Trading software

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Interesting

I've been going through my records on the inplay trades and one thing I've noticed is that horses priced above 10/1 tend to be more successful for my strategy than those priced under 10/1.

Regular readers will know that I try to back certain horses at Betfair SP then lay them off at 50pc of their price in-running. Have a look at the below charts - the first shows how the strategy performs to a €10 stake on my horses priced below 11.0 and the second shows how my strategy performs on horses priced above 11.0:



The horses priced under 10.0 rise to €100 and comes crashing back down. The horses above 11.0 are a good deal steadier and it's those that have made me my profit.

Should I just stick with horses above 11.0 then? I'm not sure to be honest- there's not a huge amount of data to go on.

I'm aware that I could be 'backfitting' this too. Isn't it funny how we always look at our data looking for a fix during a bad run? During the good times, we always think "If it's not broke, don't fix it". Perhaps a better way would be to do a review after a set number of weeks or number of bets, rather than just when things are going arseways.

I don't like changing things without a reason so if I'm to come up with a theory as to why the shorter priced horses perform worst, it is this:

Horses at the shorter end of the market are analysed more - therefore, their running style is more likely to be priced into the odds already. With big priced horses, they don't get as much attention or analysis. Therefore, when they start to perform well mid race, it's often a surprise and in-running punters may get a bit over-excited.

I dunno, it's just a theory. As I say, not a lot of data to go on and I'm conscious of how punters often tinker with things during a poor run in haste. I'll keep plugging away as I am for now and perhaps take a look at this again.

Unfortunately, Punchestown is getting messed up because of the weather. It's a shame really as it's a meeting I love. Looking forward to today's Quevega vs Voler battle - I think the former may come out on top but both are top animals. Could be a good one.

Anyway, here's today's inplay trades:




2 comments:

  1. I feel you are very right.

    For a horse to move from 10.0 to 5.0 he only needs to be going well for a short period as at 5.0 he doesn't have to be running a stormer.

    However, a horse @ 4.0 has to run a massive race to get to 2.0 and this will already be partially priced into his SP, he is 4.0 , he should run well. My thoughts, as I feel the way to profit is small stakes and big prices, although my success rate means you should discount everything I say.

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  2. Yeah, I'm going to keep monitoring it and come back to it in a few weeks to see how they compare then.

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