Kevin Blake's Book: It can be Done

Agree with Trackside that KB's approach seems to depend a great deal on knowing his horses, and the courses they run over, but suspect it's his self-styled "iron discipline" that really separates him from the common herd, as it were.
Interesting to note that his 25k starting bank (equates to around 25 bets) was never, ever in danger, and a piece smaller than the 200k or so that some on here reckoned necessary, to strike out on their own.
 
LUKE said:
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.
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€25k. He says it in the book.
 
gigilo said:
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.
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If you wrote a book it would be far more interesting than Blakes.
 
reet hard said:
Agree with Trackside that KB's approach seems to depend a great deal on knowing his horses, and the courses they run over, but suspect it's his self-styled "iron discipline" that really separates him from the common herd, as it were.
Interesting to note that his 25k starting bank (equates to around 25 bets) was never, ever in danger, and a piece smaller than the 200k or so that some on here reckoned necessary, to strike out on their own.
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He's not pro punting, he's got several incomes.
 
Overall I thought the book was an interesting read but it didn't teach me anything about betting. I think the recreational punter may find something in this book but I got bored after 7 chapters as it was basically paga after page of "I had my usual stake on". I think the book serves a purpose but if someone was asking me for advice on starting out betting I wouldn't send them in this direction because very few people have that discipline and I bet Kevin didnt for a fair few years too. He should have expanded on the learning curve in the book.
 
On the contrary, Slim, if the only thing one learns from this book is to impose an iron discipline, then it'll be well worth the purchase price (imo, anyways).
 
reet hard said:
On the contrary, Slim, if the only thing one learns from this book is to impose an iron discipline, then it'll be well worth the purchase price (imo, anyways).
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But it's his way. How many people can realistically punt that way and more to the point how long did it take him to get to that point? The book was very shallow to the real story for me.

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That's a bit like criticising a healthy cookbook on the basis of "how many people realistically eat healthily?" and asking for how many years did the author eat poorly for! Considering the likes of the reckless and helpless punter Steve Palmer are given public outlets, it's no harm for anyone to emphasise the importance of discipline in betting in the public arena.
 
SlimChance said:
If you wrote a book it would be far more interesting than Blakes.
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I couldn't think of anything that would be of huge interest in writing a book,i have never read one would think it would be a dull read.The most interesting bits would be the jockeys and trainers involvement but those bits wouldn't be able to publish!!
 
canteatvalue said:
That's a bit like criticising a healthy cookbook on the basis of "how many people realistically eat healthily?" and asking for how many years did the author eat poorly for! Considering the likes of the reckless and helpless punter Steve Palmer are given public outlets, it's no harm for anyone to emphasise the importance of discipline in betting in the public arena.
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Fine for the beginner but of no use to advanced punters.
 
One for the beginner....
36% of horses who finished in the first three last time out and run again within 6 days are successful.
Backing all such horses in Irish races since 2009 would have returned £2681 to a £1 stake.
The stat holds for flat and NH racing.
Since 2009 1859 horses yielded 672 winners, a good population sample!
Past performance is no guide to future profits!
Courtesy of Irish Field article by John O Riordan www.proformracing.com
 
They're are plenty that will point you in the right direction but they won't have been written about betting.

Michael Lewis' Moneyball is essentially a book about value.

Soccernomics is a good book to tear down everything the average football fan knows about football and gives some simple insights into football markets. For example why does the price move on the team that takes the first kick?.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb has written three books that are worth reading. Black Swan is essentially about putting your money on outcomes with low risk on the downside but potentially a massive upside. Too often stock brokers and punters are taking short prices on the market going up etc. I've elaborated on such bets on the Queen Mother thread. No one on the forum will have noticed but Sprinter Sacre being pulled up LTO was a black swan moment in the QM market.

There are some interesting concepts in Freakconomics on match fixing in Sumo Wrestling which could easily have been written about Italian football.

I'm not a big reader so I'm sure others can point us in the direction of plenty of other books that may not be about betting but the logic still applies.

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Was Soccernomics originally released as 'Why England Lose'? I read that when it came out and thought it just got silly from the second half onwards.

Spot on about Moneyball; and pretty much all of Lewis' stuff is worth reading. Start at the start and work your way through. I wonder what kind of punter Billy Beane would make. He'd probably never watch anything he bet on.
 
Most of us want to bet and most of us lose. Presumably we don't mind losing because it heightens the pleasure. Rather like auto-erotic asphyxia, wouldn't you say?
 
Gareth Flynn said:
Was Soccernomics originally released as 'Why England Lose'? I read that when it came out and thought it just got silly from the second half onwards.
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Yes there is an updated version. I won't lie, I've read maybe 100 pages.
 
How come this guy gets £1k on anything he wants with Ladbrokes, yet this morning they restricted me to £18.18 on an 11-4 shot?
 
Personally I prefer the book Doped, and cant believe it included Pinturischio and Cyril Stein in its characters. Did I spend my whole teenage life being conned. Were the blue bloods running the sport that naieve in thinking they were beyond corruption
 
Yes, I'd like to know how he gets bets on with Ladbrokes. Unless he perhaps bets at SP, but whats the point in all the discipline if he then risks SP betting.

Slim said he knew, and it was obvious. I don't see how, really I don't.
 
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