I know more than most what the pressure is like when you’re going through a tough run and you’re losing money but more importantly, what it is like to be followed by others who are using your advice to try to make money. Quite simply, losing runs can affect your judgement in a way that most people reading this would never appreciate and having been there with the horseracing before, it is something I could never do again.
When I stopped following horseracing at the end of 2009, I could barely recognise what it meant to pick a value selection as my judgement was so badly impacted by previous losers, I’d lost every bit of confidence in myself that I could find value. The fact that the previous 3 months, 6 months and 12 months indicated I had found myself a fairly significant edge no longer mattered as quite simply, once your judgement goes, you start to doubt everything you’re doing and the edge you once had is effectively gone. That’s not to say it will never return again but being honest, I’ve barely looked at horseracing since the day I turned my attention to trying to find an edge with the footie.
Anyway, the reason the above is important is because after Saturday’s wipeout, I wasn’t exactly brimming with confidence when I saw the two selections thrown up for this midweek on so many systems. Of course, the selections have little to do with me (I just press buttons and drag down formulas) but at the end of the day, I’m following many of the systems with my own cash and I lose confidence as much as anyone.
It has been a tough few weeks for the systems (or at least, it feels that way) and seeing both these bets thrown up, I was hardly brimming with confidence. Aways have suddenly embarked on a really bad run on the systems and many of the systems are 5-10 points down on a drawdown. Not a disaster but if you are following multiple systems, the drawdowns soon add up.
Throw in the fact that one of the Aways was in the Bsq Prem and that has been a graveyard for longer priced Aways this season and let’s just say I was expecting to be writing a post today saying that the systems have hit a really bad spell and we all better be strapping ourselves in.
Of course, the systems don’t know they are on a really bad run (I don’t tell them the results! ;) ) and therefore, they just continue throwing up the same bets day in, day out. I know for a fact that if I was picking the selections after the weekend (none of the teams were even close to winning), I’d have been doubting myself just a little. But no, the systems pull out two decent priced Away bets as value.
It’s easier to write this post now that I know both teams won but even before the games started last night, I had a little wry smile to myself. Both teams were punted very heavily pre-match and compared to the odds I backed at, they were much shorter at kick-off. That is effectively what this blog is about. Yeah, it’s good to hit lots of winners and I sometimes get great satisfaction from seeing a big drifter win when I’ve backed it but for the vast majority of the time, the systems are selecting teams at odds which then shorten and in the long-run, over 100s and 1,000s of bets, that gives the systems an edge over the bookmakers. That effectively is the edge I’ve created at this game.
Algorithm One had 2 bets, 2 winners.
Algorithm Two had 2 bets, 2 winners.
Algorithm Three had 2 bets 2 winners.
Established systems made a profit of 17.99pts for H/A and 10.55pts for DNB betting.
New systems made a profit of 26.79pts for H/A and 15.71pts for DNB betting.
If you look back to my previous post, you’ll see that overall, the systems have nearly recouped all the losses from the wipeout on Saturday. Of course, different systems may have won back more than they lost on Saturday and vice versa but I can’t do much about that in the short-term!
Next bets will be posted on Friday night for Saturday’s games.
I have to say, Graham, that was two cracking predictions your systems came up with last night.
ReplyDeleteAs one who is still persevering with trying to find a horse racing edge, I still watch your systems with interest.
Hi Dartguru.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment.
Yeah, it was a good result last night. Much needed after Saturday.
As I said in my post, it probably feels worse than it has been over the past 3-4 weeks. I can’t recall too many winning days but when I look at the P&L, it isn’t a disaster over the past few weeks.
Good luck with the racing. Devoted a good number of years to studying form and would still class myself as being pretty good although I’ve not proven it for a long time! One day though, once my edge on the footie is eroded, I’d love to build a system for the racing.
Cheers,
Graeme