gambling strategies - Help please

jameshayes

I know about the Kelly Criterion method for 2 results but I am looking for a method for 6 results.


If each result had the same odds how would I make sure I could always pick a loser?

The reason I'm asking is because I'm having fun with greyhound racing - I'm laying one dog in every race for odds ranging from 4-1 to 10-1 (the odds dont matter when laying if you win, just if you lose) The method i'm using at the moment is a random number generator (link; http://www.random.org/dice/?num=1)

Yesterday I got out of 15 races I got 14 right. Here's an example of the bet;

Lay dog number 1 @ 5.00 for €10 = liability of €40 -If i win that bet i'm up 10euro, but if I lose i'm back 5 steps,

So although I won 15 yesterday I actually only won approx 10...

Anyone think of any other way of doing it other than the random number gig?

bohsman

Reading the form?

jameshayes

Yeah, I kinda mix that in, but it doesn't always do it, you'll still get some wrong... I mean percentage of bankroll etc to maximise profits etc..

bohsman

Your liability should be the same in each race, 5-10% of your bankroll at most.

zuutroy

LOL, this is destined to fail...what makes you think random laying of dogs could be profitable? The over-round means your return on investment will be a steady -5% or so (depending on the liquidity etc) over a large sample.

jameshayes

yesterday I started with 100euro, finished with 200. Today i started with 100 and now i'm on 180. Doesn't see to destined to fail -so far-!

MrJoeSoap

jameshayes wrote: »

yesterday I started with 100euro, finished with 200. Today i started with 100 and now i'm on 180. Doesn't see to destined to fail -so far-!

Are you failing to see the logic behind his statement though? You could win €100m from this and it still wouldn't make it a good system.

zuutroy

jameshayes wrote: »

yesterday I started with 100euro, finished with 200. Today i started with 100 and now i'm on 180. Doesn't see to destined to fail -so far-!

There's no argument...its simple maths...over a large enough sample size you will lose! You might aswell be playing online roulette.

jameshayes

but do you not think odd's of losing at 1:6 is not good?

zuutroy

jameshayes wrote: »

but do you not think odd's of losing at 1:6 is not good?

I don't mean to be harsh, but your posts indicate that you don't understand the principles of gambling.
The market on Betfair is such that random bets will always lose in the long-term. It's the equivalent of betting on the flick of a coin with someone where you give him a euro if its heads, and he gives you 95c if its tails...You can go on a streak of tails and look like you're turning a profit, but do it for long enough and you'll be down 5c for every flip.

If you want to know more, look up 'over-round' and 'expected value' to see why your system won't work, and 'variance' to show why you're winning at the moment.

hotspur

jameshayes wrote: »

but do you not think odd's of losing at 1:6 is not good?

Laying off on dogs where the odds of losing are 50-1 is still stupid if the real chance of them winning is 49-1. It will be a long term loser in that situation.

But more generally, there is no reason why laying off on dogs cannot be profitable, but you fundamentally do not understand what would make it profitable, or the process of analysing it to come to that conclusion. I'm not attacking you for that, but the people here are making valid points. Your bets will only be profitable in the long run if you are laying dogs off for a lower price than their real chance of winning. Since you have no clue about the dogs' real chances of winning then you are not betting profitably.

What you are doing is no different to randomly picking a dog to bet to win. The only difference is that with laying it is in the long term that you are sure to lose unless you are giving poorer prices than their chances.

jameshayes

zuutroy wrote: »

I don't mean to be harsh, but your posts indicate that you don't understand the principles of gambling.
The market on Betfair is such that random bets will always lose in the long-term. It's the equivalent of betting on the flick of a coin with someone where you give him a euro if its heads, and he gives you 95c if its tails...You can go on a streak of tails and look like you're turning a profit, but do it for long enough and you'll be down 5c for every flip.

If you want to know more, look up 'over-round' and 'expected value' to see why your system won't work, and 'variance' to show why you're winning at the moment.

Well when I start losing money, I'll post it on here. Until then, I'll take my winnings and Lay some more!

lolkelly

jameshayes wrote: »

Well when I start losing money, I'll post it on here. Until then, I'll take my winnings and Lay some more!

what you should do is take the money you’ve won and stop when you are ahead. Hotspur and zuutroy make some great points but you just choose to ignore them. It appears that you have no reason for laying any of the dogs, so have no idea whether each lay represents value or not. Do you not understand that in the long term this is a sure way of losing your money? Or does the fact that you have won some cash blind you from the truth? I wonderif the first 4 dogs you layed had been winners, would we have seen your initial post??

jameshayes

I am heeding what they are saying but I am not finding the value in there statments. I'm betting on a 1 in 6 chance that the dog will not win, with added knowledge from form. It's working so far, second day trying it and i'm up another 75%.


Therefore i'm maintaining my profits by only betting a percentage of my bankroll - the only way I can lose money is if I was to lose more than 3 bets out of 10 - which is against the odds.

Collie D

Fair enough, you are making a profit but you've been at it, what, three days? It hardly stands up as a working system after that length of time. 3/10 is not hard to reach.


You say you're laying dogs with odds of 4/1 to 10/1. So basically you're backing at best 1/4 shots and at worst 1/10 shots. Sonner or later you will take a big hit backing at odds like that to a level stake.

Most dog tracks in England are owned and operated by bookies to maximise their profits eg Sunderland is owned by William Hill.

Dog races are graded in a much more efficient way than horses are handicapped. Whoever the graders are really know their stuff and most races will have dogs of a similar enough standard in them. Obviously they don't get it right all the time but how often have you seen winning distances of short heads and photo finishes in a dog race compared to a horse race? Slim margoins for error.

thedini

jameshayes- are u serious or are u trolling? u obviously post a lot in the gambling forum but in all fairness are u serious-u are using a random no generator to pick ur doggy lays. why dont u use it to pick the lotto nos. i dont mean to sound harsh but this is crazy and u will lose guranteed. say u pick any dog to lose in theory u have a chance of being 83.33% correct but if as i think it was zuutroy said the odds dont reflect this then u dont have a chance to sustain profits. u might get a few lucky days. come back to be with a sample of over 10,000 races it only takes c.100 days and i will eat my words because i have done a fair bit of research into this area.

jameshayes

4th day of doing it and i'm up to 1K from 100euro

IrishMike

Keep on trucking James.
Take 500 out and no matter what anyone says u have made 5x profit.
James for mod!


PS to anyone who is saying this is madness think about it for a minute.
Is it any worse than putting 3 of 4 odds on teams into an accumulator?
Dont we all do that basically every weekend?
Its as good a system as any if its profitable in the short or the long term.

zuutroy

IrishMike wrote: »

PS to anyone who is saying this is madness think about it for a minute.
Is it any worse than putting 3 of 4 odds on teams into an accumulator?
Dont we all do that basically every weekend?
Its as good a system as any if its profitable in the short or the long term.

Baffling stuff.

OP: Have a look at this thread from a while ago about a football system that I trialled.....This is one that I researched for a long time to see if it was a +EV proposition. Even at that I was still very unsure after over 100 trials...You need 1000's to be confident you're onto a winner. Tbh the fact that you've ignored several logical posts that plainly spell out the pitfalls of what you're doing makes me think you're trolling but whatever.

http://ww.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055098267

thedini

Irishmike- you shouldn't be encouraging him.he is using a random no generator to pick his lays for gods sake!i have never heard anything so stupid. why doesn't jameshayes use his magic dice to pick soccer matches etc etc.the dice understands value i suppose lol.james u say u only lose if u lose 3 out of 10. what happens when ur dice picks 5 or more losers in a row- broke is what happens. u should take ur money now and run.

jameshayes

Over the last 6 months my profit was 23%

Over the last 4 days i'm up from 100euro to 1000euro.. I'm using random numbers to make sure I dont pick on name/number and then I am using form to back this up...

Eg. if the random number is 5 but 5 has won his last 6 races I will not lay him.

The money I am betting is money I have won, providing I do not break down to less than 100euro I will not lose money.

IrishMike

Lads what i dont think ye are grasping is the fact that this is gambling.
There are no certs no matter how good a price a team is
Ill tell you throw darts at a page and picking your teams that way can be as good
as any way of making your winnings recently
With dogs it doesnt matter a toss what the form etc is as most of the races are rigged
anyway so what the hell is the value in trying to work out a number of parameters that
in truth have no bearing on that actual outcome.
I have used stats a lot in trying to discern the outcomes of soccer matches and after
some weekends i honestly think guessing would be as useful as looking at form.
James has made his initial bank grow by 10x.
That return is as good a reason as any to keep using it.
He is in a win win situation now no matter what happens so why the hell no continue.

I tried a similiar tactic to this with darts numerous times.
Back the odds on favourite to win any leg in which he is throwing first.
Returns were excellent even if the system was not actually rocket science.
Half of gambling is fun, its not a profession for most of us, just an obsession

lolkelly

IrishMike wrote: »

Lads what i dont think ye are grasping is the fact that this is gambling.
There are no certs no matter how good a price a team is
Ill tell you throw darts at a page and picking your teams that way can be as good
as any way of making your winnings recently
With dogs it doesnt matter a toss what the form etc is as most of the races are rigged
anyway so what the hell is the value in trying to work out a number of parameters that
in truth have no bearing on that actual outcome.
I have used stats a lot in trying to discern the outcomes of soccer matches and after
some weekends i honestly think guessing would be as useful as looking at form.
James has made his initial bank grow by 10x.
That return is as good a reason as any to keep using it.
He is in a win win situation now no matter what happens so why the hell no continue.

I tried a similiar tactic to this with darts numerous times.
Back the odds on favourite to win any leg in which he is throwing first.
Returns were excellent even if the system was not actually rocket science.
Half of gambling is fun, its not a profession for most of us, just an obsession

We have no proof that James has made hes bank grow by this amount! After posting is just stupid in my opinion. A screenshot of his Betfair P&L for Greyhounds over the last week would help to clear up this fact (if hes willing to post it).

Also, you make reference to stats and form for football matches, but again no reference to price and value, which are the only way to win money from gambling in the long term. For example in the upcoming Masters i think Woods will win it, but 11/10 is too low a price IMO....As a result i will be laying woods as i believe this represents value.

zuutroy

I give up.

IrishMike

lolkelly wrote: »

Also, you make reference to stats and form for football matches, but again no reference to price and value, which are the only way to win money from gambling in the long term. For example in the upcoming Masters i think Woods will win it, but 11/10 is too low a price IMO....As a result i will be laying woods as i believe this represents value.

Why is it too low a price in your opinion?
What stats or facts do you have for saying this?
Someone else who may know more/less about golf will look at the exact
same stats for the masters and say Woods at 11/10 is a great price.
I think liverpool to qualify to the semi finals of the CL @ 8-13 is a great price.
Someone else is obviously going to think the opposite.
Only way of knowing is to check the result after the game.
Making money from gambling in the long run has as much to do with luck
as it does being informed, saying a price is good or bad value can at times
be extremely subjective. At least James backing radom dogs removes
emotional attachment which is the reason so many people lose gambling
on soccer matches.
Hell its half the reason im backing Liverpool again even though i have lost
at least 4 times on them this year.

prendy

lolkelly wrote: »

For example in the upcoming Masters i think Woods will win it, but 11/10 is too low a price IMO....As a result i will be laying woods as i believe this represents value.

so you think james system is wrong but your willing to lay woods even though you say you think he will win???
that makes no sense to me but then iv no stats to prove my point!!!!
i usually lay people/teams which i think will lose.

zuutroy

IrishMike wrote: »

Making money from gambling in the long run has as much to do with luck
as it does being informed,

Wrong.

zuutroy

prendy wrote: »

so you think james system is wrong but your willing to lay woods even though you say you think he will win???
that makes no sense to me but then iv no stats to prove my point!!!!
i usually lay people/teams which i think will lose.

He may 'think' he'll win...but he also thinks the price is very good value for a lay, which is something completely different.

Pj!

The problem here is you have people who regularly lose from gambling argueing a case for someone else who regularly loses. They are all going no-where because they don't understand the basic concepts. Its like primary school standards arguing against college standards.

There are a few on the thread who make money or at least understand the basic concept of it.

Maybe harsh but definitely true. This isn't the first time or the last time this argument has been had on gambling forums. It usually develops into the 'losers' (for want of a better word) saying its only a hobby for them and all hobbies cost money. Fair enough but stop trying to argue against others who are seriously interested in making money.

And jameshayes no way you are up money from gambling mate. I had a scan through your posts on this forum and holy f*ck! You've no fixed bank, no staking plan and you bet on eveything and anything. You after-time, you bet accumulators, you bet without confidence.
Fair enough you could be in early days, we've all been there but unless you had 1 lucky big win, there is no way in hell you're up money.

63587614

I'm not sure what to say here lads. But Laying Tiger sounds ok but because its a tournament. But for what return I ask. That's why I think even at 11/10 your return is better. I think i'll wait anyway for the betting in running. Hopefully Tiger will start slow and then back him strong.

Again i'm very interested in strategies lads. Myself I try to stick to rules I've learned but again and again I even break them or just simply forget them.

1. Simply, Home Team

2. Avoid Odds of 1/2 like plague.

3. Avoid bets on teams in relegation trouble

4. Check form, team coming off threble wins dodge.

LuckyLloyd

IrishMike wrote: »

Making money from gambling in the long run has as much to do with luck
as it does being informed

The attitude displayed in your posts here is quite frankly the biggest reason why firms like PPP and Boyles are expanding rapidly in this country.

Could you please take up poker aswell?