Solid #2

We shan't mention the football...

I love days like today. Deep down you see, I crave a dull life. I haven't yet mentioned targets, and I don't want to go into great detail about them now, but if I can make £15k+ this year, I'll be satisfied. If I could guarantee £50/day, each day, for the rest of the year, I'd snap the hand off of whoever was offering (£18k to save you working it out). I'd trade those fantastic, adrenalin rushing days that see last minute goals go in to land yet another footie selection, the 12/1 shot make a beautifully timed late run to snatch the big race by a nose on the line; the days when the totting up process at the end of the all the action takes an age because you have to check everything three times to make sure the large sum you seem to have made isn't a combination of wishful thinking and inaccurate hitting of calculator keys. I guess that's why I don't see myself as being a "gambler".

Don't get me wrong, I love those rarified days when they do come along. But ultimately my gambling is simply a generation of an additional income stream. The proceeds help to pay the bills, that's all. And if I could achieve that by making a steady £50/day...

You'll probably read many blogs and hear much advice on dealing with losing runs. I imagine you'll read a fair bit of it on here if you persevere with me. But one thing I have found is that it is very rare for anyone to talk about dealing with winning runs. And yet not dealing with them can lead to serious mistakes being made. There is the temptation to up stakes, to believe that your "hot" tipster can do absolutely no wrong, to think the game is easy and become sloppy in your bet-placing leading you to miss out on the best odds, etc, etc. Oh yes, those pesky winning runs need to be watched. They are the Sirens of the betting world, and personally, I distrust them deeply.

And you know something else - if you think about it, winning runs must affect the people running the services. What happens if the tipster is lulled into thinking he cannot lose and starts to come away from a tried and tested staking method? Or he starts to include selections that he would normally say weren't quite good enough to include? Well, the consequences could become pretty disastrous, pretty darn quickly.

Of course the key to facing the problem of winning runs is obvious. Look at the long term roi of the tipster, and of your own portfolio. The long term figure is the most accurate for a reason, you know. What goes up, will at some point, definitely come down.

You may have guessed by now, how much profit I made today.

Today's Action

Pretty quiet today with just nine bets on the horses, and only ProBandit finding a winner. A good bet was had though, as half a point each way was wagered on Shared Moment at Lingfield, the nag obliging at 5/1. That was enough to cover the losses made elsewhere and come out grinning the other side to the tune of £50.20. Sweet!

Wednesday 12th January: Staked £133, +£50.20.
Week to date: Staked £548, +£94.73.
Month to date: Staked £6,196, +£621.94, roi 10.03%.


Football Elite

Last night I explained how I see some of the services I follow as being a "core" service. Football Elite is the core football service in my portfolio. If I was starting out all over again, and could afford to follow just one service, then this one would be it. It ticks so many boxes. Tips are released at a sensible hour. The markets played are some of the most liquid in sports betting. Odds are often greater than those advised by the time kick off comes around. It provides a high strike rate of winners (50%+). The historical roi seems to sit constantly over 15%. The guy's selection method is consistent and well reasoned. I could go on.

However, it is not immune to losing (and winning) runs, and what has happened to Football Elite over the last six weeks emphasises another vitally important factor to consider when trying to gamble successfully - timing. But that is a story for another day.