

I did spot an error in my formula for calculating profit though. I've amended the spreadsheet accordingly (see attached). Thanks for spotting the error.

Incidentally, as regards the random number thing, I used random numbers in two ways. I generated a random number between 11 and 40 and divided it by 10 to arrive at random odds between 1.1 and 4.0.

I also generated a random number between 1 and 100,000. Let's say that a horse has a 60% chance of winning. There is a 60% chance that the number generated will be between 1 and 60,000, so I will declare the horse a winner if the random number is between 1 and 60,000. That's the principle I used.

Jeff

[Ethanol]

Jeff,

If 007 hasn't already lost his bank, then I hope the time and effort which you put into that spreadsheet will help him to understand, and save what he has left. Nice one.

To reiterate what others have said - you need to lay at odds lower than the "true" price in order to make a long-term profit. Assuming you're not analysing form, then unless you have developed a more mechanical system which enables you to spot value (you can use the BSP - Betfair Starting Price - as a guide as to whether you're achieving this), then you will lose money.

[foxwood]

Let's take a horse at odds of 5.0. Your liability per horse is £100. Therefore, if the horse wins, you lose £100. If the horse loses, you make £25 profit, minus commission.

Aha and apologies ! I was totally misled by the semantics and lost what your formula was doing !

In my head, I call the £25 in your example the "stake" and that's the column title of your £100 column - which I call the "liability" - hence the query

Maybe I should try naming them in those terms - I can see how that more neatly reverses the "back" terminology and thinking.

I thought the random tricks were neat. One for the toolbox

[Zenyatta]

Jeff,

If 007 hasn't already lost his bank, then I hope the time and effort which you put into that spreadsheet will help him to understand, and save what he has left. Nice one.

Sadly, I fear 007 took a bullet today, a whole bunch of maidens under 4.0 romped home Poor fellow.

[007]

..nice work on the spreadsheet by the way..

[gazuty]

Such a good song.

Now you swear and kick and beg us that you're not a gamblin' man;
Then you find you're back in Vegas with a handle in your hand
Your black cards can bring you money so you hide them when you're able
In the land of milk and honey you must put them on the table

[007]

I started with (next to) nothing and I don't deny that what I'm doing is gambling, but is gamblin' with peanuts still gambling? If we have to define it, yes, I'm gambling, but I'm losing nothing - washers really. I'm having fun. Now I'm in the fortunate position of being up, so if (or when) I lose, I just lose other peoples' money which I haven't invested any emotional attachment into.

Based on the comments in this thread already, I've changed my expectations and anything from here on in is a bonus.. The risk vs reward ratio stacks up when you had nothing to begin with.

At least I'm not pissing it up against a wall like I used to. When you can take a bottle of whisky and still stand up then you know you've got a problem

[gutuami]

Jeff, here's some real data for your simulator.
all runners with bsp less than 5.01 from 2011

[mugsgame]

I am completely confused about this thread.

007 comes on and says he is Laying favs (I think he mentioned 25 bets in 18 days).
I have read through the thread again and at no time does 007 say he is blindly laying favs. So here is my point.

007 -If you are BLINDLY LAYING FAVS below 4.0 - STOP NOW
As almost everyone else has rightly pointed out this strategy is doomed. If this is what you are doing. We don't want to hear about it anymore. You will just encourage other newbies to get involved with this silliness. However.....
If you are using skill, common sense, form backed observations and market knowledge to identify weak favourites that you think are over priced and have a good chance of getting beat - GL with your journey.

We need some clarity here

[gazuty]

I started with (next to) nothing and I don't deny that what I'm doing is gambling, but is gamblin' with peanuts still gambling? If we have to define it, yes, I'm gambling, but I'm losing nothing - washers really. I'm having fun.

I take this to mean this thread is talking about punting.

[007]

Yep, for clarity there is method behind my madness - it's not just a stab in the dark.. I may be mental but I'm not stupid mental.

And to clarify further, as I started laying I wanted more knowledge, then found out about the BA software, trading etc. So the reason I'm here came about through a search for knowledge on the software, trading etc and as an aside I mentioned that I was laying horses trying to build a wee bank. This thread then developed into others advising against laying. It seems for the moment that trading might be asking too much of me given my limited time and understanding, hence the chat about laying horses, albeit not stupid mental laying.

[freddy]

I am completely confused about this thread.

007 comes on and says he is Laying favs (I think he mentioned 25 bets in 18 days).
I have read through the thread again and at no time does 007 say he is blindly laying favs. So here is my point.

007 -If you are BLINDLY LAYING FAVS below 4.0 - STOP NOW
As almost everyone else has rightly pointed out this strategy is doomed. If this is what you are doing. We don't want to hear about it anymore. You will just encourage other newbies to get involved with this silliness. However.....
If you are using skill, common sense, form backed observations and market knowledge to identify weak favourites that you think are over priced and have a good chance of getting beat - GL with your journey.

We need some clarity here

I think it was Frogmella's post that got us talking about laying randomly or without any real knowledge of the markets.
And people have assumed 007 is in that same Category as he was asking for advice.

[007]

There have been some good posts in this thread, but I'm not sure this is the place to discuss my laying activities as it should really be BA focused. The categories are Bet Angel Professional and Sports Trading - not sure if it fits in either of them.

I came here to learn about the BA software, trading etc but from what I've read it seems I don't have enough time to put into it. Your comments help newcommers who come along and (from your experience) can save them a lot of money in the process.

Re laying: I'm thinking of moving this thread or I'll pull out and let you carry on with what you do best related to the BA software. At least I found out at this stage that it's not for me, and this may help others who visit this thread in the future.

[JollyGreen]

Why not post your adventure in the Horse Racing section?

JG

[mugsgame]

Why don't you move it onto the Betfair forum? - You will get properly slaughtered there