Tuesday 19 January 2010

The drawdown continues

Well, it's been a horrible start to the year.

Just about avoided as bad a week as i had 2 weeks ago, but still some horrendous luck is being suffered.

On the bright side managed a huge arb with betfair that lost 56k at betfair, so that keeps the PC wolf even further from the door.

On the downside, it just isn't much fun at the moment. But it never is when it's like this. Must consider january as a month off next year. It's also left me wondering how much of a factor the weather has been.

This week has started badly as well. Hopefully I can turn it around by the end of the week, then push on next week. One day at a time at the moment.

Thursday 14 January 2010

A reader or two?

So apparently my blog has made it onto my facebook, somehow. Can't remember sharing it myself, but I guess I must have done!

Things ticking over slowly - another game passes which, a couple of years ago would have been a huge earner on the coupons, but in the "tight teenies" as they may well be called (as far as coupons are concerned) it passes without incident.

The weather still isn't helping, although at least the temperature is up a bit. Things are so quiet I'm even watching the cricket and having a blast at trading it. It's not going great at the moment, but (hopefully) its a 5 day event, so we'll see how we go.

Monday 11 January 2010

The rollercoaster

Not the rollercoaster in the "standard" gambling sense of the word either.

Had one of my famous "ideas" earlier this week. I thought I was really on to something, so spent a little bit of time on it. I thought I had found a potential middle situation - a situation where I could get a bet on, place some clever hedge bets, and win either way - but also, in a rare situation, win on all bets placed, both the original bet and the hedges - hence creating a massive (potential) win.

Even better this bet was available regularly at the asian bookmakers, and was available in volume. It looked too good to be true - but not so good that I dismissed it out of hand.

As it goes, I was in a game situation tonight where I could have won 32k on the game. I also mistakenly thought that my worst result was +220 on the entire game. Looking more closely at the rules of the bet I was using, I could infact have been "polish middled" on the game and lost both sets of stakes (which would have been around -31.5k. And indeed I was only one goal away from doing so.

I am thankful that I didn't realise it at the time, otherwise there would have been major panic in the camp, I'm sure. A very close look now reveals that only extremely occasionally will this bet be viable, and then only as a value bet, not a bet to be hedged or middled pre-off.

The holy grail is back in the cupboard for a little longer then.

Next time, gadget.....

Friday 8 January 2010

What a start to the year!

Well, a big drawdown on the bank holiday 28th Dec didn't help kick things off. Had a tough time of it on multiple strategies, which is always bad news. One of those weeks that comes along maybe twice a year. Not the best way to start a new one!

Been dipping in and out of football in-play markets as well again - used to play on them quite a lot. It will remain to be seen whether the strategy I am employing there will reap any rewards (although I think it will in the long term).

Picked up nice and early on the general trends in tonight's championship game (West Brom vs Notts Forest) and will have a nice position if its under 2.5 goals and if WBA don't win. May indeed have started bailing out too early - but I've been foolish recently in not closing off what could have been some excellent trades - and every price has to stop somewhere, so I've got to approach these with a little more risk-aversion I think. I see 0-0 as a possible, or a sneaky 1-0 either way, or maybe 1-1. 1-0 forest looks like it could be a fair bet on betfair.

The rest of the weekend could well be a serious damp squib. I see it as unlikely that any lower league football will take place and Scotland looks largely if not completely out of the question. So here's hoping for some juicy continental action.

How the hell am I going to maintain a 2% account for the rest of january! Time will tell, although I have some holidays saved up which I'll be putting into practice I think.

Monday 4 January 2010

A new year, a new project

First post, so I will try to keep from rambling straight away. That will come later no doubt.

Introductions: My name is Adam, and I'm a professional gambler. Although, as time will tell, its not the only thing I do, but it is the main way that I support myself.

Makes it sound like a gamblers anonymous blog already!

I've started the blog because I had a good 2009, my best year so far from a work and life point of view, and am going to try and chart my progress to improve on that in 2010. I can't see me topping the 2009 earnings in all honesty - but you never know. I've also got my wedding this year (and stag do!) and hopefully a fantastic honeymoon to look forward to.

My success as a gambler in the past has come from having multiple "income streams" or whatever those american motivational speakers like to call them - and this year I'll be looking to expand them yet further. With one company already started at the end of 2009 I'll also be a legitimate company director and 2 more ideas in the pipeline for taxable sources of income, I'm also back in the system - which I feel 2 ways about: 1) Tax - yuck. 2) Its nice to not have to look forward to living forever under the radar.

More in the next post about how I operate and make money from the murky waters of the betting markets. And (if I get any readers) before I continue, my surname isn't Heathcote, if any of you read the betfair forums :)