My first taste of success

[iambic_pentameter]

I started my trading journey less than 3 months ago.

I've left positions go in-running, I've traded when I've been tired and I've used stakes that were too high.

Yesterday, I took the decision to limit myself to a £10 bank and only trading with £2 stakes.

Here is a screenshot from the 19 races today - all pre-race.

Whilst it's not a huge amount of profit, I'm dead chuffed with it

Positives:

1) I stopped trading at 4.30pm because I was tired
2) I didn't take any positions in play
3) Before entering a trade, I made an assessment of what is happening i.e which horse is strong / weak / money matched etc.

I've still got more to learn but what today's session has taught me, is that I can do this.

Thank-you to everyone who has answered questions for me, especially Dallas, who has answered messages privately.

Iambic Pentameter

[Abraquay]

Stick with it. I started in January this year like you on small stakes.

[iambic_pentameter]

Good work Abraquay and well done on your journey, too.

Less than a year and I'd be more than happy with that from horse racing.

[dannycutts]

I started 3 months ago and only really started last week... still losing :-\

Practice mode I made £100.02 one day... I could not repeat that though in real life

[iambic_pentameter]

Hi Danny

Firstly, well done on giving it a go!

Secondly, I wouldn't get too hung up on your losses - I traded 20 races yesterday (Monday) and made a 0.23p loss overall.

Rather than viewing that as a bad result, I look it as:

a) Education - I've traded 20 races and I know more than I did before I did that PLUS it only cost me 0.23p

b) I was able to trade 20 races without losing my whole bank - i.e. I must be getting something right.

Practice mode is okay to a point but you'll only become better by putting real money through the markets.

Always keep in mind that any successful trader will have losses - it matters not whether they are sports traders, financial traders, commodities traders - the crucial aspect, is how they deal with those losses. Remember, with trading, the risk can be established beforehand.

With my £10 bank, I have a £2 stake and a 10% stop loss i.e. 20p loss per trade.

Perhaps you could try something similar?

Also, before entering any trade, make sure you have a valid reason for doing so - don't make the mistake of just trading for the sake of it.

Finally, remember that certain market conditions suit certain strategies - i.e. if the price is jumping around all over the place, best not to try scalping.

Good luck with it, Sir.

[Bluesky]

Hi iambic, nice set of results thanks for posting. I noticed one of the losses (70 pence) seemed to stand out from the other results. This was three times bigger than your next biggest loss (23 pence) and almost double your biggest win (37 pence). Did you get hit by a big spike that resulted in this loss or was there another reason?

[Bluesky]

Great set of results Abraquay does that now represent a typical days trading for you or was that one of your best days?

Have you done any trading courses or have you managed to teach yourself from what you have learned from trading forums and youtube videos?

[Abraquay]

Hi Bluesky,

That £103 profit was over 7 days. I work full time so can only trade on a weekend and on an evening. I have a few screenshots that i can post. Most of the time i break even and have a few good days where i can make a small amount. Still have a lot to learn about the markets. Just watching Peter's videos on youtube and the forum.
Not been on any courses.

[Bluesky]

Thanks for the reply Abraquay and the screen shots, you certainly seem to be making some progress. I have watched several of PWs videos and Mugsgames vids but I'm not really understanding what is going on.

I have been match betting for nearly a year and have made several thousand pounds profit, but unlike trading match betting takes very little skill and it also has a very limited life expectancy (the bookies gub and restrict your accounts very quickly). I would imagine that by this time next year I will have used up most if not all available bookmakers.

I am therefore looking for something that might be both enjoyable and profitable once I have to stop match betting, sports trading might be this something, but it appears from what I have read to be extremely difficult.

I will probably use some of my match betting profits to take a course or two on sports trading to see if that can give me some help in getting started.

[dannycutts]

Hi Danny

Firstly, well done on giving it a go!

Secondly, I wouldn't get too hung up on your losses - I traded 20 races yesterday (Monday) and made a 0.23p loss overall.

Rather than viewing that as a bad result, I look it as:

a) Education - I've traded 20 races and I know more than I did before I did that PLUS it only cost me 0.23p

b) I was able to trade 20 races without losing my whole bank - i.e. I must be getting something right.

Practice mode is okay to a point but you'll only become better by putting real money through the markets.

Always keep in mind that any successful trader will have losses - it matters not whether they are sports traders, financial traders, commodities traders - the crucial aspect, is how they deal with those losses. Remember, with trading, the risk can be established beforehand.

With my £10 bank, I have a £2 stake and a 10% stop loss i.e. 20p loss per trade.

Perhaps you could try something similar?

Also, before entering any trade, make sure you have a valid reason for doing so - don't make the mistake of just trading for the sake of it.

Finally, remember that certain market conditions suit certain strategies - i.e. if the price is jumping around all over the place, best not to try scalping.

Good luck with it, Sir.

Thanks for that Today was better I lost a lot less than normal I just sat and watched and tried to predict what I think was happening... I will get it in the end

[iambic_pentameter]

Hi iambic, nice set of results thanks for posting. I noticed one of the losses (70 pence) seemed to stand out from the other results. This was three times bigger than your next biggest loss (23 pence) and almost double your biggest win (37 pence). Did you get hit by a big spike that resulted in this loss or was there another reason?

Hi Bluesky, good observation and I can't recall exactly what happened.

What I can tell you, is that I lost £3 yesterday due to doing some In Running trading - won't be doing that again.

Interestingly, had I not done those trades, I would have been up on the day and I've worked out that with my current win rate (60%) if I trade 24 races and win 14 races with an average of 21p and lose 10 races with an average of 20p per loss, I'd be up 94p on the day - based on a £10 bank, this is 9.4% which isn't too bad at all.

So, for me the following approach will be made:

1) No more in-running trades using the In Running trader - great tool, by the way, but I'm not yet proficient enough to read races.

2) If I hit my 20p loss per race, I'll move on to the next one.

3) Try and ride my wins out more i.e. if the market moves in my favour, I will add to the position.

Like you, I've tried matched betting in the past and it was being gubbed by Ladbrokes, Stan James, Betfred that put me off doing it.

I think you can make money doing it but it's a lot of hassle and, unless you have multiple accounts / time to manage it, it will never be a long term source of income.

Best of luck with your trading journey.

[Crazyskier]

Stick with it. I started in January this year like you on small stakes.

I started last summer also with VERY small stakes and a risk-averse strategy of trading well in advance of the off to avoid the more rapid and in my case frightening price swings.

95% of this is automation and penny-pinching / scalping, with limited manual intervention if I spot gaps that mean I make more than my default settings on my auto bot.

See image below, this is a typical day of trading every race with around 85% profitrate and losses not exceeding my biggest wins...

Pennies make pounds, so keep up the good work guys. Discipline is everything!!

[iambic_pentameter]

Good work, Crazyskier.

Do that 24 days a month, and you've got an extra £100 in your bin - whiich, over the course of a year, is a holiday.

Depending on where you holiday, of course.

[Crazyskier]

Good work, Crazyskier....
Depending on where you holiday, of course.

Thanks, I'm a crazy skier, so holidays are rarely inexpensive

[jimibt]

Stick with it. I started in January this year like you on small stakes.

I started last summer also with VERY small stakes and a risk-averse strategy of trading well in advance of the off to avoid the more rapid and in my case frightening price swings.

95% of this is automation and penny-pinching / scalping, with limited manual intervention if I spot gaps that mean I make more than my default settings on my auto bot.

See image below, this is a typical day of trading every race with around 85% profitrate and losses not exceeding my biggest wins...

Pennies make pounds, so keep up the good work guys. Discipline is everything!!

like yourself, i stay WELL away from the grown up action in the 5 minutes leading up to the race. all my strategies are automation based too, with 75% of them occurring IR. without automation, i found i had far too twitchy a finger to consistently profit from this. by accepting that there will be losing races as well as winners, it helps in preventing the type of manual intervention that more often than not turned a good trade into a loser for me