late night races aren't great for trading

The Daytona 500 was rained off on Sunday, and again Monday afternoon local time, so the race was run on Monday night, which meant it started after midnight UK time. And it has just finished at 6am UKT. So combine that with being shown on a premium channel, Premier Sports, and it made it a pretty poor trading race this year unfortunately. Overall matched volume on Betfair way lower than any previous year. Still got a green book, but nothing like in previous years and not worth the effort really. Thankfully I got a few hours sleep in the middle, just happened to have the baby wake me up near the end of the race...

Matt Kenseth won the race, a crash with just a few laps to go usually sets up a great finish, but nobody was awake and Kenseth's teammate Greg Biffle (who was a much better result) was parked right behind him, protecting him from the chasing pack, hence no last-lap volatility and chaos.

In previous years, it has been bloody marvellous -

2011
2010
and 2009

Ah well, c'est la vie. Back in the zone on trading long-running markets with many selections, with this and the Next Wolves Manager market - which unfortunately I have to wait two months for it to settle.

Comments

It's all gone Pete Tong at Betfair!

The Christmas Hurdle from Leopardstown, a good Grade 2 race during the holiday period. But now it will go into history as the race which brought Betfair down. Over £21m at odds of 29 available on Voler La Vedette in-running - that's a potential liability of over £500m. You might think that's a bit suspicious, something's fishy, especially with the horse starting at a Betfair SP of 2.96. Well, this wasn't a horse being stopped by a jockey either - the bloody horse won! Look at what was matched at 29. Split that in half and multiply by 28 for the actual liability for the layer(s). (Matched amounts always shown as double the backers' stake, never counts the layers' risk). There's no way a Betfair client would have £600m+ in their account. Maybe £20 or even £50m from the massive syndicates who regard(ed) Betfair as safer than any bank, but not £600m. So the error has to be something technical. However, rumour has it, a helpdesk reply (not gospel, natur

Spot-fixing - you will never, ever be able to stop it

According to this report , IPL tournaments so far have been rife with spot-fixing - that is fixing minor elements of the game - runs in a single over, number of wides bowled etc. The curious part of that article is that the Income Tax department are supposed to have found these crimes. What idiot would be stupid enough to put down 'big wad of cash handed to me by bookie' as a source of income? Backhanders for sportsmen, particularly in a celebrity- and cricket-obsessed culture like India are not rare. They could come from anything like turning up to open someone's new business (not a sponsor, but a 'friend of a friend' arrangement), to being a guest at some devoted fan's dinner party etc. The opportunities are always there, and there will always be people trying to become friends with players and their entourage - that is human nature. This form of match-fixing (and it's not really fixing a match, just a minor element of it) is very hard to prove, but also,

lay the field - my favourite racing strategy

Dabbling with laying the field in-running at various prices today, not just one price, but several in the same race. Got several matched in the previous race at Brighton, then this race came along at Nottingham. Such a long straight at Nottingham makes punters often over-react and think the finish line is closer than it actually is. As you can see by the number of bets matched, there was plenty of volatility in this in-play market. It's rare you'll get a complete wipe-out with one horse getting matched at all levels, but it can happen, so don't give yourself too much risk...

Sport is made for betting

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