What is the Kicking Bets Blog?

A record of my thoughts on gambling (and related bets that I place). This first post will have the general that I intend to follow.

Golden Rules

1. Discipline - It is critical that you maintain your discipline is you wish to make gambling profitable. If you go through a losing (or winning) sequence (which is statistically likely) do not adjust your betting plan. Do not wither chase losses or up stakes with your winnings. Bet levels for what is appropriate for the value of the bet. Adjusting bets levels should be happen as result of evaluating your bets (see below).

2. Evaluation - Ensure, after each bet, to evaluate whether the bet was a good value bet or not. N.B. Do this for both winning and losing bets - it his quite possible for a losing bet to have been an excellent value bet (and a winning bet to have been a 'bad' bet').

3. Record - Keep a record of your bets. This includes all bets (including 'fun' bets). This is the only way to ensure you maintain discipline on your betting and to make it possible to evaluate your profitability (or otherwise!)

4. Judgment - to achieve value bets, you have to make the correct judgment through analysis. This analysis is achieved in many different ways - I'll cover this in a later post.

Why is this blog called kickingbets? For 2 reasons

1. I hope that the bets I place are 'kicking' (i.e. win)
2. My betting fund was created with my winnings from backing Kicking King @ 1000-1 for the 2005 Gold Gup - check out the Racing Post website where this is documented.

To ensure I remain discplined, I will keep a running points/percentage total on this blog for the bets I make. Stakes will be on a scale of 1 to 5, and I will have a % running return (how I wish all betting analys would do this.)

Finally, a word of warning. If you choose to bet as a result of reading what the bets I have placed, only do so with money you can afford to lose. As in life, you are personally responsible for all your decisions (and consequent wins/losses).

Update: To give myslef more flexibility, I have changed the Stakes Scale from 1-10 points.