A Newbie Guide/Help Required. Where Do I Start?

[Hammyali]

Hi All

I have fiddled about with Bet Angel for a couple of months but only bits and bobs, and nothing specific. I have decided the time has come to actually stick to one thing and try to get half decent at it, and given my work and family life I thought Horse Racing was a sensible place to go as it's available to me in the evenings and when I have spare time in the day.

One of the things I was using Bet Angel for was dutching horse races, of which I had some success but more failures, likely due to the lack of knowledge about the system.

So, what I need really is some people on here who do this day in day out, who would be willing to help me learn exactly what I should be doing. What do I need to learn, do I need a specific strategy, do I need something automated, do I do this before the race or during, plus a million other questions.

I'm not a big fan of training videos, I'm better with someone explaining something to be in a straightforward way for a beginner.

So, any and all advice/help would be really great if you have the time to give it.

Thank you.
Ham

[Realrocknrolla]

Hi mate.

For dutching, i would definitely recommend you learn about horses, jockeys, trainers, form, track, going, flats, jumps, hurdles, fences, the class of a race, the age of a horse…. So much more but it’s a start.

There is plenty of free information online such as racingpost.com, timeform.com and plenty more.

Then some paid sites such as IR and HRB, dataform etc is something to think about if you require more info such as speed ratings etc.

Best of Luck

[ShaunWhite]

Take a long hard think about what interests you. Are you looking at horses just because they're on or do you actually have an interest in them. Learning all the stuff above will just be a massive pain if you don't really give a damn about them. There's always lots of footy worldwide 247 too, and greyhounds or tennis.

I'd suggest for now that you steer well clear of automation, get some screen time in and really understand the basics first.

[Derek27]

Hi All

I have fiddled about with Bet Angel for a couple of months but only bits and bobs, and nothing specific. I have decided the time has come to actually stick to one thing and try to get half decent at it, and given my work and family life I thought Horse Racing was a sensible place to go as it's available to me in the evenings and when I have spare time in the day.

One of the things I was using Bet Angel for was dutching horse races, of which I had some success but more failures, likely due to the lack of knowledge about the system.

So, what I need really is some people on here who do this day in day out, who would be willing to help me learn exactly what I should be doing. What do I need to learn, do I need a specific strategy, do I need something automated, do I do this before the race or during, plus a million other questions.

I'm not a big fan of training videos, I'm better with someone explaining something to be in a straightforward way for a beginner.

So, any and all advice/help would be really great if you have the time to give it.

Thank you.
Ham

You'll be very lucky to get a personal trainer for free.

You didn't say what your aim is. Are you intent on learning gambling or trading?

Horse racing is the worst sport to start gambling on. It took me over ten years to become knowledgeable enough to be profitable. If you're trading it's not necessary to learn about a sport to expert level, you can even cold trade without knowing anything about it but just studying the markets and it opens the doors to many sports.

In my opinion at least, one of the key skills you need to trade is the ability to problem-solve, spot trends and figure things out yourself. I'm not saying you can't learn from others, but you should be able to learn the basics from literature and videos, there's so much good material about. I believe Peter was planning on a beginners course (I think it was a video course but don't remember).

Or you could do a football trading course here; https://www.psychoff.co.uk/courses-fees

or receive one-to-one mentoring here. https://www.psychoff.co.uk/vip-mentoring

[Kai]

I'm not a big fan of training videos, I'm better with someone explaining something to be in a straightforward way for a beginner.

Welcome. But as Derek said, active mentoring is quite the luxury. Costs aside, would take weeks if not months to go from beginner to pro(fitable)

[Derek27]

So, what I need really is some people on here who do this day in day out, who would be willing to help me learn exactly what I should be doing.

I'll just add that nobody can teach you exactly what you should be doing because there is no correct way to trade. There probably are as many successful ways to trade as there are successful traders. After learning the basics you'll eventually develop your own MO. Good luck.

[gazuty]

So, any and all advice/help would be really great if you have the time to give it.

Ham

Welcome.

Recommend you read my guidance - viewtopic.php?p=265873#p265873

I took time and I was thoughtful about what I had learned. Many others on these forums are the same, and will pass on great information and guidance, you've already received great stuff up above and no doubt more will follow (and some of what I say has already been said but let me put it in my own words).

There is nothing like trial and error to get going. There is no "best idea", no "best solution", no "best course" - in short there is no "silver bullet". Don't go on a search for the grail. There has been lots of debate on these fora over the years about whether in fact "it" can be taught. The answer is not to everyone because so much relies on the abilitiy of the student to learn, to set ego aside, to master their own mind, and finally grit (perhaps the most important ingredient). So many cannot even spend 10 minutes a day writing down their ideas and thinking about their results, let alone setting aside time to do some research. Don't spend all your time on ideas and research, spend 80% of your time on trial and error, spend 10% of your allocated time writing down what is happening and 10% on reading and research.

So, what I need really is some people on here who do this day in day out, who would be willing to help me learn exactly what I should be doing. What do I need to learn, do I need a specific strategy, do I need something automated, do I do this before the race or during, plus a million other questions.

This question cannot be answered. We each skin the cat in a different way - that suits our individual thinking patterns and what we have discovered. I am good at pattern recognition and my strategy is based on that. Others analyse horse racing form, greyhound form etc and have built fantastic models. Some have gone deep into statistical analysis, poisson distributions and goal spread across soccer leagues. These are but a few examples.

So what are you good at? Where does your interest intersect with your natural intelligence? Can you code in python or are you an excel wizard? Can you watch lots of pre-off trading and recognise patterns? Do you closely follow horses or greyhounds and want to get further into form analysis. One thing is for certain - go your own way. And if you don't make, there is no shame, it does not in any way impact on who you are or your worth as a human being. Just make sure you don't spend all your evenings away from your family and wake up divorced, lonely and a stranger to your kids. Don't chase your losses.

Gaz

[jamesg46]

"There is nothing like trial & error" best advice you'll get.

Asking for advice can lead to chaos, you'll end up with conflicting opinions that will drag you in an 1/8 of direction from all sides, ultimately you'll end up dizzy with no understanding of anything.

Practice makes perfect but do it deliberately.

https://youtu.be/one1xfdC4PE

[decomez6]

One of the things I was using Bet Angel for was dutching horse races, of which I had some success but more failures, likely due to the lack of knowledge about the system.

a value finding system ? ........how about you take dutching seriously and be as good as a proffessional. unpeel the layers of failure and find out what is causing it.
BA is an executional tool which will rely on your input to find value. Now that you have a reasonable grip on the bits and bobs, its time to work on your intuition and build a wealth of knowledge and come up with a well defined trading plan. its all good to try things out but its even more important to learn from it.

ask yourself.

1. is BA the edge (value) . traders put lots of effort learning how to code and use executional tools .this can be exhausting and give a false sense of trading/betting achievement .
2. have realistic targets and expectations.
3. financial state of mind ( loss or win is part of the game)

my take:
keep it simple adapt and evolve.

[Anbell]

I'm impressed by the gumption

[wearthefoxhat]

If you're not a fan of videos, maybe a thread recommendation could help get you started.

Here are some that might help get the creative juices going. (JollyGreen)

All 8 parts worth working through.

viewforum.php?f=2

[Kai]

I have fiddled about with Bet Angel for a couple of months but only bits and bobs, and nothing specific.

You can do many things with Bet Angel, compared to other software, it would take far too long to write about all the differences

[Derek27]

I have fiddled about with Bet Angel for a couple of months but only bits and bobs, and nothing specific.

You can do many things with Bet Angel, compared to other software, it would take far too long to write about all the differences

[Kai]

One for Dallas, the unsung hero

[Hammyali]

Well, firstly can I say a huge thank you to everyone who has commented and offered advice. It's quite rare in a forum environment to find actual supportive common sense replies as usually there is the odd sarcastic comment from someone who thinks they know everything and look at you as an inferior nobody.

Secondly, I'd like to clarify my post by saying at no point was I asking for someone to give me one to one 'Make me rich' training and mentoring, I just wanted exactly what you all gave me, which was useful advice and somewhere to start. Having read all the comments I can give you a bit more info on exactly what I want from all this. I have been into sport in general since I was young, and competed in lots of them, some to higher standards than others. So, my knowledge of sport in general is pretty good, and I can give you a rundown of rules and players for most mainstream sport. That said, I have not one particular thing I prefer over another, but the ones I would watch would tend to be some tennis, snooker, cricket. Snooker would be the one I would know most about as I played 8 Ball Pool to county/national level so I played for practice.

As I know general information and not in depth specifics my trading would be analytical based and not sport specific. I'm not interested in becoming an expert in horse racing or football, but I have an analytical mind and I am good at solving problems, so this is where my trading strong points would be.

I obviously still need to start from scratch and learn exactly how to put my analytical problem solving mind to use, so that would be advice I would need. And the above answers another question, trading NOT gambling, as I have no interest in it.

I'm sure I will have lots of questions about the system (after my fiddling around I have some already!) but I will post these on the newbie forum for some help.

I hope that answers some questions and gives everyone a bit more info on what I want to do.

Hamish