Warts and All (18th March 2007)

All was not well at Toad Hall upon my return from holiday.

A temperature difference of 30 degrees between the United States and England resulted in the central heating being turned up to full blast. This action unfortunately uncovered a latent problem in the system.. You can guess what happened next..

A jetlagged and cold Friday and Saturday directing mopping up operations is not what one wants after a two week break. However now warmth has returned to Toad Hall and having had time to reflect on a number of changes while away I can report that I am fully refreshed and ready for the forthcoming flat season.

As a consequence there will be minor but subtle changes to my approach, most will remain invisible to anyone that reads my blog as they relate to process changes such as defining rules for betting trifecta’s

The major change thought will be my “attack profile” i.e. when to strike win bets.

In reading Mark Cramer book “Odds On Your Side” (The Logic of Race Track Investing) my fire and forget approach exposed me to the mercy of the “crowd” and their superior knowledge when it comes to determine the pre race market odds (the public consensus selection wins 33% of the time, fact!)

A lot can happen between the early morning prices set by the bookmakers and Betfair and the vital two minutes on course before the off. Underlays can become Overlays. Market leaders in the morning will drift dramatically, long odds outsiders become contenders..

Mark advises the following

“The best strategy is to treat the public as a respected adversary. Don’t meet it head on as if you were in military battle. Look for little openings here and there as if you were waging guerrilla warfare. Find the vulnerable points and only attack there. A good betting line (“tissue”) is designed to pick out those vulnerable points”

He later goes on to say how difficult things get if you don’t go to the track to observe the tote board. I’m quoting him out of context but the following sentence struck a cord with me in my attempts to beat the crowd in placing bets well before the start of the race

“.. is equivalent to one who wears glasses driving without corrective lenses. It can be done but things can get blurry and once in a while you might crash.”

Creating my own betting forecast before the off is extremely important. However my opinion should be compared to the opinion of the “crowd” (the live betting show) just before the off and this will be my approach from now on

As Mark states

“.. consider the tote board as a system of traffic lights. Consider that when no light on the tote says “advantage” you are getting a red light. The red light says, “do not proceed. Sooner or later there will be a green light for a playable race. All you need to do is wait."

Ok. This approach may result in me missing some juicy early prices, overall though I feel that a method that is guided by a “go/no go” process based on my tissue should yield an improvement in my overall performance instead of placing reliance on my handicapping hours before the crowd has had a chance to have their input..