Ascot racecourse - half price tickets

For those that would like to go to the races as well as trade them I have received an offer from Ascot racecourse for half price tickets. If you are interested in going, book here and when you order quote 'OOM' as the promotional code. Offer is valid for Sat 22nd Nov, 20th Dec, 14th and 17th January.

Sandown park to be renamed Betfair park

Betfair have agreed a sponsorship deal with the Melbourne Racing Club to have the Sandown Park Racecourse rebranded as Betfair Park.

Along with the name change, Betfair gained on-course presence via signage and race sponsorship involvement at Sandown and Caulfield Racecourses. The deal will also allow Betfair to promote in the days following up to races at events through spring to autumn.

The sponsorship officially begins on Saturday.

“In establishing this new relationship with Betfair, we fully acknowledge and respect both Tabcorp and the current wagering model,” said Warran Brown, Melbourne Racing Club’s chief executive. “The TAB since its privatization has been the financial backbone of the Victorian racing industry and will so remain. But this sponsorship arrangement recognizes the additional revenue opportunities for racing by embracing technology and innovation.

Long weekend / Best trading market ever?

Well another day over and what an excellent one it was. Cheltenham is living up to its expectations and I am thankful for it's presence; the rest of the card didn't really deliver much at all. I managed to get one of my biggest ever single race totals today which was immensely pleasing. It's really difficult to do that now as I have done so many races in my time, many tens of thousands. So getting a top result is always a fantastic feeling as I need to wind behind me to bag a decent result. Unfortunately this means I can't resist trading this Sunday. With the quality at Cheltenham set to continue I won't be able to put the mouse down.

An important note with this post, Horse racing isn't the sport that generated the title to, its the tennis market.

As I have mentioned before Andy Murray has recently been the tennis traders dream and he served up another treat this week against Federer. I was using the match to write an article about tennis and to document some work on it. I am now kicking myself that I wasn't trading it! Both players traded as low as 1.11 before Murray went on to win. The swings were amazing and the stuff of trading legend. I'd love to post up the article but unfortunately I am not allowed to under the publishing rights but I should be able to document some more tennis stuff fully when the new season starts.

SP Manipulation

I mentioned a couple of posts down about using SP to exit but there are some caveats I should insert. As I have mentioned before SP actually isn't a starting price at all but a price generated a few seconds AFTER the start of the race. As such it is open to manipulation. Take this evenings race at Wolverhampton. Just before the off on the TV the price, which had been bumping around 2's, shot out to 2.50. SP settled at 2.44 way way off the true starting price. Shemali went on to win and now Betfair can report a significant improvement on the bookies starting price of around 2.00. This tends to happen most often on flat races but it's so common its stick out like a sore thumb. At Cheltenham today there were no such issue. As such I recommend use of SP sparingly.

Very tight premiership table

I had a look at the matches today and one thing that struck me was just how important each game is at the moment. A win for Sunderland could catapult them from second to bottom to unlikely 10th place. While it would require all the others above them to not get a result it just shows how tight the premiership is and what a huge incentive there is this afternoon for three points.

Fast pictures without an exchange shop

I know I have covered this in more depth elsewhere on the blog but if you want to get fast pictures you only need to look to this week. Channel 4 racing has been covering Cheltenham and also today, Wetherby. When you analyse the pictures from channel 4 they are two seconds ahead of Racing UK, that's not far off being on the course. For the best pictures you need the BBC to cover the racing then that's a good as being there. One caveat is that you need to view the pictures straight from the aerial, i.e. no routing through another receiver like a sky box. Else you could be inducing a delay again.

Pictures are useful for seeing what's going on, on course. But for pre-race traders there isn't a significant benefit from the extra couple of seconds a faster feed would get. If you think you need that extra couple of seconds then it probably means you are getting out too late. I often leave it late to get out, which generally isn't recommended, but with things like SP available on Bet Angel there isn't actually a massive need to leave it to the last second to exit. You can always turn the order to an SP order if need be.

Frustrating....

What a frustrating week this is proving to be so far! Usage problems with Betfair thanks to a errant API and today the medics get stuck in the mud at Ludlow so the races are clashing. This isn't going to be a great week by the look of it. But take heart because at least we still have Cheltenham on the way. This is one of the weekends that I would consider trading on Sunday as with a three day meeting on at Cheltenham it will be a good warm up for some decent NH racing. I may also make up lost ground form the start of the week.