Kevin Blake's Book: It can be Done

Aragorn said:
"So the other question is, was he simply lucky to get 13 winners?"

This is the key question is it not?
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I think the key question is "How good is his ability to select bets?".

If you add up the implied percentage chance of all of the odds he took, you would expect him to have around 9 winners. But he's finding so much value that even if he hit that bookies' expectation of 9 winners he would be making, on average, a profit of £14,000.

In fact, he's doing more than that. Were those extra 4 winners pure luck? Its hard to tell, but he's put himself in a brilliant position to take advantage just by the quality of his selections.
 
If you add up the implied percentage chance of all of the odds he took, you would expect him to have around 9 winners. But he's finding so much value that even if he hit that bookies' expectation of 9 winners he would be making, on average, a profit of £14,000.
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Great stuff, Gareth, but I'm struggling to understand this part. How is the implied percentage chance derived and how does it differ from value?
 
Gareth Flynn said:
(You did ask)

I've only read the first 4 or 5 chapters so far so I don't know if he goes through it in detail later, but based on the proofed results at the back of the book:

He only had 56 bets, so normally you'd think "small sample size!" but you have to remember that he specifically chose the bets from a potentially massive number of possible bets. That's his skill; narrowing down the opportunities and rooting out the value.

He backed all but two of them for £1k, so he gave each selection the same value; we don't need to take into account the idea that he was more confident in some than others (even if that was actually the case). They all passed his threshold for what constitutes a bet.

13 of the horses won. It so happened that the 13 winners gave him a profit of £44,500.

So lets say 13 winners was his true strike rate (more on this later). That, given random chance, his skill allowed him 13 winners from his 56 selections. Where random chance comes in is *which* of the 13 winners would win.

How many different ways can you have 13 winners from 56 selections? Just short of 2 trillion.

Here's the thing - his worst case scenario, in which his shortest 13 bets win, would only have left him with a loss of £1500. So the number of ways he could have lost money with that strike rate (13/56) at the prices he was playing is vanishingly small.

Was he lucky to win as much as he did given that strike rate? I simulated 100,000 trials where 13 of the runners he backed were randomly picked as winners, and the rest were called losers. He wins at least £44,500 around 54% of the time. So actually he was a little bit unlucky in terms of which horses won, but not much. The break-even amount, i.e. the amount he should win more than 50% of the time, is around £46,000.

So the other question is, was he simply lucky to get 13 winners?

Here are the amounts (to the nearest £1k) he could have expected to win around 50% of the time for a given number of winners from the 56 bets:

13 winners: £46,000
12 winners: £38,000
11 winners: £30,000
10 winners: £22,000
9 winners: £14,000
8 winners: £6,000
7 winners: -£2,000

So for every 1 less winner he has, his profit drops by £8k. His strike rate would almost have to halve before he makes a loss.

Then again maybe he was unlucky to only win 13 of the bets...
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Brilliant stuff, Gareth!!

You should write a book yourself!!
 
Grey said:
Great stuff, Gareth, but I'm struggling to understand this part. How is the implied percentage chance derived and how does it differ from value?
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I would guess that the implied percentage is derived from the SP, whereas this dude appears to have taken morning prices.

So if you back a horse at 6/1 and its early morning price is 4/1, you will have "value" (assuming you believe that SP is a fair reflection of a horse's chances of winning).
 
Thanks, Bar, that sounds plausible.

But did you mean to say "So if you back a horse at a morning price of 6/1 and its SP is 4/1, you will have 'value'..." ?
 
but if that 6/1 shot's SP ends up at 12/1 ...you don't have value?

what if you back 100 horses...and still make a good profit at sp...surely the sp/forecast or price taken relationship doesn't really matter?

to me if you beat the odds at sp..then you are doing something very right...whereas if you looked at the ones from that 100 that actually drift..and win....you would say you haven't had value on them...
isn't it swings and roundabouts re drift or shorten?

we know that sp returns usually point to real chance over a series of many bets...but on a small number of bets i'm not seeing why a shortener's price is a real indicator of chance..a lot of them lose..so could have been falsely short
 
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I actually calculated it on the price he took. In short: the selections he made were good enough at the price he took to make it very difficult (without a lot of bad luck, basically) for him to lose.

Regarding SP, he beat it 38 times out of the 56 bets. Took the same price as the eventual SP 12 times, and took a shorter price than the eventual SP 6 times.

In total he beat SP by 96pts, or an average of 1.7pts per bet (the best was a 25/1 shot* that returned an SP of 9/1).

*edit, wasn't a winner
 
Gareth Flynn said:
I think the key question is "How good is his ability to select bets?".

If you add up the implied percentage chance of all of the odds he took, you would expect him to have around 9 winners. But he's finding so much value that even if he hit that bookies' expectation of 9 winners he would be making, on average, a profit of £14,000.

In fact, he's doing more than that. Were those extra 4 winners pure luck? Its hard to tell, but he's put himself in a brilliant position to take advantage just by the quality of his selections.
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Yep that's what I meant. Fascinating stuff this.
 
Gareth Flynn said:
I )

Regarding SP, he beat it 38 times out of the 56 bets. Took the same price as the eventual SP 12 times, and took a shorter price than the eventual SP 6 times.

In total he beat SP by 96pts, or an average of 1.7pts per bet (the best was a 25/1 shot* that returned an SP of 9/1).

*edit, wasn't a winner
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This is the key though. Warm punters like Kevin do not need to take best price because he knows the horse's price is way wrong so he doesn't need best price. I know good punters that struggle with this concept. I'm not in the 'a winner is a winner' brigade but there are a number of waves to market moves on horses. Just because you missed the first wave doesn't mean the second, third or even fourth wave won't give you implied value.
 
Losing 43 of your 56 bets on the face of it is enough to put most people off.
Remember the grief McCoy got a few weeks ago for a similar losing percentage in some quarters.
He beats my % strike rate hands down but I do not bet £1K at a time nor would I recommend it no more than intra-articular injecting.
I dare say reading his book will not change my mind.
It can be done but I have no real intention trying.
 
But the joke is a lot of people on here will turnover in a year double or treble of what Kevin will do betting £1k a go!!!

.
 
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Have read the first 5 chapters, really like Kevin Blake on ATR / Twitter and the superb @FinalFurlongPod. Knows his stuff beyond doubt- but I couldn't agree with the "win only" betting policy.
 
PRICEWISE2008 said:
Have read the first 5 chapters, really like Kevin Blake on ATR / Twitter and the superb @FinalFurlongPod. Knows his stuff beyond doubt- but I couldn't agree with the "win only" betting policy.
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He's well aware that selectively betting e/w is mathematically advantageous but he's out to maximise his profits and to do that in the type of race he bets in, win only makes sense.


.
 
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edgt said:
Losing 43 of your 56 bets on the face of it is enough to put most people off.
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At the risk of upsetting people, only someone ignorant of the real world would be put off by this.

A 23% strike rate is no mean feat. Obviously it all depends on what prices your getting about your winners as to whether you can turn a profit. If you're a chalk-eater you'll go bust. If you're getting an average price of 6/1 you're quids in.
 
SlimChance said:
He's well aware that selectively betting e/w is mathematically advantageous but he's out to maximise his profits and to do that in the type of race he bets in, win only makes sense..
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It's a double bladed sword. He's out to maximise profits, maybe, but to me the question is why? He wanted to fill his book up with as much profit as possible in 20 weeks?

If he had used EW betting as well, then the return wouldn't have been that much different imo. Sure you can run through his results, and I'm sure win only was better than EW only. The thing is, how many more bets would he have placed if using EW in his betting? All those 6/1 winners that were almost surely an EW bet to nothing, but not solid enough for a win bet. Would that not cancel a lot of the 'win only for maximum profits' theory out? I'm not suggesting he bets EW on everything either, but rather included it when appropriate.

The real benefit from EW betting (ignoring EW doubles etc) is that it smooths out the roller coaster that your balance rides, and therefore keeps emotions under control which he realises is an important factor. It depends how much of a rush you're in I guess. I'd rather make 50 points slowly and comfortably, than 'maybe' in a shorter time and get all stressed out out.

EW betting has it's place. To not include it in the book and actually denounce it, seems strange to me.

Regarding SP, EP's etc. I see cards in three ways...

1) Race has obvious potential winners and I can't oppose them. The bookies have priced the race up correctly. Little chance of any value. Majority of races. Maybe there is 'value', but no strong fancies with value, so to cash in on the odd bit of value seems pointless as losing runs could be long, so smaller staking is needed. Whats the point?

2) I've dug a little bit and realise something has a sound chance and is overpriced at the moment. I'm not going to be alone though, and EP's need to be grabbed ASAP. Most of my bets and certainly the majority of my winners.

3) I've really dug deep and found something that very few will have spotted. I might be privy to some quiet inside info, or I know a race was timed incorrectly. Anyway, I know something which not many do, so I wait to see how the market develops and I'm ready to pounce should the price start to contract, but stay at the ready if it starts drifting. Generally bigger priced horses and these will be when your results show a profit at SP. Rarest bets for me and I'm sure many of us know when to sit tight.

It's all about being versatile with your approach, then knowing what you've got and what to do with it. This guy seems too rigid for my liking and with a SR in the low 20's seems sure to be at the crest of the big dipper at some point. Don't get me wrong, I've tried the 'nerves of steel' approach, and I've just about shat myself at times doing it, becoming quite depressed as well, until the joy of the big priced winner comes along. Whats the rush?

That was a strong coffee. Rant over.

DO, **** the real world. :)
 
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Kevin Blake has always punted that way. I was working for Ladbrokes up to 2011.
 
Read this over Christmas as well and thought it was well worth it.

His "edge" as far as I could tell is in understanding the preferences and relative ability of horses racing around Tramore and Bellewstown in 47-65 handicaps in the same depth as many people understand Group 1 horses. Takes a hell of a lot of discipline and single-mindedness I would imagine.

The only thing I would say is that while the chapters chronicling his betting interest degenerates like me who punt low-level Irish flat racing, anyone with no knowledge of the horses might find it dragging a bit.
 
Finished the book tonight -very interesting read but while I have no doubts about his profitability or integrity I would like to know how much his bankroll is and I also thought the chapter on compiling your own tissue could have been better.
 
Having read this I went through my bets from October/December and I knew they had been massive months,i see 56 bets is mentioned that's a minute sample.In my last 3 months I've had 137 bets roi of 96% sp 45% and 45 winners 33%.I think I need to start using betfair.
 
EC1 said:
I'll get a copy

just think 20 weeks isn't long..i've had runs longer than that where i can do little wrong..then the opposite ..where i am still doing similar picks

discipline & temperament are the most important aspects if you want to make a living imo.

i wonder if its ever possible to think you have a long term plan that works..doubt creeps in with me even when i'm doing well

i think one thing i have learned is that you have to wait to play..if you want to make consistent profits..use it like a tool you only use when required...if you must play everyday then use very small stakes..then the occasions when everything is aligned ..go in big

i've always been very interested in the analysing side..and never given the necessary attention to the staking/discipline side
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The nearest thing to a punters ensemble I have ever seen, this should be the beginning of the punters Ten Commandments.
help me out on this....
Thou shall not deviate from the following rules.
Thou shall not be swayed by fervour alone
Thou shall not up stakes when I'm winning
Thou shall have patience reign over me
Thou shall endeavour to be frugal
Thou shall .....help
Thou shall .....help
Thou shall .....help
Thou shall .....help
Thou shall with full endorsement of all other rules back my conviction whole heartedly
 
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