What makes you a good sports trader?

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brimson25
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I'm a new poster to the forum, from a gambling background. I'm trying now to take trading seriously.

I watched Peter's video at the matchbook conference. He said he regarded his performance as being something of an outlier. It got me thinking about what makes an excellent trader.

I'd be really interested in what more experienced people here think. Attributes that seem to me to be useful are: mathematical sense, some underlying knowledge of the sport (I think the importance of this varies depending on what kind of trading you're trying to do), discipline, calm temperament, eye for opportunities, adaptability. Perhaps I've missed some.

I have no sense how important each element is to the mix.

Another interesting angle is what are your most obvious deficiencies? What do you wish you could do better?

Sorry if this is in the wrong place - and thanks for any views. Cheers.
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Derek27
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Hi Brimson, welcome to the forum.

I reckon discipline is the most important attribute for any trader and often a trader's biggest weakness. Being able to stay calm and in control when markets go berserk, cutting and accepting your losses and not letting it affect you on your next market. All other skills are useless when you lose discipline.

Knowledge of a sport is useful but not essential when you're cold trading as long as you are aware of your lack of knowledge (known unknown). An eye for opportunities and adaptability to changes in the exchange are important as the exchange is always evolving - I wouldn't like to be stuck with a single strategy for years only to find at some point it no longer works.
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LeTiss
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Derek27 wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 3:04 pm
I reckon discipline is the most important attribute for any trader and often a trader's biggest weakness. Being able to stay calm and in control when markets go berserk, cutting and accepting your losses and not letting it affect you on your next market. All other skills are useless when you lose discipline.
Go along with that
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brimson25
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Thanks for the replies.

I've been pondering the adaptability issue. Perhaps I'm thinking about it the wrong way, but this seems directly opposed to those who will tell you that specialisation is important.

At the moment, I'm doing a bit of everything to see what I like. I have a nagging feeling that I'll have to decide what I want to do most soon though.
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Derek27
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There's certainly nothing wrong with trading multiple sports. I only trade horse racing markets but it's still important to be able to adapt your style of trading to suit the nature of the market. Markets have generally become more volatile than a few years ago so I gradually moved away from scalping and did more swinging.
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ShaunWhite
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brimson25 wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 3:51 pm
Thanks for the replies.

I've been pondering the adaptability issue. Perhaps I'm thinking about it the wrong way, but this seems directly opposed to those who will tell you that specialisation is important.
I think adaptablity probably refers to being able to modify a preconception more than just having a go at a few different things.

I'll +1 LeTiss's & Derek's comments. It all comes down to discipline, whether it's money management, psychology, patience, or just the sheer number of hours it takes aside from just clicking on numbers, they all come back to the d word.
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ShaunWhite
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I saw this list once somewhere which seemed reasonable but overcomplicated,

Discipline - Don't go off your plan
Decisiveness/confidence - As in poker, scared money doesn't win.
Focus - Don't get distracted
Commitment - Self explanitory
Patience - Don't get click happy
Acceptance - Don't dwell on past results ('past' might be 10s ago)
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Dallas
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ShaunWhite wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 4:28 pm
I saw this list once somewhere which seemed reasonable but overcomplicated,
I'm sure I have seen this quote once from a wise old man some where ;)

"I have said this countless of times on this forum, but the difference between a successful trader and a bankrupt one, is what they do when faced with a red screen"

Undercomplicated and sums it up.
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ruthlessimon
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Derek27 wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 3:04 pm
I reckon discipline is the most important attribute for any trader and often a trader's biggest weakness. Being able to stay calm and in control when markets go berserk, cutting and accepting your losses and not letting it affect you on your next market. All other skills are useless when you lose discipline.
There's more to it than just that

"I'm going to back every favourite with a 10 tick target & a 10 tick stop"

If that trader does that for a yr, I'd say he's pretty disciplined. But is he going to see progress, & make it as a proficient trader - absolutely not! & that lack of progress, will cause crazy apathy, leading to a loss of discipline, leading to his failure.

I think the "out-of-trading-hours" discipline is far more vital. Spending 30mins every day trying to learn a little bit more VBA code, 30mins a day catching up with other traders, 30mins a day testing that idea you've had for yonks, 30mins a day proving what you do even has an edge - could someone do that, with the same intensity for 1yr straight - whilst seeing no progress in their trading? That's the true test of discipline.

What Euler, Dallas, Tiss do in their mornings & late nights. That's the discipline I want - which in turn - will breed the market hrs discipline. But the off-hrs discipline has to come first
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Derek27
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ruthlessimon wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 4:46 pm
Derek27 wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 3:04 pm
I reckon discipline is the most important attribute for any trader and often a trader's biggest weakness. Being able to stay calm and in control when markets go berserk, cutting and accepting your losses and not letting it affect you on your next market. All other skills are useless when you lose discipline.
There's more to it than just that
That wasn't intended to be a comprehensive list. :)
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ruthlessimon
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I just see it too much, :D

"discipline means taking losses & following a plan"

.. which came from the discipline of making the plan in the first place!

I'm a keen cyclist. If my training plan is crap, I can be disciplined as hell, but there comes to a point where I have to say, "I need to break from this discipline & change something here, I'm just not seeing the progress I should be seeing". I do this all the time! I'm a big zwifter, & if I see my performance dropping, I will step back & say "what can I change". Better sleep, better diet, more distance work, not enough work in Zone 4 - generating these ideas & creating a new plan is the key discipline imo - & constantly learning more about my biology & the science of cycling. Suddenly I see my performance improve, which improves my mood, which improves my motivation, which increases my discipline even further!

The difficulty with trading is it's hard to know what to change when you step back & review
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ruthlessimon
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Here's a brilliant video.

Basically, Meccano deliberately put mistakes in the instruction manual to test children's ingenuity building the sets. The most disciplined children, diligently following the plan exactly - failed. Those who saw the mistake, & were clever enough to break from the discipline of the instructions - succeeded. But learning to be ingenuis is such a rare & difficult skill - which btw isn't taught anymore. Especially my generation. We were taught - not to think, but just to memorise - which is why I believe the failure rate of trading is so high.

https://youtu.be/_fSDWwpnKWs
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ShaunWhite
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ruthlessimon wrote:
Tue Feb 13, 2018 5:20 pm
We were taught - not to think, but just to memorise - which is why I believe the failure rate of trading is so high.
Trading failure rate is so high because it attracts a high number of people who want the earth but aren't prepared to put in the effort. And that demographic is booming.

Not sure when you were educated but in the 70s thinking at my grammar school definitely wasn't on the curriculum. But the biggest difference is in the way we had to be more ingenious and creative about finding entertainment which made us better and more tenacious problem solvers.
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nikolong
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Temperament is really important, and keeping an open mind. Determination too, to get over the learning period.
Emmson
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Dedication has become my main edge, I will do what others will not.......like in cricket follow every ball of a test match or every ball of a one day international. even if they start at 3.30am.
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