In play horse race suggestions/comments welcome

[kenfrost]

Hi Folks, during August I have been trying a new strategy wrt in play horse races.

Basic Overview

I use a servant to place a lay bet a few seconds after the start of the race on a horse I select based on my non scientific assessment of its likelihood of drifting.

If the lay is matched, the servant places 4 closing green up back bets 1 tick 2 tick etc above the lay.

I keep my finger on the green up button if the horse starts to come in and the loss hits my personal exit threshold, or if not all the back bets are matched. NB I also cancel the lay bet if it doesn't get matched quickly.

Out of approx 60 races so far (where the lay has been matched), this is generating a profit with zero losses.

Now clearly, at some stage, I will have to green up a loss. Fair enough.

BUT, I have noticed that out of the 60 races, every horse I have selected loses.

In other words, if I had removed the green up back bets I would have made a much larger profit.

Clearly 60 races is not statistically significant, all the more so because my horse selection is very unscientific.

I do not know how often the horses I select in the future over a meaningful period of time will win eg 1 in 5 races, 1 in 10 races, 1 in 20 etc.

Nonetheless it is tempting to remove the back bets and keep my finger on the green if the horse starts to some in.

The downside of this is that the horse might come in then still lose, or that the losses I green up at are so large (because the market moves quickly) that cumulatively they wipe out my profits or that over the long term this 60 straight losses is a statistical anomaly.

So my questions to you are a.o.:

1 Do I stick with my current system?

2 Do I add an automatic stop loss to it (to lessen my chances of being to slow to manually stop loss in the future)?

3 Do I remove the green up back bets and go for straight lay with an auto stop loss?

Your thoughts, comments, suggestions are all welcome.

Thanks

[Kai]

You are basically scalping from the lay side, hence your strikerate

What's your average lay entry price? I can assume but worth asking

All ranges are tradable more or less, not sure if Bickat has deleted all of his videos by now but he was the first trader I've seen with good execution around these while others were taking on stupid risk, maybe compare yours with his (sometimes he didnt close his lay but he had a million races of XP)

Based on what you said in your shoes I would probably ditch the scalping servant and aim to catch the big drift from your selection and always hedge

Also, you probably posted in the wrong subforum : viewforum.php?f=5

[kenfrost]

You are basically scalping from the lay side, hence your strikerate

What's your average lay entry price? I can assume but worth asking

All ranges are tradable more or less, not sure if Bickat has deleted all of his videos by now but he was the first trader I've seen with good execution around these while others were taking on stupid risk, maybe compare yours with his (sometimes he didnt close his lay but he had a million races of XP)

Based on what you said in your shoes I would probably ditch the scalping servant and aim to catch the big drift from your selection and always hedge

Also, you probably posted in the wrong subforum : viewforum.php?f=5

Thanks.

Re your comment about strikerate, do you mean lay scalping has a higher successful hit rate? If so, why?

I must admit I am seriously considering experimenting with ditching the back bets and experiment with very very low stakes on catching drifts with a stop loss built in. BUT, I will wait and see what others think and also see how I get on for the next few days with the servant.

[jamesedwards]

Either you've got a subconscious knack for picking losing horses, or you've been lucky.

Given what you know about your selection process, which do you think it is?

And it would help others advise if you could share the rough average price that you are laying. Eg, if it's 5.0 then you're a miracle worker. If it's 500 then you're seeing an expected distribution of wins.

[kenfrost]

Either you've got a subconscious knack for picking losing horses, or you've been lucky.

Given what you know about your selection process, which do you think it is?

And it would help others advise if you could share the rough average price that you are laying. Eg, if it's 5.0 then you're a miracle worker. If it's 500 then you're seeing an expected distribution of wins.

I suspect it's a combination of both.

Odds roughly 10

[jamesedwards]

Either you've got a subconscious knack for picking losing horses, or you've been lucky.

Given what you know about your selection process, which do you think it is?

And it would help others advise if you could share the rough average price that you are laying. Eg, if it's 5.0 then you're a miracle worker. If it's 500 then you're seeing an expected distribution of wins.

I suspect it's a combination of both.

Odds roughly 10

That's encouraging. Keep at it! Resist any urge to significantly increase stakes, even the best will hit winners occasionally.

[kenfrost]

Either you've got a subconscious knack for picking losing horses, or you've been lucky.

Given what you know about your selection process, which do you think it is?

And it would help others advise if you could share the rough average price that you are laying. Eg, if it's 5.0 then you're a miracle worker. If it's 500 then you're seeing an expected distribution of wins.

I suspect it's a combination of both.

Odds roughly 10

That's encouraging. Keep at it! Resist any urge to significantly increase stakes, even the best will hit winners occasionally.

Thanks

I'm certainly not increasing stakes anytime soon!

[jamesedwards]

I suspect it's a combination of both.

Odds roughly 10

That's encouraging. Keep at it! Resist any urge to significantly increase stakes, even the best will hit winners occasionally.

Thanks

I'm certainly not increasing stakes anytime soon!

There's no right answer to your initial offsetting question. Personally I trade in-play very successfully and don't automatically apply an offset bet, but I know of other successful traders who always do. It's all down to personal preference. Perhaps it's safest to trade with offsetting for now as you gain experience.

[kenfrost]

That's encouraging. Keep at it! Resist any urge to significantly increase stakes, even the best will hit winners occasionally.

Thanks

I'm certainly not increasing stakes anytime soon!

There's no right answer to your initial offsetting question. Personally I trade in-play very successfully and don't automatically apply an offset bet, but I know of other successful traders who always do. It's all down to personal preference. Perhaps it's safest to trade with offsetting for now as you gain experience.

I think that's very wise advice, and much appreciated