I'm calling it a comeback!

After seven consecutive weeks of loss I can be forgiven for getting a bit down-heartened over the situation. However one good week and everything suddenly seems a lot more promising. This week I totalled a profit of £481.94, which considering my recent form is rather amazing. Suddenly this week everything just seemed to click right into place, hardly any football bets this week so it mostly all horse racing bets for me. Those annoying 2nd that seem to strike suddenly disappeared and I was actually getting winners and plenty of them.

It is of course important not to get too carried away with this one week, after all I'm still around £1.25k down for the year but this week as at least softened the blow for March and I'm likely to escape the month with a much smaller loss than I anticipated. I'm rather pleased with the way I've adapted since the loss of a number of my main horse racing systems, my remaining systems are going well and a few new ones I've delved into seem to have good potential also. All things being considered I'm in a much more positive mood about my future betting than I was just a week ago. I've also been trading on Betfair to various success, trying a few new ideas with my trading including doing a lot of non in-play trading which isn't usually my thing but it seems to be going reasonably well so far. I shall include a more detailed update on my Betfair trading next week I think. Next update however shall be the end of March update where I shall discover my overall loss for the first quarter of the year.

Super System Selections

I mentioned a "beacon of light" in my last blog entry and that light has turned into something of a solar flare at present. It's a return to an old friend if you like, long-time readers of my blog (probably just me then) will know that I followed a subscription service called system selections during the summer. The system itself performed steadily but nothing too outstanding, however with my university time coming to an end I now have more time on my hands to follow the selections more closely. The selections are sent via email at around an hour before the start of the day's racing, problem for me I wasn't always able to get to the computer at that time but as I just mentioned more recently I've been able to do so and I've reaped the reward. The system is an amazingly 57.2pts in profit to 1pt level stakes over the days I've followed over the past two weeks (10 out of the 14). In that time there's been 85 selections with 15 winners including big-priced winners at 20/1, 16/1, 10/1, 8/1, 7/1 and two winners today alone both at 11/1. Whilst this is obviously a purple patch for the system the results on the site speak for themselves, last year for 2010 there was over 4000 selections at a very healthy profit on turnover of 10%. The guy that runs this system, Andrew is a top bloke also and will answer any questions you might have. If anybodies interested finding out more simply follow the link in my recommend sites sidebar, or simply visit: www.systemselections.com

The emergence of this systems success will surely mean I'll end the week in profit for a change (although I'll adhere by the saying and not count my chickens just yet). Elsewhere this week has been rather crazy, the "news" seems to be everywhere and not a lot of it is the sort of stuff to cheer you up really so I've been trying to avoid. Well apart from the budget although that's more an act of theatre really with the backbenchers bleating in agreement in the background, usually makes for amusing viewing. The budget itself didn't contain anything too drastic the petrol deduction and the scrapping or future taxes rises on petrol will come as some relief, although I'm led to believe some petrol stations simple raised their prices by 1p prior to the 1p deduction in tax the next day so that when the 1p deduction did occur the petrol remained at the same price. Don't know if that's just mischievous hearsay but it wouldn't surprise me if it was true.

Back on a sports front and I've not had a chance to follow the cricket world cup that closely unfortunately, although I did catch the South African cricket team choke yet again (surely one of the biggest chokers in world sport along with England football team). On the topic of England looking forward to their game against Sri Lanka tomorrow, the squad is seriously depleted but England can beat anyone on their day it just depends which England side turns up for this. Also the football, England against Wales. Fancy England to win this Wales are not great shakes in my opinion although the odds on an England win are rather pitiful, thinking of a small HT/FT bet with Draw/England for interest, expect the first half to be tight before England take over in the second. All shall be revealed in due course, next update will be on Sunday with my usually weekly misgivings. In the meantime I should really get on with my assignment, which shall be one of the last I shall ever write in all likelihood which in itself is quite an odd feeling.

It never rains but it pours

We are taught almost programmed by sayings that when bad times fall upon us they often seem to fall together. Bad things come in threes? How about seven losing weeks on the bounce for bad luck? Needless to say I don't really believe in any of this, although at times this year it seems things have turned against me time and time again. This week I recorded a loss of £365.96 which is my third biggest weekly loss of the year. Yes maybe I did get a bit carried away with too many Cheltenham bets, after all it is true to say a 16/1 in a class 6 race at Wolverhampton pays just as much as a 16/1 chance in a top class race at Cheltenham. All things being said I was only about £100 down with my Cheltenham bets which I don't think is too bad in the grand scheme of things.

However it's the loss of Adrian Massey's fantastic ratings that will undoubtedly go onto hit me hard over the remainder of the year, I had my main years horse racings bets especially from the period of March to June solely based on the back of systems devised from the ratings. The ratings sadly had their last outing on Saturday and now in hindsight I realise I was probably quite foolish to have so much of my betting year relying on one source of information. Now I have to make a swift adjustments to try and find a new "edge" safe to say I don't think football or at least Premier League football is the way forward for me. Seem to keep hitting brick walls with my selections there, thought Tottenham @ 1.71 and Arsenal @1.96 this weekend both offered cracking value but neither could win. Could claim I was unlucky, Tottenahm had about a gizillion chances and Arsenal's keeper went walkabouts again. But you can only claim being unlucky for a short period of time and I'm over £300 down with my Premier League bets this season which seems to indicate that I'm not very good at spotting "value". What with my horse racing bets seriously reduced it now leaves me incredibly light on betting options. Trading hasn't been going well either, think I'm too much in the gambler instinct to have the patience and discipline to trade although I shall continue to try with the little bit of money I have remaining in my Betfair account.

Overall the tag in my blog title which states how I'm striving to "become a fully pledged professional gambler" looks a forlorn illusion. At the minute I'm starting to think i'm turning into a mediocre recreational gambler rather than someone who's taking things seriously. The full-time dream seems very much a dream at present. My mindset is now trying to regain a "part-time income" attitude to gambling which I had last year. I'm over £1.7k down for this year, which is a lot worse than I could ever have imagined. To compound things the loss of my biggest profit turning horse racing systems means the task to turn that loss around looks a very difficult task. I shall keep fighting and battling away though, a return to an old horse racing system as proved a beacon of light this week I shall post an entry on that sometime next week.

That's why I love Cheltenham

Well firstly apologies for not posting all my Cheltenham selections up, you haven’t missed out on much to be honest. Just posting to say what a brilliant Gold Cup that was, okay I have only been watching racing for about five years or so but that’s got to be up there with the best race I’ve ever witnessed. It had the element of fairy story to it could one of the old boys in Kauto Star or Denman reclaim their crown. It looked as if those two were going to battle it out to the finish, but then staying on and finishing strongly was the favourite and young pretender Long Run under amateur rider Sam Waley-Cohen. Long Run’s the winner and injuries aside should go onto have a long, successful racing career. But the real winners from my point of view was Kauto Star and Denman, still racing their hearts out and giving punters a good run for their money as always. This may well be the last time either of them take part in the Cheltenham festival, if that’s the case it will be a fitting way for them to bow out.

The Gold Cup's thrilling finale

Cheltenham - Day One

Wouldn't take these as tips or anything, Cheltenham bets are usually just a bit fun and not something I take too seriously. Stuck a fiver on each of these in simple win bets, hopefully I can yield a few winners.

1:30
AL FEROF 9/1
RECESSION PROOF 9/1

2:05
REALT DUBH 9/1
DAN BREEN 16/1

2:40
THE RAINBOW HUNTER 25/1
WOLF MOON 14/1

3:20
PEDDLERS CROSS 9/2
KHYBER KYM 12/1

4:40
SPARKY MAY 4/1

5:15
SWING BILL 16/1

Peddlers Cross faces its toughest task to date in the Champion Hurdle

Fiddlesticks!

A very disappointing and upsetting week for me. It's not so much the £314.45 loss incurred this week but the news that Adrian Massey's fantastic horse racing ratings will cease to exist from Saturday next week. The majority of my horse racing system (5 out of my 8) use the ratings directly therefore in a sense 5/8th of my proposed horse racing bets for the year become totally redundant. Therefore my hope that "things will pick up" later in the year seem so much more unlikely now these system have become unexpectedly taken away due to the ending of the ratings. This means I'm going to have to do a lot of re-thinking over the next week or so. My proposal at the beginning of the year to potentially go "full-time" now looks a rather wacky pipe dream on my behalf and I shall just concentrate on getting back into profit for the time being. It's true you don't really appreciate something until its taken away, and that has to go for Adrian's fantastic ratings. I was unable to access the rating for two days and I felt totally lost and unequipped without them for the day's racing and thus didn't bet at all. I must however take this time to thank Adrian for all the time, work and effort he's put into offering such a fantastic site for absolutely free when many people (probably including myself) would have deemed it more than acceptable to pay some sort of fee for access.

Although I'd like to put things into perspective, I'm sure everyone has seen the endless news coverage of the earthquake/Tsunami natural disaster in Japan. Seems to be an awful lot of these acts of "mother nature" recently what with the earthquake in New Zealand only a few week backs and numerous under such incidents seem much more common over the past five years or so. It sort of makes me moaning about the loss of a few numbers for gambling ventures look a bit feeble. People have had their lives ripped apart by recent events in Japan and I think everyone's thoughts should be with them now.

Oh well that was a nice and jolly update wasn't it! or maybe I've just got a bout of depressive realism. Anyway it's Cheltenham next week, that will cheer me up yeah! Probably lose some more money but at least I'll be doing so watching some top quality racing. I'll probably post my "Cheltenham tips" up on my blog for what it's worth. Right time to go for a long walk off a short pier.. i mean ermm for a shower.

Very mixed week

As the title may suggest this was indeed a very mixed week for me, started rather well before fizzling out towards the weekend. A few horse racing systems doing really well another couple doing rather badly add to that my football bets came to nothing this week. Ended the week with a small loss of £28.82. Although I prefer to look at the positives and how a couple of my horse racing systems did well, still confident of long-term success with them.

It was however a fantastic week for sport some cracking games in the Cricket World Cup not least thoose ones involving England. Add to that two cracking games on TV this Sunday, the Wolves v Tottenham game is right up there as a game of the season for me, pure sport entertainment at its best.

It's actually five losing weeks on the bounce at present, something I didn't anticipate at the beginning of the year. Although it's worth nothing the last three weeks have been very small losses. Hopefully next week I'll be able to bring news of a profit, all these losses are becoming rather annoying.

End of February Update

Sorry for the belated end of month update I have been spending time revising and doing my Uni work, not exactly exciting stuff but it needs to be done. Anyway back to the point at hand and February's conclusion. Not much I can conclude to be honest other than it's been a very poor month which I've ended with a loss of £2,220.18 that's right £2,220.18 in the red. Sounds bad and it feels bad but like I've said in the past you can't go beating yourself up over it, you've just got to move on and look at the long-term picture. Overall for the year I'm just short of a grand down, but with the earning potential of my system to follow I'm still very confident I'll be able to pull that back plus some more over the next few months.

One bright note was my Premier League football picks for the month of February, which where on the whole very good I thought. You can see all my PL and other football picks on my Blogabet page (see sidebar).

Cumulative profit for the year against selections in February

So roll on March and the remainder of the year I say, I might be down but I'm definitely not out.