This was the name of the horse that reared as it left the stalls in the first at Epsom this evening. I was waiting for a lay to get matched and hanging in there I had turned the lay to an SP order. As the fast pictures boys saw it l0ng before I the price shot out and the SP returned was dreadful. What was a nice profit turned into, well, an expensive problem!

I’m looking forward to the Ashes and if the markets are anything like the last time the Ashes were held in the UK, we could be in for a treat. I remember visiting Betfair’s offices just after the last test finished. It had turnover of £32m or something similar. There was a lot excitement and activity last time around.

I must admit to not having done much Cricket trading. It still remains a relatively untouched area for me. I have carefully modelled horse racing, soccer and tennis but cricket is still on the edge of my agenda.

I know it’s something I would like to get into and I know some excellent cricket traders, but unfortunately there are only 24 hours in the day. There are some good blogs out there so if you are interested in getting involved have a nose around them. I’ll see if I can get a list up at some point. For this series I may have a dabble but until I know what I am doing it will remain just that.

The only hint I can offer at the moment is that it seems the weather can be an important contributor to odds movement as well as the underlying score.

Last week we had a meeting abandoned because they couldn’t get enough water on course. This week we appear to have too much. Uttoxeter has been abandoned this evening in another embarrassment for the racing industry. I’d understand the odd one but these ‘freak events’ do seem to occur with amazing regularity!

It’s been a really disjointed start to the week, I hope it gets better from here.

http://www.racingpost.com/news/horse-racing/waterlogged-uttoxeter-abandons-evening-card/605914/

Thank you for reading this blog. I trust you get something out of reading it and based on the tons of emails I receive, a lot of you do. That’s pleasing to know.

You should always welcome opinion and whether you agree with it or not, its important if it provokes thought or debate. Asking “why?” is a great human gift. However, if opinion isn’t voiced for constructive debate, it serves nobody. Let me tell you where my opinions are sourced.

I draw next to nothing from the commercial side of my activity in the market. I prefer to re-invest that money into future projects. For me, actually using exchanges has always been central to everything I do, in fact, its a passion. If it wasn’t a passion I wouldn’t sit here playing with odds models shoveling millions a week through the markets. In fact, if I had no other interests and didn’t earn a penny from it, or anything else, I would probably still be sat here probing the market. That’s how Bet Angel came to life. Back when it was created there was nothing with the features I needed, nobody was convinced they were needed, so I had to design  the concepts myself. A lot of features you see in the market, even some of those introduced by Betfair first appeared on Bet Angel.

Having successfully navigated the markets since they were formed nearly ten years ago, I’m bound to voice what I think. My opinion comes from actually being here and doing it, and that is what drives my thought processes and comments, nothing else.

Saw this article recently and wondered if this experiment would translate into the trading elements of the markets?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8105963.stm

But seriously, psychology has a big part to pay the way you approach any market but more specifically how you deal with losses, which is effectively what the rats are doing in this experiment. Losses create a pang of negative emotion and dealing with it is a often a critical key to success. Losses are normal, to be expected and part of your trading mix so not getting freaked out by them is a key factor in the way you approach a market. One of the classic failure points people experiance is a desire to avoid a loss at any cost, which often leads to chasing them. That works to a point but when eventually it fails, along with your trading bank.

It’s a cautionary tale, succesfull traders rely on good money management to earn profit; as they know that without that no amount of skill will earn them money. If you see any ‘traders’ who have lost their bank regulary then it should set off alarm bells for you. They are probably just gamblers at heart and may never escape the clutches of a bad mindset.

Could be another great trade but it’s not, its about your health.

Last year I suffered with my back. It was due to my posture, sitting down for very long periods of time. As a result I changed my lifestyle and also signed up to a posh gym with my own trainer. That has done wonders for my general well being and my back problems are a thing of the past.

Recently I started to notice was that my calf muscles are a bit ‘tight’. It appears that once again my posture is to blame. Because I used to do a lot of sport my legs muscles are very toned, just not that flexable. It seems that when I sit down now, my legs don’t carry enough weight and are too relaxed.

However the short term solution is quite simple. Stand more, but also put some support for your feet under the desk. This allows you to tense your lower leg muscles which will avoid calf problems. I have also made my PC headset wireless , which gives me the freedom to move around. On top of that I have a seperate area where I have set up a trading PC in a standing only position. So, as well as looking after your back, make sure you look after your legs as well!

I think all these problems show that I spend far too much time behind my desk. While the money is great I’m starting to think I need some broader changes in my life and a bit more balance. Rather than be a slave to the markets maybe I just need to stop pushing so hard and set off some new projects that don’t require me to sit behind the desk.

After all, never forget that good health is like money, difficult to get and easy to lose!

At throwing away a match. It looks like the England U21 players have learnt a thing or two from their elder brethren. I’ve been switching frantically between the Tennis, the football and racing all afternoon. The Tennis hasn’t thrown up many clear cut opportunities today but in between races I saw England were 3-0 and cruising it. I immediately thought, well they are surely in the final. So I put in a small lay at 1.01.

I think the only time I will ever feel comfortable with England is if they are 14-0 up with 30 seconds left! At least I was lucky on this occasion. Somebody was unlucky enough to lay the draw at 1000!!!

Just waiting for a player to get sent off, for it to go to penalties and for England to blast a few over the bar.

Just traded the 14:30 at Folkstone and the favourite was George Baker, ridden by, George Baker! George is a good jockey he just can’t get enough rides due to his height and therefore weight.

Curiously the race was won by another name, Huygens, no namesake jockey there though. The famous Huygens died in 1695. That would have been a first!

Huygens is reckoned to have written the first book on probability theory in 1657 but also is credited with discovering rings around Saturn. The NASA mission named Cassini-Huygens is one of the most successful and fascinating in recent times.

Full story here

Yesterday’s game in question featured Austria’s Jürgen Melzer, 28, who is ranked 30th in the world, and Wayne Odesnik, 23, a South African-born American ranked 109th. Melzer was the favourite and always should have been, but bookmakers reported “extraordinary” sums on him winning by three sets to love. He won 6-1, 6-4, 6-2.

The most astonishing figure is that £350,000 was traded on Melzer to win 3-0 on Betfair alone, at odds as short as 1-9. A comparable match between players with low profiles, on an outside court and not on TV would be expected to attract about £10,000 in set betting. Yesterday’s gamble suggests that a number of people had a strong belief in a Melzer win and by a 3-0 scoreline.

Before the game, £405,000 had been wagered on the overall outcome match (Melzer or Odesnik) on Betfair, with £395,000 of that on Melzer. On the specific scoreline, £242,000 was bet before the match, and £241,000 of that on 3-0 to Melzer.

While these big racing weeks bring lots of activity in the market you could be forgiven for thinking that everybody is just focused on the big races. I know some people prefer volatility while others hate it, some do well on the big races and others don’t. I tend to never pre-judge what is infront of me or set targets. I just try the best I can using all the tools available to me.

As a case in point, on Friday I started the day with a loss, no surprise there! After getting the first Ascot race under my belt I was then greeted by a massive steamer at Redcar. If I didn’t know how to swing trade I would have missed it. But jumping on the back of this opportunity, not only put the Ascot race in the shade a little, it got me off to a postive start and with spirits lifted, I trounched the day across the card.

So if you struggled to get anything from Ascot this week, don’t worry there is always opportunity in every market. You just need an open mind to find it.

See the following article: -

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tennis/8085394.stm

This would open up the draw for Murray and create quite an interesting tournament. Nadal’s price has drifted already. The draw is out today and whether Nadal takes part or not is going to have a huge impact. Turn’s out Wimbledon is exciting, even before it’s started!

Evens shot turned over, has this happened before? OK, that headline doesn’t sound particularly exciting as this must happen very often, but not like this!

For some strange reason, every now and again, the market goes bonkers and this happened again last night. I got filled at 2’s on something that should have been 30’s way before the start of the race. At first I didn’t realise it had happened, but when my P&L started showing some odd amounts I figured something odd must have happened. A quick scan around the market showed that Halaak had been backed in from mid 30’s to just 1.84! Not just once but on several occasions. An obvious error and one that gave the backer pretty much no chance of getting a return. For anybody able to lay at the smaller prices, probably the best trade you will make for a while!

Looking at the £80m Real Madrid have paid for Ronaldo you have to ask, is it good value? Well according to the stats ,the answer on value is not clear but on “will it bring success?”, pretty emphatic.

I’ve studied loads of things about football markets including some less than obvious statistics. One of these is whether buying good players pays dividends. The answer was much more emphatic that I ever expected.  There is a very high correlation of wages paid to league position.It seems money does buy success!

If you look at the 07/08 premier league season the correlation was near 90%. This meant that the league pretty much ended up with the lower spending teams near the bottom and the higher spending teams at the top. This would have been much higher if the free spending Newcastle had performed to their expected level. The big four, not only ended up in the top four but also have the top four wage bills.  What happened to the three teams with the lowest wage bill? Relegation.

Sorry, but if your club owner doesn’t have big pockets it’s unlikely you will ever challenge those that do.

Was doing some research the other night for an investment fund I am on the board of. We were looking at consumer oriented companies and arguing about disposable income. I went off and dug around to see what I could find on the average wage in the UK and thought I would share this with you.

Before you click on the link, work out how much you earn and have a guess at where you are in the grand scheme of things. Then click on the link and find out for real! Very interesting.

http://www.ifs.org.uk/wheredoyoufitin/