End of season report - 2013-14 season

Headline figures

TVB tips

Total staked: 124.75pts

Total profit:  36.16pts

ROI  29%

*Adjusted figures

Total staked: 124.75pts

Total profit: 12.78pts

ROI  10%

*The adjusted figures assume that all bets are layed off at 2 IR to produce the same profit regardless of whether it wins the race.

I’ve taken out the Cheltenham & Aintree festivals – including the ante-post tips – so these are the numbers for the main service from Nov 1^st to Mar 30th.

To achieve an ROI of 29%, you would need to have backed all advised selections at the generally available best price – with the BOG concession.

Needless to say, I wouldn’t expect many to have achieved that !

However, I would think that an ROI of around 20% should have been achievable by anyone, with a reasonable number of bookmaker accounts – and a desire to get on quickly.

Furthermore, that number should have been beatable, by applying some of the points made in the ‘Making the most of the TVB service’ on the blog…

The suggestion from the adjusted figure, is that we were lucky this season.

However, I don’t honestly believe that was the case - I think we were neither particularly lucky – nor unlucky.

I believe that the adjusted figure is lower simply because the in-running market on Betfair continues to get smarter.

From the 124.75pts staked, just over 160pts were returned.

There is a price to pay for ‘insuring ‘ the bets with an in-running lay, and my guess is that this is now around 15% (I used to estimate at around 10%).

Take 15% off 160 and you have 24 – the number of points difference between the raw profit and the adjusted profit…

I think that you would have to question whether this is too high a price to pay for a more stable P&L…

Service Edge

When you are following a service, I think it is important to know whether or not it really has an edge (or if it is just going through a ‘lucky’ period).

The best way I know of establishing this, is to compare the advised prices of the tips with their starting price on Betfair (BSP).

If a service can continually beat BSP, then over time, it should make a profit…

The prices of selections advised by the TVB service, beat BSP on all 5 months.

To advised stakes, this was by the following amounts:

Nov – 7.84pts

Dec – 6.52pts

Jan – 3.85pts

Feb – 2.41pts

Mar - 3.13pts

Over the whole season, this means that BSP was beaten by 23.75pts – which equates to an edge of 19%.

Detailed break-down

The 124.75pts staked were spread across 276 horses running in 236 races.

The 276 horses yielded the following in terms of finishing positions:

1^st – 35

2^nd – 31

3^rd – 33

4^th – 37

You will rarely see a more balanced ‘scorecard’ !

My target is for 25% of my tips to finish first or second – and 50% to finish in the first 4. The actual figures were 24% and 49% - so I’m happy enough with that !

In addition to the 35 winners, a further 25 horses traded at 2 or less on BF.

However, 32 traded at 2.1 or less.
As I said earlier, you can read this in 2 ways - but my feeling is that the in-running markets on Betfair are just a bit smarter (so if your horse hits 2 in-running, it actually has a greater than 50:50 chance of winning – more like 55:45 !).

Staking

Last season it was luck that played havoc with the final P&L – this season, it was the staking…

Generally, the idea of variable staking, is to leverage profits.

So you have bigger stakes on selections you expect to do well – and smaller stakes on selections that you are less confident about.

Last season, this theory worked well: level stakes on all selections, would have yielded a 12% ROI – whilst the suggested staking, yielded an ROI of 30%.

This season however, things didn’t go so well…

Level stakes on all selections would have yielded a profit of 42% - compared to a profit of 29% using the suggested staking.

This is not good !

If I had successfully used the variable staking to leverage profit, we should have been looking at an ROI of 50-60%…

So where did it go wrong..?

I think there were 2 areas: firstly, the uncertainty over the staking system I was using for the first couple of months - and even when I had settled on this, my inability to stake the stronger selections appropriately.

I’m sure you’ve all got you ‘favourite’ under-staked selection.

Mine was Tatenen – but I didn’t really learn from him !

I think the staking system I finally ended up with will help (due to its lack of flexibility !) – but it is still an area that I need to be wary about…

Seasonality

Whilst the TVB season is only 5 months long, I still feel there is a real ‘seasonality’ about it – which I’m sure many of you have picked up on…

It is true, that 4 of the 5 months ended in profit – however, the service did little more than break even for the last 3 months of the season, as the vast majority of the profit was made in the first 2 months.

Rather than break the service down into months (as per the monthly reports), I think it far more useful to break it down into periods (as I mentioned in the daily write-up, a few days back).

As I see it, there were 4 periods:

- The Warm-up period

- The Golden period

- The Wet period

- The Closing period

I felt the same last season – and there is logic behind the periods - so I don’t think it is a one season phenomena !

Once you know about the periods, then the key is to identify when you are in them and act appropriately…

For me, that means acting with caution during 3 periods – and going for it in the fourth (the golden period).

Generally, I think I did that - but I think I should be brave enough to do it even more.

If that means that you get more tips during a week of the Golden period than you do in during a month of the Wet period, then so be it.

I believe that the service has enough facets to be able to cope with periods of reduced tipping

Service sub sets

There are a couple of service ‘sub sets’ that I am particularly keen on keeping an eye on: namely, the Weekender (primarily Saturdays) and the Irish racing.

The Weekender, is something that I feel I need to make a success as it provides a ‘nursery’ for potential new subscribers to the main service (plus a service for others, who only look to bet on Saturday).

The main service produced the following figures, broken down by day of the week:

Mon - 3.25pt profit on 3.25pt

Tue - 6pt profit on 10.75pt

Wed - 0.25pt loss on 13.5pt

Thur - 12.88pt profit on 15.5pt

Fri - 2.13pt profit on 19pt

Sat - 3 pt profit on 45.5pt

Sun - 9.16pt profit on 17.25pt

Generally, these number make perfect sense to me – as I know what I have to juggling the tipping with on the various days of the week !

Thursday and Sunday have always been my favourite days for betting/tipping, so I’m not surprised that their figures are good.

Monday, Wednesday and Friday are generally more difficult days for me, so I’m not surprised to see them less profitable…

Saturday is the really interesting one however…

I commit the vast majority of my time from Friday lunchtime through to Saturday lunchtime, to finding tips – yet the numbers don’t do justice to that time.

Of course the big issue with Saturdays is the sheer volume of racing.

Per race, I almost certainly spend more time on the study/write-ups for the mid week/Sunday races.

The only way I can get round this is to look at fewer of the races on a Saturday (and produce less comprehensive write-ups).

Interestingly, a check of advised prices against BSP for Saturday tips, reveals an edge of 16%. This is close enough to the overall edge of 19% to suggest to me that I am picking the right kind of horses on a Saturday – just that they aren’t winning often enough !

The situation with the Irish racing is quite different…

6.25pt profit on 16.5pt staked, gives an ROI of 38%.

There were only 34 tips issued in Ireland – but the suggestion is they are worth following !

Again, this makes sense to me, as I know how closely I follow the Irish racing – and despite the fact that early price markets tend to be hugely defensive, I still believe I can find selections worth following.

Backing at Starting Price

For a number of you, I think this will possibly be the most interesting section of the report…

Account closures/restrictions are getting to be a bigger and bigger issue – and whilst consistently beating SP should see you in profit, it won’t if you can’t get your bets on !

The trouble with betting at SP, is that you have no idea what odds you will be getting – and nowadays, with the market so accurate at the off, that means you are likely to lose.

Interestingly, if you had backed all of the tips, to suggested stakes, at BSP, you would have finished virtually level (2pt profit).

If you had backed all of the tips at BSP to a level stake, you would have made 18pts profit (ROI 7%).

To be fair, that isn’t bad – but there is a more interesting angle…

If you had backed all tips that shortened in price from their advised price (compared to their BSP), then you would have placed 172 bets.

These 172 bets yielded 27 winners – and backed to a level 1pt stake at BSP, a profit of 41.16pts (ROI 24%).

Now I really do think that is interesting !

So much so, that I checked out the same thing for last season.

In the 2012-13 season, there were 96 tips that shortened in price and they produced 15 winners and a profit of 10pts on the 96 staked at BSP (so an ROI of 10.4%).

I’m after a brave volunteer to give it a go in the real environment next season !!

This season, I did actually have a go at finding tips specifically with the aim of them being profitable at BSP, namely the Top Picks.

The rationale was that the price of these horses was already as low as I would reasonably expect it to go – but I expected them to win their races (possibly at a bigger starting price).

Following their introduction in the middle of December, I issued 24 Top Picks.

They produced 5 winners and 5 seconds - and to a level 1pt stake, yielded a 1pt loss.

Clearly, any loss is not great – but I introduced them just as we moved out of the Golden Period; I didn’t included some of the best tips (eg. Freckle Face and Come on Annie) – and BSP is the worst that anyone should have had to settle at (any bookmaker offering BOG would probably have produced better results).

In short there is plenty of upside for them.

As I said in the introduction, I think this is a very interesting area, that I think could  appeal to quite a few of you…

Changes for next season

There are a number of changes that I plan to implement next season (driven to a greater or lesser extent by a lot of what you have just read):

- Take ante-post out of the main service and put it on a free blog.

Nothing splits the existing subscriber base more than ante-post ! Some of you love it – some of you hate it !

Whatever, I’m not sure it really sits within what I’m trying to do, so I’m going to move it outside.

I’ll try to get more active with it on a public blog – but will advise subscribers of any selections before they go on the blog.

I would hope that the blog will get the ‘right' kind of readers, some of whom will ultimately subscribe to the main service.

- Put more focus on the Top Picks and introduce ‘Late Comers’

I think the previous section explains why I want to major more on Top Picks.

The Late comers will be tips that are issued as part of the Daily write-up. These will generally be horses that have drifted to an acceptable price during the morning (or ones that I’ve changed my mind on! ).

It will effectively give me a second bite of the tipping cherry, after I have produced the write-up.

- Take a break over the Christmas Period

I can’t tell you how important it is that I stay ‘fresh’ whilst I’m doing all this – and the Christmas periods nearly did for me last year !

I just can’t juggle everything over that period – so I think it makes sense to draw stumps for a week or so and comeback fresh in the new year.
Anyway, I’m sure you’ve all got better things to do over that time, than listen to me rattling on !

- Tip more in the Golden period – and less at other times

Again, I think I’ve already explained why – I’m just confirming that I will look to make it happen !

- Improve staking

I couldn’t do much worse !

- Improve Saturday performance

I’m absolutely determined to crack this one – so it will happen !

Summary

So that’s about it !

I know I’ve written a lot – but a fair chunk of it is for my benefit, when I return in 7 months time.

I’ve put an amazing amount into the service over the past 5 months – and hopefully you consider it time well spent.

I estimate that I have typed close to half a million words – and spent over 1000 hours studying, watching and writing…

Was it all worth it ? Well that’s more difficult to say…

On average, you guys bet at around £40/40Euro a point.
Therefore, if you had followed all of the tips to advised stakes, you would have ‘risked’ around £5K/5K Euro – and should have returned around £1K/1K Euro profit (at 20% ROI).

Collectively, you have therefore won around £40K/40K Euro – of which I have been ‘paid’ around £7K.

Ofcourse, that’s just in monetary terms – and I would never want the service judged purely in such a way…

Hopefully you will all have got just as much pleasure/enjoyment from following the tips and the stories – and latching on to the horses.

I would hope that this is a hobby/interest for many of you – and that the TVB service has improved your knowledge and enhanced your enjoyment.

I’ve certainly enjoyed it.
Sure there have been some stressful times – but the roller-coaster never got out of control, which helped enormously !

I would like to thank you all for your support over the past 5 months – I really can’t emphasis how much it means to know that all of you are right behind me in this.

In particular, I would like to give special thanks to Michael and Ciaran, for the invaluable roles they play in keeping me sane whilst I’m in the pressure cooker !

I will make contact with you all again at the beginning of October to see if you want to subscribe for the 2014-15 season, which I intend to make the best one yet  !

TVB.