My New Blog

I'm back blogging again. If you wish to follow my new blog please do so, this one is more of a simple challenge starting with a £100. More just a straight forward diary of my thoughts behind bets and conclusions.

http://long-way-to-a-100k.blogspot.co.uk/

Thank You.

This Is The End

I did initially state that I'd blog up until the end of the year but I feel that now is the right time to end my blog. I'm afraid to say my motivation for all things gambling as dwindled a lot recently. This was summed up somewhat yesterday when I totally forget I'd left an unmatched bet with the intention to trade later. Lucky the bet won and therefore I'm actually roughly back even for the year but that was somewhat besides the point really.

My activities have more or less come to a stand still for now. I may some time in the future regain my motivation to try and pursue gambling and be profitable. But at the moment my focus just isn't there and I think it would be somewhat detrimental for me to continue for the time being. In addition it's not just gambling that I have seemed to have lost motivation in to be honest. To put it bluntly I seem a bit lost at present, I don't really know what I want to do with my life. I've been constantly applying for jobs but had no look. Secretly perhaps I was always hoping I wouldn't need to find a job and could pursue the dream of living off gambling.

So to conclude I hope all the people that took time to read my blog at any point enjoyed my input and hopefully took something positive from my insight. The big question I started this blog with was whether it was possible to be a profitable gambler and possible make a living from doing so. In fits and starts I've shown that there was/is profitable methods out there if your willing to look hard enough and put in the work. But the harsh psychological effects gambling can have on a person makes it very difficult to do this and maintain the required discipline and consistency of thought to do so. For me the advice for any budding gamblers out there is simply to pursue gambling as something serious but something leisurely, I think I made the mistake of treating as a possible full-time earner when in fact I feel the best way to approach it is to set a small amount aside and any profit earnt is simple a little extra spending money.

One great irony of my time gambling is that I've come to the conclusion that money doesn't really mean all that much to me anymore. Sure you need enough to live off adequately, but beyond that I don't think I really see much appeal in having massive wads of money. For me the joy of gambling was the intellectual game against the bookmaker or against other people (in the case of betting exchange). It just so happened that this game took place using knowledge from areas I follow intensely, i.e. sports. That was always the appeal, yes I wanted to make money from gambling but the large part of the enjoyment was in the challenge and also in the watching of the sport. I don't think that appeal just disappears but it feels like that at the present. Perhaps one day it will return but with heavily limited accounts and the scars from my previous venture I think any future gambling would only ever be a part-time pursuit.

I don't plan to delete the blog by the way, it will still be here until whenever it gets taken down. One day I'll probably read back through it all with a smile on my face. It was an adventure and I'm sure there's plenty of good advice mixed in there too.

My email is denmanbetting@hotmail.co.uk, I plan to seize using that address soon. If you want or need to contact me for any reason please do so at that address within the next week or so if you want to make sure I read it.

Well that's it 29 months of blogging and this is the end. I bid you farewell.

End of May/ Euro 2012 Preview

Quite pleased to say I ended the month of May with a non too shabby profit of £469.29. Although it came at a bit of a cost as a couple of my bookmakers accounts got shut down. Presumably because I was taking odds just before they where cut. Might have been foolish of me to be so obvious, but I had been limited with both bookmakers previous so having my accounts closed completely wasn't a total surprise, despite me hardly turning a profit with either. This means my cumulative loss for the year is back down to just over £100. I hope a decent June could see me back in the black for the year.

My main point of the update was to give a run down of my pre-tournament bets for Euro 2012. Whilst I do take betting seriously mostly I do like an occasional fun bet know and again. Although I still try and only bet on things I think are value. These long-term tournament bets are always a bit hard to judge though mainly because the tournament only involves an handful of game for each team and an element of luck undoubtedly comes into it.

Outright Winner
For me and for many others I'm sure, the two stand out candidates are Spain & Germany. Both come into the campaign with 100% records during qualification. I lean towards favoring the Germans for the tournament, because I feel they have a more rounded team than the Spaniards and in my opinion Germany where the outstanding team in the last World Cup but came up narrowly short against Spain on that occasion. Always worth covering yourself with a potential dark house and I think Poland could be that in this tournament. Home advantage of course and as easy a group as they could have wished for. I expect them to qualify for the quarter-finals although I admit it would be something of a surprise to see them progress further, but by no means impossible and at their current odds worth a speculative punt.

Recommended Bets:
2pts on Germany @ 4.5 (Betfair)
1/2pt on Poland @ 51 (Various)

Top Goalscorers
Again the top goalscorer market is always a bit of a lottery and I don't really think there's one outstanding candidate for it this year. Given that Germany will probably rotate Klose and Gomez in the lone-role upfront, Spain without their top striker in David Villa. Whilst both Van Persie & Ronaldo seem a bit short considering their countries are in the "Group of Death". Therefore I've just gone for a few more speculative punts, although should Germany go all the way I'd fancy one of my two German selections to be thereabouts for the Golden Boot.

Recommended Bets:
1pt on Thomas Muller @ 34 (Betfair)
1pt on Lukas Podolski @ 38 (Betfair)
1pt on Andrei Arshavin @ 126 (Coral)
1pt on Wesley Sneijder @ 74 (Betfair)
1pt on Ztlan Ibrahimovic @  51 (Various)

An Update!

First and foremost thanks for all the comments on my previous post, it's nice to know that somebody at least may be benefiting from my blog and that you are so willing to offer advice.

I've not updated in ages so I'll firstly round of April which came in with a profit of £252.24, although I admit this was mostly down to luck rather than any sort of wisdom I think. (bad trading, lucky profits)

With the first week of May came the end of the Premier League football season and thus my football bets. Here's a graph displaying my performance since the start of February to season end.

So ended up with £25.66 profit from a starting bank of £100. The profit yield was a fairly healthy 6.29% and the average price taken with my selections was almost exactly evens (2.017). I'm happy enough with that, I watch a lot of Premier League football but the season before I didn't finish the season profitable so the knowledge itself doesn't always guarantee you'll turn a profit. Think some of the key themes I noticed this season was teams like Liverpool & Chelsea where continuously under-price given the poor rum of form both teams endured during the season. In addition backing Newcastle every game would have surely given you a nice profit, they where often over-priced presumably because they performed a lot better and maintained for the large part their good form throughout the entire season.

Right my future plans now. Well it is gambling related but not exactly outright gambling as such. Some people may say it's a little bit boring and maybe not in the spirit of the gambling game. But I've recently being taking full advantage of any bookmakers offers and also taking advantage of differing price lines between both bookmaker Vs. bookmaker and bookmaker Vs. exchange. I've been doing it for the last month and turning over a decent profit without having to do anything spectacular. I admit the work involved can be time-consuming but I'm quietly enjoying it. It keeps me in the gambling world and as a result I'm getting an even closer look at how prices shift and change at various times. I'm also looking at maybe developing an horse racing systems out of any reoccurring prices patterns I may come across.

That's keeping me fairly busy at present, as well as watching the England/West Indies cricket (no betting/trading on it though). I'm also looking forward to the Euro 2012 which is rapidly approaching. I'll be having a few bets there no doubt, although I didn't do that well with my bets at the last World Cup, hopefully that taught me some lessons that I can put into practice. I shall update again just before the tournament starts with an end of May update where I shall give my views on the tournament.

The Lost Soul Returns

I shamefully have abandoned this blog for a long-time now. I kept meaning to update but never got round to it. I think I need to take a leaf out of Jim Carrey's character in Yes Man and start doing things instead of waiting for something to happen. Being a more pro-active person is definitely something I want and probably need to be.

One of the main reasons I never got round to updating is the simple fact I don't have much to say anymore, or least not stuff that I've mentioned several times in my blog before. Maybe I was foolish thinking gambling was easy way to make money. My logic says I believe that it is very difficult to make money gambling but deep down maybe I've always, maybe still do believe that there is a way to come out a winner.

I now operate no horse racing systems and I'm not tied to any sort of betting on daily basis. I still tried and failed throughout much of March to try and trade once again. I re-read a book or two on the subject and thought maybe this time I could make it work. But my same old mistakes reared it's head. I've read all about the psychology and the sort of mindset needed to trade successfully. Although understanding what is needed and actually implementing it is two different things completely. I still remain bouncing back and forth between idea, one day I want to try my hardest at poker (that's took a bit of a dip recently) and the next I want to be a trader once again.

I've always been an indecisive sort of person and my mind is all over the place at present. I've taken a few steps back from gambling of late and now spend a lot less time thinking on gambling activities. On a personal note my whole life is just one big frustration at present I can't find a job anywhere, struggle to even get interviews. Tough economic times I know, but I think I'm a bright enough individual to do a very good job at anything I put my mind too. (well if you don't count gambling that is). I should probably feel guilty for spending what is effectively tax-payers money on my silly gambling dreams, but then again I spend very little money elsewhere and I'm sure other people waste money just as badly as I have.

I was contemplating this being my last post on this blog. It would be nice to see a blog finish with a definite ending. Too many blogs I've read just end abruptly and you never know what has happened to the blog poster. Probably just made a mega-mistake and doesn't want to face the punishment of reciting this in words. I'm somewhat the opposite I find typing my thoughts into words is cleansing and makes me feel better for some reason. For that alone I think I would find it difficult to stop this blog today. Although I do fear the time to let go of my gambling fantasies is quickly approaching. But it's been so ingrained in me for the four years now that it even when I've recently took a full week away it felt somewhat weird not to be thinking or hatching plans about my gambling pursuits.

One quick final note on the Grand National, I always hate how the animal activist always rear their heads every time the Grand National comes around. The truth of the matter is horse racing is sport where animals are bred specifically for racing, yes it's true all national hunt racing carry an added element of danger and horses will sadly get hurt and die. But isn't it the added amount of danger that makes The Grand National what it is. Modern day society seems to want to take the danger out of everything. Anyway it was a fantastic finish (one of the best I've ever seen), chuffed for Neptune Collognes always been a big fan of the horse and probably would have won a Gold Cup sometime but not the dominance of Kauto Star and Denman.

Pipped at the post

Loss of Direction

To be frank I'm suffering from a big sense of loss of direction at present. My sports betting/trading is quite clearly not working and I get the sad, sinking feeling of me going around in circles only to come back to the same result of me slowly losing money through my pursuits. The fact that I'm currently unemployed and stuck around the house a lot does not help the matter any.

Starting to think my plans have all been one big delusional thought. It's true that they say you should never really give up on your ambitions and your dreams, but that doesn't apply when they have proven to be largely unrealistic does it?

Do I still enjoy sports betting and trading? There's still a part of me that does, but then there's an other part of me that 's saying think of all the hours you've spent pursing this only to end up losing a decent amount of money. Sometimes difficult when you've got your heart set on something to let it go and move on. It seems I'm very close to coming to that conclusion, but there's still a little bit of drive and passion to continue. If I did however decide to pack it in, I think it would have to be completely. Don't see myself carrying on as a casual punter, be a bit like seeing your ex-girlfriend you still love on the train every day or something and always wondering what could have been or what still happen.

I'm about as close to my gambling goals as Charlie Adam's penalty was to the goal in the Carling Cup final, and I end up feeling a lot like the guy at the end of the clip.

Mistakes, Mistakes and More Mistakes

The more you think about the more you realise that gambling and trading is predominately about mistakes. The more mistakes you make the more likely you are to lose money, whether that be backing or laying something at unfavourable or your more classic mistake in placing a bet you didn't intend to. The saying goes Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Although in betting and trading you can afford to make hundreds and thousands of mistakes, basically as many mistakes as your bankroll will allow you. Sure all people make mistakes, it is often said the most successful people in the world have made big mistakes in the early career but have overcome them. But that fails to notice all the people who make big mistakes who didn't overcome and become routed down by a mistake they've made.

I know that last passage was somewhat vague but my point is that different people react differently to mistakes. The way you react to mistakes and losses in gambling/trading is one of the most important things. It fails under the all important D word again, but is deserving of a category of it's own in my view. I know from experience when I make mistakes I don't like it, it annoys me, it frustrates me, it angers me. I'm the guy banging my head on the wall after my horse is beaten by a nose. I do my best to try not get frustrated in this way, but it's almost inherent human nature that we don't like it when we are wrong, we don't like knowing that we aren't as clever as we think we are. I know I'm some steps ahead of the regular punter who simply thinks he can predict with certainty what's going to happen in a given sporting event. I know what value is. I may or may not have edge when it comes to betting and trading these days. But I know for certain that somewhat primal instinct part of my brain gets frustrated and angry far to easy. I have taken up poker recently but even in that I drifted into the same mode, I was playing my usually game and got a couple of bad beats I proceeded to go "on tilt" and play hands I would never even usually look at playing which of course resulted in further losses. Decided to take the rest of the week off after a very poor week upto Wednesday.

What I'm saying after all this time is that I realise I don't have the mindset for betting or trading. After reading up about trading in particular, it seems there is the possibility that you can train your own mind to get out of this problem. Although old habits die hard as the saying goes.

This week was another loss of £161.95 of which $11.85 (roughly £8) can be attributed to poker, the rest was simply me being a lemon trying to trade, hence the mistakes, mistakes rant. I'm not saying I'm giving up on this pursuit of mine. But I do admit to losing a bit of interest in betting and trading recently. Twinned with the realisation that my mindset is still all over the place, I've decided to take this week off largely to try and think things over and do a little more reading on trading psychology. Reading and applying are two completely different matters though, although despite all this I'm determined to remain positive.