Backing First Two Faves System Test
 

In the spirit of giving at Christmas time and also due to comments on another thread about the UK forumites not sharing anything, lest someone take their advantage away from them, I will share with you what I am currently trying out.

This testing was the subject of the “Advise Sought” thread (sorry about the wrong spelling for “advice”) :oops: where I asked if it’s better to stop after a set amount is reached or you just keep betting all day long.

Most said that it was better to keep going with some making a caveat that there may be some merit in stopping early should there be better outcomes in the early races. One such system that worked by stopping early was Bhagwan’s 3rd fave system where you stop after 6 losses or after 1 winner (whichever came first). This produced 50 points profit for the month of testing (1 point per bet) however it seemed to affect which horse was 3rd fave according to a few posters. That’s what I’m worried about in revealing this “system”. It may affect the prices should it be moderately successful.

But, what the hey! Here goes.


RULES
Back first 2 faves if the prices are within 3% chance of winning with each other (My bot – BF Bot Manager – has a function that says what the percentage chances of the horse/dog winning are which is based on their prices. Thus a 1st fave with a 25% chance and 2nd fave with a 22% chance are a bet)
Back equal amount on each of the 2 faves (1 unit each on first 2 faves = 2 units per race)
Maximum Odds of 4.5 for the 1st fave on Betfair (doesn’t matter what price the 2nd fave is)
Trailing stop loss at –10 units (that’s 5 losing races in a row or a combination of winning and losing races resulting in the –10 trailing stop loss being hit)
Profit Stop at +5 units
ALL RACES TOGETHER– That’s gallops, harness and greyhounds in running order
Minimum $3500 volume on Betfair
Minimum of 5 runners

I’m betting the minimum amount on Betfair which is $5 per fave (or $10 per race).
Stops for me are +25 profit stop or –50 stop loss (I’ve set mine at -49 as the bot doesn’t stop on –50 – it has to exceed that amount).

As you can see, this is a little like Bhagwan’s backing the 3rd fave system in that, if you just keep betting all day then, chances are you will end up giving back any gains (but obviously, not always so) as the law of averages will then hit you.


I’m not sure if anyone has tried this angle before or know the stats for something like this. If you do, then please let me if I am wasting my time. L I’m thinking that the law of averages will just hit me sooner or later but I’ve got to try something. I haven’t got 20 or 30 systems on the go like some others have here.

I’ll give my results so far in the next post.

Results
 

RESULTS

I started testing on Sunday 11 December 2012. Real betting started on Monday 12/12 where I didn’t have a profit stop. The profit stop then kicked in from 15/12.

9 Days
$25 Profit Stop/$50 Stop Loss – 8 winning days & 1 losing day = +$185
No Stops – 4 winning days & 5 losing days = -$62

Here are the results so far (if you can read them) with Actual being my actual results:

Date, $25 Stop, Actual, Ongoing
20121211 27.65, N/A, 27.65
20121212 29.12, 9.1, 9.1
20121213 27.72, -6.67, -6.67
20121214 30.41, -10.33, -24.23
20121215 25.52, 25.52, 59
20121216 24.43, 24.43, 14.45
20121217 31.57, 31.57, -33
20121218 -46.08, -46.08, -63.42
20121219 34.83, 34.83, -45.76

TOTALS
$25 Stop +185.17
My Actual +62.37
No Stops -62.88

I’m not sure how to record it in units. I am betting $5 per fave but $10 per race. So does 1 unit equal $5 or $10 in this case?

So far it’s 37 Units for $5 per fave and 18.5 Units for $10 per race.

I’ll keep updating for a month, if I don’t keep losing, in which case that will be the end of that.

+25 profit stop hit already today. Update all results at end of day.

You know why they don't share on the Uk forum, they are mugs the lot of them. you just have to read some of the crap that gets posted on the betfair racing thread, just a lot of try hards with no real clue on what racing is.

I feel you could be right Shaun.

I get the same feeling looking at the languaging being used.

They appear to go on & one about why a certain horse did not win - Boring.

Well done Ocho,
Thanks for sharing your findings & well done on those impressive results so far.

I like that 3 percentage points idea.

That's something new worth looking at closer.

I feel you have got your parameters sorted to a nice balance.


That's the important bit.

The 3 point difference thing between Horses price , is something only a Bot can do on a very consistent basis & doubt anyone has the patience to do it manually because that's like work or something.

Units thing.
The way I would record something like that , would be $10 = 1 unit per race
Because we are always betting $10 a race , using a 50/50 split.
So
Essentially , we are going for 2.5 units a day.
This is very doable on a daily basis.

Tip:
When doing layouts.
Try & use ---- or ..... to separate because the program that's used on this site, automatically adjusts all 2+ spacings to just 1 spacing.

LOL Lay the draw, correct score, all up, 1 pound into 100,000.
Yep, seen it all.

Is it actually the birth place of all new punters?

Results
 

Thanks Bhagwan. I'll try and keep the spacing thing in mind.

The 3 percentage points is the most distance apart that the prices can be. So you can be backing equal faves or up to 3% difference in the chance of winning.

On a few occasions I've noticed the fave gets selected over 4.5 (like today which was selected at 4.7). I can only put that down to at the 10 second mark the horse is trading at 4.5 and then by the time the bot fires the bet it has gone out slightly.

RESULTS

The results today could not have been any better (literally) as they were struck after only 2 qualifying races. I don't think that will happen again very often (if not at all). I will list my ACTUAL bets as the $25 profit stop bets as they are the same.

TODAY
$25 Profit Stop +26.03
No Stops -31.46

TOTALS - 10 days
$25 Profit Stop +211.20
No Stops -94.34

Profit 21.12 Units (based on $10 per race being 1 unit as suggested by Bhagwan and with 5% commission deducted)

Full Market Name Selection Price Profit And Loss Identifier
AUS / Mngl (AUS) 20th Dec / 12:20 R1 2300m Trot S 3. Yankee Eyes 4.78 18.91 Second
AUS / Mngl (AUS) 20th Dec / 12:20 R1 2300m Trot S 7. Distribution 4.2 -5 First
AUS / Kyne (AUS) 20th Dec / 13:00 R1 1125m 3yo 7. Milwaukee Belle 4.7 18.5 First
AUS / Kyne (AUS) 20th Dec / 13:00 R1 1125m 3yo 3. In Spirit 5.2 -5 Second

I feel the SR could be enhanced by trying to avoid races where outsiders are known to get up .

Those outsider races, are usually races where there are 12+ runners in a race.
So...
Maybe ones SR should be higher if one targets races where there are 11 runners & less.

The average SR for the top 2 in the market is approx 50% (30+20)

I dont know what the 3 percentage points difference makes , but it does appear to be logical.

The highest SR is 6 runners & less.

What also helps a lot is avoiding races where fields have first starters in them.
This tells us that there can be surprises in store for us.
So
Maybe only target fields where all horses have had 1+ career starts.

With a system like this there is no real way to test except live testing.

I don't think there is any system tester to test it, you could design one if you have the raw data.

Stopping for the day at a profit/loss point may not sound logical to the old pros that say if you have the prices and the strike rate then there is no last race it is just a continuous cycle.

But we all know to win in the game you need to be different from the rest, and this is just that being different but with some logic to it.