NEW Website Launched!

I'm pleased to announce the launch of the Sports Trading Journey website! Please feel free to have a look around and sign up to the FREE membership plan. After joining you can will be able to check out the 'Ultimate Start-Up Package', which is a series of 11 videos I've created that contains everything you will need to set yourself up as a trader. Some more free videos are available to watch and plenty more will be updated over time.

All the information about what the Sports Trading Journey is all about is viewable on the site, so if your tired of waking up to cancelled meetings and an overload of all weather tracks, go check out some videos.

I'm really looking forward to getting stuck into trading again after spending more time on the site than in the markets recently. But I'll ease myself into it all over the next few weeks while the weathers still a little temperamental. My rusty trigger finger will have to get polished off but a break from it all I've found in the past is never a bad thing. Fingers crossed to a few warmer months....OK maybe I'm dreaming.

The best advice I'd give over the winter is to reduce stakes and be less active in the markets. The moves can be erratic and the fill rate can be terrible! There is a huge percentage of traders fighting against each other for positions and the markets don't always react in a controlled manner. So being clever about when you enter/exit and control your staking is so important. Being patient and picking your opportunities wisely is the way to go.

Just remember loads of opportunities will be around the corner soon. It's a time to plod by and lower your expectations this time of year, preparing for the coming new year and having some epic snow ball fights!

Denman's Third Hennessy?

I've always been a massive follower of Denman and he returns to action once again today at Newbury. He attempts to make history by winning his third Hennessy Gold Cup in the 15:05. Denman's a year older, 8lb higher in the weights but this year the preparation has gone very smoothly apparently. He will have to be at his best to beat a very competitive field today and with Sam Thomas back on his back (rightly so in my eyes) things are lined up for a fantastic race!

I've been watching the market over the past day and there's an interesting drift on Denman. It's traded at a low at 4.72, but around the 5.8 mark this time yesterday. It's currently trading at 7.4 and even touched 7.8. I believe this price could look massive at the end of the race as I think Denman's going to be back to his best fresh. Jumping in his relentless fashion and almost bullying his rivals into defeat. If he starts to find his rhythm, anything over 7.0 on Betfair is going to get smashed in price. Could be a nice back to lay in running but I'm personally having a cheeky double. Go on the tank!

I'm doubling Denman with Big Bucks, another horse who I have closely followed over the years and has done me well. Today should be a walk in the palk for him and he should be a class above his competition over 3m hurdles. He's very short in price though and currently trading at 1.30 running in the 14:30 Newbury. That's why it's worth a double and no single bet. He often hits a flat spot in his races but always finds more :)

As a trader I don't often have a punt, but now and again I like to get involved. Today seems a nice opportunity to get a decent double up.

Fingers crossed!

Ello Ello

Howdy all, It's about time I get back to blogging and update a few things. I haven't posted in a while coz I haven't done much trading for myself recently. I've been busy finishing off the educational videos for SportsTradingJourney and it's taken me a lot longer than I first thought. It's the planning, editing and producing stages rather than the actual video creating that eats up the time. So the only way I was going to get this site finished before the end of the year was to focus 100% of my time on it. It's well on the way now and I'll be opening the doors up very soon. Thanks for your patience to everyone who has shown an interest.

Motherland Return

I moved back from Madrid a few months ago which was pretty crazy. I stayed there a little longer than first planned, but it was well worth it! I still have the travelling bug inside me and I can see myself jumping on a plane to another country sometime in the future. The experience was awesome and who knows where I'll be checking out in the years to come but for now my feet are firmly set in the motherland. I'd recommend to anyone to live in another country for the pure shits and giggles of it all, and I'm looking forward to doing it again someday.

Geeks Toy

Most of you in the sports trading world will be aware of a trading program called The Geek's Toy. But if you haven't heard of it by now where have you been?? Link here: Geek's Toy

It's taken the trading industry by storm and not just coz the software will remain free for 2011! It's due to the fact that The Toy easily competes against the other product vendors that charge a fee for their use. Recently GeeksToy.com have been running a charity fund raiser for charity need. This message is a bit belated I know but check out the good work thats been taking place as I'm sure he'll be running more fund raisers like these in the future.

I was beta testing the new release of Version 1.1 with Advanced Charting & Market Overview before the official release came out, as I've been thinking about using the Toy for my day to day trading for a while now. The only main feature the Toy was missing was the charting, and ladies and gentlemen it has arrived! There's a million and one settings in the Toy and all customizable to set up the software perfect for your needs.

I've used another product vendor for years now so I wasn't easily going to change over to a program just coz it's free. I wanted a program that added something extra and everything about the Toy makes it an easy decision to change products. After playing around with it for sometime I think it's actually faster, more customisable and generally a more slick product in general to use than anything on the market. The product being free is just a huge bonus and my hats go off to the Geek to creating this bit of software that is only going to get better!

"Probably the best Betfair Trading Software in the world!"

Back To It

I'm looking forward to getting down to business again and I'll be easing myself back into things as this time of year can be a bit tricky. Mainly due to the change of seasons - from flat to jumps and the weather will throw a spanner in the mix soon. But it's a great time to get stuck in the markets and learn the ropes for when the nice summer meetings come into action next year. In December there is some nice meetings on though, especially around the end of year so they should be some good trading fodder.

I've had a few bizarre comments regarding Sam Wilson I want to clear up. I don't speak on behalf of Sam but I want to mention he's definitely not an alias of mine I'm pretending to be. A silly bit of speculation that if you checked a few of his videos you will realise we are 2 different people. Makes me laugh really as I don't know how pretending to be someone else would benefit me.

People come and go in the blogging world and I know a few ex bloggers who stopped coz the amount of ridiculous comments from unwelcome anonymous contributors. My words of advice for these people....If you have nothing useful to say....pipe down and focus on your own trading.

On a lighter note I'm going to introduce something new to my blog next year. I've been thinking about what ideas I could implement to make things more interactive with people. I'll explain in more detail about this at the start of 2011 :)

Happy Trading!

Goodwood & New Vids

Well I'm still in Spain even though my initial plans were to move back to London in July. I couldn't resist staying here till the end of the summer as it's scorching now. So come November I'll be back in the big smoke :)

I was lucky enough to be in the country that lifted the World Cup and wow what an experience! The streets were flooded with people all with a grin from ear to ear and it felt like a festival vibe with the city buzzing for days. It's safe to say the city has calmed down a little now, although you can still see the smugness a mile off. Who blames them, I thought Spain were the stand out team from the start and they didn't disappoint.

Glorious Goodwood

The markets last week were very nice trading fodder. The big meetings attract a lot more interest to the exchanges and this in turn generates a lot more liquidity than normal meetings. What is great though on major festivals is that the extra boost of cash flows into the other meetings on the card which creates opportunities all over the place. Big meetings like this tend to raise the bar day by day where you will see a build up to the top top races later in the week. But this doesn't always transfer into the way you profit from the markets. Bizarrely enough though this week it did, where I kept improving on my previous days profit by a hundred or so. So when the end of the Saturday came I felt a little tear slide down my cheek as I wanted Goodwood to last forever ;(

I think a lot of people struggle on the big meetings due to the fact the markets look and feel so much different to normal. You simply have to adopt an alternative approach to trading these and be willing to increase your stakes to get the most out of them. The reason why most full-time traders enjoy these times is mainly down to the market acting like it should most of the time. What I mean by this is a market is filled with enough genuine money to counteract the amount of traders and manipulators in the market. This means the market finds resistant points nicely which can be easily spotted/enough turnover to power through orders yourself/and many strong indicators can be found to back up your opinions. So really this makes things easier for the experienced trader and most of the time makes things become enjoyable and profitable.

Unfortunately the evening racing is coming to a close, and soon we'll be tackling obstacles such as bad weather and poor meetings. But for now make the most out of the next month where you can make a nice bonus on the day with the extra races on the card.

Here's Saturdays P/L:

New Vids

I took the day off trading today, but wouldn't have if I took notice of it being a Bank Holiday. There are always more meetings on the card and I always seem to do well on them. But hey I decided to create a few video's instead.

The first 1 is uploaded to my Screencast folder and is for everyone who reads the blog. It's using £10 stakes and shows you how you really don't need a big bank to chuck a few ££'s in the account.

First Vid: here

The Second vid is exclusively for people on the SportsTradingJourney mailing-list. Don't worry if you are not currently on it, it's free to sign up and all you need to join and receive the second vid is include your name and email.

Mailing-list: here

The Second vid is 20 minutes long and gives a little bit more info on what's happening with the upcoming online tuition site that's going to be launched. The vid shows you 2 races with audio commentary, expressing my thought process behind every decision.

The video will be sent out to your email over the next few days, keep an eye out in your Inbox.

I want to mention that no trader is perfect and even people who are full-time constantly make mistakes. The difference is the people who have found consistency are those who are willing to make mistakes and learn from them. It's part of the game that you will lose before you succeed. It's not about trying to maximise every opportunity while your learning trading, these videos will show you that you don't have to be clicking like a madman chasing yourself around the market to make a living from trading. It's staying patient and picking your opportunities wisely first, then after when you find a consistent edge you can start trying to maximise your returns and push yourself furthur.

Enjoy & Happy clicking!

New Courses Dates In London

After several months of running separate training courses from home, Sam and I have organised our first joint courses held just after the World Cup Final. We are now taking bookings and for more info please click HERE

Market Madness

Trading is a funny old game, as you don't really know what each day will bring and what new opportunities may arise. All it takes is 1 bookie or big punter to put a decent order through the market and it changes everything in that 10 minutes worth of trading. Even though the turnover in a race can easily push over the 1 million pound mark in high quality meetings. An order for example of £10-20k can dramatically affect the overall price even in these types of races. There are many factors for this, but the main reason is that most of that massive turnover in a race is accumulated from traders and not genuine bets. When someone is willing to smash a large genuine bet in the market, some traders will instantly be caught out and needing to close their positions out. This accelerates the desperation in people's minds and you can almost feel people starting to panic. This ultimately leads to people not only scrambling to get out for a loss but also other people scrambling to get on the possible move.

Another knock on affect of large orders flying into a market, is if someone is manipulating the price to their benefit and holding a price where they want it. Then this can completely destroy the manipulators objective and force a market to react in other crazy ways when they either chase their own position, or alternatively keep trying to push a market back to a price which puts them back in the green.

From Thursday-Saturday (I didn't trade Sunday but it might have been the same behaviour) someone was willing to smash through large orders on nearly every race of the day and eve's. This proved an exciting few days in trying to make the most of of situations like these, and in my eyes if you see a big gambler like this around you have to base your whole strategies and styles around him. If anyone was trading and had a hard time of things, I'll explain a few basis ways to approach markets with a big player in them.

1. Be very careful leaving too much lay money sat around. The big punt can come at any time and can easily wipe your orders out leaving you no time to exit for a small loss.
2. Try get on the first move, but only if you are confident the order is genuine and they want the bet matched. If they do a common occurrence is they drag the bet down until its matched.
3. If you miss the first move, there is often a chance to still get ride the price down. But it all depends on how much of the large bet has been taken and how far the price has gone down already. React to the situation accordingly and if you think the order is still going to be dragged down don't hesitate and get involved.
4. Looking for the reversal can work nicely as well by watching closely for when the big bet gets taken, riding a possible bounce back move where the price adjusts to the over reaction of the large bet.
   
5. If the price is being manipulated anyway before the big bet flys in, be careful what price you hit and pay attention to what the manipulation is trying to do after the large orders comes.

These are a few things to consider if you see this type of behaviour again, and I assure you will do at some point in the future. Who knows today at Ascot could entice some large bets :)

Friday and Saturday were my best days last week, although unfortunately on a few occasions I didn't make the most out of what was going on. I was getting a little bit too aggressive on some of the moves and I annoyed myself near the end of the day time card on Saturday. You'll see on the p/l screenshot I got a bit carried away with putting too much money on at times where I really didn't need to. Especially when I was already 600 notes up. There was a lot of money to be made and it's hard to really nail all of these markets. But all in all I was happy with the overall profits in the madness of the weekend.

Friday

Saturday

Good luck at Ascot and keep an eye out for large orders!

The Secret Of Consistency

Apologies for the lack of blogging recently, I've been busy finishing off my last courses in Madrid and planning out my move back to London.

I'd like to thank everyone who has attended 1 of my courses so far. It's been a very interesting experience for me which has changed up my lifestyle somewhat. After years of looking at the markets its a nice venture to go down by making my days different to just staring at numbers going up and down :) It's also been very rewarding and something that I will be happily doing with Sam for sometime to come. On that topic Sam and I will soon be announcing our first joint course dates very soon on my next post! We are going to be offering for the first few course packages of 1-2 days in mid July. I'll explain it all on my next post so keep an eye out over the next week or so.

When I first started running the courses I didn't expect that I would enjoy them as much as I have, even though I seem to have a habit of exhausting both the client and myself out by the time the course finishes. I hope you have gained a lot from them in offering you a chance to see what works for me, showing you an alternative perspective looking at the market and offered you a plan of action for the coming months.

The people who has sat beside me realise I have no golden ticket in controlling your financial future. I can show you the how to, but you have to be the one that clicks the button and react correctly to a mix of circumstances. This will come with time, but you have to be willing to give it just that - time. It's all about being able to adapt to each market condition and trying to maximise profit from the markets your reading correctly whilst minimising your losses from the markets that are difficult. There are so many more difficult markets on an average week that successfully cutting your losses is so important. It sounds simple I know, but you have to stick to strict rules in this game otherwise your fighting a losing battle. I think here lies a factor why people have many problems coming to term with consistent profits.

In simple terms what I regard a good market is 1 that not only has decent liquidity in volume but also has a good fill rate in the market. This is essential in being able to get out of trouble quickly if it turns against you as your order gets matched at a loss that is easily recovered. Also it ensures you turn over your own bank a few times which ultimately leads to happier rewards. Thinner markets are trickier due the fact they don't attract as much genuine money to them. Which leads to them being pushed around by manipulation and not bouncing to and from resistance points very easily. I often know when and where and market 'should' be at throughout a race, but when there isn't enough genuine moves occurring, then situations don't always happen as they 'should' do. I always tell people expect the unexpected at all times, because inevitably markets will do unexpected things more times than you could imagine.

So the secret of consistency I believe is down to being able to minimise your losses very well in many different scenarios. From swing to scalp trading it doesn't make much difference. Apart from in a swing trade I am willing to give myself a larger loss margin where I'm looking for a potential swing back in my favour. A small loss can turn into a substantial loss very quickly if you are not ready to execute your exit position. If you can be prepared to take the small loss before the price hits you, closing out for a loss becomes so much easier. Simply put you were ready to take the loss before the market even got there. Like programming your mind into expecting the market to do what you weren't expecting, and just take the recoverable loss straight away. If you don't do this it is almost too easy to panic when the a situation turns into a small loss, freeze, stare at the screen and 2 seconds later that small loss you could of taken is now a loss that isn't easily recoverable. Having a big loss affects not only a nasty look on your p/l, but makes it so hard to stay clear minded in the following races in the day. Depending on how bad the loss is even to the point of affecting your head throughout the whole week/month.

Hope that made some kind of sense :)


Here's the difference between a steady day of little losses, and smaller wins with more consistency.




Compared to a day with bigger losses and bigger wins meaning less overall profit on the day. It just shows how the small profits build up when you are not throwing away too much of hard earn cash.

SportsTradingJourney

We have had many discussions on where to how to take the membership site forward. It won't be a million miles away from launch but we want to make sure we get it right from the off so please bear with us. It will be more likely be launched when I'm back in London. Also we'll get some more free vids out to the mailing list very soon so check your emails.

Few thoughts -

The reason I think this is worth pursuing and how the idea came about is because it became apparent how much people learnt from analysing my own videos whilst on my courses. If we can get a similar kind of experience over the web then I think it will really benefit people.

The problem is that when I can talk over the videos in person. Where I pause, rewind and re- explain things. I can give a full understanding of exactly whats happening and why. Where expressing this online in a vid will be a little harder to get the full story across. With this is mind we want the membership site only to be available to people who have attended the course. Not only will this make it a very exclusive area where people can interact with each other, but mainly that people we are trying to help have met us in person and seen it all happen live. The way we trade, how we go about our decisions and how to implement strategies successfully. So seeing new fresh video's on a regular basis will really push their learning and understanding of the markets in the right direction a lot more. So we have decided to have the site like an on-going mentoring idea where we can easily get across everything we want to offer over a perfect teaching platform over the web.

Saying that we might introduce an area where people who haven't attended 1 of our courses can join up in another section. The interest looks good but we just really want to have the main aim of the site dedicated to the people we have met in person and can show them a clear path through our video's. The small group training courses are our main focus so the membership site will be a great way of helping these people out after they are thrown in the deep end and tackling the markets for themselves.

Chat & Forum

I've created a new chat feature to my site on a page at the top. I'll be on it when I can so feel free to come and say ello. But I won't be chatting away to myself so don't be shy :)
Sam and I will also be doing a Q&A session on the chat very soon where you can fire away questions at us for 30 mins or so. The date will be announced on the next post.

The forum seemed to have lost its momentum a little so I'll make sure I get some new posts on there and discuss a few things with everyone there. Sam and I will make sure we post quite often so again please don't hesitate to get involved.



Yikes sorry bit of a long post there, just had a few things I wanted to cover. Many thanks and please check back for more information on the London courses coming up in July.

Theres loads of opportunities around now with evening racing and some big meetings coming up Happy trading!

Betfair Travelling

I returned back to Madrid from Barcelona on Friday night after escaping to the beach for 5 days and enjoying some time with a friend of mine. It's an awesome place to visit and I would recommend you not only check out some of the amazing architecture around, but also keep your wallet firmly in your trousers. It's renowned for having loads of dirty pick pocketers and there was a few occasions I had to give a few people the evils. It has a different vibe to Madrid and both have their charms. But I am definitely going to be searching for somewhere to live near a beach after my return back to London for a year or 2. Living the simple life is all I want really, and as much as life in Madrid has rewarded me this, living so far away from the ocean is something I am craving for on my next adventure.

Some people have asked me why I'm moving back to London when I'm living abroad like a lot of people dream of. But there many reasons for my move and my return to the motherland is by far a run away home mission. I moved to Madrid not to settle down and soak up the sun for the rest of my life, I moved here for an adventure with a friend of mine and it was never going to be a full-time move. I'm still young and want to travel the world trading in different countries and Madrid was just my first step. I'm thinking of possibly Brazil in the future to take advantage of the morning working hours and enjoying the beach life in the afternoon. I know someone who is already there and says its unbelievable.

What I have realised though, Betfair trading is not the kind of profession you can easily take your laptop with you and earn money whilst exploring different countries. Due to needing a good Internet connection and feeling the need to be happy in your work surroundings. But to all those wanting to travel and trade all i can say is do it! Instead of thinking for months about the consequences and challenges too much just go with the flow....what's the worst that could happen!

But for now I eyes are set firmly on London, and when I lived there before I was so far away from the centre I didn't feel like I got the most out of it. So I'm going to be pretty central this time probably around the Camden area and enjoy the crazyness of London for a bit. I've got a lot of friends in which I'm looking forward to catch up with, and Sam and I and going to really get stuck into teaching and helping as many people out as we can with progressing their own trading.

Trading Courses

I'm running my last few courses in Madrid so if people are interested in coming for a nice holiday combined with learning how to trade send me an email. The course dates are on the right and due to them being my last over here I've reduced the cost of them. These rates will only be this cheap whilst I'm in Madrid due to the fact that clients have to pay for other costs - flights accommodation etc. So for people wanting a very reasonable but very substantial training for 3-6 days let me know. You will be automatically be entitled for a group discount as well so its a double bonus.

SportsTradingJourney

Thanks to all who have checked out the free vids on the site and have put themselves on the mailing list. The interest has been amazing and this venture is something we are really looking forward to getting started as soon as we can. It looks like it will properly be launched when I'm back in London and Sam and I are currently building a huge amount of some great content for the site. The main emphasis of the site is just that - content! And clients will get a constant supply of new, fresh exciting videos on a regular basis that shows you a massive range of examples of how to trade the pre-race horse markets.

A few people have informed me that the first video is out of sync with the audio so apologies for this. I've rendered a new 1 and the correct vid will be on the site tomorrow. Many people have asked when some more videos are coming out and the wait will only be a few more days. Those who have subscribed to the mailing list will be getting 2 new free videos to get stuck into whilst you wait for the proper launch of the site! So keep an eye out this week in your email.

If you want to see some more free videos simply register on the mailing list @ www.sportstradingjourney.com and you will receive another free vid. With 2 more getting sent out to you over the next few days.

Hardest £9 Ever Earnt

After returning from Barcelona and having a week off I wanted a nice steady day on Saturday to get me back into the swing of things, but trading is never as straight forward as you want it to be. I started well building up a decent amount only to be stung badly in the 14:30 Sandown. A whopping -844 to be exact. Ouch! It was one of those freak times that you do something that 90% of the time would have worked but this time didn't. I layed Twist Magic at the off for a big stake as it was at the back of the field and looking like it was going to get a terrible start. Only to suddenly kick on from a running start whilst every other runner was left standing still. The price collapsed horribly from 3.0-1.80 straight away and left me pretty screwed the say the least. It was a combination of bad luck and getting way too involved on something in running that is generally the devil when it comes to pre - horse trading.

So I went on an almighty comeback after that, knowing I was trading well before that blip and continued in the same fashion there after. I got it all back with a crazy roller coaster day only to chuck 200 away on something very silly. I simply should have stopped when that big loss back but naturally wanted to kick on after seeing the green. So i plugged away on a few evening races and yet again managed to sneak in the green for £9. My hardest ever £9 earnt.......I'd probably say so.

The markets were fantastic on Saturday and it should have been a great day, but you have to keep your head and battle through times like that when luck sometimes isn't on your side. But I'm very happy to make the loss back and I feel now the markets have gathered momentum and the good times have come :)




So a conclusion is still this -

In Running = The Devil!

SportsTradingJourney

Fellow traders and fellow want to be traders!

.....

I'd like to announce a project that Sam Wilson and I have had in the pipeline for a while. After many hours of idea swapping and brain wrestling we are introducing a membership in the name of:

www.SportsTradingJourney.com

If you click the link above it takes you to a temporary sign up page in which you will see my small stakes video I added on my forum to the left. When you add your email to the mailing list to the right, a confirmation opt in link will be sent out to you. Simply follow the link and it will take you to my second small stakes vid I've created using £5-£10 stakes. Also check out Sam's small stake's vid he's recently added on his blog - http://samwilson82.blogspot.com/.

If you like these training vids, you will love the membership site we are working on....It's everything you need to take your trading journey to the next level and show you the styles and techniques we use on a daily basis.

I think there is a common misunderstanding from pro traders that if you give away your secrets and your own styles behind your successful trading, your own edge will be lost. But I don't think this is the case and Sam and I intend to show you a very honest membership site with no hidden secrets. We are willing to show a full journey of trading material using videos with in-depth audio, and regular webinars to interact with our clients. Feedback and reviews of how to read a market accurately and a huge amount of trading content that will open your eyes up to how pro traders react and think in a wide range of examples. Progressing from small stakes in the region of £5-£10 - increasing them over time to £100+ stakes.

This site will be the only 1 of its kind anywhere in the world!

We have been approached by some big players in the sports trading industry, who wanted to fund some interesting projects with us. However there ideas and systems didn't fit within our philosophy of teaching trading. Ever since I started doing personalised training courses, I wanted to show people a very honest approach to really what's going on in the market. So this is why Sam and I have decided to create our own site dedicated to helping people in a long term trading journey.

We don't have to offer help, as we are both comfortable with the amount we are earning to live the life we choose. However we really think we can help traders who have a serious aspiration to become full time mentored by us. We are fully aware that there is a very very small percentage of people on the exchanges that make decent money from trading pre-horse markets, and I think a big reason for this is that there really isn't much good advice currently on offer. We want to improve this success rate and help take clients to live the flexible free living life trading can offer.

Sam and I have been on these markets separately and combined for coming on 5 years now and witnessing tens of thousands of markets we have experience and knowledge people are searching for. There are too many questions being asked on this some what mysterious profession as a full time exchange trader, and far few decent and genuine answers being offered back. Having this project we can organise all these answers in 1 centralised place.

This won't be a site about betting systems offering you simple trading tips, it's going to be guiding you down a path of how 2 pro traders make money from these extremely tricky markets. Get your name and email on the mailing list, and we will releasing a few more free videos until the site is all ready for kick off! Also please send me any requests and ideas that we could possibly introduce to our membership site. Many thanks!

Hasta Luego!

I Smell A Rat!

Well after only a week of launching my new forum there's someone up to mischief already! Unbelievable really but something like this was bound to happen sooner or later. There's always going to be people who have nothing else better to do than try and spoil the friendly help given by other people. We are all here to make money and learn from 1 another, but this anonymous person either has too much time on there hands or has some alternative motives. Whatever the case I'd like to apologise on behalf of this unwanted poster and please have confidence that I'm on the case straight after writing this post in banning and removing all their posts/usernames they have decided to create.

The reason I wanted to create a forum where people can post as an anonymous user is to get anyone and everyone posting. It looks like this can't be the case unfortunately ladies and gentlemen so what I'm going to do is provide a forum only available to people registering. But this only takes literally a minute to setup and will get around this problem which is the last thing I and the people using the forum want. This joker has even pretended to be myself and it just shows when you offer anything in life, there's always going to be a select few who decide to take liberties on your kindness. But the forum is still viewable to all unregistered users, it's just you have to login to post.

So I'll explain the simple procedure to enjoy my forum in peace:

1. Click the forum link at the top of my blog.
2. Click on register to the right of the forum and open a free nabble account. Type a username/password, where a confirmation will be sent out to your email.
3. Follow the rest of the simple instructions and just make sure you login every time you view/post on the forum in future.

Easy Peazy! :)

I won't tolerate this kind of abuse and spam on my forum and simply won't hesitate banning users who decide to adopt this kind of behaviour. You've been warned!

Thanks for all who have posted so far (excluding this obvious fool of course) and it looks like the experiment of a forum on my blog seems very worthwhile me continuing. So long let the community grow and continue to be a big help for all involved!

I'll continue moderating the forum for now, but will be looking for a trusted moderator soon to keep a close eye on proceedings. It could be someone posting regularly on the forum or someone who has attended 1 of my courses. I'm not too sure yet but there is already some contenders on the forum who could be perfect for the job :)

Just a quick reminder that the members section on the forum is exclusively for people who have attended 1 of my courses. Simply register on the blog and send me out an invite so I can let you in to chat to other like minded chappies.

Please continue to use the forum now this issue has been sorted.

New Forum With New Vid

I'd like to announce my new forum which I've added to my blog, where like minded traders can exchange ideas and any thoughts on the subject of trading.

Thanks go out to Alistair Hamilton from BetYourLifeSportsTrading for explaining the tricks of the trade as it were and helping me put the forum together. It's an awesome blog so check it out! Alistair like myself are just experimenting the idea of a forum on a blog. Please don't be shy ladies and gentlemen and start conversing.

If you go to my forum and go in the horse racing tab, you will see I've uploaded a new video with audio! It is 30 mins long using small stakes and shows you a technique of using speculative bets as a method of making money. The video will explain more of my thought process than I can easily explain here, and it just shows you really don't need a lot in the bank to make a living from trading. Enjoy!

There is also a members section exclusively for people who have attended 1 of my courses. Here you can chat openly to each other traders about specific methods and strategies I shared with you on my course. Even possibly linking up like a trading/skype buddy like I do with Sam. If you can kindly send me a request, I'll happily add you on the list for a very exclusive area for just you. Many thanks

Manipulation

I think I have to mention a few things that's being happening in the markets of late, just to make people aware of how much these markets are being manipulated. Yes we see this all the time and people mention the fact just deal with it and get on with it. But as much as I agree with this philosophy, you have to be aware of these constant changes in conditions and trade accordingly. You simply have to try and read behind the numbers of what's really going on in a market. Don't just follow the sheep and get drawn into traps that are constantly being set. These traps are set to catch traders out thinking its going 1 way, only to be pushed rapidly against them. Try and read into their decision processes of what they are trying to do to a market, that can ultimately be the difference between winning or losing on a race. Big money rules and you have to take note of market behavior where big money is forcing the price around at their leisure.

With all that in mind strategies like this are very risky and as its an unbelievably aggressive way of making money. I know for a fact they lose from time to time and who knows to what extent these guys are winning/losing as well. All I know is when you get these sort of things wrong it goes very very sour for them quickly.

This is what I saw a few times today where massive money was forcing it 1 way, only to turn against them. But the amazing thing about the current behavior is that I've seen these people chase themselves out of losses. To try and force a market yet again when its going against them, only to chase another big bet. Even to the point of waiting till it goes in running and bailing out of their postitions.....this baffles me! It seems odd to say the least but this what makes it a great game to play....not 1 day is the same and it keeps you guessing and searching for new answers.

There methods used seem rather reckless but the fact I keep seeing this manipulation makes me think they have to be making money overall. Or is it someone with more money than sense, quite possible! But a sure fire money maker when you have a massive bank....no way in my eyes! 1 thing I will give them credit for is the size of their bollox, wowza!

With any amount of money you are playing with, you have to be shrewd and trade with control, discipline and remember, theres always a bigger fish in the sea. Watch out for circling sharks, as we wait for these opportunities.

Like an opportunity on the 16:45 today where I noticed someone had a large order to get out on the lay side, I stuck with my gut instinct and got a lovely move going up.

Cheltenham

Well thank f@%* its March :) as Jan/Feb is the hardest time of year to trade. With the poor weather and everyone with one eye on Cheltenham, it proves a tricky time for traders. But come March I start to get an excitement of good times to come. The roar and big liquidity that Cheltenham brings sets the scene for the rest of the year, and I'm heading to London on Tuesday to enjoy it back in the motherland. I'll be back in Madrid late March to enjoy my final 6 week stay here before returning back to London in May.

Hope to speak to a few friendly faces on the forum, so ciao for now

Betfair Get A Grip!

First of all I have to mention how awful Betfair (the monopoly exchange) has been operating recently. I can say that after trading on Betfair for many years, this is probably the worst run of Betfair downtime there has ever been! Usually if Betfair goes down, they sort out their issues and have it running by the next day no worries. Then if we are lucky, we might be able to have about a month's trading before yet another un-surprising crash. But this is getting a joke now too be honest and I'm definitely not the only 1 with these opinions. I've lost confidence in trading on the markets of late as I have no clue when betfair might possibly go down. It's hard enough to make a good living out of Betfair, without the fear that your whole bank can be lost in a split second if Betfair decides to fail on us. If it's there servers not able to withstand the hammering we do to them, misleading information on exactly what the hell is going on their end, or just the lack of consistency in how they deal with the process when everything decides to shut down. Whatever none sense is happening, it's simply not acceptable! Who's running this hugely profitable business...hamsters in hamster wheels? You have to ask yourself where is all that profit going towards? Making Betfair's api run more efficient? Creating a solid backbone to the whole workings of Betfair to keep us clients happy? I don't think so.

So what do we do?

Not a lot unfortunately as Betfair dominate the market by a country mile, and the liquidity is without a doubt the only reason why everyone is still putting up with this Betfair scandal. But I assure you this will keep happening over and over again unless we make a communal effort to try and put a spanner in the works. What I suggest is making 1 small step towards making it better for us all and forcing Betfair to open their eyes up to the truth.

How about once a week, lets say on a Monday everyone migrates to the purple side of Betdaq and trades/bets/arbs on there all day/night??? www.betdaq.com

I am asking everyone reading this post to please join me in practicing what you are all preaching for and give it a go. Actions speak louder than words and I'm hoping if I get a following of people this could really generate some momentum and swing some justice in our favour from a multi-billion pound company. It takes a mass migration for change so take a small step with me in showing Betfair who is really king...the client! They are never going to improve as a service unless they have some decent competition against their monopoly empire. Please vote on the poll for people willing to make this step with me.

Back To London

On a more happier tone, I mentioned on a previous post I was planning to move back to London in 2011. But I'm going to move my plan forward to the start of May 2010! In 3 months, the time feels right to go Central London and be more accessible to the people I'm trying to help out trading. Even though this great city of Madrid will stay firmly in my memory for a years to come.

I've had an awesome time here and I've proven to myself I can take this profession as a exchange trader to any country I decide to live in. The freedom and flexibility I was searching for in a job, where you can travel and be your own boss is not a figment of my imagination. So really this creates endless opportunities I could only dream of when I first started.

Trading in another country has been far from easy from the word go, but after setting up a comfortable base to trade from there's no real difference to trading in the UK. Just with the obvious change of climate and culture :) My rough plan is to stay in London for a year or 2, then continue my adventure in another country after, who knows where yet but I like it that way.

It's not goodbye to Madrid just yet so I'm not going to get emotional on you all haha, but my adventure here unfortunately feels like it's jumping it's final few hurdles. London has its charms and It almost feels like home after moving there before I moved to Madrid, so bring it on is all I can say!

I understand for many people wanting to learn this black art of trading, the need to travel to another country is not ideal. But for the many people already attended my course, the holiday/tuition idea has suited them great. I'm here till May and still offering courses on the dates posted to the right on my blog. I will put future dates in London from May onwards soon.

Playing With Fire

We play with fire on a daily basis when trading on the exchanges, as the odds of succeeding are stacked heavily against us. I'm not just talking about reading the market effectively and making the correct decisions, I'm referring to many other factors that seem to be testing our bottle.

1. Betfair going down
2. Internet going down
3. Power cut
4. Computer crashing

These 4 are the main 1's and every point apart from the first we can save ourselves a lot of potential losses that might occur.

I was reminded last Thursday that having no backup for point 3 was my downfall. The whole flat lost its power and I was left up shit creek not knowing what position I was in. Having no working phone nearby and my laptop battery being dead I was simply not prepared for this. I kicked myself when it happened knowing I should always be prepared for the worst and luckily I lost £400. But this could have been a lot worse so I took this on the chin. So always be ready for unfortunate things to happen, because trust me sooner or later they will.

The Markets

Last week i dug myself out of trouble after a great Saturday, ranking in my top 10 best ever days. So finishing the week on a very happy £1050 after a potential disaster.

Here's my week saving Saturday + £751

The last few days I haven't traded many races but made a nice return on the few I've done. Seeing Betfair down just before starting today, I thought I would wait until Friday and see if the situation improved.




Ohh I'll get a new video posted up soon.

Experimenting

With the markets being a little mad around this time of year, It's given me a chance to experiment using different techniques and trying out things I haven't tried before. When i say this it's sounds as though I've being planning out secret methods over xmas that will make me more money in the future, then implementing them when I dabbled in the markets again. But I assure you this is not how I am improving as a trader. It has come from a natural process of being active in the market and experimenting new things while it's all happening live. Mistakes will come on the way, especially when you are upping your stakes and trying to reach new levels. If you have a very hands on approach to change like this, you can tackle subtle differences in new market conditions.

The real work and idea process of experimenting comes from a very practical side I believe. You can think all day of new strategies and approaches to make you your fortune, but you simply have to evolve your own trading styles whilst your actually trading. The markets are constantly changing and no one can try and predict with positive certainty what will happen. When your looking at the markets day-in day-out, your brain picks up on slight changes in the market. Such as recent trends and adapting to how new players choose to behave. My advice is to not think too much about your trading style/methods/ideas or however choose to word it. Try and tune in more with your subconscious while your trading and really listen to your instincts. I'm beginning to get more aggressive in the markets and it's paying off for me, although I'm still taking some big losses on the way.

Week's Analysis

I started off on Tuesday this week and it was the first time I had a proper dabble in the markets in weeks. I was amazed to have such a good day on the Tuesday and my new found aggression seemed to work in my favour.

My discipline let me down at crucial times on the following few days which led to poor decision making and over trading. If your head isn't 100% focused when the markets are a bit twitchy, then small errors turn into large losses surprisingly fast. Ask yourself what you could have done differently if you could replay the day over? Address the issues where the losses came from, try and understand what went wrong and how you can change your style into stopping these mistakes happening again. I know exactly what I've done wrong if I've struggled on the day, and if you're willing to evolve you have a great chance of succeeding on Betfair. Camtasia is awesome! Record and watch everything back, you can't hide behind excuses when its staring back at you in your face :) Saturday came with a boom, but it was far from straight forward. I started terrribly and tried a bit too hard early on forcing a few positions which didn't go as expected. But an hour later i turned a -230 into a +230 on the day which was boosted my confidence.

Antepost

Saturday was a solid day's trading and it gave us all a chance to see some of the Cheltenham hopefuls. 1 of the horses I really like and I've been very impressed since seeing it run around 4 races ago is a horse named Diamond Harry. I have been looking to back this for a Cheltenham race for a while now, so when I saw it going for a chase debut I had to back it antepost for the RSA chase at 14.0. To me this was a great trading opportunity that was almost certain to shorten after an impressive jumping performance. This horse I believe could be something special so keep an eye out, and I think he's more physically suited to chasing rather than hurdling.

My antepost selections have worked out great this year for Cheltenham and I can't wait for March now. Big Bucks will take the world of beating in the World Hurdle and I was fortunate to get a tidy £500 on at 2.2 a few races ago. I might be very tempted to leave it all on, even though this was not my intention when I placed the bet.

This week's p/l from Tues-Sat:

Trading Courses

I'm really looking forward to getting back to teaching after my time off over xmas, and the first course of 2010 starts on Tuesday for 3 days.

I have had a lot of interest over the coming few months and to make it easier for all I wanted to set up specific dates I can teach groups.

I am still offering other packages, for instance if you wanted to come out to Madrid with a few mates or even a 1-1 course. But these types of courses will have to be booked up on certain dates when I'm free. Simply offer some dates and we can sort something out.

The dates are as follows for the organised group packages:

Fully Booked up until -

February -
23rd - 27th

5 - day course: 2 spaces available

March -
2nd - 4th

3 - day course: 3 spaces available

23rd - 27th

6 - day course: 3 spaces available

April -
1st - 6th

6 - day course: 2 spaces available

28th - 30th

3 - day course: 3 spaces available

May -
10th - 15th

6 - day course: 3 spaces available

25th - 27th

3 - day course: 3 spaces available

I have to stress that although there are most of the spaces still available. Many people have shown an interest and could be booking up on all courses over the next few weeks. I am only reserving the spot when the course is fully booked with me. I am filling up my packages very quick so feel feel free to reserve a spot.

Many thanks