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Sizzler wrote: »

Just a point of clarification here, maybe my mistake as I read through your stuff last night, but are you saying in these races always go for the 2nd fav or are you looking beyond that and going for 3rd or 4th favs too in some cases? You mention e/w a lot but refer to betfair quite a lot, are you actually backing e/w or going straight to BF and betting on a place and then having a nibble for the win also?

Where do you stand on a straight lay on very short price favs, the likes of the 10/11's, 4/7's etc. Would you not have a crack there?

no, i'm saying go for any horse that looks like you are getting value overall... it's just that normally these are 2nd favs... but to use an extreme example that wouldn't actually ever happen just to illustrate my point...

imagine an 8-runner race where the odds on each horse were 2/1, 2/1, 2/1, and the other 5 horses were 100/1 or bigger.

in this case it would actually be value to back the three 2/1 shots EW. their real chances of being in the top 3 would probably be 1/10 or shorter.

i mention betfair because i use it as a guide, and because it illustrates the value available.

if a horse (or tennis player, or golfer, or anything really) is 5/1 with Ladbrokes and hills, and can be backed EW at 1/5 odds for the place part... and the same horse (or whatever it is) is trading on betfair on a reasonably tight market, at close to 5/1 to win, and 1/2 to place, then it should be obvious that there is great value if u are able to get on it EW at 5/1.

u'll be getting close to the correct price on it to win, and double the correct price on it to place.

i would neither back or lay it on betfair, because i think it's a reasonable assumption that overall the betfair prices are a pretty accurate representation of the horses chances, so there wouldn't be any value in backing or laying on BF.

for that same reason i don't lay odds-on favs on betfair.. i've said already, i don't know anything about horse racing and i don't particularly want to. this is just a mathematical system that can be applied to any betting medium... it's just that it's more common in horse racing

In_tuition wrote: »

Hi Mug.

Thanks for answering my questions in the interview. Appreciate it.

Given your language in your interview I've no doubt you are an intelligent, although youthful.

I refer to your proposition bet. You said your biggest losing streak was €80,000, should that happen, which is easily possible, you then would need to turn around €180,000 with €20,000. Over 300% turnover.

Overall. I'm not posting to bash you so don't get all thick on me. I've had the misfortune of befriending people similar (note not like) to yourself in the past and 100% of the time they were completely full of garbage.

I know it's possible to win big on sports betting. I had the pleasure of doing so several years ago. But sustaining that profit over the course of year's when you say that you are prone to a lack of discipline is extremely hard to fathom. In fact probably impossible.

Simply my thoughts and if there wasn't an argument then it wouldn't be much good of posting in the first place. It's also alarming that I was the only person to post who questioned anything you do and in response (which I appreciate) you ended up attempting to undermine me by trying to create a huge proposition bet. Why be so defensive.

The maths don't add up. You bet €50,000 per week which is over €2,600,000 a year. (and that's only your side of the total amount)

If you are a 'professional' poker player you'll be fully aware of the maths behind discipline. For example if you play $25/50 you know that you need a bankroll of roughly and at least €150,000.

Now it's the exact same for professional sports betting. If your weekly bets are €50,000 well then you need a bank of about €1,500,000 at least.

And if you had a bank of €1,500,000 the last place you would be is boards.ie attemping to become the finest gambler Ireland has seen since J.P.

For me, it doesn't add up and hopefully, this time, you can see where my argument is steming from.

first of all, i don't have a bank of over 1.5 million, as a bankroll. although i've made more than that from poker and betting, i've bought property, invested, and had living expenses for the last 10 years that i haven't been 'working'.

however, as 'thedini' pointed out, your figures are way out. 1.5 million is much much more than i would need as a bankroll.

i'd estimate that i bet about 50k per week on average, but that could be over 20-30 bets (and i do bet for other people too, but we settle up every so often when the balance gets signifigant, so that doesn't affect my 'bankroll'). a lot of those bets i have over the week are on EW horse races where i am backing a horse, which despite being unlikely to win, is very likely to place, and therefore return me some kind of money. most of the sports bets that i do are close to 1/1s, and the more speculative ones that i do at bigger prices, i'm not going to be backing for as much money.

can u think about how incredibly unlikely it is that i can bet 50k in one week and lose every part of it? in very simple terms i would compare most of the bets that i do, to betting 2k on the toss of a coin, and getting average odds of 1.05/1 each time. take a coin and try doing this yourself and keeping records and you will find that the chances of ever having having a losing streak of close to 80k are astronomical.

i've estimated that 2k is close to my average stake, but it's not uncommon for me to have bigger bets too (and a lot of speculative smaller ones) 80k is my worst downswing, which happened when i had a 5 or 6 big losing bets in a row, co-inciding with a lot of smaller bets not going well. i've said already, that i should really be more disciplined, and that figure of 80k should really have been 60k. looking back i definitely tilted a bit, not really by having bad bets, but certainly by staking much more on some of them that were very marginal indeed.

if i'm going to bet someone that i can turn 100k profit from 100k stake then i'll be a bit more disciplined... obviously its possible that i could get off to a bad start and lose half my stake in the first month, in which case it will obviously make you a big favourite, but i'm still very happy to take this bet if or anyone else want to give it a spin.

i'm quite prepared for people to have a different opinion to mine, and i completely understand people being doubtful, although i did think you were a little bit rude though to be so dismissive before i even posted anything or did the interview.

i also know some people who claim to be professional gamblers who are full of garbage, but i also know a few who are genuinely really good at and make similar (or greater) amounts than i do.

i put up the bet offer, to show that i am serious about what i'm saying as i know how easy it would be for people to spout this kinda stuff without backing it up. i don't expect for you or anyone to take me up on it, but i'm certainly prepared to follow through with it if anyone does

finally, i didn't come on here professing to be the finest irish gambler since JP. i've already said i only show a relatively small profit on my own sports bets. i make good money at it because i'm well connected, well bankrolled, and have established good avenues for getting money on

Nulty wrote: »

Following on from the short priced favs etc.

The price can change so radically in the 10 mins before the off. Often, people see a shorty and lump on distorting the price of the other runners. I suppose it doesn't matter as much with Guaranteed Prices these days but is it not best to monitor the market right up until the off so you can press up if the price gets significantly better. Racing I'm talking obv.

A few months ago at in the evening Wolver, the Queen had a runner who price nose dived and went off at about 1/4 or something ridiculous, I had €20 on a 25/1 shot who drifted to 33/1 and I pressed up to €100 for what would have easily been the biggest payout I've ever had. The fav got beaten but so did mine. Mine finished second. (complete aside, sry)

it's definitely better to do that, and sometimes i have a bet at lunchtime which looks great, but turns out to be terrible value. (non runners are the biggest problem.. 8 runners becoming 7, the fav being pulled out). but i have to spread my bets around a lot of shops to get decent money on so i have to do it well in advance. if ur doing it for relatively small stakes, then u should wait til closer to the off.

ValueSeeker wrote: »

A neutral to the brewing 'argument'.

I'm not going to bother telling you exactly what my status is in the betting world but let's just say this is coming from someone who knows what they're talking about.

OK, I read the interview and I got the impression that Mug wasn't exactly very confident in his own abilities. There are a lot of things that stand out as quite the opposite to the rules of successful betting/investing. Using terms like "lumping on", "professional gambler", "betting for interest" and the likes for a start are not the norm for this way of living. People who bet for a living are not gambling, they are simply investing in probabilities to make a profit over time. Most of the time they will know exactly what they stand to make over a given period of time.

Having no sort of staking plan or bankroll management skills would suggest to me that you are prone to bankruptcy in a short space of time when, not if, when the 'laws of probability' strike. I could be wrong - I'm just going by what you said in the interview.

There is no stress whatsoever in what I do and little risk as my staking plan etc all cater for these inevitable bad runs. Each bet is taken individually and if I had 10 losing bets in a row, it would have absolutely no bearing on bet no. 11. There is no such thing as taking a break when you hit a losing run. A holiday every now and again is a must just to refresh the brain but you don't stop betting just because you hit a bad run. That IS going to happen.

I could go on forever and am very tempted to answer all the questions in this thread to show people how it can be done from much smaller bankrolls but I'll get straight to the other side of the coin.

I always go on about how you don't need to be some sort of betting genius to make money (even a living) out of this game. Now Mug even says himself that he isn't 1. I think this article shows exactly what I am saying. Mug is very competent in what he does, and he has a big enough bankroll to make his "small edge" pay.

Fair play to Mug for coming on here and putting himself in the firing line.

cheers.

i should say, that when i used the term lumping on, what i was referring to was the instance of the snooker match where i thought that pretty much every market was way off, so i utilised every means i had to get as much money as i could on at the best prices on a variety of markets with a number of firms, and it was a much bigger investment than my normal stake. partly because i thought it was tremendous value, but mainly because i was able to get a lot of money on as it was a pretty high-profile event.... anyway - i just thought the term 'lumping on' summed this all up and people would know what i meant.

i don't even know if i'm a professional gambler... i'm definitely pretty unprofessional at times. however i do make more money for this and the poker than i could ever make working, so i do this for a living instead.

i do have some kind of staking plan although i'm not that strict with it, but as you'll probably know yourself, most of the time i'm just having the maximum stake that i'm able to get on. this might be 500 quid, or in something high-profile, it could be a lot more.

the snooker bets that i had in the above example, where in theory i could have lost maybe 60-80k if it went horribly wrong, wasn't me breaking my staking plan and it wasn't going to break the bank either. it's just that i was able to get that much on. i'd love to have 30k EW on some filthy Each Way races where i have a 20% edge, but obviously that isn't possible.

99% of the time this is stress free for me too, but on the rare occassions that i am able to get a lot of money on, it does definitely get the blood pumping a bit if i'm watching it live.

i know exactly what u mean about 10 losing bets not affecting the 11th bet, and you are completely right. i know that should be the case and i'm getting better and more level-headed with dealing with that.

i'm a gambler by nature who used to be terrible at it, but has gotten better at it and learned to control my urges to gamble, and now i understand how it should be done. i too look at my bets as investments and have a good idea what my expected return from each bet will be. even the ones i don't pick myself, i know that over the years, the guy that gives me golf stuff has an ROI of 7% or so, and that's what i can expect to make on average from each one of his bets.

i could be wrong, but i'd guess you are someone who understood what was required to beat the odds from pretty early on and have always been professional about it.

in terms of explaining to people what is required you would be much better at doing this kind of thread than me.

thanks for your comments anyway