End of 2011 Update - Part 2

This update is more to look ahead to the next Gregorian year rather than reflect on the last (see part 1). This is going to be more or less just a list of personal goals and resolutions for the year, but since the new year always seems hectic I'll be starting these rules and goals proper from the 7th January. Although the first week of year for all my stats will run from the beginning of the year.

Right seeming as this is a gambling blog I thought my aims in regards to this should go first. I've done my best to shorten it to five, could probably include a lot more but five things is comfortable to remember and I can keep it fresh in my mind and hopefully then practise what I preach.

1. Discipline, Discipline, Discipline - Did I mention the word at discipline at some point. Whatever the situation or monetary amount I shall do my best to stay disciplined at all times. That means no chasing and sticking to my own rules.
2. Follow my systems and staking plans religiously and keep detailed records - I've got my set systems and a sensible staking plan in mind, in someways that's the easy part. The most important thing to do is to stick by this at all times. By that I mean no mistakes and no ill-discipline. In addition keeping good and detailed records is important to determine whether a system is worth continuing with or not.
   
3. Take advantage of bookmakers offers and arbing opportunities - may not be the most exciting or glamorous type of betting but I've shown that it can earn you a decent profit if done effectively. I made over £200 last year taking advantage of such situation and I know for certain there was other offers and arbs I could have got involved in to earn myself a much bigger profit.
4. Try my hand at poker more often and read poker/trading books - I've decided that this is the year I try and take poker more seriously, usually play for a bit of fun. But considering putting some serious effort into this and treat more like business than pleasure. Also to read and re-read a few recommended poker books I've got as well as other gambling literature including e-books on trading psychology.
5. Try to break-even - That's it quite simple really, my aim is to try and break-even for the year. May think I sound crazy here, but after the year just gone by a break-even year would be an improvement. I feel like I've been gambling for years upon years but I'm sure there's plenty more experience I can gain over the course of the next year. The profit in a sense is a by-product of having an edge and also having the mindset to cope the variance that comes with gambling. I'm hoping understanding greater the game of poker can also help me with my mindset when it comes to gambling.

Right there are my gambling aims for the year. I was going to post a list of my personal resolutions but I think I'll spare boring people with the usually eat healthy, exercise more speech. My one main aim in my personal life is to try and get on the job ladder, which I'm finding increasingly difficult. In addition my main motto or though going into the new year is to try and enjoy myself more. I can admit to being a bit negative at times, I'm determined to have a more positive outlook on things.

End of 2011 Update - Part 1

Well hello there. It has been a long time since I last updated my blog but it was after all fully intended. December is always a busy month and 2011's was no different. This is the first of a two part special (makes it sound special doesn't it) as I firstly look back at my December performance and my overall yearly performance and the second part will focus on 2012 and my aims for this year.

So December, the beginning of December brought about the news that the great Denman would be retired. Very sad news for me, Denman was the main reason I became so interested in horse racing and it's sad no one will every get to see him race again. But his legacy and memories will remain with many people for a long time, I was going to rename my blog in his honour but I've kind of already got the base covered. Mid-December that proceeded to drag on and on in the build up to the birthday of christ. The day it self seemingly goes down in a very similar way each year and if not for the effects of aging I'd find it very difficult to separate one year's Christmas photos from the next. I do like eating and drinking a lot, it is one of few times in the year where it's basically okay to be a fat slob and drink and eat as much as you like. I'm not a big drinker anyway and I don't like to over do thing as Boxing Day is a very big for sports fans and gamblers alike. Enough top-class horse-racing and football to meet the everyone's demand. So between Boxing Day and New Year it was basically a case of watching all this wonderful sports and trying to make some money in the meantime.

Unless your happen to be a gambler that lives under a rock (some perhaps do) you will I'm sure have heard about the Voler La Vedette fiasco on Betfair.

"Too good to be true"

Maybe some people thought Christmas had come a little late this year and that one person's major mistake could earn them a big payout. But the sheer size of the lay almost immediately renders it some sort of Betfair malfunction unless Bill Gates has suddenly decided to take up horse racing trading. I was actually casually watching the actual race as well as the darts at the time but didn't actually have the race market open it wasn't therefore until afterwards I heard what happened. Was a void market in the end unsurprisingly so I never missed out thankfully.

To round off the year and December I finished with a profit of £112.78 for the month which brought the cumulative loss for the year to -£3,903.45.

The monthly breakdown where as follows:
January: +£1,232.87
February: -£2,220.18
March: -£12.80
April: -£294.23
May: +£1,145.58
June: -£2,271.20
July: -£1,289.22
August: +£376.51
September: -£781.24
October: +£233.82
November: -£136.34
December: +£112.78

I've also put my weekly figures into a graph, the bars represent the weekly P/L and the line is cumulative P/L.


Whether it's in figures or on charts there's no hiding away from the fact my year has been very bad, losing just short of £4,000 in one year is never ideal but especially so when I had such high plans for the year ahead (my look forward to 2011 looks a bit deluded on reflection).

One more graph to show the damage can't do any harm can it. Well here's my P/L for the year with each separate bookmaker account. Thanks to the fine folks at Boylesports who I profited around the £2,300 mark, meanwhile all my other accounts where either a very small profit or ranging losses from medium-sized to rather big.

My Different Accounts P/L 2011

One bright note I suppose is that my accounts are unlikely to be limited, A few of my accounts already are to a degree but on the whole I'm not too bad on that front. But then they are always happy to take your bets if your a loser I suppose, it's when you start winning the problems occur.

Well that just about sums up 2011, pretty bad year I guess. The loss of Adrian Massey's ratings was a big blow as my betting year was largely focused around those very ratings. I'd like to think I've evolved into a better gambler with me having to change my approach and try and find new ways of betting. Not going to really talk about my plans for 2012 in this part (that's for part 2). After I did so well in 2010 to turn a profit it is obviously highly disappointing to give all that back plus more, but hopefully I'm now older, wiser and better placed than I was at the beginning of last year to go into the new one with better plans and attitude to make 2012 a success. Please do tune in for part 2, which I hope to post up tommorrow or sometime later this week.

End of November Update

Well I kind of forgot it was the end of November, despite the fact I do have an advert calendar. So I'll have to cheat a little and count the 4th of December as the last day in November. Not that it makes much difference to the overall picture. It has been a very poor year with my betting exploits and the month of November was another losing month to the tune of £136.34. My system haven't been doing that badly, my own ill-discipline once again seems to be the undoing of me with silly mistakes like trying to trade horse racing when I know I can't or trading on football matches with poor liquidity.

I'm sure I've said it a few times but I feel like I need time away, to go back to the drawing board if you like (I do not own a drawing board). But you get the idea, maybe some time away to have a recap on what I've been doing both wrongly and rightly. I'll continue with my obvious "good" or sounds methods of betting like my horse racing systems (between them netted me around £1,500 this year) and I'll carry on with my £10 challenge which seems to be more or less standing still (but they do say that's the first step in gambling, breaking even). I'll continue with my weekly update but won't have too much to say I don't think. I shall re asses and look at new betting options for the remainder of the year as well as scrutinising closely my existing methods. By my end of year update I should have a fully picture of what I'm doing. In the mean time I'm doing some volunteering work at present, nobody seemingly wants to give me a paid job so boasting my CV working for free was a recommended route for myself.

Perspective

Cliche it may be but sometimes it's true that certain events really do put your current life into perspective. The very sad news I awoke to on Sunday morning about Gary Speed did just that. Such a tragic loss at a relative young age. Has odd as it may sound deaths among football personaltities always seem to hit me hardest, always difficult in these times to find the words to sum up how you feel but there's been some wonderful tributes I've read that sum it up better than I ever could. My condoleses go out to his family and friends.

On what seems something of an irrevelant sidenote, my betting adventures led me to a loss of £86.89 this week. A few errors along the way and no horse racing systems winners took care of that. Still a few days of Novemeber remaining, has been a relative quite month but looks like it may end in a loss.

Time Management & Organisation

By no means the most exciting topics in any walk of life by things that are absolutely necessary if you want to succeed. The world of gambling is no different, the best gamblers out there not only have a very good edge but they also have very good organisation and time management. It may seem simple at times but little things like knowing what time games kick-off and what TV channel they are on. Collecting all those little nuggets of information in quick time is vitally important so you can concentrate on your picks. At times it feels like I spend far too much time on the admin side of my gambling, updating records, placing bets and so forth. But these are things that need doing successful if you want to be successful. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) for all of us (well for the time being at least) our time on earth is limited, therefore our time is a precious commodity and we must treat it as one.

Procrastination I admit myself is an easy trap to fall in but you must fight against it, for if you get the work done quicker you'll have more time to yourself anyway. It is always best to task quickly and efficiently than dwindle your way through it slowly.

Anyway enough of my ironic ramblings about procrastination and onto this week's round-up. Well it was an interesting week, plenty of bets and action and managed to turn a profit of £30.11, which I've got to be pleased with. The end of November is approaching quickly now, been a bit of slow month in truth but hopefully I'll end it with a profit.

Being Lazy Doesn't Pay

As it turns out I missed a winner on Sunday because I was being a little lazy. Thought I had plenty time to wake up around noon get my usually bacon butty and place any bets whilst watching the Grand Prix build-up. Turns out that proved a minor slip-up by myself, as I said I went onto miss a winner, the saving grace I suppose was that it wasn't a massive priced winner, that really would have made me angry with myself. Note to self Horse Racing starts earlier since the clocks changed, understandably due to the swift darkness that descends mid-afternoon during winter. Think it gets to something ridiculous like horse racing at 11am as the winter dawns on. Although I should really check what time meeting start the day before, organisation or not being sloppy and lazy must rank just behind discipline and staking plans on the gambling must do list.

This week was quite slowl on the betting front considering there wasn't much football action. Ended up playing a few games of poker this week, did rather well in fact. I get bored with poker easily at times, it is a fascinating game and I believe I could be very good at it if I tried. But playing for small stakes is very different to playing for big stakes, I've set aside £5 for my poker balance and I usually just play cheap SNGs and see how far I get. It looks a lot more glamorous when you see major events on TV, although it must be noted they only show the most interesting or exciting hands on TV whilst cutting out the uneventful hands which make up 90% of the game of poker. It also takes a lot of time up, you cna play trubo games but I feel that becomes more of a lottery at times. Playing the normal slow types of SNGs can take anything from an hour upwards. Playing multi-tables is the way a lot of people go, but I tried that before and it didn't go so well.

Anyway this is my weekly round-up and I managed a loss of £2.75 this week. I did stupidly try to get back into horse racing trading this week, which flopped again predictably. I really should stay away and stick to football. My last 3 months of Betfair P/L show why I should concentrate my efforts on football bets and trading.

My Last 3 Months P/L - Betfair

Week#44

Managed to come away from this week with a small profit of £6.96. My £10 challenge still going strong although I don't post all my bets on Betfair in there. Doesn't make sense to post every single trade and in-play bets as I place them because there's just to many and sometimes I change my position in matches.

My weekly Betfair P/L

Just been getting into the routine of Premier League at weekends and the Champions League/Europa League midweek. Whilst I'm not turning over huge amounts I think I'm doing a decent job in these football markets. Internationals some competitive, some friendlies to follow this week.