[AMA] The Life of a Professional Gambler

[tyKiwanuka]

Since there are always a lot of myths and misconceptions surrounding people that gamble for a living, I am opening this thread and you can ask me anything. Feel free to post your questions and I will try to give a bit of an insight of what gambling for a living means and what challenges, dis-/advantages, problems etc. come with it.


This thread is not supposed to be some place to brag. I am doing this since around 15 years and had my ups and downs. I was never a highroller, but was always able to make enough money to survive - and a bit more. Forget about the idea, that every click of the mouse is a new Lambo. I won't give any actual numbers (this is probably what people are interested the most in ) so don't bother asking such questions.
There are many ways to be successful and every gambler has his own methods to extract money from the markets. So I can only share my very own experiences/knowledge and maybe some stuff and stories from my little network. There are people that go a completely different route, all roads lead to Rome.

Most of the things will refer to sportsbetting/-trading as this is what I am doing and what is, hand in hand with poker, the only gambling area, where you can actually make money longterm. Feel free, to prove me wrong on that one


This is a self-moderated thread, since I don't want it to evolve into some spam megathread, which unfortunately is the fate of so many threads in gambling board. So please stay on topic and don't spam for signature purposes.


Some glossary:

• Have you ever been scammed by a bookmaker ?
• How to spot a scam book ?
• Which bookmakers do you use ?
• How did you start and with how much money ?
• Do you have a daily target ?
• What motivates you to do this job ?
• Do you have any additional job ?
• What is your advice for newbies ? 1 2
• What sports/leagues do you bet on ?
• Do you play poker too ? 1 2
• Are you addicted to gambling ?
• What do your family and friends think about this ?
• How do you handle losing streaks ?
• Have you ever thought about qutting and what were the reasons ?
• How to spot valuable odds ? 1 2
• What do you think about paid tipsters ?
• How did you find your niche ?
• Do/Did you have any fallback plan ?
• Legal and cultural issues
• What about Martingale ?
• Differences between punting and trading
• Luck and losing big money in Poker
• How does a day of betting look for you ?
• Do you need luck to make money with betting ?
• Variance and bad luck
• Good/bad sports/leagues to make money with
• Wealthy players in poker
• Money Management and starting bank 1 2
• (Not) Contributing to society
• Bluffing in poker 1 2 (from @Steamtyme)
• Do you have any plans for retirement ?
• How can you know that a single bet has value ?
• Are there any books your would recommend ?
• Disadvantage of being a pro gambler 1 2
• Getting bullied by authorities
• The biggest loss
• The best bet ever
• Opinon about Casinos

[safari88]

i saw a youtube video like how to cheat a casino but did know how to do that? and did you ever try it on another website to see how it works?

[AniviaBtc]

i saw a youtube video like how to cheat a casino but did know how to do that? and did you ever try it on another website to see how it works?

In a licensed gambling site, the government will take action if there are reports that a gambling site can be easily hacked and scammed. Decentralized gambling sites are more likely to have that kind of features because they want people to play gambling in a 100% legit site that will surely make people entertain and enjoy. An authorized gambling site will always fixed some bugs and errors that occurs day by day that's why it is very impossible for you to cheat in a casino. If your cheat works, then that gambling site is trash and most probably, people will not play in that casino which is easily manipulated by hacks and cheats. Nobody wants to be cheated, nobody wants an unfair game when there are money involve. There's no easy money, and gambling is all about luck, some sort of strategies, patience and humble.

[tyKiwanuka]

Have you ran into any crypto gambling sites that have actually turned out to be a scam that ran off with your funds? If so how much did they end up getting away with and do you have tips to spot these.

Yes, I did. I have been scammed by two crypto-only books (and one fiat bookie), one of them still advertising here and the other one used to advertise here.

First case was, when me and a fellow punter played an early odds parlay for Chinese Basketball. It was the last round of the season and the odds for some of the games were completely wrong. So we parlayed the very wrong ones. During the following days, the odds were changed and were completely different (among all books) when the games started. I checked my betting history and my bet slip was still open, not cancelled/voided. Games finished and all our selections won, so did the parlay. Went to check my balance and it wasn't as high as it should have been So checked my betting history and the bookmaker settled the parlay as won, but lowered all odds to how the odds were shortly before kick-off. So a parlay with odds of >100 was turned into a parlay with odds of like 8 iirc. Around 1 BTC less payout, which was around 15k Euro at that time if my mind serves me right.

Second case was a bit different. I was exploiting some bug in a betting software and/or some dumbness and ignorance from the odds compilers. This is maybe not 100% morally okay, but a) bookmakers are rich and b) bookmakers take advantage of your mistakes all the time, so I can take advantage of their mistakes as well - this is a competition in the end. They noticed what I did and just settled the bet as lost, although it won. While I am okay with them not paying me any winnings, I would have expected them to at least return my stakes on that one (was 0.2 BTC). Bookmakers make good money and should either take such things on the chin, pay the customer and learn from it or at least return the stake and kick that customer. In my case, I "showed" them a bug and think I should have at least gotten my initial deposit/stake as a bug bounty. Probably saved them some money down the road But what can you do, that money is lost and I was aware of the risk.

Speaking of being aware of the risk, I am always willing to even gamble at maybe scam books. In the end it's a cost-benefit relation. If I am able to make good money with their odds, I will try to take advantage of that, knowing that I maybe won't get paid. The possible benefit often outweighs the risk. And most scam books do actually pay - up to a certain point. It often takes a longer time for them to spot a successful customer. If you are doing frequent smaller withdrawals, you can often fly under the radar for quite some time. And by the time they scam you (i.e. not pay you), you probably already have taken out five times the amount they are going to scam you. So, even though I was scammed and I was expecting it, it still was EV+ to play there in the end and take the risk.


How to spot a scammy book is pretty difficult, as they are often starting their business with everything running smoothly. Only at a later point they will probably start to scam (see all the scam ICO's in crypto). I was never the one to immediately register with new bookmakers and deposit huge amounts. I am always more in a waiting position and observe what other players are experiencing (just checking some betting forums or googling a bit).
There will be always be some scam accusations for any bookmaker (mostly from frustrated customers ) and in the end you can never be sure.

[tyKiwanuka]

i saw a youtube video like how to cheat a casino but did know how to do that? and did you ever try it on another website to see how it works?

I am not interested in cheating. I am taking advantage of mistakes they make with being careless or ignorant, but cheating is something else. Even if there is a possibilty to cheat a scam book and make big money from it, I probably wouldn't do it. You are not harming the people behind that company with it, but your fellow punters in the end, because the money you cheat comes from them And you harm all the employees that lose their job and have some mouths to feed.

I actually already wrote to bookmakers, if I saw something that would cost them lots of money.

[sunsilk]

What were the fiat bookies or casinos that you have been with all over the years, preferably the longer ones where you have stayed.

Now, in crypto, I have the same question. Well, with your disclaimer, I'm actually interested with that but anyway you have said it already so no more questions with that.

Last question, how much capital or do you have a specific amount of capital to start the day? and for you to stop and get to say that you have a profit, how much profit or percentage do you have to achieve within the day? I hope these questions are okay to you.

[LbtalkL]

It is great to hear someone in gambling for around 15 years. Anyways, my question is how do you survive? given that gambling is not always winning. what are your strategies and discipline? Did it come out on your mind selling one of your properties just to do gambling or did you just borrow money to do gambling stuff? I am just curious but I never did those though.

[tyKiwanuka]

What were the fiat bookies or casinos that you have been with all over the years, preferably the longer ones where you have stayed. (...) I hope these questions are okay to you.

Those questions are perfectlyy fine, don't worry.

The first bookie I ever registered with was Interwetten, an european soft book. During all the years I have registered with maybe 200+. Some of them still exist, others do not, but most of them I can't use anymore due to being limited to very low amounts or even having my account closed by them. I didn't play with all of those accounts frequently, often times they just had one good bet, so I registered, placed the bet and never went back there. I placed the majority of my bets with 15-20 bookmakers, but the portfolio always had some fluctuation due to various reasons (limits, geo restrictions, witched bookmakers, taxes, ceased operations, some smaller books were taken over by bigger ones etc.).

Nowadays I am placing my bets mostly on exchanges, agent accounts and two accounts that survived the years. I tried my luck with some crypto bookies, but they rarely have the best odds for my bets or don't offer what I want to bet on, so they are not that interesting to me.  

Last question, how much capital or do you have a specific amount of capital to start the day?

Did it come out on your mind selling one of your properties just to do gambling or did you just borrow money to do gambling stuff?

I started like a lot of people do - losing. After some time, maybe half a year, I was done with losing and said to myself, I either up my game or quit gambling. So I took 800,- Euro and that was my starting bank. I always had a pretty simple money management and I started with staking 3% flat. Only single bets allowed.
I still remember my very first bet as a "pro". It was a tennis WTA match, Bammer to beat Bohmova @1,55. Stake was 24,- Euro (3% of 800,-) and it won, which gave me a net profit of 13,20 Euro. And so it started.

As the weeks, months and years went by, my winnings were higher than what I needed for my expenses. I only ever cashed out, what I needed to live and thus was able to compound - my betting bank grew and with it the stakes I placed on bets. I stayed on flat 3% stake for a long time. And with higher stakes and good, valuable bets, I was able to make more money of course. So, I never had to sell anything or borrow money. I started with the 800,- Euro and build my way up from there.

Nowadays I still have a betting bank (i.e. money that sits on my betting accounts, Neteller, Skrill etc.) and I am using this capital for my bets. I don't play 3% flat stakes anymore, it's lower now. I was never a fan of money management systems like Kelly for example, just for the reason, that I can tell that a bet has probably value, but I am struggling to tell precisely how much value it has. So flat stakes is a bit for the lazy ones, but just suits me right. And you should always do things the way you feel comfortable, if possible.

and for you to stop and get to say that you have a profit, how much profit or percentage do you have to achieve within the day?

It is great to hear someone in gambling for around 15 years. Anyways, my question is how do you survive? given that gambling is not always winning. what are your strategies and discipline?

I don't set myself any targets or limits. I play bets whenever I see value (well, sometimes the recreational gambler in me also places some fun bets ). This can be 10 bets a day or no bets at all for several days. I don't stop for the day after I have won amount X nor do I stop, when I have lost amount Y. I stop, when there is no bets with value left. So the discipline is to not gamble when there is nothing worth to gamble on.

And I am not thinking in days, but rather in months. Every single betting person, pro or not, will have losing days, losing weeks and losing months. I have had a few losing months, but never a losing year. I was never the person to chase losses or go on tilt, I just tried to keep going and do solid work (yes, this is hard work). So discipline has never been an issue for me, but it is for many people. If you lack discipline and lose your mind easily, you will have a hard time in this business.

In regards to my strategy, this is easy: Value. Play valuable odds and you will win. There is no other strategy than value, thats the whole secret and pretty straightforward. The difficulty lies in spotting the value. But if you are able to play valuable odds on a regular basis, with a good money management and discipline in place, you can't lose. You just can't, it's maths.

[dimonstration]

How you started on it? What motivates you to keep doing it knowing that you already won a lot. And able to sustain your living. I'm asking since Im not a good gambler,I'm finding it hard to risk money in gambling knowing I'm not skilled or lucky enough in winning in it.

[Darker45]

I remembered there was a thread here which asked whether there are gamblers who are professionals in the field that they make a living from gambling alone. I remembered arguing that there are indeed professional gamblers but I doubt if they are fully dependent on gambling for their and their families' day to day expenses as they are not immune to losses and the tide is definitely not always on their side. They must also have losing days.

Since you are a professional gambler yourself, I want to ask you this question. Is gambling the only source of income for you? I mean, are you fully dependent on what you win from playing games? And what if you have a losing streak, which I think is normal, how could you manage to still support yourself or your family and still able to go back to placing bets again?

[maloy633]

What's your attitude towards slots?

[tyKiwanuka]

How you started on it?

This I answered in the post above yours, please check.

What motivates you to keep doing it knowing that you already won a lot.

First of all I love betting. So whatever I will be doing in my future, I think it will always remain at least a hobby. It's just super fun for me. I turned my hobby into a profession, what more can you ask for job wise.

I won a lot - well there are people that have won way more than me - but I also spent a lot for paying my bills etc. So what keeps me going is the fact that I am far, very far, away from being financial indepently and the bills keep coming in unfortunately I see this as a normal job, it's just maybe a pretty rare one, but not that much different from any other job the people do. It gives you some freedom, you have no boss, no one to report to, but you still have to put in a good amount of work and dedication to keep it like that. The biggest difference for me to a "normal" job is, that it is called work, but doesn't feel like that, because it's also my hobby.

A lot of people, lets say in western countries, have earned tons of money. The problem is, you always have to spend most of it just to live your life So nearly all people have to keep on working, although they already earned so much.

I'm asking since Im not a good gambler,I'm finding it hard to risk money in gambling knowing I'm not skilled or lucky enough in winning in it.

No problem being a bad gambler, most of the people are. There are games (dice, roulette etc.) you just can't beat, no matter how hard you try. There are certain games though (betting & Poker), where you can win, if you develop skills. And you don't even need luck with these.

I remembered there was a thread here which asked whether there are gamblers who are professionals in the field that they make a living from gambling alone. I remembered arguing that there are indeed professional gamblers but I doubt if they are fully dependent on gambling for their and their families' day to day expenses as they are not immune to losses and the tide is definitely not always on their side. They must also have losing days.

Since you are a professional gambler yourself, I want to ask you this question. Is gambling the only source of income for you? I mean, are you fully dependent on what you win from playing games? And what if you have a losing streak, which I think is normal, how could you manage to still support yourself or your family and still able to go back to placing bets again?

I used to have a little job, which gave me a small steady income and also paid for my health insurance and things like that. I liked that job, since it put me away from my screens for some hours every week and sort of refreshed my mind. I never liked to spend the whole day in front of the computer, I always looked for some variety, which that job gave me, but also doing some sports, going out, doing this and that. I don't have that job anymore, so I am relying solely on my bets now, which is putting some pressure on I must confess.

Losing streaks happen of course. To go through this drought you should have a money reserve on top of your betting bank. There is different opinions on how much money that should be; I think it should be as much money as you need for the next 6 months without earning a penny with betting.

What's your attitude towards slots?

Slots are not a way to make money. You can of course play slots to entertain yourself a bit, but don't expect to win anything; every hobby costs some money. Slots are pretty addictive, so if you have other options to entertain yourself, I would probably choose those.

[Ailmand]

Since you are earning through gambling, would you say that you are the type of gambler whose aim is just to earn, or do you juat do it for fun? How much time do you spend gambling everyday?  Would you give an advice to people who are planning to make gambling a profession.

[swogerino]

It is great to see such a thread with a person that makes a living from gambling.Now it is only natural to me to ask in what markets you have won more often than you have lost as this is the only way to be profitable and of course the odds need to be relatively higher.

[slaman29]

Hi tyKi, thanks for sharing the story of this. I actually have only spoken in real life to professional esports players (very low level but they were still very knowledgeable) and I've always wanted to know how pro gamblers view their life and how they got into it!

Poker seems to me like the way to go to, but how do you play online when there are so many bots taking player places. Each game can last hours and hours, how do you keep all that while being sane?

[Ucy]

Well, I never doubted that some make money from skill-based gambling. Afterall it involves skills or talents. By the way, If you keep competiting with less skillful/talented players, you will most likely be successful skill-based gambler. And  with enough data or information, you could also do fine in gambling like sports betting.

[LbtalkL]

Did it come out on your mind selling one of your properties just to do gambling or did you just borrow money to do gambling stuff?

I started like a lot of people do - losing. After some time, maybe half a year, I was done with losing and said to myself, I either up my game or quit gambling. So I took 800,- Euro and that was my starting bank. I always had a pretty simple money management and I started with staking 3% flat. Only single bets allowed.
I still remember my very first bet as a "pro". It was a tennis WTA match, Bammer to beat Bohmova @1,55. Stake was 24,- Euro (3% of 800,-) and it won, which gave me a net profit of 13,20 Euro. And so it started.

As the weeks, months and years went by, my winnings were higher than what I needed for my expenses. I only ever cashed out, what I needed to live and thus was able to compound - my betting bank grew and with it the stakes I placed on bets. I stayed on flat 3% stake for a long time. And with higher stakes and good, valuable bets, I was able to make more money of course. So, I never had to sell anything or borrow money. I started with the 800,- Euro and build my way up from there.

Nowadays I still have a betting bank (i.e. money that sits on my betting accounts, Neteller, Skrill etc.) and I am using this capital for my bets. I don't play 3% flat stakes anymore, it's lower now. I was never a fan of money management systems like Kelly for example, just for the reason, that I can tell that a bet has probably value, but I am struggling to tell precisely how much value it has. So flat stakes is a bit for the lazy ones, but just suits me right. And you should always do things the way you feel comfortable, if possible.

That was inspiring I guess making it simple and not complicated is fine. Anyways, what gambling sites are you into? sports betting sites? dice, poker, etc. Personally I have more success at sports bettings I don't know but in sports, you can pretty much predict who is winning if you know the team and sports of course but not at all time, In majority I have more wins than losses in those betting platforms.

[Tramirostronix]

Ok, so on my side I'm just curious about the reaction of your family and friends
At the beginning were they afraid of your "job", because it is not a safe one and it's an addictive one ?
Are they still afraid ?

When you meet someone for the first time and they ask you about your work, what's your answer ?

[efialtis]

Awesome thread mate!

You know I like you as a person but this has got nothing to do with the fact that this might be one of the most interesting threads ever created in the gambling discussion section. Also like some of the questions a lot, keep it up guys!

[tyKiwanuka]

Thanks for all your questions guys. I will (try to) answer them all, but it needs some time.

Since you are earning through gambling, would you say that you are the type of gambler whose aim is just to earn, or do you juat do it for fun? How much time do you spend gambling everyday?  Would you give an advice to people who are planning to make gambling a profession.

I started betting for fun in first place. By the time I learned that I can actually make money with this and now the fun and making money aspect have merged.

Measuring the time is pretty hard. I am spending quite some time in front of the computer, but this is not all betting related. I do other things, like posting here, then I would check some news/stats, surf the internet, check some odds - this is all a bit chaotic tbh. I was never the person to prepare a lot for my bets and do extensive research. What takes a lot of time is watching my sports and I watch them a lot ! This is my preparation and the best preparation imo. You can extract many useful information by just watching sports, observing things and building your own opinion by what is presented in front of you.

There is two advices I would give to a beginner. A) There is always someone better. B) See A.

And then:

• Get yourself familiar with the concept of value betting.
• Pick a sport/league/niche and specialize on it.
• Have a proper money management.
• Track every bet in an excel sheet for example.
• Play ONLY single bets.
• Start with very small stakes.
• Always shop for the best odds.
• Don't think in days or weeks. Give yourself and your bets enough time to get rid of the "luck factor".
• Don't expect to win anything for a longer time, but monitor your progress.

It is great to see such a thread with a person that makes a living from gambling.Now it is only natural to me to ask in what markets you have won more often than you have lost as this is the only way to be profitable and of course the odds need to be relatively higher.

In the early days I specialized on cycling bets and made around 90% of my profits with it. I then specialized in winter sports (Biathlon, Cross-Country, Nordic Combined, Ski jumping) too, as it fitted quite well with cycling being a summer sports and winter sports running mostly, when there was no cycling. I would always have some bets with Football (Soccer), Basketball, Tennis or whereever I found some useful and valuable information. And then I always played some bets, that I was given by my little network. I trust those people blindly.

There were always some big events where I put my focus on and invested lots of time. This is mainly the Olympics and the Eurovision Song Contest. The ESC was quite a good event betting wise for some years, but not now anymore (for me). Olympics have always been a very good opportunity to make money in a short period of time. I remember the 2012 Olympics in London, where I worked 17 days in a row for 18h/day, but it paid off very well. Afterwards I was a zombie though and needed some days to recharge my batteries again.

The cycling and winter sports markets have undergone quite some change and are not profitable anymore for me for various reasons.
Struggling with having betting accounts available, I shifted my focus more to trading than pure betting/punting now. You always have to adapt. I am now trying my luck with german Football, german Basketball and looking to do some tennis (trading) as well again when the tournaments are in a more friendly time zone after AO. I am doing around 95% of my trading/bets inplay now.
Main stream sports like Football, Basketball, Tennis are way more competitive and the very golden days in sportsbetting are over imo. So I am making less money now compared to the past. 

[maxreish]

How do you manage to control gambling addiction?

You see, I started to feel that kind of attitude when I experienced to win huge at gambling and not contented with small profits. I have some reflections but it is hard for me to go back from being a small player which contented with small gains. How can you control yourself from greediness?

I am refraining from gambling slowly, which is not kinda effective.

[tyKiwanuka]

Hi tyKi, thanks for sharing the story of this. I actually have only spoken in real life to professional esports players (very low level but they were still very knowledgeable) and I've always wanted to know how pro gamblers view their life and how they got into it!

Poker seems to me like the way to go to, but how do you play online when there are so many bots taking player places. Each game can last hours and hours, how do you keep all that while being sane?

I never was an ambitious poker player. I probably made some money with it, but not noteworthy. And I learned that poker just isn’t my game. I never had problems with tilting when betting, but on the poker tables I get into a rage quite easily, because I often feel treated unfair and you have someone to blame instantly – the donk that sucked you out. When you have AA and someone calls your all-in with 72o, your mind expects you to win this hand 100/100 times. But actually you only win that hand 87.4% of the time and this is a bit hard to grasp, because AA looks so superior. With poker your mindset has to be stronger than with betting imo.
So poker was always more annoying to me than actually being fun and I only play from time to time when I am bored nowadays (and quit after short time again, because of rage^^).

As to how I see my life. Well, I have a pretty normal life I think. I work full-time, but from home. I am kind of self-employed and responsible for what I am doing, without being held accountable for anything. But else than that, I am not having some kind of Jetset life, like maybe poker or esports pro’s have with travelling, staying in fancy hotels, attending parties with drugs, alcohol and whatever else. And I was never looking for that anyway. I don’t get easily impressed with material things either and I am not the envious type of person. I just like to live my life the way I want and betting gives me the opportunity to do just that to a good extent.

I explained in an earlier post how this all unfolded. I could maybe add, that I was first introduced to betting by a friend of mine. We were on our way to the pub and he told me, he would win hundreds of Euros, if Barca, team X, team Y etc. win. He played some parlay with our german state bookie and it kind of got me excited, so I decided to have a look what this is all about.
And for the record: His parlay lost of course

How do you manage to control gambling addiction?

You see, I started to feel that kind of attitude when I experienced to win huge at gambling and not contented with small profits. I have some reflections but it is hard for me to go back from being a small player which contented with small gains. How can you control yourself from greediness?

I am refraining from gambling slowly, which is not kinda effective.

I often asked myself the question, if am addicted to gambling. In the past I tended to say probably yes. But I never bothered with being addicted, since it was kind of good addiction to me – I was making money with it and didn’t feel like I ticked a lot of boxes that come with a gambling addiction.

Nowadays I can clearly say, that I am not addicted. I have no problem being without gambling for some time and I am not missing it in these times. I probably have already gambled too much in all those years, so there seems to be some saturation But I always get back to gambling, since I have to make some money as well of course.

Greediness is a bad thing, but all people suffer from it; not only gambling people.  And I have no recipe to stop it tbh. It’s just some natural human instinct I guess.
If you think gambling has a negative impact on your life and you are spending/losing too much money, I would just stop. This is of course easier said than done and I am no psychologist. But I would probably start with breaking my routines and look for other things to do during my spare time (sports, going for walks, going out, learn new things, read).
And if all that doesn’t help, I would seek for professional help. There is no reason to be ashamed to look for help, if you are sick and gambling addiction is a sickness.

[tyKiwanuka]

That was inspiring I guess making it simple and not complicated is fine. Anyways, what gambling sites are you into? sports betting sites? dice, poker, etc. Personally I have more success at sports bettings I don't know but in sports, you can pretty much predict who is winning if you know the team and sports of course but not at all time, In majority I have more wins than losses in those betting platforms.

Thank you. Doing my best to give some insights and background information.

I am only doing sportsbetting and some poker every now and then for fun.

Having more wins than losses in betting does not always mean you are a winning player. It depends of course on the stakes for each bet and the odds.
I can play 50 bets with odds of 1,01 and stake of 10,- and win them all. Then I lose one bet with stake 10,-. I’ll then have a W/L ratio of 50-1, but till sit at a loss.

For the questions about the sites I am using, see this:

The first bookie I ever registered with was Interwetten, an european soft book. During all the years I have registered with maybe 200+. Some of them still exist, others do not, but most of them I can't use anymore due to being limited to very low amounts or even having my account closed by them. I didn't play with all of those accounts frequently, often times they just had one good bet, so I registered, placed the bet and never went back there. I placed the majority of my bets with 15-20 bookmakers, but the portfolio always had some fluctuation due to various reasons (limits, geo restrictions, witched bookmakers, taxes, ceased operations, some smaller books were taken over by bigger ones etc.).

Nowadays I am placing my bets mostly on exchanges, agent accounts and two accounts that survived the years. I tried my luck with some crypto bookies, but they rarely have the best odds for my bets or don't offer what I want to bet on, so they are not that interesting to me. 

Ok, so on my side I'm just curious about the reaction of your family and friends
At the beginning were they afraid of your "job", because it is not a safe one and it's an addictive one ?
Are they still afraid ?

When you meet someone for the first time and they ask you about your work, what's your answer ?

It took a long time until I told my parents what exactly I am doing and that I wanted to do this longterm as a profession. You know parents are parents and they always want the best for their kids. This is my life and I am not trying to please people and fit into their schemes. I have to live this life and I have the right to shape it like I want and the way I think it is a good/fun life.
They were ok with it, since they saw it made me happy and that I could live from it. They always trusted me a lot, but deep inside I know, that they would have been happier seeing me working in some more fancy job, like in a bank for example. Parents always like to brag a bit with their offspring, but if your son is gambling for a living, this is a bit hard to do. Most people don’t understand what this is all about, don’t know that such jobs exist and in the end are not interested anyway.

From my friends I had at least no negative reactions. Most were like, yeah, just do what you’re doing. But my closer friends always found it pretty cool and showed interest, being curious, asking questions – and also wanted to give me money to bet with it for them and make them some money too. But I never took money from anyone. Putting your own money at stake is already enough pressure, so no need to put other peoples money at risk too.

Being asked what I am working, I either tell right away what I am doing or just say I am a freelancer. It depends a bit on who is in front of me. I was more cautious in the past with telling what I really do, but these days I don’t care that much no more.
Especially the older generation isn’t aware that there is lots of possibilities to work online/from home today. The internet opened up a lot of online jobs and this is a completely secret and mysterious world for older people. So with older people I tend to tell something they understand better just to not being forced to explain it all to them.

[dunfida]

Okay here some of my questions. 

What pushes you to go full time with gambling(poker)? Do you have a day stable job before that?

Have you considered first on playing dice games and other luck-based one before you do jump on poker?

If you do make consistent profits on daily or living basis then you are doing a good job and only a few who do able to
manage this one.

[DarkDays]

Is/was gambling your only profession, or did you have other jobs also?

I was a professional poker player for several years back when I lived in LA, but now I spend my time shorting derivatives. Seems like a lot of professional poker players end up as traders, since they've already learned to avoid the emotional part of dealing with money.

I'll bet you've tried your hand at trading too.

[sunsilk]

tyKi, thank you for answering those questions. You know what? while I'm reading the answers for my questions, I'm imagining the struggle you've been with your starting days. But that was a great experience you have, such a very good example as a gambler. Base on your answers, it shows how disciplined you are as a gambler.

I want to ask few more question/s but I guess it's going to be too much already. I appreciated your answers.

[tyKiwanuka]

What pushes you to go full time with gambling(poker)?

I went full-time with betting, not poker

It kind of fell into my lap as explained earlier. I was making good money with betting, more than a regular job in modern slavery would have given me at that time, so why work for less money and more importantly less fun.

Do you have a day stable job before that?

Is/was gambling your only profession, or did you have other jobs also?

I never had a regular job, but kept on working in my students job after finishing my studies (I already turned "pro" during my studies):

I used to have a little job, which gave me a small steady income and also paid for my health insurance and things like that. I liked that job, since it put me away from my screens for some hours every week and sort of refreshed my mind. I never liked to spend the whole day in front of the computer, I always looked for some variety, which that job gave me, but also doing some sports, going out, doing this and that. I don't have that job anymore, so I am relying solely on my bets now, which is putting some pressure on I must confess.

Have you considered first on playing dice games and other luck-based one before you do jump on poker?

No, I never was into things like dice games, lucky me I never had any contact with gambling until I was introduced to betting by a friend (see the story above somewhere, if you are interested).

Seems like a lot of professional poker players end up as traders, since they've already learned to avoid the emotional part of dealing with money.

I'll bet you've tried your hand at trading too.

Yes, good point with those poker pros. Once you understand how markets/tables work, get the dynamics behind it and also are not super dumb when it comes to maths, it's all pretty similar. You have the framework and already went through all the emotional hussle that comes with it. I have seen poker pros go betting pros and vice versa. I have yet to meet people that went from poker/betting pro to trading pro though, but they surely exist (like you).

Actually I only ever traded sports odds and nothing else.

I want to ask few more question/s but I guess it's going to be too much already. I appreciated your answers.

Just ask them. When I find the time, I will answer.

[Ailmand]

I was never the person to prepare a lot for my bets and do extensive research. what takes a lot of time is watching my sports and i watch them a lot ! this is my preparation and the best preparation imo. you can extract many useful information by just watching sports, observing things and building your own opinion by what is presented in front of you.

Thank you for answering. I would also like to ask are you following or have a set of principles or discipline that you stick with when you gamble, or do you sometimes or most of the times bet randomly on events or sports avalaible you are familiar with? Would you consider your self gambling addicted? No offense meant, I am just curious. 

[Genemind]

Did you ever try to quit and stop yourself from gambling because you have lost most of your capital and assets? How did you handle your downfalls in gambling? We all know that gambling isn't all about winning and sometimes, losing leads us to disappointments, how did you surpass those stages?

[Rosilito]

I never thought that someone would take gambling for a living. You're quite a different man. Well, living is a gamble in the first place, isn't it? Anyway, what made you decide to take gambling as a source of income? And do you let a day having no gain? Or you won't stand up unless you lose? Do you have any long term plan? Like conducting a small business for you to generate passive income? And what it takes to be a professional gambler? Sorry for loads of questions, man 'cause I find your life interesting, and I have more question I just can't say it right now. Thank you in advance, appreciated.

[Mahanton]

What situations you experienced that almost makes you quit on betting? Ex. Losing streak etc. and how you do overcome it?

[maxreish]

Aww, you made me realized one thing when I read your answer to my question.
Discipline
You have that and not every gamble has that attitude. I feels like there is something that is lacking ingredient as a gambler and that is what I do see now with myself. I still managed to stop when I do think I am depositing my own money already and then lose. Now the only one who can help me is myself. Thanks for the answers being my reflections. Highly appreciated, bro.

[tyKiwanuka]

Thank you for answering. I would also like to ask are you following or have a set of principles or discipline that you stick with when you gamble, or do you sometimes or most of the times bet randomly on events or sports avalaible you are familiar with? Would you consider your self gambling addicted? No offense meant, I am just curious. 

My main principles are sticking to my money management, focusing on single bets and staying with the sports/leagues where I have an edge; or think I have. This leads to discipline, if you follow those rules; which is probably hard for a lot of people, since no one monitors and you can just break the rules without any consequences but monetary ones. From time to time I do some fun bets in other sports, bigger parlays or system bets. I am just human and like to have some gambles as well - my normal/pro betting I would phrase investing (in good odds) rather than gambling.

Your second quesiton was already answere here:

I often asked myself the question, if am addicted to gambling. In the past I tended to say probably yes. But I never bothered with being addicted, since it was kind of good addiction to me – I was making money with it and didn’t feel like I ticked a lot of boxes that come with a gambling addiction.

Nowadays I can clearly say, that I am not addicted. I have no problem being without gambling for some time and I am not missing it in these times. I probably have already gambled too much in all those years, so there seems to be some saturation But I always get back to gambling, since I have to make some money as well of course.

Did you ever try to quit and stop yourself from gambling because you have lost most of your capital and assets? How did you handle your downfalls in gambling? We all know that gambling isn't all about winning and sometimes, losing leads us to disappointments, how did you surpass those stages?

Why should I stop with something that brings me joy and money ?

There were losing stretches, but you should always think longterm, variance happens. My first losing month came after 3.5 years of betting and it even was two losing months in a row with quite some losses. Was hard to digest at first, but I looked at the big picture. I had won amount X during all those years and now I have lost 10% of that, no big deal and it was expected to happen at some point.  I was still confident with my abilities and trusted my system. Took my foot off the gas a bit, lowered the stakes and tried to forget about what happened and have a fresh start. It worked and it took a long time for the next losing month to appear on my spreadsheet again.

I never thought that someone would take gambling for a living. You're quite a different man. Well, living is a gamble in the first place, isn't it? Anyway, what made you decide to take gambling as a source of income? And do you let a day having no gain? Or you won't stand up unless you lose? Do you have any long term plan? Like conducting a small business for you to generate passive income? And what it takes to be a professional gambler? Sorry for loads of questions, man 'cause I find your life interesting, and I have more question I just can't say it right now. Thank you in advance, appreciated.

That are indeed a lot of questions

Some of them I already answered more or less earlier, let me get some quotes for you:

It kind of fell into my lap as explained earlier. I was making good money with betting, more than a regular job in modern slavery would have given me at that time, so why work for less money and more importantly less fun.

I started betting for fun in first place. By the time I learned that I can actually make money with this and now the fun and making money aspect have merged.

I don't set myself any targets or limits. I play bets whenever I see value (well, sometimes the recreational gambler in me also places some fun bets ). This can be 10 bets a day or no bets at all for several days. I don't stop for the day after I have won amount X nor do I stop, when I have lost amount Y. I stop, when there is no bets with value left. So the discipline is to not gamble when there is nothing worth to gamble on.

And I am not thinking in days, but rather in months. Every single betting person, pro or not, will have losing days, losing weeks and losing months. I have had a few losing months, but never a losing year. I was never the person to chase losses or go on tilt, I just tried to keep going and do solid work (yes, this is hard work). So discipline has never been an issue for me, but it is for many people. If you lack discipline and lose your mind easily, you will have a hard time in this business.

I don't have any long term plans betting wise. It's a very fast business and what works today might not work tomorrow anymore. During recent years it already has become harder and harder to survive in the betting markets and regulatory issues are not helping this case as well. So I don't bank on doing this for eternity, I take it day by day and don't think too much on what will be in 1 year.

I do of course have a private plan or a plan for my life in the future, but this is not something I would want to discuss in public, sorry Generating passive income is always welcomed, but I don't think I will (have to) start a small business for that. There is lots of possibilites to invest your money and generate some income from it.

Let me do some brainstorming for what it takes to be a professional gambler and put it here without any particular order:

Discipline, money management, dedication, cold-bloodedness, some maths, willing to learn, be content with spending a lot of time in front of the computer, mentally stable, accepting losses, working hard and for long hours, being able to adapt, good observer, lots of reading/watching, gut feeling, motivation, don't be greedy and start small.

You don't have to have that all I am lacking in some of those as well, but if you lack the majority, you should better not think about going pro. Being a pro isn't always fun and also has quite some disadvantages, but no one asked so far about that, so no need to post it just yet^^

What situations you experienced that almost makes you quit on betting? Ex. Losing streak etc. and how you do overcome it?

Longer losing streaks of course always make you kind of think of that. See the second question in this post and how to overcome it or how I do it normally.

The thing that always makes the think about quitting and what will probably make me quit one day, is the "logistics". German government is coming up with some pretty crazy shit all the time to bully gambling people. As a result I am pretty tight on betting accounts nowadays. And without a good and somewhat big bookmaker portfolio, things are getting complicated. I am running out of accounts because the german government wants to get their share of taxes from the bookmakers smokescreening it with "player protection". So lots of geo restrictions are in place, some bookmakers tax me as a resident of Germany and I am blocked by a lot of bookmakers.

That is why I was shifting my focus more on Betfair trading in recent times, as Betfair is a place where you can do your business without too many inconveniences. But I can't access Betfair (Exchange) from Germany, so had to go via an agents account. Betfair decided to close those agent accounts in December, and as a result I don't have a Betfair account now no more. Only have this white-label Orbit account. They have no API and thus no betting software can be used. Trading without software on a pretty laggy site like Orbit is kind of weary.

These surrounding logistics are really a nightmare and annoying

[pleasureteam]

As I see the most of your winnings come from tracking value from the market. Do you manually search for valuebets or do you use some special software to do so?
As you also mentioned currently your mostly are betting on exchanges. Do you really bet (gamble) on the exchange or do you rather trade on those exchanges?

[tyKiwanuka]

As I see the most of your winnings come from tracking value from the market. Do you manually search for valuebets or do you use some special software to do so?
As you also mentioned currently your mostly are betting on exchanges. Do you really bet (gamble) on the exchange or do you rather trade on those exchanges?

I know my leagues/sports I am covering so have "my" odds in mind for the matches. When the first odds come out, I will have a look and can compare, where I have a different opinion and what probably has some value. And everybody can do it more or less, the good punters/traders just can do it better.

Lets say we have Liverpool playing Watford at home and you get these odds: 8,71 - 5,62 - 1,33 (1X2). Anyone can see that the odds for Liverpool are insane and most likely have some value. Now this example is of course exaggerated, normally you have smaller "margins" (not sure, if that is the correct word).

In my mind I maybe have odds of 2,0 as a fair price for a certain team. Odds come out and I could get 2,50 for that team. I would place a pre-match bet here then. If the odds were only 2,20, I probably wouldn't place a bet, since I can get better odds inplay. If the odds were 2,0, I would just wait for inplay and see if some opportunities arise. If not, then not, there is enough other matches to bet on.

So, in general, I spot value by just following my sports/leagues, keeping myself informed, think about winning probabilities, make up my own odds and things like that. You can also spot value with doing statistical analyses of course, but this requires some expertise in coding etc and was never my way (apart from the fact that I am not able to code such things ). You are most likely working with a lower yield then, but will have huge turnover of course, since your computer just tells you what to do and you can calculate the fair odds for tons of matches and place your bets accordingly. This is a bit bot-ish then and would take lots of fun out for me. But to each his own, as I said there is lots of ways to make money with betting - but the concept of value always applies.

-

Really pure punting I rarely do on the exchange, so my answer would be trading. But what is trading in the end ? It's a pretty wide field. If I place a pre-match bet on Liverpool to win and hedge it after they scored the lead - is that considered trading ? A trade can be backing something and laying it after the odds moved in your favour and never come back. Or I can do gazillion of backs and lays during a tennis match for example. I am not a high frequenzy trader, so I would normally back and lay a bit, wait for higher inplay odds or just react to what is happening in front of me.

I only play pre-match bets, when I see very good value and think that I won't get to see these/higher odds inplay (these bets are often not found on Betfair, but are early odds with bookmakers). But even with these pre-match bets, that were supposed to be a classical punt, I may be  tempted to lay off some liability inplay, if things go my way. I often hedge punts, which is a flaw in my "system". Cut your losses short and let your winners run they say, but I always struggled a bit with that tbh.

[White Christmas]

Actually I can share a story on how and what is the life of a professional gambler. If you are usually going to a casino, definitely you can see a people who are just playing and gambling but definitely it is not hid/her own money, in which there are a manager that is giving him a money or stakes in order to gamble it and play. Most likely I can saw those person who has a lot of debts and his manager is giving him a money in order to play and pay for their debts. And the percent of the player and the financer will be divided in terms and agreement with the both parties. What I am trying to say is, there are still some professional gamblers that still not rich but able to play at it's fullest.

[rhomelmabini]

I just read poker in the OP I guess I'll ask things in regards to it.

1. Do you believe that your hands are just pure luck or it really has to do with strategy or involving math skills?
2. Which one you make money a lot easier is it from poker or from trading (feels like I'll include this to make some comparison)?

[amishmanish]

Great thread to read as my first one coming into the Gambling section. Being a professional gambler yourself, I am sure you have dipped hands into almost everything from dice games, poker to slots, maybe in both the online as well as real-world casino format. So here is my question.

How would you describe to someone about the world of gambling including its value as entertainment as well as a source of income, like in your case.

PS: You described the sports betting and your strategy towards it in one of the answers. It seems a big part of it is actually watching a lot of sports. So, Watching sports and then earning money off of it, you have done quite well..

[tyKiwanuka]

I just read poker in the OP I guess I'll ask things in regards to it.

1. Do you believe that your hands are just pure luck or it really has to do with strategy or involving math skills?
2. Which one you make money a lot easier is it from poker or from trading (feels like I'll include this to make some comparison)?

I don't play poker for a living and never did, but I thought about it. I said in the OP, that poker is the only gambling game apart from betting, where you can make money longterm. So to answer your question, I make more money with betting/trading In general, you can make good money with both, it depends a bit on your personal preferences and abilites, which one fits you better.

Your poker hands are just pure luck short-term of course. But over a big enough sample size you should be dealt the exact same cards as all your fellow players, so we have a level playing field. The question is, what you do with your hands and how you play them. That is where the math comes in play and the ability to read your opponent.

Great thread to read as my first one coming into the Gambling section. Being a professional gambler yourself, I am sure you have dipped hands into almost everything from dice games, poker to slots, maybe in both the online as well as real-world casino format. So here is my question.

How would you describe to someone about the world of gambling including its value as entertainment as well as a source of income, like in your case.

PS: You described the sports betting and your strategy towards it in one of the answers. It seems a big part of it is actually watching a lot of sports. So, Watching sports and then earning money off of it, you have done quite well..

Actually I only ever invested lots of time in betting. For poker I read some books and played a bit with small-ish stakes, but not my game in the end. Never played dice, and slots only, when I got some free spins from bookmakers. I was in a real life Casino only once and don't think I will go there very often in the future.

Your second question is a bit unspecific, so I am having trouble to understand what you would like to hear. I already wrote a lot about intentions, how it all started, about the fun/money relation and all those things. Maybe scroll a bit through this thread and see if that answers your question. If not, just come back


This is a bit off-topic, but everyone who is fascinated by the "world of betting" and likes to read a bit, should have a look at "Game, Set, Cash!: Inside the Secret World of International Tennis Trading" from Brad Hutchinson. It's about courtsiding in Tennis and taking advantage of time delays in TV broadcasts. It's an easy to read and understand book with a lot of fun stories of a young man getting paid to travel the world and working for a gambling syndicate.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22226468-game-set-cash

I am not earning any money by mentioning this book here nor do I know Brad. I just recommend it here for interested people, since I have had so much fun reading it (and did so already thrice).

[sunsilk]

I want to ask few more question/s but I guess it's going to be too much already. I appreciated your answers.

Just ask them. When I find the time, I will answer.

I forgot the question that I'm about to ask you yesterday but it goes something like this. What can you say about those paid tipsters? those gamblers that are asking for payment with their insights and insiders?

I think it's a good question because we've been seeing those kind of tipsters here in the forum before and probably in the future, more of them will come. Do you have anything to say for those people that wants to avail it or try it? honestly, I'm not asking this for myself but in general because it is what I see.

[tyKiwanuka]

I forgot the question that I'm about to ask you yesterday but it goes something like this. What can you say about those paid tipsters? those gamblers that are asking for payment with their insights and insiders?

I think it's a good question because we've been seeing those kind of tipsters here in the forum before and probably in the future, more of them will come. Do you have anything to say for those people that wants to avail it or try it? honestly, I'm not asking this for myself but in general because it is what I see.

Yes, it's a good question and I actually can share a bit of my own experience as I was subscribed to two of them as well once. That was in maybe 2007/2008 and I didn't monitor the paid tipster market afterwards, so my own experiences are probably a bit outdated.

Generally speaking I wouldn't advise against subscribing, but you have to be careful. There surely are some scammers amongst them and from my experience these services are doing good for some time and then fade. The services I used were quite successful for maybe 3-4 months (I joined relatively early after they started) and after that they barely managed to get break even and then went on tilt and were chasing losses. Subsequently they ceased operations then.

The people that offer these services often have a good (publicly trackable) stretch and then decide to milk some money out of it by opening a service. It's nothing to condemn, but you have to be aware of that. It's something you can jump on while it lasts, but with the first signs of things going the wrong way, I would exit.

The main point from people against these services is always: "Why would you sell a working system, this must be scam." But these paid tipsters don't sell a system, they sell their value bets and there is no system behind it. If you are able to find valuable bets in liquid markets, it's fine to sell them as you will make some additional money with it. Selling your bets from small markets is something you shouldn't do though. You will a) destroy those markets that make you money and b) nearly none of your subscribers will be able to follow your bets with the same odds and thus will lose money.

There is/was a user in a german-austrian betting forum, that used to be the best punter I ever saw publishing his bets. He was mainly playing Basketball bets from smaller markets. The moment he published his bets in the forum, you could see the odds drop real-time. He maybe recommended a bet on team A for 2,20 odds and in a heartbeat, those odds were brought down to like 1,50. All those guys being able to catch that bet above 2,00 are probably fine, but if you follow a 2,20 bet with 1,60, you will lose longterm - no matter how good that punter is.

If someone has a proven record over a good amount of time (several months and frequent bets), there is nothing bad in subscribing to such a service, if it's not too expensive and breaks your bank just for the fee

-

There is an Australian guy who started a journey to make money with just following tipsters. He had no real idea about betting and/or wasn't a succesful punter, but had some money available. So he subscribed to some services and placed shitloads of bets every day, with the goal to make $25 a day. He used to be subscribed to like 10 services iirc., but nowadays he only keeps on following the bets from one of them. The other ~9 weren't successfull anymore after some time/years. He is transparent like no one else with his finances and bets, his wins and losses (and his weight )



He is also doing lots of other things too that give him passive income, and he is a pretty funny and smart guy.

You can check out his blog here, if you are interested: https://www.daily25.com/ (again I am not making any money by mentioning his blog here)

[Steamtyme]

Hey great thread. You fall into a rare bread of pro/semi pro gambler, that are willing to share their story, advice and general tips honestly and without the expectation of earning from it - I don't consider the Sig campaign to fall into that category.
I've recently met a few people such as yourself from the Poker community and must say it's been eye opening to say the least. On top of that I followed a youtuber for a few months and just the free information he put out in the world through his content motivated me to buy some of his training materials. I realized that he was giving away a good portion of it for free, if you put in hours of watching and focusing on his channel, but went much more in-depth and in a focused manner through the paid material. Though it was well worth it to support his business after the freebies I got, and couldn't be happier.
I've also been getting an absurd amount of personal reviews done by a few individuals which is huge. Most people out there want a cut or a piece of everything you make for anything they share with you. I can understand it to some point but as someone who personally likes helping people with my knowledge when I can, it's nice to receive that same assistance from others.

I was reading on your evolution from cycling and winter sports due to the action not being as good. How heavily do you rely on your friends/common interest gamblers to find the next niche you want to focus on?
Seeing as you started out while being a student, did you/do you have a decent fallback plan if your gambling career is no longer profitable?

[sunsilk]

Amazing. Thank you for sharing your about those paid tipsters so out of many that asks for payment, there's few of them that are actually real and offers the service for real with their valuable bets.

I'm shock with the guy that you have shared his journey about many tipsters and then in the end, he stayed to one. I'll check in to that blog and will read the story. I guess I'm done asking questions and you have shared more than what I have asked. Thank you very much tyKi.

[tyKiwanuka]

I've recently met a few people such as yourself from the Poker community and must say it's been eye opening to say the least. On top of that I followed a youtuber for a few months and just the free information he put out in the world through his content motivated me to buy some of his training materials. I realized that he was giving away a good portion of it for free, if you put in hours of watching and focusing on his channel, but went much more in-depth and in a focused manner through the paid material. Though it was well worth it to support his business after the freebies I got, and couldn't be happier.
I've also been getting an absurd amount of personal reviews done by a few individuals which is huge. Most people out there want a cut or a piece of everything you make for anything they share with you. I can understand it to some point but as someone who personally likes helping people with my knowledge when I can, it's nice to receive that same assistance from others.

People always wonder, how to make a living out of betting/poker and think of a well kept secret in a taciturn community, but it's not like that. The answer is always value (or EV+ for the poker players). When I get asked, what is the secret, what is your system, how do you do that and I then tell them it's just the value aspect, they are always kind of disappointed They often expect to be given a very precise answer, like do this and that and then you'll be successful, but I can only can give the very unspecific answer of value and I can just guide them on how to maybe find value and give them some tools. But they have to go their own way and take a path they are comfortable with. And if they just want to be given a money printing recipe on a silver platter, they are likely kind of lazy (or naive for that matter) and it doesn't work like that. You experienced yourself how much work, dedication, effort it takes to get things going. If you are not willing to learn and put in all the hours, you are doomed to fail. But we all fail - often and a lot and it's a good thing.

I am always willing to share my knowledge and experiences - and I really like to talk about betting - if I feel a genuine interest and people always seem fascinated by a, what it looks for them, shiny world. But it’s hard work and a pretty normal job in the end. It’s just a rather rare job, which most people fail to do, but would like to do. And as stated in the OP, there is lots of myths and misconceptions. Being a poker/betting pro is pretty similar to be being a stockbrocker for example and even insurance companies just do betting in the end; they calculate the probability of a claim and put their premiums accordingly. They just bet how likely it will be you dying, having a car accident or your house catching fire. And they are pretty good bettors considering how filthy rich all these insurance companies are.

I was reading on your evolution from cycling and winter sports due to the action not being as good. How heavily do you rely on your friends/common interest gamblers to find the next niche you want to focus on?

My cycling niche I "found" on my own, since I was always interested in it even when I didn't know betting yet. A pro friend of mine, who I got to know in the beginning of my "career", then introduced me to winter sports and taught me a lot of things about the dynamics in the different winter sport competitions.
Finding new niches is not really about actively looking for it, they are often found by coincidence. You read something, which gets you interested, you watch some sports you have never really cared about and find some angle, you are given a bet by a fellow punter and get interested in the sports while following the bet, things like that. But you have to like your niche and have some joy following it. For example a lot of pros are involved with horse racing and a lot of money can be made there. I had a look, invested a bit of time, even tried a bit, but it's not mine, because I don't like horse racing. No need to force things that just aren't there.

For the moment I don't really have a niche. When saying niche, I am refering to some smallish and/or non-mainstream sport/league. The last years, I was always kind of searching for a new niche I could cover, but as explained above, it doesn't really work like that (maybe only for me, not sure). You could consider german Basketball as kind of a niche, but it's a pretty mature and well compiled market these days too. And you only have a few games on the weekends always.

The reason why I am not desperately looking for a niche now, is the issues with my betting accounts. For a niche, you need some non-limited, non-taxed accounts with soft books and I don't have those no more. So even if I found a niche again, I probably couldn't bet on it properly. That is why I shifted my focus more on trading and getting my feet wet in the bigger markets with it. This is a longterm decision, since I don't see any future for me in the niche markets. Niches only last so long and there isn't infinite sports/leagues to regularly have niches open up. The markets mature pretty fast these days.

Friend of mine is doing Chinese basketball as a niche. When betting was available for this league, it was pretty easy for him to make money there. It wasn't very well covered internationally and he is Chinese, so no language barrier. He was able to collect lots of valuable information and knew things only a few people knew. The CBA wants to become the NBA of Asia and they have lots of money available for that. They have a NBA-like schedule and some really good and famous import players, so there is way more coverage now. Today my friend is struggling a lot more in extracting value there. There is now a lot of stats available, lots of news to be found and even all those strange extra rules they have for CBA (foreign players are not allowed to play all the time etc.) are publicly known now. His edge is way lower now. And if the CBA gets really big, he might lose his edge completely and the niche stops being a niche to him. He would have to look for a new niche then. But the possiblities are endless in China as we all know

Seeing as you started out while being a student, did you/do you have a decent fallback plan if your gambling career is no longer profitable?

I am pretty well educated, at least on paper , so that was kind of a fallback plan and my ticket into the regular labour market. Before I went to university I completed an apprenticeship and was offered a job to work for that company. But I declined that offer, since during this apprenticeship I felt that this isn't what I wanted to do in life - a 9-5 job. So I decided to go studying to buy some time and think a bit more what I wanted to do in life and what are the options. Well, I just drifted with my studying and wasn't really interested in all this theoretical stuff and listening to 90min monologues. So I mainly skipped my classes and decided that all this could be learned from home as well. And then somewhere during that time I got to know the betting world and found something that I really liked to do and where I could earn good money with. I was about to cancel my studies just 1 year before I would have gotten my diploma, but decided to go through with it and get this piece of paper for my CV. Funnily I managed to get my diploma with a rather good grade, regarding the effort (read: non-effort) I put in. So my apprenticeship and diploma were my fallback plans, without me really wanting to get such a regular job ever. By now, I would guess that these pieces of paper are not useful anymore, since I am too long "without a job", so if I fail with my betting, I would probably have to work in some low paying and pretty basic job (or open a paid tipster service^^).

I don't consider the Sig campaign to fall into that category.

I am not getting paid for wearing the sig


@sunsilk
Thank you, my pleasure.

[leea-1334]

Interesting to read some of these. My question for you is, how do you suggest a person approaches gambling when it is culturally frowned upon and also not legal in their country. Should they just do it in silence? How do you explain to people what you do? Knowing it can get you or even your family in trouble.

And no this is not a question for me even though the situation is true where I am.

[deisik]

Most of the things will refer to sportsbetting/-trading as this is what I am doing and what is, hand in hand with poker, the only gambling area, where you can actually make money longterm. Feel free, to prove me wrong on that one

Well, I'm not going to prove you wrong

Moreover, I have always been saying something to that tune myself, that even with dice where you have to play against the house edge (read, you are more or less set to lose in the end), you can build pretty safe or even fail-safe strategies that allow you play indefinitely long without busting (for the inquiring minds, see here), though your profits will be tiny compared to the capital required to implement these strategies in practice (read, it may simply be not worth it)

But that's not why I'm posting here. Apart from sports betting, you seem to refer to trading as an activity you are currently involved in. So I'm interested in your honest reply, i.e. do you consider trading (whatever variety you stick to) as more profitable than gambling in the long run? I don't mean sudden bursts of luck but more like a regular source of income over years? Isn't trading less heavy on you personally given you have been in the game for so long?

Me, I consider trading (I mean cryptocurrency trading first and foremost) a type of gambling in its own right, even with a house edge of sorts (more specifically, the advantage that exchanges, insiders, arbitrageurs and their likes have before regular traders). However, it seems like many people are turning to trading eventually as they come to see it less psychologically demanding than gambling (stress and all that stuff)

[tyKiwanuka]

Interesting to read some of these. My question for you is, how do you suggest a person approaches gambling when it is culturally frowned upon and also not legal in their country. Should they just do it in silence?

Generally speaking I wouldn't care about what other people expect from you. This is your life, so you should do with it whatever you like - it can be over any day. Don't please expectations of others, because you have to live this life, not the others. Now this is often not as easy as it sounds. I am living in a country, where culture (which often stems from religious stuff) isn't really an issue. So I have never experienced rejection for cultural reasons and can't really judge what it means, how it feels and what are the consequences of being a sinner

With gambling not being legal, this is another issue. You would have to weigh, what there is to gain and what there is to lose/risk. Nowadays you can find workarounds for a lot of legal domestic issues, when it comes to gambling. So, if there is not much punishment, if/when they catch you, why not give it a try, if you would like to do that and earn some money from it. Gambling is officially forbidden in China as well (or controlled by CPC), but my chinese friend is still doing his betting more or less freely. There is always a way, if you are really dedicated.

How do you explain to people what you do? Knowing it can get you or even your family in trouble.

Me and my family fortunately won't get into (legal) trouble for what I am doing. Betting is considered a game of luck in Germany and thus is no taxable income - looks like I have a lot of luck with my bets Betting is not legal nor illegal here, it's still a grey area. I spoke about the other question here:

It took a long time until I told my parents what exactly I am doing and that I wanted to do this longterm as a profession. You know parents are parents and they always want the best for their kids. This is my life and I am not trying to please people and fit into their schemes. I have to live this life and I have the right to shape it like I want and the way I think it is a good/fun life.
They were ok with it, since they saw it made me happy and that I could live from it. They always trusted me a lot, but deep inside I know, that they would have been happier seeing me working in some more fancy job, like in a bank for example. Parents always like to brag a bit with their offspring, but if your son is gambling for a living, this is a bit hard to do. Most people don’t understand what this is all about, don’t know that such jobs exist and in the end are not interested anyway.

From my friends I had at least no negative reactions. Most were like, yeah, just do what you’re doing. But my closer friends always found it pretty cool and showed interest, being curious, asking questions – and also wanted to give me money to bet with it for them and make them some money too. But I never took money from anyone. Putting your own money at stake is already enough pressure, so no need to put other peoples money at risk too.

Being asked what I am working, I either tell right away what I am doing or just say I am a freelancer. It depends a bit on who is in front of me. I was more cautious in the past with telling what I really do, but these days I don’t care that much no more.
Especially the older generation isn’t aware that there is lots of possibilities to work online/from home today. The internet opened up a lot of online jobs and this is a completely secret and mysterious world for older people. So with older people I tend to tell something they understand better just to not being forced to explain it all to them.

[Betwrong]

~
There were losing stretches, but you should always think longterm, variance happens. My first losing month came after 3.5 years of betting and it even was two losing months in a row with quite some losses. Was hard to digest at first, but I looked at the big picture. I had won amount X during all those years and now I have lost 10% of that, no big deal and it was expected to happen at some point.  I was still confident with my abilities and trusted my system. Took my foot off the gas a bit, lowered the stakes and tried to forget about what happened and have a fresh start. It worked and it took a long time for the next losing month to appear on my spreadsheet again.
~

You are saying in the OP, "I am doing this since around 15 years", but since I don't know your age, I can't determine for how long you've been in this business actually.

The thing is that I'm a poker player myself, not professional, but I love Texas Hold'em, and I play this game a lot(I'm in total profit of about 0.15 BTC from 3 years of playing). And I have a theory, that anyone who knows the rules of the game and also has the knowledge of the basic concepts of probability, can be in profit for 2-3 years in a row just because of luck. I came up with this theory not because of my personal experience, but rather after reading and watching videos about famous poker players. Tom Dwan, for example, was losing millions of USD within a particular year, and not just once.

What are your thoughts on that?

[tyKiwanuka]

Moreover, I have always been saying something to that tune myself, that even with dice where you have to play against the house edge (read, you are more or less set to lose in the end), you can build pretty safe or even fail-safe strategies that allow you play indefinitely long without busting (for the inquiring minds, see here), though your profits will be tiny compared to the capital required to implement these strategies in practice (read, it may simply be not worth it)

You would also need an infinite bank to be on the safe side of things. Sure, Martingale works to a certain extent, but for it to be a sure thing to make money without any risk involved, you would have to have infinite money and no one has that. And even if you had, you would have to find a casino/bookmaker that lets you stake infinite money on a single dice/bet. And to my knowledge such casino/bookmaker doesn't exist.
The problem with Martingale is, that it might work very well for some time and smallish-profits. But sooner or later, you will get to the point, where you would have to invest a huge amount of money - just to get all your losses back and make like 1 cent profit. This is not good for your health

But that's not why I'm posting here. Apart from sports betting, you seem to refer to trading as an activity you are currently involved in. So I'm interested in your honest reply, i.e. do you consider trading (whatever variety you stick to) as more profitable than gambling in the long run? I don't mean sudden bursts of luck but more like a regular source of income over years? Isn't trading less heavy on you personally given you have been in the game for so long?

Me, I consider trading (I mean cryptocurrency trading first and foremost) a type of gambling in its own right, even with a house edge of sorts (more specifically, the advantage that exchanges, insiders, arbitrageurs and their likes have before regular traders). However, it seems like many people are turning to trading eventually as they come to see it less psychologically demanding than gambling (stress and all that stuff)

First of all I would consider trading a discipline in this whole realm of gambling/investing. So I am having trouble to compare trading and gambling, as trading is part of gambling in my view.

To stay on topic to your question, I would maybe consider comparing trading and punting (placing a bet pre-match and just waiting for the outcome). Punting takes place in a more or less fixed/set market with most circumstances and parameters standing still. There is not much happening pre-match. The stats are known, the news are known, injured players are known, all those things. And the bookmakers/markets have learned a lot and not much value can be found in this situation.

Now with the match starting and the markets going inplay, things get dynamic and the fixed setting from pre-match is broken up. Things happen very fast and there is a lot of imperfections in the market. There is not enough time to take all the different parameters into account, so it's easier to find valuable spots trading inplay - or lets say there is more value to be found, to actually spot it, is quite difficult.

In regards to crypto trading, you could think about a market moving sideways for very long, like we often saw in recent months. Not much value to be found (short-term), no big gains to be expected from trading. Now imagine a sudden jump of +10%, things are getting crazy then and there is lots of good trading options opening up. But you have to be fast and have no time to calculate and weigh for ages. You have to prepare beforehand. Like a sniper. He lies there for hours and hours and is well prepared. He knows he will have to pull the trigger, but he does not know when and always has to remain alert. Once the opportunity arises, he has to act fast. There is probably only a short time window.

Trading/gambling/punting all have their own, but pretty similar, psychological demands, so I wouldn't claim trading to be less demanding in that regard and people turning to trading because of that. With trading it's a bit easier to make money, if you are good in doing it. But you will also lose a lot more, if you are bad at it

[tyKiwanuka]

You are saying in the OP, "I am doing this since around 15 years", but since I don't know your age, I can't determine for how long you've been in this business actually.

The thing is that I'm a poker player myself, not professional, but I love Texas Hold'em, and I play this game a lot(I'm in total profit of about 0.15 BTC from 3 years of playing). And I have a theory, that anyone who knows the rules of the game and also has the knowledge of the basic concepts of probability, can be in profit for 2-3 years in a row just because of luck. I came up with this theory not because of my personal experience, but rather after reading and watching videos about famous poker players. Tom Dwan, for example, was losing millions of USD within a particular year, and not just once.

What are your thoughts on that?

I went pro, or tried to, after maybe half a year of losing and saying to myself I either up my game and start winning or quit. So I am betting for around 15,5 years.

If you are playing profitable for 2-3 years in a row, you are not lucky, but have developed some skill to beat the tables. You can't be just lucky for 2-3 years winning with poker. You know, the good thing in poker, and what is quite contrary to betting, is, that you don't always have to compete with the best of the best. In poker you can choose your limit that fits your skills and what you are comfortable with. You can play small stakes and take money from a lot of donks. When you rise up the limits, it will get harder to make some money and you are probably the donk then If you play high-stakes poker with small stakes skills, you will probably have to file for bankruptcy very soon.

In betting you will always have to compete with the best of the best. There are no markets for newbies or not so skilled people. You compete with all the sharks right from the get go.

With all those rich poker players losing millions or even going broke at some point, this is for various reasons I think. The playing style of Tom Dwan is pretty reckless to say the least. So some variance is very much expected with him. And poker players often go through rough stretches, where they are just not able to play their A game for a long time. But if you win $10m over a few years and then lose $3m in one year, it's not that bad of an average income I think And it's something you have to deal with mentally, work your way through this, maybe do some additional theory and not go on tilt. Believe in your abilities and always try to improve. Not improving is deadly.
These very good poker pros often earn lots of money at a very young age and this might be a bit overwhelming for them and not healthy. They never learned to value money and that it's hard work earning it for normal people. And they think that they can make millions playing poker forever. So they get a bit careless and cocky I think. Every good businessman went broke at least once earlier in his career they say

[DoublerHunter]

If you were telling the truth, I've never imagined meeting someone who gambles for 15 years and survives. I used to look for some since my family was victims of unwise gambling. I would love to hear your story by answering these questions I will address. In 15 years, I know when you were getting started of course you were a newbie.

Nevertheless, I have a few questions. How did you do it? How did you master gambling? Did you find a mentor who taught you how to play the games? Or did you learn your strategies all by yourself? How long did it take for you to be able to master the games you play? Did it take a short single year or it took you more than a year? Can you be specific? Did you ever lose? How often did you lose when you were getting started and still mastering your craft? Did you invest a massive amount of risk for you to attain your gambling skills?

[amishmanish]

Your second question is a bit unspecific, so I am having trouble to understand what you would like to hear. I already wrote a lot about intentions, how it all started, about the fun/money relation and all those things. Maybe scroll a bit through this thread and see if that answers your question. If not, just come back

This thread has a lot of anecdotal information and you make many references to the world of gambling that a new person would find not identify. I get that someone will need to actually be immersed into it to get all the references. My question was aimed at getting a bird's eye view of what the "Gambling world" is like. How would you describe it to someone in a way that they can decide if it is for them or not, the triumphs and the tribulations?

I understand that it is a pretty open ended question and someone could probably write a book on that. Your experience is mostly in sports betting and you are doing a great job in eliciting interest. I think the line that best summarizes it for a newbie to the world are in just your last reply:

In betting you will always have to compete with the best of the best. There are no markets for newbies or not so skilled people. You compete with all the sharks right from the get go.

[tyKiwanuka]

If you were telling the truth, I've never imagined meeting someone who gambles for 15 years and survives. I used to look for some since my family was victims of unwise gambling. I would love to hear your story by answering these questions I will address. In 15 years, I know when you were getting started of course you were a newbie.

Nevertheless, I have a few questions. How did you do it? How did you master gambling? Did you find a mentor who taught you how to play the games? Or did you learn your strategies all by yourself? How long did it take for you to be able to master the games you play? Did it take a short single year or it took you more than a year? Can you be specific? Did you ever lose? How often did you lose when you were getting started and still mastering your craft? Did you invest a massive amount of risk for you to attain your gambling skills?

All of these questions have been answered already one way or the other and I don't like to repeat myself too much. So, if you are interested in the answers to your questions, make yourself a coffee or grab a beer and just read through this thread from the beginning.

I will already answer one question of you right here:

Did you ever lose?

Yes. Without having any stats to back it up, I think I have lost more bets than I actually won

[tyKiwanuka]

This thread has a lot of anecdotal information and you make many references to the world of gambling that a new person would find not identify. I get that someone will need to actually be immersed into it to get all the references. My question was aimed at getting a bird's eye view of what the "Gambling world" is like. How would you describe it to someone in a way that they can decide if it is for them or not, the triumphs and the tribulations?

Hmm, ok, I can maybe talk a bit about how a normal day (of betting) looks for me. Not all days are the same. Beginning of the week, there is not a lot to do for me normally or only in the evenings, when I can actually watch some sports. So lets take a Saturday maybe, which is always the most busy day. I am a night person, so would get up rather late without any alarm being set. I would have breakfast and some tea/coffee and go through my mornings internet routine. Like checking mails, checking some general news, this and that. At 1pm the games for second division football in Germany start, so I would watch the pre-coverage starting at 12:30pm and check the line-ups, check the latest odds. In my mind I already know, what I will look for in these games and what I will do if X or Y happens. So from 1pm I will be watching the matches and see, if there is some opportunity to get in. Games finish 2:45pm and I will switch to pre-coverage for Bundesliga then, check the line-ups etc. Those games start at 3:30pm and finish 5:15pm and I will look to get some food afterwards - waiting for 6:30pm game in Bundesliga. This late game in Bundesliga is often times not very interesting to me (Bayern, Leipzig, Dortmund playing some scrubs), so my attention turns more to german Basketball, where you have games at 6:30 and 8:30pm on Saturdays normally. Basketball I can only stream and not watch on TV. There is a ~30sec delay with this stream, so I have to adapt my trading accordingly. Trading german Basketball on Betfair is pretty pointless though, since there is next to no liquidity and I don't feel comfortable with this 30sec delay anyway. So I will wait for a time-out or half-time to take some action if any (this is more of a punt at a bookmaker then).

During american College Football season, I would have some game running on TV after the late Bundesliga game has finished and which is normally running muted on TV while I focus on Basketball. The Basketball matches finish at around 10:30pm. The last weekends I would then watch some NFL playoffs. I am not betting on NFL with the intention or the hope of making money, I just do it for fun to add some spice while watching. The NFL is my big love and I watch as many games as possible, but I am not able to bet on it profitably, so I see my bets on NFL games just as a hobby and don't care too much about winning or losing. Stakes are pretty low there too then.

During all the time, there is always some distraction with mails arriving, talking to my fellow punters, phone calls and whatever, so it can get quite chaotic and hectic. I should probably shut down all things that could get me distracted, but I never chose to do so. Watching a match of football can be very boring at times, so some distraction is maybe welcomed deep inside of me, I don't know.

After I finished betting for the day, I will eat something. Then go away from the computer and go to some supermarket, for a walk or just watch some TV (no sports then!), meet with friends or family (those that are maybe still awake^^) and do what other people do as well in their spare time and then go to bed.

On contrary on a day like today, there really isn't much to do for me betting wise. I am wating for the german second division football match today, which starts 8:30pm, where I will monitor what is happening and maybe do something inplay. Other than that, there is nothing to do today.

[deisik]

Did you ever lose?

Yes. Without having any stats to back it up, I think I have lost more bets than I actually won

And here comes a tricky question

You seem to state that you are making a living out of gambling (widely defined). Just in case, I'm totally cool with that. But since you lost more bets than you won, it basically means that the bets that you lost are smaller than the bets you won since otherwise you couldn't remain profitable for so long (let alone make a living out of it)

However, this instantly begs the question if you are in fact using some variety of martingale, i.e.doubling (tripling, etc) your bet size after a loss and letting the variance make its thing as you can't possibly predict that your smaller bets are going to lose more often than the bigger ones. So how come really?

[tyKiwanuka]

And here comes a tricky question

You seem to state that you are making a living out of gambling (widely defined). But since you lost more bets than you won, it basically means that the bets that you lost are smaller than the bets you won since otherwise you couldn't remain profitable for so long (let alone make a living out of it)

But this instantly begs the question whether you are using some variety of martingale, i.e.doubling (tripling, etc) your bet size after a loss as you can't possibly predict that your smaller bets are going to lose more often than the bigger ones. So how come really?

It solely depends on the odds you play and the stakes you use. I stake more or less always flat (% of my bank). I like to play higher odds. Example:

Bet#1: Odds 5, stake 100,-, lost
Bet#2: Odds 5, stake 100,-, lost
Bet#3: Odds 5, stake 100,-, lost
Bet#4: Odds 5, stake 100,-, won

Net win for #4 is 400,-. net loss for #1, #2 and #3 is 300,-, so I have a net win of 100,- over all those bets, despite having only won 1 and losing 3.

[AicecreaME]

I've gambled a couple of times in the past but I didn't put too much money on it, like a couple of dollars and that's it, I quit, I just tried it. So let me get straight to my question, this would probably help a lot of people who are trying to try gambling.

Before you enter this world (gambling) that became your profession, [1]Is this worth to try and push your limits until you got your winnings and decide whether it is for you or not? [2] How are you going to figure it out when to stop and realized that you're taking the wrong path?

[tyKiwanuka]

Before you enter this world (gambling) that became your profession, [1]Is this worth to try and push your limits until you got your winnings and decide whether it is for you or not? [2] How are you going to figure it out when to stop and realized that you're taking the wrong path?

The job you do should a) be some fun to you and b) give you enough money to pay for everything.

A job that gives you b) but not a) is doable and is what 80%+ of people are doing imo. A job that gives you a) but not b) is probably not worth doing.

[1] I definitely think that it's worth trying, but thats just me. You always only regret things you didn't do rather than the things you actually did. So, if you are considering to make a living out of gambling, just go for it and give it a try. You will dedicate a huge amount of your life-time to work, so better look for something that makes you happy.

[2] I think at the point, where you realize, that you are not able to make (enough) money (no more). For the start give yourself some time to figure everything out and don't give up after like 1 week. Expect to be losing for some time. If you are seeing no progress at all and are losing for months, you should stop. If you see some progress and are maybe able to break even instead of losing, you should look into improving more and give yourself some more time to turn things around. If after some months you are still not able to make money, you'd better stop.

[leea-1334]

Thanks for your responses to my query about how to approach gambling when it is culturally, religiously and legally inappropriate. I of course agree with you,,, that my life is my life, but the reason I ask is simply that, for some of us, we earn money on a normal job and it is enough of course to eat and feed people.

But like now I am not ashamed to say I earn a small amount from a gambling site which I myself play at. And I also invest that amount in another gambling site and profit is good. So I do not earn from gambling, but my extra bitcoin earnings are all gambling related. I am proud of that personally for sure.

But I can never tell my family where it comes from,,, the extra money. They would get upset:) And someone might report me;) So guys like us we have to make things up.

Like I said we all gamble actually everyone does,,, but those who do keep it silent and obviously we in the circle know each other.

[deisik]

But this instantly begs the question whether you are using some variety of martingale, i.e.doubling (tripling, etc) your bet size after a loss as you can't possibly predict that your smaller bets are going to lose more often than the bigger ones. So how come really?

It solely depends on the odds you play and the stakes you use. I stake more or less always flat (% of my bank). I like to play higher odds. Example:

Bet#1: Odds 5, stake 100,-, lost
Bet#2: Odds 5, stake 100,-, lost
Bet#3: Odds 5, stake 100,-, lost
Bet#4: Odds 5, stake 100,-, won

Net win for #4 is 400,-. net loss for #1, #2 and #3 is 300,-, so I have a net win of 100,- over all those bets, despite having only won 1 and losing 3

I may be missing something here

But how are you going to beat the house edge as it will eventually catch up with you? If you made just 4 bets, the luck may of course be on your side, which follows from the example given. With odds 5 you are quite lucky to win on bet #4 and stop there (which you implicitly assume)

However, the longer you play the less you can rely on luck alone (in simple terms, you can't rely on it). So unless you don't play games of luck (think dice here), there is only one way to beat the house and its edge in the long run, and that is via using old-school martingale (or some more advanced variety of this strategy)

[tyKiwanuka]

But how are you going to beat the house edge as it will eventually catch up with you? If you made just 4 bets, the luck may of course be on your side, which follows from the example given. With odds 5 you are quite lucky to win on bet #4 and stop there (which you implicitly assume)

However, the longer you play the less you can rely on luck alone (in simple terms, you can't rely on it). So unless you don't play games of luck (think dice here), there is only one way to beat the house and its edge in the long run, and that is via using old-school martingale (or some more advanced variety of this strategy)

The house edge is already included in the odds. In a two way market, with both outcomes having 50% of probability, you will not get 2,0 - 2,0 odds, but something like 1,97 - 1,97.

This was just an example how you can be in profit, although you have lost more bets than won. I have probably played 10.000 bets in my career and lost 6000 of them but I am still in profit. Next year at this point I might have played 11.000 bets and lost 6600 of them (won 4.400) and still be in profit. I never stop betting, it always continues, I am not doing Martingale and "bet in blocks" and start from scratch afterwards.

Betting/poker has no luck factor longterm, so I am not relying on luck in no way. Short-term you might be lucky/unlucky, but longterm it offsets.

You shouldn't compare betting/poker and games like dice/roulette/slots - there is a huge difference.


Lets have a look at roulette and putting your stake on red/black:

Probability for red: 48,6%
Probability for black: 48,6%

You double your money, if you win, which implies 50% probability. But red/black only has 48,6%, so you are playing something that has no value of making you money longterm. Lets say you stake 1000 times on red, always 100,- units.

486 times red will come and you will have a net win of 48.600 units with that.
486 times black will come and you will lose 48.600 units with that.
28 times zero will come and you will lose 2.800 units with that.

In total you will sit at a loss of 2.800 units. Now you will argument: But with 1000 spins, red can come 700 times, black only 300 and no zero - and that is correct. But we are talking about the statistical/mathematical approach here and your chances to make money with a game like roulette. If you spin the roulette wheel 1000000000000000000000000000000 times, you will end up with 48,6% red/black each and 2,8% zero. So no point in playing odds that reflect a probabilty of 50%, when the mathematical proven probability is only 48,6%.

With betting (and poker) it's different. You can play valuable odds there.

Will take a tennis example here; WTA finals of the Australian Open. Kenin vs Muguruza 2,49 - 1,61 offered by Pinnacle. This implies the following probabilities for either of these ladies winning:

Kenin: 40,16%
Muguruza: 62,11%

Everything over 100% is the house edge of Pinnacle, so 2,27%. Now imagine you are walking through a mall in Melbourne today and see Muguruza twisting her ankle while walking/falling down the stairs, screaming in pain and not being able to walk properly afterwards. Do you think Muguruza still has 60+% of winning the final the next day ? No, she has not. She maybe has 20% now, because she is injured with a high ankle sprain. If Muguruza has 20%, Kenin now has 80%. Now with placing a bet on Kenin, you will play something that has 80% probability of happening, whereas the odds only give it 40,16% probability - you have a value bet. Kenin might still lose, bad luck, but if you play thousands adn thousands of bets like these, you will make money.

This is an extreme example of course and just for illustration.

[deisik]

But how are you going to beat the house edge as it will eventually catch up with you? If you made just 4 bets, the luck may of course be on your side, which follows from the example given. With odds 5 you are quite lucky to win on bet #4 and stop there (which you implicitly assume)

However, the longer you play the less you can rely on luck alone (in simple terms, you can't rely on it). So unless you don't play games of luck (think dice here), there is only one way to beat the house and its edge in the long run, and that is via using old-school martingale (or some more advanced variety of this strategy)

The house edge is already included in the odds. In a two way market, with both outcomes having 50% of probability, you will not get 2,0 - 2,0 odds, but something like 1,97 - 1,97.

This was just an example how you can be in profit, although you have lost more bets than won

I'm not sure I understand how it can work out with games of luck unless you use martingale or something similar

As I see it, if you bet long enough, the house edge will inevitably kick in and make luck irrelevant, i.e. you can't rely on luck if you are going to gamble for any extended amount of time. But if luck eventually becomes out of luck, so to speak, you can't be in profit at all after some time, no matter how many bets you made that far, winning or otherwise, as you are expected to lose in the long run anyway. And some would say that even with martingale you are still going to lose (though I for one disagree with them)

[tyKiwanuka]

I'm not sure I understand how it can work out with games of luck unless you use martingale or something similar

You can't win in games of luck longterm. I'll give you that Martingale might work to a certain extent, but mathematically it doesn't work as well and I wouldn't recommend playing Martingale.

In contrast to games of luck like dice, roulette etc. there is games of skill and betting/poker fall into that category. Betting/poker are often considered games of luck, even by lawmakers and authorities, but they are not. You don't need any luck to win with betting/poker longterm. I think you can even be a general unlucky person and still make money with these

As I see it, if you bet long enough, the house edge will inevitably kick in and make luck irrelevant, i.e. you can't rely on luck if you are going to gamble for any extended amount of time. But if luck eventually becomes out of luck, so to speak, you can't be in profit at all after some time, no matter how many bets you made that far, winning or otherwise, as you are expected to lose in the long run anyway. And some would say that even with martingale you are still going to lose (though I for one disagree with them)

I'll say it again: You don't need any luck to be profitable playing betting/poker. You can completely discard luck longterm.

House edge is not really important in betting. By shopping for the best odds (= having a big portfolio of bookmakers and check where you get the best odds for a particular bet), you can often play without any house edge at all or a very low one. And you don't need to bet and shouldn't do so, if you think there is too much house edge (i.e. odds are too low).

By reading your posts, I get the impression, that you never actually placed a bet and this is not meant as an offense (it's actually a good thing, if you never did). It's always hard to explain the concept of value to a non-betting person and as you see, I am struggling a bit with explaining it you or you struggle to understand what I mean. So, if you are really interested in learning something about value, you could maybe google a bit for it and find some better explanation, than I can give at the moment. If you do, it's really important, that you distinguish between games of luck vs games of skill - they are different animals.

[bbc.reporter]

@tyKiwanuka. What was your worstest experience on bad luck, how long did it last and what did you do to overcome it mentally?

[nutildah]

I just got finished reading the entire thread (good job, I thoroughly enjoyed it) and I don't think I saw anybody ask this question:

Is there any one sport/league that you find to be particular easy in terms of spotting a bargain?

And going in the opposite direction, which sport/league do you find the most difficult to make a correct pick?

[panganib999]

i saw a youtube video like how to cheat a casino but did know how to do that? and did you ever try it on another website to see how it works?

I am not interested in cheating. I am taking advantage of mistakes they make with being careless or ignorant, but cheating is something else. Even if there is a possibilty to cheat a scam book and make big money from it, I probably wouldn't do it. You are not harming the people behind that company with it, but your fellow punters in the end, because the money you cheat comes from them And you harm all the employees that lose their job and have some mouths to feed.

I actually already wrote to bookmakers, if I saw something that would cost them lots of money.

If you cheat in gambling, the value or the thrill of playing it will disappear. So for me, every time there's a people cheating in a certain game, I will leave the game with no hesitation because most of us will not enjoy and will loss a lot of money. It is very unfair and most especially casinos should do something about it because they are the one whose responsible for that kind of problems. If they don't suddenly fix it then people will have bad reviews for them. It is not a good thing to fool people and at the same time earning money, it is the same way as stealing.

[tyKiwanuka]

@tyKiwanuka. What was your worstest experience on bad luck, how long did it last and what did you do to overcome it mentally?

I talked a bit about that here:

There were losing stretches, but you should always think longterm, variance happens. My first losing month came after 3.5 years of betting and it even was two losing months in a row with quite some losses. Was hard to digest at first, but I looked at the big picture. I had won amount X during all those years and now I have lost 10% of that, no big deal and it was expected to happen at some point.  I was still confident with my abilities and trusted my system. Took my foot off the gas a bit, lowered the stakes and tried to forget about what happened and have a fresh start. It worked and it took a long time for the next losing month to appear on my spreadsheet again.

And this was maybe the worst experience, since it was something that never happened before. For the first 3.5 years, the only direction I knew was up. And then suddenly nothing was going my way anymore and I couldn't understand what is happening, because I didn't change anything with my betting style. It was two months, where even a 1.01 bet would lose easily for me. I more or less kept going as stated in the quote, but lowered my stakes of course (also due to the fact, that I was staking a percentage of my betting bank always and that bank was shrinking all the time). Also talked to my fellow punters and they tried to help me with giving more bets of their own and bring back some confidence with winning those. So slowly but surely I got back on track and was able to win again.

Looking back, it was a mix of greed, variance and getting a bit too cocky and/or thinking the (betting) world is mine. I learned my lesson and it made me aware of the fact, how fast this business is and that it can be over any day. So you better not make too longterm-ish plans and take nothing for granted.

-

The worst single event of bad luck, was a football match in Champions League. I don't recall exactly whom played whom (tried to search for it, but no luck), I only know it was Bayern Munich playing an away game and I had a bet on the over 3.5 goals. It was 2-1 for Bayern and 3 minutes of injury time were added. The other team had a corner with one minute left to play. The goalie decided to move upfront as well and all 22 players were in or around the Bayern box. A Bayern defender headed the ball away and Paulo Guerrero from Bayern picked it up and ran uncontested towards the empty goal to make it 3-1 and win the bet for me. When Guerrero was past midfield already, the referee blew the final whistle at 92:30 minutes and I couldn't believe my eyes (well, more my ears to be precise). Match ended 2-1 then, with 30sec less played than announced.

I felt robbed and had to buy a new keyboard afterwards, since it hit the wall and didn't survive

I just got finished reading the entire thread (good job, I thoroughly enjoyed it) and I don't think I saw anybody ask this question:

Is there any one sport/league that you find to be particular easy in terms of spotting a bargain?

And going in the opposite direction, which sport/league do you find the most difficult to make a correct pick?

Thank you for your feedback buddy.

It's not any particular sport/league that makes it easy to find valuable odds, but more the lower and smaller you go in general. If we look at the NFL, there is really not much hidden or inside information. It's well covered, any stat you can think of is available and news spread very fast. So gaining an edge is very hard there, unless you have a very well developed gut feeling.
Now if you go to Canadian Football League things are different. It's not that well covered, because the public interest in it is not that big. There you are able find some useful information and angles to make profitable bets - if you put in the work.
When you even go one step lower and shift your interest on lets say the German (american) Football League, there is even more information to be found. And in these leagues, the bookmakers don't bother to make any research themselves. They have their statistic models/algorithms and just put the odds up without looking further into it. With you checking the regional newspapers, checking the teams website, reading forums etc., you can get information that is not priced in in the odds. This could be some flu going around in the locker room, some players missing the game because of university exams (they are amateurs and not pros in GFL), some fresh injury to the QB, things like that.

I can give you an actual example of how such information made me some money. It was the last race in winter sports Cross-Country World Cup Season some years ago. For a german athlete it was his last race and he retired afterwards. It was a 15km race and you are allowed to change your ski during the race. That german dude announced the day before, that he would, to honour the sport and his career, change his ski mid-time during the race and instead of using the modern, high-tech skis, he would use some wooden, oldschool skis that people used to wear in the 1960´s. Such wooden skis are probably nice and it was a good gesture of him using them in some pro race nowadays, but there is no way that you can be competitive with these Bookmakers didn't know or didn't bother and still offered a H2H bet involving this athlete. My friend and me placed max bet on his opponent at every bookmaker where this H2H was available. While being on his modern skis, the german dude and his H2H opponent were still together in the pack, but after putting on his wooden skis (and just running for fun), he lost lots of time of course and finished down 5 minutes to our guy. It was easy money for us and such valuable information can often be found in smaller leagues and non-mainstream sports.

The hardest sports/league to bet on for me, and where I actually had some bets, is Baseball (MLB). Results there are very random and the sheer amount of games played (sometimes twice a day) just makes a single game not that important for the players. They play 162 regular season games and swing their bats nearly every day. So they don't bother a lot with losing on any given day - the next game will be just tomorrow. You can already see the difficulty betting the MLB by looking at the odds. You rarely see a team priced below 1.60 and that already shows how random the results in MLB are. Even if the worst team plays the best team, you will have quite balanced odds. And with not much valuable extra information to be found, this for me is the hardest sport to bet on. NBA and NHL are not any better btw. NFL is a bit different in that regard from the Big4 in US, because with only 16 regular season games, every game is very important and NFL players tend to have some pride, even when 0-10 for the season.

[Genemind]

Thanks for sharing all your experiences and views, Op. I admire you for inspiring especially those who are not gaining much from gambling these days. You're able to answer all the questions being thrown to you and we could see from there that you're really an experienced player who knows how to handle different circumstances. I wish I could have the same ability and eagerness to learn everything about gambling.

[AicecreaME]

Before you enter this world (gambling) that became your profession, [1]Is this worth to try and push your limits until you got your winnings and decide whether it is for you or not? [2] How are you going to figure it out when to stop and realized that you're taking the wrong path?

<…>

This clarifies all the things I'm wondering about gambling, I hope all the gamblers and those people that wants to try gambling should consider these pieces of advice of yours for them to avoid diving too deep in the realm of gambling world. But since most of the gamblers are hotheaded jerks, I bet they are just going to laugh at this when they read such advice, oh well, can't blame though, since it is their own money and decision.

You always only regret things you didn't do rather than the things you actually did.

This hit home, mate, this is true as hell. I hope they don't misunderstand the whole thing you've just said.

[Betwrong]

~In poker you can choose your limit that fits your skills and what you are comfortable with. You can play small stakes and take money from a lot of donks. When you rise up the limits, it will get harder to make some money and you are probably the donk then If you play high-stakes poker with small stakes skills, you will probably have to file for bankruptcy very soon.
~

I play small stakes poker normally. Yes, I participated in tournaments with 0.01 BTC buy-in 4 times, but I was either awarded with a ticket, or I won it in a satellite. I would never buy such an expensive ticket with my own money. And 0.01 BTC buy-in is still far from high-stakes poker, so I can say that I have no experience in playing high-stakes poker.

But if you do have such experience, can you please confirm or deny my theory regarding the high stakes poker players' aggressiveness, which helps them to win in many cases.

I think it's not so much their skills as their wealth is what helps them to play aggressively, and win as a result. If you can easily afford to lose a $10k buy-in, it gives you an advantage over those for whom it's a big money. Imo, they wouldn't look so skillful under equal conditions.

What are your thoughts on this theory?

[Ziskinberg]

I always believe that making money in sports betting is possible, if you can advise how much bankroll you think would be a decent for a start and how do you manage that bankroll? I am gambling for long term like the whole season of the NBA, or do you cash out more often when you are in profit or you will just wait until the season is over?

[tyKiwanuka]

But if you do have such experience, can you please confirm or deny my theory regarding the high stakes poker players' aggressiveness, which helps them to win in many cases.

I think it's not so much their skills as their wealth is what helps them to play aggressively, and win as a result. If you can easily afford to lose a $10k buy-in, it gives you an advantage over those for whom it's a big money. Imo, they wouldn't look so skillful under equal conditions.

What are your thoughts on this theory?

First, I don't have any experience in high stakes poker as well

Just wealth will get you nowhere in poker though. There have been quite a few celebrities and/or rich businessman that played with the pros and I don't remember any of them being successful with it. A millionaire playing a 0.01 BTC tourney like you mentioned surely has some mental advantage since he isn't bothered about losing that money and is less pressured with it, but you can't beat skill in poker. In such a tournament, you might have lots of people that get intimidated by an aggressive playing style, but you will also have players, who are not and will beat you skill-wise.

The thing with not being bothered by losing (huge amounts) is, that it will also make you lazy and not being focused. You just want to have fun and don't work on improving your game. Being pressured and alert is necessary to keep your concentration up. So, if you don't bother, you are likely to make bad decisions.

If you are playing a $10k buy-in tourney and it's big money for you and you are scared of losing that money, you shouldn't play such a tourney in first place. This is just a matter of good bankroll management. I don't know the exact number, but there is this rule, that you should have like 100 buy-ins for your limit. So by playing a $10k tourney, you should have at least a $1.000.000 bankroll. If you only have $100 as a bankroll, then you should only play $1 tourneys.

The poker boom some decade ago has brought up a young generation of loose-aggressive players. They very much changed the whole game, which up until then was more of an old mens game, who were playing more tight-ish. These young people were pretty successful and gave the oldies a good run for their money, because they couldn't adapt. But there are also tight players, that are successful.

We can see lots of aggressive players being successful, but what we don't see, is all the aggressive players that fail - and that is the overwhelming majority. Even with an aggressive playing style and being "rich", you have to know what you are doing (often times it's already suffice, if you know, what you are better NOT doing). And not everyone likes to play aggressive, you should play the way it suits your style and not try to force something that just isn't there. You should always work on many aspect of your game - and that can be getting more aggressive - but a change to a playing style that is totally opposite to your temperament won't work as well imo.

In general, having a good financial background definitely helps you mentally, but it's only one of many ingredients of being successful in poker.

[deisik]

The thing with not being bothered by losing (huge amounts) is, that it will also make you lazy and not being focused. You just want to have fun and don't work on improving your game. Being pressured and alert is necessary to keep your concentration up. So, if you don't bother, you are likely to make bad decisions

Fully support this reasoning

And it goes far beyond just poker or gambling in general. Such an attitude, in its generalized form, is applicable to how we live our lives, altogether. To be more specific, you can be very well off overall like having a handsome stash of bitcoins (let's talk cryptocurrency here as it seems appropriate), but you may still be somewhat short of cash money, and that will keep you extremely focused and alert on looking out for earning opportunities even if you could just spend your bitcoins and fill your boots to your liking (though that would make you lazy and idle)

[tyKiwanuka]

I always believe that making money in sports betting is possible, if you can advise how much bankroll you think would be a decent for a start and how do you manage that bankroll? I am gambling for long term like the whole season of the NBA, or do you cash out more often when you are in profit or you will just wait until the season is over?

This is a hard question, since I don't know how much money you have, how much money you need (to make) etc.

But I can give you the most important advice: start small.
If you want to give it a try, to make a bit of regular income with betting, I would advise to take some money, put it aside for betting and consider it lost for the time being. This can be any amount, but it has to be money, that you can afford to lose. This would be your starting bank to start the journey then and you should always look to protect your bank in first place.

I personally play flat stakes, which means I stake a percentage of my betting bank on each bet and recalculate the bank afterwards. I don't always stick strictly to that; if there is a very valuable bet, I might stake more, vice versa with some huge gamble bet. The percentage per bet should be somewhere around 1-2% mark. So if I have lets say 1000,- as my bank and decide to have 2% per bet, I would stake 20,-. After having placed a bet, my bank would have shrinked to 980,- and the next bet would only be 19,60. Same goes for if my bank grows, then I would be "allowed" to stake more.

Flat staking is not the most efficient way of a money management (since you play bets with different value with the same amount), but I am most comfortable doing it this way. In NBA I guess you play in the odds range from 1.9-2.1 most of the time, so flat stakes are an ok-ish way to manage your stakes.
Another commonly used money management is the Kelly System - or a variation of it. You can google for it. With the Kelly System you stake each bet different, depending on the amount of value it has. The exact value of a bet is often hard to tell, so if you are very wrong with the evaluation of value for a bet, you might overstake heavily. For a beginner, I would recommend to start with flat stakes and as you get better with time, you can look into staking more with Kelly.

A friend of mine is doing Kelly, but he is not sitting there calculating the value, he has the value of a bet in his mind/gut feeling. With experience, you don't need to strictly calculate the value, but you know if a bet has low, good or tremendous value and stake accordingly.


I cash out regularly, because I need the money to cover my expenses and pay my bills. And you don't need to have all your betting bank spread among all the bookmakers you use. You will never need it all, unless you play like 1000 bets simultaneously. Normally you just use like 10% of the bank all the time at once and the remaining 90% just sits there untouched. You should have some money in every bookmaker you use regularly, then some money in BTC, Skrill, Neteller, Ecopayz, credit card to have money available fast for some good bet, a new bookmaker, whatever. The rest can remain in your bank account.

[Yatsan]

I've watch a related movie regarding this topic, The movie title is "Rounders" it's about making gambling as profession and a source of income, can't believe that it is actually happening in real world, after reading your thread I have a several question.

-Does your base capital everyday/when you play, is always equal? and what is your exiting point when you are gonna quit on that day? For example if you reach x3 you will quit and call it a day.
-If you lose your money how are you going to get back into the game?

This is just basic questions, I really want to know how are you going to get back on your feet if you get a bad beat in poker or in any game.

[tyKiwanuka]

-Does your base capital everyday/when you play, is always equal?

My betting bank grows/shrinks on a daily basis, or lets say on the days I actually bet, since I don't bet every day. If I had a winning day, my bank would be bigger starting the next day, if I had a losing day it will be lower. But I am actually recalculating my bank after every bet I make - the bet is considered a loss until I know the outcome and my betting bank will be lower for the next bet. My stakes go a bit up and down all the time, since I am staking flat (see one of the earlier posts from today).

And my bank shrinks of course, when I withdraw money to pay for expenses.

and what is your exiting point when you are gonna quit on that day? For example if you reach x3 you will quit and call it a day.

See here at the bottom.

-If you lose your money how are you going to get back into the game?

If I lose all my money, I would have to quit of course Losing bets, losing weeks and losing months are part of the game and you have to deal with it.

How I deal and dealt with it, you can re-read here and here.

[Lakai01]

First of all: Thank you very much for this very interesting thread. I would love to hear some figures, too, but it's very understandable that you don't talk about them

We all know that gambling is (or can be) very addictive. I read that you eg. quit on a losing streak, which is one of the most important things to do to keep a healthy balance and don't get in the struggle of "I have to win back my losses asap" and become slowly addicted. Are there any additional suggestions you could give to an rather unexperienced gambler (like me) so that he or she doesnt fall for common traps and end up losing way too much money?

[tyKiwanuka]

We all know that gambling is (or can be) very addictive. I read that you eg. quit on a losing streak, which is one of the most important things to do to keep a healthy balance and don't get in the struggle of "I have to win back my losses asap" and become slowly addicted. Are there any additional suggestions you could give to an rather unexperienced gambler (like me) so that he or she doesnt fall for common traps and end up losing way too much money?

Well, I don't really quit when having a losing streak. I might take a few days off, but in general I am more slowing down a bit and that would be my advice.

Discipline and money management are two big key ingredients, when it comes to professional gambling. If you lose your mind easily in tough situations, this might not be the right profession for you. Tilting has already seen a lot of bankrolls being busted and you better not have a tendency to go on tilt when gambling.
Don't question everything that worked before just because of some variance and keep looking at the big picture. This is pretty general advice, but it's a psychological issue in the end and each person deals differently with it and has to find an individual way to turn things around again. There is no golden way nor any magic pill.

A good and proven money management will help a lot in these situations. It will automatically lower the stakes while on a losing streak and you should even lower the stakes yourself (in addition to your money management telling you to do so). So instead of flat-staking lets say 1.5% of your bank, you can go down to 1% or even 0.5%. Start small again to get your confidence back, you can always up your stakes at a later point again. But during a losing streak you have to protect your bank first.

And as I said earlier somewhere in this thread, you should also have some backup money in place. This should be enough to cover your expenses for around 6 month without winning anything from gambling. This will give you some mental peace, since you know whatever happens, I am safe for the next 6 months.

[Steamtyme]

But if you do have such experience, can you please confirm or deny my theory regarding the high stakes poker players' aggressiveness, which helps them to win in many cases.
I think it's not so much their skills as their wealth is what helps them to play aggressively, and win as a result. If you can easily afford to lose a $10k buy-in, it gives you an advantage over those for whom it's a big money. Imo, they wouldn't look so skillful under equal conditions.
What are your thoughts on this theory?

Just wealth will get you nowhere in poker though. There have been quite a few celebrities and/or rich businessman that played with the pros and I don't remember any of them being successful with it. A millionaire playing a 0.01 BTC tourney like you mentioned surely has some mental advantage since he isn't bothered about losing that money and is less pressured with it, but you can't beat skill in poker.

If you are playing a $10k buy-in tourney and it's big money for you and you are scared of losing that money, you shouldn't play such a tourney in first place.
~snip~
The poker boom some decade ago has brought up a young generation of loose-aggressive players. They very much changed the whole game, which up until then was more of an old mens game, who were playing more tight-ish. These young people were pretty successful and gave the oldies a good run for their money, because they couldn't adapt. But there are also tight players, that are successful.

I'm studying up from a lot of what the boom brought out. It became a game of solvers and pure math for many of them, also online made it possible to rack up a lot of hands combined with HUD's for reads. The materials I see mostly point out to playing x hands this way pre-flop because over 10 000 hands it's +ev, or making this re-reaise or bluff here for the same reason. Tournaments get trickier as they talk about all the moving pieces as the levels progress and stack sizes change, not to mention Itm pressure. When it comes to cash they say it's more straight forwards and it's about getting stacks in when the numbers say you are +ev. They don't deny that there are still moments where you can exploit a player, but that overall you should have a range and play it the same way each time thinking of the long term.

I found that with the wealth = aggressive play is more prevalent making your way through a micro stakes tournament. I used to only play those as they were fun and I could get a lot of time out of the 1$ or less buy-in. It lost it's fun factor though when re-buys became more prevalent as so many people would spew off or jam all-in and say chill out it's only an 1$ tournament. I have always assumed that higher stakes don't really run the same, as most are there trying to play a higher level... unless you watch the Triton cash games  
Watching some cash game vlogs you definitely see some though that are willing to bluff jam for 100's if not 1000's just because, all you can hope for is to have them beat I guess.

[ChrisPop]

I certainly agree with the OP. The only venues to make money in the gambling industry are sportsbetting, poker and I would add blackjack, yet I don't think counting cards is viable anymore as most of the decks are continuously shuffled.

My question is what income did you have before sustaining yourself solely from gambling?
Also doesn't it bother you that your "job" doesn't add any contribution to the society? I mean you're taking money from the casino and that's it - playing your edge. At least a trader provides liquidity in the markets for the hedgers while a gambler doesn't have much impact unless you do something significant with the profits which is another story I guess.

[tyKiwanuka]

I'm studying up from a lot of what the boom brought out. It became a game of solvers and pure math for many of them, also online made it possible to rack up a lot of hands combined with HUD's for reads. The materials I see mostly point out to playing x hands this way pre-flop because over 10 000 hands it's +ev, or making this re-reaise or bluff here for the same reason. Tournaments get trickier as they talk about all the moving pieces as the levels progress and stack sizes change, not to mention Itm pressure. When it comes to cash they say it's more straight forwards and it's about getting stacks in when the numbers say you are +ev. They don't deny that there are still moments where you can exploit a player, but that overall you should have a range and play it the same way each time thinking of the long term.

This is very true and probably the reason I never looked any deeper into turning into a poker pro. Grinding online as a poker pro is a very robotic way of making your money and the fun element is taken out of the game to a good amount. It's different for live poker then again.

I always had the idea of some algorithm for cycling/winter sports, that I just feed with data and maybe some additional information (athlete doesn't like altitude or whatever) and that algorithm then throwing out the bets for the day and I come back in the evening to see how it unfolded and collect my money. But this is boring to me in the end. I am doing this because it really gives me joy and happens to bring me some money too.

[deisik]

Also doesn't it bother you that your "job" doesn't add any contribution to the society? I mean you're taking money from the casino and that's it - playing your edge. At least a trader provides liquidity in the markets for the hedgers while a gambler doesn't have much impact unless you do something significant with the profits which is another story I guess

I'm not OP and thus can't speak for him, so it is up to him to reply to your question as he sees appropriate

However, I tend to think that you are following a very narrow approach to this matter ("taking money from the casino"). Essentially, you are looking only at one side of the equation, the "take" part of it, to be exact. We don't know how OP manages his money which he wins through his gambling activities. And technically, it is not just about money

Indeed, he makes a living out of it but if it goes beyond that (which seems to be the case here), we should also consider the "give" part, i.e. how he spends his income other than for mere sustenance. In other words, yes, it is another story but the one which could make all the difference as far as "contribution to the society" is concerned

[Lakai01]

Also doesn't it bother you that your "job" doesn't add any contribution to the society? I mean you're taking money from the casino and that's it - playing your edge.

That is a tough (and maybe inappropriate) question. I am sure the vast majority of us dont have a job that adds any contribution to the society because this solely depends on how you define the society itself (are you talking about all people around the world, only poor people, ...).
So his profession may not bring any contribution to poor people  but he is able to feed his kids (thats a plain assumption that he has kids ), pay his bills and maybe gives him the opportunity to spend money twice a year for eg. a cancer research institute.

A good and proven money management will help a lot in these situations. It will automatically lower the stakes while on a losing streak and you should even lower the stakes yourself (in addition to your money management telling you to do so).

Thanks for the elaboration, sounds plausible to me. Do you have any fixed intervall for lowering your stake, eg every second loss?
Additionally, you mentioned that you may take a few days off on a losing streak. Is there any fixed number of consecutive losses which makes you pause or are we talking about a gut feeling which tells you that you should rather stop playing for a while?

[tyKiwanuka]

My question is what income did you have before sustaining yourself solely from gambling?

I started my pro career while still being a student. I had a little student job and still lived with my parents, so didn't have to pay for accomodation and everything that comes with it. I kept this job through many years after finishing my studies, since I liked it and gave me at least a bit of steady income and some variety.

Also doesn't it bother you that your "job" doesn't add any contribution to the society? I mean you're taking money from the casino and that's it - playing your edge. At least a trader provides liquidity in the markets for the hedgers while a gambler doesn't have much impact unless you do something significant with the profits which is another story I guess.

This is a good question and I actually have thought about it often times and talked to my fellow punters about it. Since nobody asked so far, I wanted to do a post on my own about disadvantages about being a pro gambler anyway - and not contributing to society would have been one aspect - but will answer this very aspect right now then.

Being a pro gambler really adds nothing to society in the end. I am mainly doing sportstrading nowadays, so in your view, I at least add some liquidity to the markets, but this doesn't add anything to society too in my book. And on top of that, I am not taking any money from casinos (bookmakers in my case), but actually I take money from other people. It's not the bookmakers that pay me, but I get my money from other peoples losses (a lot of them probably addicted gamblers, i.e. sick). Not very nice.

I always adore doctors, firemen, nurses, social workers etc., because they do actually add a lot to society and are able to help people in need; often on a very low wage and with a lot of idealism. But this is my job now, I love to do it, I am happy with it and can't think of any other job, that would give me such joy (and freedom). And I have to be a little selfish in this case, because there is no point in doing a job that adds to society, but makes me unhappy. I would probably be a burden to society then and by being a pro gambler I don't contribute to society, but I am also no burden.

So I live with this disadvantage, but it doesn't bother me to the extent, that I ever considered quitting. I try to compensate, by striving to be a good, honest and reliable person, be there for my family and friends, help people in need out and do some donations from time to time (I am not rich though - people always think pro gamblers are rich, but most of them are not; it's a normal job).

That is a tough (and maybe inappropriate) question.

As mentioned above, I think it's a good question and not inappropriate at all Everybody should take a moment of silence from time to time and think about what he is doing in this world, what could be improved and if there is any reason to change things. This world has gotten so fast and sophisticated, so digital and cold, so money-driven and competitive, that humaneness is just a phrase in the vocabulary of many people and I can't exclude myself from this as well. Unfortunately. But I am aware and try to give my best.

[tyKiwanuka]

Just saw your edited questions.

Thanks for the elaboration, sounds plausible to me. Do you have any fixed intervall for lowering your stake, eg every second loss?

Yes, my stakes are lowered with every bet I make. Every bet is considered a loss for the time being and the stake placed, will be deducted from my betting bank (I do this via an excel sheet). So a betting bank of 1000,- with a bet placed for 20,- Euro (2% per bet f.e.), will lower my bank to 980,-. Next bet will only be staked with 19,60 then. If the first bet is already decided by the time I place my next bet, I will recalculate my bank beforehand and if I maybe won that bet (lets say I had a net win of 25,- with it), my bank for the next bet will be 1025,- and the next stake will be 20,50 accordingly.

Additionally, you mentioned that you may take a few days off on a losing streak. Is there any fixed number of consecutive losses which makes you pause or are we talking about a gut feeling which tells you that you should rather stop playing for a while?

There is no fixed number for that. As anticipated by you, it's more a gut feeling that makes you feel you better take some time off and come back with a fresh mind afterwards. And hopefully better results

[Betwrong]

~
We can see lots of aggressive players being successful, but what we don't see, is all the aggressive players that fail - and that is the overwhelming majority.

That's what I've noticed too. Overly aggressive players rarely make it to the paid places. They may stay at the top for about first 30 minutes of tournament, but then they are out after losing a couple of all-ins to players with really good hands. It's a known fact that over-aggressiveness can be exploited.

 

And not everyone likes to play aggressive, you should play the way it suits your style and not try to force something that just isn't there. You should always work on many aspect of your game - and that can be getting more aggressive - but a change to a playing style that is totally opposite to your temperament won't work as well imo.

True, but without bluffing at all you can't win the game, right? I tried many times to raise only with a really good hand, and it just doesn't work. Your chips keep disappearing before your eyes, until you decide to play with worse hands than before, but it's too late already.

Imo, mixing the two, aggressiveness and firmness, is a good idea. What do you think?

In general, having a good financial background definitely helps you mentally, but it's only one of many ingredients of being successful in poker.

Agreed. Yet, being helped mentally is a good advantage, when it comes to poker, right?

[tyKiwanuka]

True, but without bluffing at all you can't win the game, right?

Well, what is a bluff in the end ? Part of poker is also reading your opponent. If you are good at it and have some indication, that your opponent has a rather weak hand (while you yourself have 72o), and you outplay him, I wouldn't call it a bluff per se. You just played the hand of your opponent in that case and didn't care about your hand.

At the final table in a tournament you might be down to 5 players and of course you loosen your range a bit then. An ok-ish hand like T9 is much more valuable against 4 players than it is against 8 players.

And position play is also a huge factor. Imagine you sitting on the button and everyone folding in front of you. You have Q8 and your opponent at SB has the exact same hand. You make a raise of 3BB to a) steal the blinds and if that doesn't work, you b) still have a playable hand. The small blind will most likely fold then, besides having the exact same hand. Now if you switch positions, you would be the one folding. You need a strong(er) hand to counter aggressiveness than you need to have to be the aggressor. Being aggressive with average to weak-ish hands is not bluffing then (for me), it's just taking advantage of the psychological dynamics and/or your ability to read your opponents.

But in the very end, you often have to pretend to have a strong hand while you maybe have not and we can call that bluffing, yes. And it's needed to win in poker, you can't have good hands all the time.

Maybe @Steamtyme could chime in and share his thoughts about bluffing.

Imo, mixing the two, aggressiveness and firmness, is a good idea. What do you think?

Mixing your game is always good of course, because it makes it harder for your opponents to read you. The problem is, if you are a naturally born tight player, it's hard to be an aggressive player too AND be good at it. That is why I often say, you should mainly do the things you are comfortable with, but try to improve other areas step by step.

Agreed. Yet, being helped mentally is a good advantage, when it comes to poker, right?

Yes, sure. Being financially well positioned helps with a lot of things. Not only poker, betting, working in general, but it gets you rid of a lot of mental headache as well.

[qwertyup23]

I have three (3) questions regarding the gambling life, in general:

First, how did your family react when they found out that you using gambling as your profession and main source of income?
Second, was there any point in your gambling life that you almost quitted this profession due to its risky and unpredictable stream of income?
Lastly, are there any advice that you would like to say to gamblers who aspire to use it as their main profession?

I used to gamble back in the days with my brother and I mainly viewed it as a form of entertainment to improve my relationship with him. I would very much appreciate to see on your point-of-view on how you chose this life.

[Steamtyme]

True, but without bluffing at all you can't win the game, right?

Well, what is a bluff in the end ? Part of poker is also reading your opponent. If you are good at it and have some indication, that your opponent has a rather weak hand (while you yourself have 72o), and you outplay him, I wouldn't call it a bluff per se. You just played the hand of your opponent in that case and didn't care about your hand.

Maybe @Steamtyme could chime in and share his thoughts about bluffing.

It's a necessity, I can't imagine anyone out there being a winning player in any stakes without bluffing. Not only is it great when you actually get it through but there is value in being caught in a bluff as well. They are less likely to believe you the next time you actually have a winning hand and might call down with something weak. I believe that's why some people think it's a good idea to show the bluff at times when it gets through.

The trick is picking good spots and evaluating more the cards you think your opponent has rather than the opponent themselves for the most part. Obviously a tight player who only comes in with say AQ+ or TT+ is easy to bluff on a board that has 2 6 8 9 8 as they have probably missed their top pair and if they've checked down you could have bet the turn or river. This isn't most opponents though, you generally have to hope they understand what you are likely to have and if the cards fit that range push the action. Sure sometimes you get caught but like I said there is value there as well in your table image.

It can be nerve racking to bet 2 streets on a pure bluff but it can also be effective, as long as you are only using it a smaller percentage of the time. A lot of people loose their nerve on a bluff and don't fire on the river or they don't play the hand the same way they would if they actually had a good hand and that's where it falls apart.

[bitmover]

First of all I want to congratulate you. This is the first ever decent threat that I ever saw in this 100% spam board.

I didn't read everything yet, but I will.

Also doesn't it bother you that your "job" doesn't add any contribution to the society? I mean you're taking money from the casino and that's it - playing your edge. At least a trader provides liquidity in the markets for the hedgers while a gambler doesn't have much impact unless you do something significant with the profits which is another story I guess.

This is a good question and I actually have thought about it often times and talked to my fellow punters about it. Since nobody asked so far, I wanted to do a post on my own about disadvantages about being a pro gambler anyway - and not contributing to society would have been one aspect - but will answer this very aspect right now then.

Being a pro gambler really adds nothing to society in the end. I am mainly doing sportstrading nowadays, so in your view, I at least add some liquidity to the markets, but this doesn't add anything to society too in my book. And on top of that, I am not taking any money from casinos (bookmakers in my case), but actually I take money from other people. It's not the bookmakers that pay me, but I get my money from other peoples losses (a lot of them probably addicted gamblers, i.e. sick). Not very nice.

I have a few comments about this subject.

There are many professions which do not contribute anything to the society.
Many bureaucrats for example, they only drain from the society. Specially here in brazil and other poor countries. But most of those bureaucrats think that their job is important,  while nobody would care if they just vanished.

Being a gambler is different because you certainly don't think that you are doing something important.
However,  when I read your comment and you said your money comes from other players I thought:" well , this guy is contributing to the society after all"

People are freely giving you money just to have some fun.  They are playing a game , which they will probably lose because they are amateurs,  but they are fine with that.

I have some friends who visited Las Vegas to have fun. They separate a stack of money to gamble and that's it. They were happy to have someone to play with and they were gambling that money.

So, somehow your contribution to the society is in this "fun" industry.


Now I will make you a question ( I don't know if it was answered already)
You said you are doing this for 15 years. So you are not a kid anymore.

Do you have plans for you retirement? Do you have kids? Do plan on having them? Would it be possible to save for retirement and to grow kids in your gambling style and strategy?

[tyKiwanuka]

First, how did your family react when they found out that you using gambling as your profession and main source of income?
Second, was there any point in your gambling life that you almost quitted this profession due to its risky and unpredictable stream of income?
Lastly, are there any advice that you would like to say to gamblers who aspire to use it as their main profession?

First question answered here and third question answered here. I should maybe add some kind of glossary to the first post and I put it on my to-do list now.

For your second question: Not really. This unpredictableness (and with it not being able to plan anything longterm) is really annoying, I can unequivocally confess that. I am always a bit jealous of people, that regularly get their paycheck at the end of the month, can pay for everything with that money and all they have to do, is go to work five times a week. But they give up a good amount of their life and freedom for it, so in that regard I am then not jealous anymore.
During a heavy losing streak, thoughts of quitting and getting rid of the pressure go through your mind, but in the end it is what you love to do and hard work really pays off in betting. These thoughts vanish and vanished pretty fast in the end.

People are freely giving you money just to have some fun.  They are playing a game , which they will probably lose because they are amateurs,  but they are fine with that.

Adding to society is maybe more of a philosophical topic in the end, but I have to disagree with this part. Because not everyone is giving me that money freely. Recreational players know that this is just another hobby that costs some money like so many other hobbies do and more importantly they know when to stop. I don't have any numbers, but I think a huge amount of my money actually comes from addicted players and for these people gambling is no hobby anymore but a sickness. They don't play for fun and know they will most likely lose, they HAVE to play to feed their addiction. And while going after their addiction, they might feel some satisfaction, but every other moment, they are "not fine with that". So taking advantage of fun players is fine with me, taking advantage of other peoples sickness not so much. But what can you do. You will never know, since you don't see from whom that money actually comes and I am glad it is like that.

Do you have plans for you retirement?

I don't plan my retirement in regards to gambling, why should I, it's fun Everybody better have a hobby, especially when you are retired. Just going to doctors and watching TV is not what I plan when I am old. I can imagine myself still betting with like 80, if still alive, because I love it.

Your question was probably more directed towards me retiring and doing things rich people do, because I got financially independent with my winnings from betting. I don't think I will ever be able to make (such) a fortune with betting and retire from "being a pro". As stated in the OP, I am no highroller and never was. And I have to regularly withdraw money to pay for my expenses, so compounding is not always easy (to up my stakes then accordingly). And it's the same for the people in my network. They maybe bought a little house, a little flat or a nice car, but other than that, they are not able to throw money around, but have a good income with a job they love.

The biggest misconception is really, that everyone thinks, pro gamblers are always filthy rich. And I have no idea where this illusion comes from tbh - these poker pros you see in TV are not the norm. There are basically no limits on how much you can earn with pro gambling, but there is also no limits on how much you can lose (well, when you are broke). Making your money with betting really isn't an easy task and there is lots of obstacles. And the golden times in betting are over, because the markets have matured so much. Lots of pro betting people are struggling nowadays. The longer a market exists, the more perfect it gets.

In big markets, where you can stake a lot of money, you only have a very little edge, if any. You will probably operate with a yield of 1.5% at best. So you would first have to turn over 1,000,000 to make 15,000. And all that with a proper money management.
In my cycling/winter sports days, I operated with 20-30% yield, but I could only stake peanuts compared to what you can stake in the big markets. So getting a huge turnover is not possible, you operate with a higher yield then and compensate the lower turnover with it. Being successful in these markets then leads to limits and you being shown the door.

I will take any bet, that I rather will (have to) quit betting at some point than becoming a millionaire with it.

Would it be possible to save for retirement and to grow kids in your gambling style and strategy?

I skipped the questions about the kids, since I don't want to talk about that in public, sorry

Well, the strategy is clear and can be found in this thread and all over the internet - value. So the basics everyone has to get familiar with on their own. As to my gambling style, my knowledge about certain sports and their dynamics, money management, tips and tricks, I am willing to share that with everyone, who wants to give it a try with pro betting. But people have to understand, that THEY have to do most of the work. I was always a fan of "learning by doing" and some lessons are only learned by doing (mistakes). I won't - and actually can't - give them a golden recipe and a rule book and they will be successful. You have to learn that from scratch and also find your own way, since my way might not suit them. So being kind of a mentor to someone only works to a certain extent.

[tyKiwanuka]

I have added a little glossary to the first post now.


I will list some disadvantages of being a professional gambler, without explanations for the time being. If you have questions about a particular disadvantage, feel free to ask.

• Not contributing to society (Discussed already starting here)
• Living on the financial edge (Discussed a bit here already)
• Ignorance from friends and family
• Being on duty 24/7
• No paid vacations
• No social insurance
• People don't understand what you are doing and are not interested due to not understanding
• Working in an often shady considered business and a grey area
• Huge mental pressure
• Bullying from authorities

[Betwrong]

~ It's a necessity, I can't imagine anyone out there being a winning player in any stakes without bluffing. Not only is it great when you actually get it through but there is value in being caught in a bluff as well. They are less likely to believe you the next time you actually have a winning hand and might call down with something weak. I believe that's why some people think it's a good idea to show the bluff at times when it gets through.
~

I've noticed that it works the other way round as well. If you fold several hands in a row, your opponents might have an impression that you play only very strong hands, and because of that you can easily get away with bluff afterwards.

~
I will take any bet, that I rather will (have to) quit betting at some point than becoming a millionaire with it.

I think it's not only you, but any pro gambler should think this way. That's what makes the lives of some gamblers miserable, they hope to become a millionaire with their gambling.

[Natalim]

This is a great thread to watch, I've been reading some of the comments but haven't read most of it actually.

I have a question, since we are talking about bankroll management here, and we know without a decent bankroll, we will never win big.
I like to give a figure, for example I have a bankroll of $5000 use for the entire NBA season, how much can I expect to win that would satisfy me as a gambler, or should I stop when I am already winning or should I end the season?

I am just thinking that along the way we could be greedy, so I would appreciate to hear your experience on this.

and by the way, what odds do you normally take? do you take 1.90 below or 2.00 up only?

[tyKiwanuka]

and by the way, what odds do you normally take? do you take 1.90 below or 2.00 up only?

I have played all odds in my career, from 1.01 to 1000. I usually don't care about the odds, as long as they have value, this might be a 3.00, but also a 1.05 can have value.

I like to play some higher odds, so I am mostly playing odds above 2.00. For prematch bets in H2H or over/under markets, I would stay in the 1.80 to 2.00 range though. I shifted my focus more on inplay trading now and there I am looking for high odds (lets say above 3.00) and try to hedge myself out of the market or reduce my liability, if it moves in favour.

I have a question, since we are talking about bankroll management here, and we know without a decent bankroll, we will never win big.
I like to give a figure, for example I have a bankroll of $5000 use for the entire NBA season, how much can I expect to win that would satisfy me as a gambler, or should I stop when I am already winning or should I end the season?

I am just thinking that along the way we could be greedy, so I would appreciate to hear your experience on this.

Another user was asking a bit of the same before and I struggled to give him an answer, since I don't know what he is looking for with his betting.

So you would have to answer (yourself) these questions first:

Do you just want to bet for fun or make a living out of it ? With what amount would you be satisfied ?
How many bets do you (plan to) play on average (per day or week or month) ?

With a bank of $5000 you can already generate quite a good turnover. A 2% flat stake money management would allow you to stake $100 per bet. The NBA season is running for around 7 months, so lets make that 210 days and there is lots of games every day. If you are doing 5 bets a day on average (prematch and live), this would lead to a turnover of $105,000. Now I don't think you can have a huge yield with NBA, it's just too hard of a market to have a big edge, so you would probably work with a 1.5% yield. With the mentioned turnover and yield, you would make $1,575 per season. I disregarded compounding in this basic example, which would let you stake a bit more in the proceedings, if you win.

If you found a niche or specialized in some smaller league, you would probably be able to work with a 10% yield. This would result in a $10,500 profit then. But you might not be able to have those 5 bets per day in that niche.

Lots of things to consider in the end as you see


You should never stop just because you have won amount X or lost amount X. You should stop, when there is no valuable bet no more.

[tyKiwanuka]

Looks like you guys ran out of questions So I will ask myself some questions, that I think are important and/or of interest.

How can you know that a single bet has value ?

Straightforward answer: I can’t.

The assumption for a a bet Is always that a game/match/race is played a million+ times under the same circumstances and you have to judge what is the probability of each outcome. Now in sports a match can’t be played under the same circumstances a million times. Circumstances include everything that can influence the outcome of a match. This groes from form, suspended and injured players, motivation to things like weather, spectator riots, tiredness or the star player going through a divorce.
All these things considered leads to the odds being  published and probably adjusted by the market, if the market thinks differently. But we will only play that one game under these exact circumstances. If there was the exact same matchup a day later, lots of circumstances might have changed.

Lets assume the odds reflect a possibility of 80%/13%/7% for 1X2 in football. Now you yourself have some good insight and think home win has 85% and place a bet accordingly. The home team loses and you lose your bet. A lot of people would now think, that the bet didn’t have any value, because it lost - but they are wrong. Your 85% for home win also included maybe 10% for draw and 5% for away win and thus it’s normal for these probabilities to come real too. Bad luck. But if this game is played another 99 times under the same circumstances, you could see a home win 60 times in a row then for example and after 100 games you could have seen 85 home wins, 10 draws and 7 away wins. But you will never know, since this game is only played once under these circumstances.

So, for a single bet, you will never know, if it actually carried value or not. The only thing you can do, is, to see if you are able to play valuable bets on a regular basis. And this is pretty easy  to judge. If you played 500 or 1000 bets and have made a profit, you are able to spot and play valuable bets. Over a big enough sample size, the luck factor is eliminated and the outcomes should more or less reflect the probabilities.

[bbc.reporter]

@tyKiwanuka. What are your best recommendations for books to read to become a better gambler on sportsbetting and other gambling games?

Also, when will you start your own tipster thread hehehe?

[Darker45]

This is the first ever decent threat that I ever saw in this 100% spam board.

No threat was ever decent. Kidding! And I agree with you 100%.

I have added a little glossary to the first post now.


I will list some disadvantages of being a professional gambler, without explanations for the time being. If you have questions about a particular disadvantage, feel free to ask.

• Not contributing to society (Discussed already starting here)
• Living on the financial edge (Discussed a bit here already)
• Ignorance from friends and family
• Being on duty 24/7
• No paid vacations
• No social insurance
• People don't understand what you are doing and are not interested due to not understanding
• Working in an often shady considered business and a grey area
• Huge mental pressure
• Bullying from authorities

The list is surprisingly long. And what's on the other end of the seesaw? Is it only this:

But this is my job now, I love to do it, I am happy with it and can't think of any other job, that would give me such joy (and freedom).

Is it therefore worth it?

Based on the list of disadvantages, I feel that you are constantly pressured not just mentally but also socially, financially, and even emotionally. You're living on a financial edge and seem alone and lonely in your 24/7 duty because friends and family are ignorant about what you are doing. I hope I'm wrong but that's what this list evoke in me. How could you even share your joy in winning a game when the other people around you are clueless?

And I'd like to get enlightened more on "Bullying from authorities."

[Sadlife]

i saw a youtube video like how to cheat a casino but did know how to do that? and did you ever try it on another website to see how it works?

If there's something like a script or cheat to let you win everytime in an online casino then they wouldn't share those methods and keep it for themselves instead of sharing to other strangers.

Most of them are probably malware or malicious script or just a gig to add revenue to their youtube channel's.

[Janation]

Most of them are probably malware or malicious script or just a gig to add revenue to their youtube channel's.

They are just doing that for views.

I remembered a scandal in the past about a YouTuber who usually gamble in this site and win a lot of virtual items in a game, as far as I know, it is CSGO. As people dig deeper into this site, they knew that this YouTuber is the owner or maybe co-owner of that gambling site. There are a lot of other scenarios like that on the internet like the gambling site that is advertised by Jake Paul in the past.

[tyKiwanuka]

@tyKiwanuka. What are your best recommendations for books to read to become a better gambler on sportsbetting and other gambling games?

For sportsbetting I wouldn't recommend any books, don't waste your time reading such books - all information can be found in the internet. The two big cornerstones of value and money management are not very extensive in the end. If I tell you, that in a coin flip with odds of 1,90 - 2,10 you should always bet on the 2,10, that is all you need to know about value, the rest you have to figure out yourself in your niche. No book can/will help you with that.

In general, reading is quite important for sportsbetting, but I would rather regularly check websites, blogs, forums etc. to learn about certain sports. If you desperately want to read a book, I would go with autobiographies to learn some dynamics about a certain sport. Since you are an NFL fan, you could for example read a book from or about Bill Belichick and extract some valuable things for your betting there (maybe). If not, it should still be an interesting read and not a waste of time.

For everything else that is needed, some books about psychology or mental strength would be the better choice.

For Poker things are different, because there is so many angles and mathematical approaches to play certain hands. There is a lot consider (position play, stack size) and you not only have to judge your own hand, but also the hands of your opponents. So theory wise, Poker is way more demanding compared to betting. There is a lot of good poker books for every stage of your poker career (beginner, advanced, semi-pro), but I can't recommend any. You could probably ask in the hand discussion thread here in this board.

For all other gambling games you don't need to read a book. You will lose wether you have read thousands of books or not

Also, when will you start your own tipster thread hehehe?

Hehe, I guess never I am a pretty poor pre-match punter these days and those threads only function with such kind of bets. So it would probably end in an embarrasing disaster and lots of people losing money. I have some good pre-match bets from time to time, but followers would want daily picks. There is also lots of added pressure, if you post your picks publicly.

The list is surprisingly long. And what's on the other end of the seesaw? Is it only this:

But this is my job now, I love to do it, I am happy with it and can't think of any other job, that would give me such joy (and freedom).

Is it therefore worth it?

For me it definitely is, but other people might hate it. It's not for anyone.

Don't underestimate, what a job/occupation/hobby that you burn for, can give you. I am really looking forward to every working day and all the joy and freedom this job gives me outweigh the negatives by miles. There is not a lot of jobs, where you are so excited to start the day, that you get up 3 hours before you actually should or are supposed to. I never saw an employee in a "normal" job, saying on a Sunday morning: "Oh, I am in such a mood to work, I will go to the office now." Never heard anyone say that or do that. Those people can't wait to finish their work for the day. They are living for the weekends (because that is the time, where they don't have to work). They are sad, when their vacation is over and they have get back to work; next vacation is months away. I can't wait to get to work and am always a bit sad, when there is nothing to bet on on a given day.

Based on the list of disadvantages, I feel that you are constantly pressured not just mentally but also socially, financially, and even emotionally. You're living on a financial edge and seem alone and lonely in your 24/7 duty because friends and family are ignorant about what you are doing. I hope I'm wrong but that's what this list evoke in me. How could you even share your joy in winning a game when the other people around you are clueless?

It certainly looks/reads like that But it's not like that, the list reads a bit "too hard". The 24/7 duty has gotten way better in recent years, because I am way more selective with my bets nowadays and switched to live-betting mostly (and don't prepare a lot other than watching my sports regularly). So today for example, I am just waiting to watch some football in the evening and am not "on duty" until then.

There is financial pressure, yes, but I know a lot of people in normal jobs, that have that pressure as well - and their job is not giving them any joy nor freedom (see above). They are imprisoned in some system and contracts and are barely able to survive.

Sport events mostly take place while other people have free time. This is logical, because the events need to generate some income from spectators. So these events have to take place, when the majority is not working (weekends, evenings). And this is the time, when I have to work then, while other people don't have to. In recent years I was often invited to some party, watching football together, just sitting together and having some beer, and this was of course scheduled on a Friday or Saturday evening. When I said, I won't come, because I have to work, very often I would hear something like this: "Huh ? Why do you have to work ? What is going on at that time ?" This always annoyed me, because it showed ignorance towards me and my job. Now I can't demand some birthday party to be held on a Monday morning, where I don't have to work. I was just asking to show some awareness and understanding what my job is about. I often skipped work due to attending parties, weddings and all those things. The times I didn't attend, I would always get ignorant questions about it. And it's not that hard to understand, if you cared just a little bit

I work most of the time alone (well, are you ever alone in internet ? People socialize a lot through the internet nowadays), but there is a huge difference about being alone and being lonely. I am not lonely, I have family and lots of friends and can look for company, whenever I want to. I am no nerd sitting in front of the computer and not wanting and not being able to get in touch with real life. Life has digitalized a lot in recent years and so did mine too. People see working also as some kind of socializing, but I can do without all these perforced friendships you have at work. I enjoy being alone doing my stuff without a boss and people to explain myself and report to, but I don't have to be alone. Being able to enjoy yourself alone is great, being forced to be alone is bad.

I don't let myself get pressured with other peoples opinion about how I should live my life. I live my life the way I want to and will happily invite everyone to be part of my life. If you are being ignorant and show no interest though - there is a door. I am always very interested in other peoples life and their stories, took a lot of time to listen and help whereever I was able to and I expect people around me to do the same to me. Give and take.

I put the list of disadvantages up, to show that not everything is shiny with being a professional gambler. Because, apart from the misconception that every pro gambler is rich, most people have the illusion that this is an utterly fancy world like some Hollywood movie. As I said multiple times, it's a normal job in the end - a very rare one and also one that not everyone is able and willing to do. I wouldn't recommend doing such a job, but for me and my life it's the perfect fit.


I will put up a post about bullying from authorities later today or tomorrow.

[naikturun]

nice thread tyki.I have read your thread from the beginning and the question I want to ask has been asked by someone else,
I also play this game but I play poker because I am more comfortable playing it than putting a bet like you do, and other types of games like dice slots etc. so I want to add a little. I think the best lesson from doing something like this is your experience might get additional info or knowledge from people who are already proficient / pro gambler. but your own experience that will determine to be better than before from the many mistakes you make and fix them in the future.

[tyKiwanuka]

I also play this game but I play poker because I am more comfortable playing it than putting a bet like you do, and other types of games like dice slots etc. so I want to add a little.

As I said before, you should be comfortable with what you are doing. For some this is betting, for others poker. Playing dice, slots is ok too, but don't expect to come out on top there. Do it for fun and don't invest too much money there.

I think the best lesson from doing something like this is your experience might get additional info or knowledge from people who are already proficient / pro gambler. but your own experience that will determine to be better than before from the many mistakes you make and fix them in the future.

You always learn more from the lows than you do from the highs of course. Mistakes and failure are necessary ingredients to move forward. There is no shame in making mistakes - the only mistake is not learning from them and doing it better next time. Being succesful in pro gambling is a skill which has to be developed over time.

A favourite quote of mine, which tennis player Stan Wawrinka also has tatooed on his forearm, from Samuel Beckett:

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.

And I'd like to get enlightened more on "Bullying from authorities."

I can only talk about the legal situation and laws here in Germany, but it's the same for many countries. Online betting is still a grey area and often times very un-regulated market (which is good and bad).

German government always puts up some strange laws. They say they want to protect the players. On the one hand, players should not run easily into gambling addiction and on the other hand they should be protected against scam (books, casinos). What they really want is taxes. Gambling is a huge market, so Angela & Co try to milk that market tax-wise, smoke screening it with player protection.

So the first thing that happened some years ago, was, that german customers weren't able to register with quite some bookies anymore. Existing german customers were kicked out, because the bookmaker didn't want to take any legal risks by letting german customers play at their sites. This was a blow, because being active mostly in niche/small markets requires a good variety of bookmakers to shop for odds and to bet on all the offers each bookmakers provides. In a game of football, the matchup is clear: Team A against Team B. In a cycling race for example, you have 160+ riders and can make gazillion of H2H. Rider A against rider S, rider W against rider Z and so on. And back in the days, a lot of bookies made their own H2H and compiled odds for them. So, I could maybe bet on rider W to beat rider Z only at one particular bookie. And as a resident of Germany I was excluded from playing at a lot of these books.

Then some time later, the german government introduced a 5% bet tax. This means, that german customers, get taxed 5% on the net win for each bet. The bookmakers would collect those taxes and send it to german tax authorities (I doubt any of those bookies ever did, it was just additional money for them). So when you are operating with a 5% yield, 5% taxes are a lot. Odds of 2.00 suddenly became odds of 1.95 (after taxes) - looks small, but makes a huge difference longterm. Nearly all european softbooks truckled and introduced that tax for their german customers. So I lost nearly all european books over night.

The latest law, which will be passed at some point later this year, will introduce a 1000,- Euro deposit (!) limit per month per user over all (!) bookmakers. There will be a big database, where all bookmakers are forced to put their customers data, betting amounts, deposit amounts, winnings etc. in. All for player protection of course
This new law is totally bs and just shows what idiots are at work there. A) Recreational/fun bettors won't reach that 1000,- Euro limit B) Addicted gamblers will always find a way to feed their addiction C) Pro gamblers bet via agents anyway, only agent knows identity, bookmakers has no clue who that customer is. So I think, that law will have no negative impact on me, but you get what I mean, when I say "bullying from authorities".  

And then you are always in danger of getting on the radar of authorities. Betting/poker are considered games of luck in Germany and thus are not taxable, gross profit = net profit. There weren't any pro bettors yet that were sued by authorities, but one poker player (there might be more, but I only know this case). Authorities sued him to pay taxes on his poker winnings, because they said, he is a commercial player and makes a business out of it, so no game of luck anymore.  
All the madness, dumbness and ignorance showed up, when they calculated what he owed the state. This player was a good live poker player, but also played a bit online afaik. Prize money winners from poker tourneys can be found in the internet and there is some databases. Authoritites added all his prize money and said, ok, you have won this and this and will have to pay like 50% taxes on that. They didn't take into account, that in most poker tourneys you will win nothing, but pay (huge) buy-ins. So, if they count his winnings, they should also set it off with all the buy-ins he has lost. But they didn't. The amount he was due he was not able to pay, it was more money than he had. I think he is still busy paying those taxes, but at least he can now also tax his losses and will get some taxes back that way. And from his own statements, he is a losing player in the end, but had some big cashes during his career.

[Steamtyme]

I've noticed that it works the other way round as well. If you fold several hands in a row, your opponents might have an impression that you play only very strong hands, and because of that you can easily get away with bluff afterwards.

It's true anything you do consistently in a game with opponents skews their view of you. Whether it's folding to 3 bets or bet folding the flop, some people will take it that you do this everytime. I always get antsy when I RFI 3 or 4 times in a row based on my pre-flop range. Usually it seems I'll have 2 really strong hands in a row where most people fold out because I've been perceived tight the last half hour or so while I waited on hands. Then I get the 3rd hand and it's in my range but near the bottom. I always think a little longer on these as to whether I play them or not, as I find people begin to lose their resolve and get annoyed maybe just spite jam or raise.
I know it still gets to me sometimes if I watch someone do the same maneuver 3 or 4 times, I still fight myself and my emotions at the table quite frequently.

[tyKiwanuka]

It's true anything you do consistently in a game with opponents skews their view of you. Whether it's folding to 3 bets or bet folding the flop, some people will take it that you do this everytime. I always get antsy when I RFI 3 or 4 times in a row based on my pre-flop range. Usually it seems I'll have 2 really strong hands in a row where most people fold out because I've been perceived tight the last half hour or so while I waited on hands. Then I get the 3rd hand and it's in my range but near the bottom. I always think a little longer on these as to whether I play them or not, as I find people begin to lose their resolve and get annoyed maybe just spite jam or raise.
I know it still gets to me sometimes if I watch someone do the same maneuver 3 or 4 times, I still fight myself and my emotions at the table quite frequently.

Poker is just so much about strategy, psychology, reading your opponent, being scared. And as mentioned you can quite easily manipulate the thinking of your opponents by doing certain things. This might even include some intentional donk plays, that don't cost that much, but which might yield you lots of chips at a later stage; people don't forget that easily.

I actually thought about putting a little piece of paper on my screen to cover the hands I am getting dealt. Then just play a tournament or sit&go blindly, only analyzing what the others do and reacting accordingly. You will most likely lose, but it's maybe a good way to improve your strategic game and the ability to read your opponents.

[Betwrong]

~
I actually thought about putting a little piece of paper on my screen to cover the hands I am getting dealt. Then just play a tournament or sit&go blindly, only analyzing what the others do and reacting accordingly. You will most likely lose, but it's maybe a good way to improve your strategic game and the ability to read your opponents.

Wow! I think, most likely it is. I'm going to try it out with some free rolls or very small stakes. It reminds me of this training for runners when they are wearing ankle weights and are running as usual, or even competing with other runners. Yes, under these circumstances, they lose even to those who are not athletes. But later, after taking the weighs off, they feel like they can fly.

[tyKiwanuka]

What was your worst/highest loss on a bet ?

It wasn’t a single bet, but an array of bets against one cyclist. I have tried to delete all memories about this day and I am no encyclopedia when it comes to sports results, but I think it was the 11th stage of the Tour de France in 2009. It was quite an easy stage, so a sprint finish was expected. No easy flat sprint though, but an uphill sprint.

Mark Cavendish was the worlds best sprinter back then and had been quite dominant in that years edition of the Tour de France as well. But he was never a good uphill sprinter. He was by far the fastest on flat finishes, but there were better sprinters out there, when the road was ascending towards the finish line.

To the surprise of my fellow punters and me, the bookmakers made Cavendish the overwhelming favourite to win this stage and we couldn’t believe our eyes. For us it would have been a great result, if he finished inside the Top5. We tried to find the reason, why the bookmakers thought that way. The published profiles for a stage often lie a bit, so we spend hours to check out, what kind of finish this is in the end. We discussed for hours and hours, checked google street view, made our own calculations about gradients etc.. In the end, we decided that the bookmakers and the market are dead wrong on this one.

So we placed all kind of bets against Cavendish. We bet against a win of him, we bet against him finishing in Top3, we bet every H2H there was against him. All with big stakes.

The stage itself was pretty boring and everything was lined up for the expected mass sprint. When the road started going upwards shortly before the finish, we held our breath, waiting for Cavendish to get distanced from the head of the peloton. But he wouldn’t go away. And it got even worse. Not only wouldn’t he fade, but he moved up to the front to start his sprint. And the inevitable happened – he won that stage to our disbelief.


https://cqranking.com/men/asp/gen/race.asp?raceid=12917

We also placed bets on Hushovd to win, Hushovd to finish Top3 and some H2H on him, since he was a fabulous uphill sprinter with smallish gradients from 4% to 6%. He was a pretty big and massive guy, but he had the raw power in his legs to master these kind of finishes. But he wasn’t good that day too and all those bets lost as well.

I still think the bets against Cavendish had some value, but we massively overstaked on that one and were rightfully punished for that. Cavendish had fantastic legs that day and you always have to take those things into account as well - but we were blind just thinking about all the money we would make on this day. It turned out to be a terrible day instead

[tyKiwanuka]

What was your best bet ever ?

This might be a little braggy, but I have talked about my worst loss before and this bet wasn’t my success, but the success of a friend of mine since it was “his” bet and I just joined it and we split the stakes and winnings afterwards.

It was a bet for the womens single Badminton tournament at the London 2012 Olympics. The nations are only allowed to send a small contingent of players to all the competitions. China had 3 spots for the womens singles. They pre-nominated 3 players: Wang, Wang and Wang (yes, they all had the same name ). Now Chinese sports authorities always like to play some games and keep people and opponents in the dark what they are really up to. My friend knew, what only a few insiders knew, and that is, that China will send Wang, Wang and Li to this competition. You can make last minute changes and they planned to replace one of the Wang’s with Li, a 21 year-old upcoming superstar, who was already in Top10 in the world at that time iirc. My friend said, she is probably already the best player in the world (it takes some time to climb up the rankings) and likely to win the women singles in Badminton.

So we checked the odds, but Li wasn’t available of course, because China had nominated 3x Wang. But some bookmakers always list the most promising and likely winners and put everyone else as “any other” option. The odds for outright winning market looked something like this:

Athlete	Outright Odds
__________________	__________________
Wang1	2.50
Wang2	4.50
Player X	5.00
Wang3	6.00
Player X	8.00
Player X	8.00
Player X	10.00
Player X	12.00
Any other	61.00

This is like offering odds for La Liga Champions, putting Barca @ 1,80, then Atletico, Valencia etc. and including Real in any other for odds of 50+.

This “any other” option offered tremendous value, since fair odds for Li would have been around 2.50 (same as Wang1 more or less). So we grabbed our money and played multiple times maximum bet on” any other” (you can repeat bets at some bookies, even though you make max bets all the time). You can't stake hundreds of thousands on such bets, but it was still more than we expected. We brought the odds down a bit, but everything above 2.50 was value, so we placed more bets. We discovered another bookie that offered the same odds and placed maximum bets there as well. In the end we had staked a pretty huge amount on average odds of around 40 for any other I would think.

The tournament started and of course Li was nominated for China instead of Wang3. She had no problems disposing of her opponents and won every match with 2-0 sets and reached the final, where she would meet Wang1. During the whole tournament (it lasted for 10 days I think), we prayed that she doesn’t get injured or sick.

For the final Wang1 was small favourite, with odds around 1.70. The match started and Li was dominant, edging out a healthy lead in the first set. That was the point, where we decided to hedge out a bit. In advance we already deposited lots of money into our Bet365 accounts, since we knew they would offer live-betting for this event. So we started to place some bets on Wang1, whose odds kept rising during the first set, which Li won 21-15. After that first set, we were already guaranteed a lot of money, no matter the outcome. Wang1 won the second set 23-21, but Li won the third set 21-17 and was crowned womens single Badminton winner in the London 2012 Olympics.



Unfortunately Li had to retire from professional Badminton quite early due to some knee injuries, but she will be my Olympic heroine forever.

[tyKiwanuka]

A little story:

One of my betting partners/friends is from China and specialized in Chinese Basketball and Football. He lives quite far away from Wuhan, so he is kind of safe-ish from Covid-19, but still stays at home most of the time and only leaves the house, when absolutely necessary. The problem he has, is, that of course all sports in China is paused for the moment as well, so he is kind of unemployed now and can't earn any money. The last Basketball match in CBA was January 21st and the start of Football Super League was postponed too. He thinks that maybe in April both leagues will start again, but I am not so sure about that.
He is not worried a lot, because he has some money in the background, but it's still something to be taken into consideration when being a professional gambler. Such a virus and all the consequences to public life is of course a very rare occurance, but there might be other things (serious illness for example), that can prevent you from being able to bet and earn money. So always make sure to put some money aside.

In Germany there are more and more Covid-19 cases now and our Minister of Health already spoke about an epidemic coming. I can see my german sports/leagues being halted for that reason too and expect it to happen in the next weeks. So, I would be kind of unemployed then too

[tyKiwanuka]

A post from Steve, whose blog I mentioned earlier in this thread. He describes how he took advantage of bonus offers from casinos: How I gambled over $1 Billion dollars in my 20’s

While it's a great and fun read, at least for me, it also shows that it all comes down to math in the end; that is the foundation. If you show some smartness, are alert to new developments, willing to dive into them and ready to put in some work, you can make money in the gambling world. In regards to sportbetting it's advantageous to have some knowledge about the sports you are betting, but I know people that even make money without having deep knowledge. They are just very smart and can spot valuable opportunities by just monitoring markets. This is probably a god-given gift and I don't have that talent too, but it can be learned and mastered to some extent.

I won't withhold, that it has gotten very hard to make easy money as Steve did some 15-20 years ago, but it is still possible to find these opportunities, if you stay alert.

[tyKiwanuka]

I can see my german sports/leagues being halted for that reason too and expect it to happen in the next weeks.

Well, my fear came true. I didn't place a bet since March 11th and this is probably the longest break in the last 15 years. I am not necessarily missing the betting part, but boy, do I miss watching some sports. Going from watching sport every day for multiple hours to zero, nada, niente is really kind of weird. What would I give now to watch some Bundesliga match even without spectators Expecting sports/league to resume in May again, so this will be a loooong April.


Some years ago, I stumbled across every punters wet dream. I found some more or less huge imperfection in some markets. Good thing was, there was no research to be done, no knowledge needed, the market did the work for me and I just had to place the bets filtering some odds and collecting my winnings afterwards. The icing on the cake was multiple of these bets being available every day for 10 months of the year.

I followed WTA tennis very closely at that time, since these were the markets where I wanted to learn inplay trading at Betfair. So I spent my days watching the ladies play and trying my luck in making some bucks by taking advantage of odds movement while the matches unfolded. Very soon I learned, that this is easier said than done. WTA tennis is said to be a nightmare to bet on, but a dream to trade. What I noticed - being someone who likes to play bigger odds - is, that a lot of these games were very one-sided; the odds favourite just won with no fuzz. That made me thinking. If the majority of the favourites wins rather easily, there must be some way to make money with it. I had a look at set betting.

Checking all results every day, there were rather few three-setters (in contrast to what one would expect in womens tennis) and most of the matches ended 2-0 with the favourite winning. Now this tells nothing, if you don't have any odds available. So I bought a lifetime license for some tennis database and started calculating and analysing what happened in the past (5 seasons). That database also included pre-match odds for all matches, but not the set betting odds. The way bookmakers compile their set betting odds is fixed, i.e. they don't really compile them. They do compile the ML odds and just extrapolate the set betting odds from that. And that formula was wrong.

It was rather easy to grasp what their formula was and so I soon had a list what were the corresponding 2-0 odds for given ML odds. So I could calculate, what 2-0 bets on WTA favourites would have yielded for past season - and the results were amazing.

But what is a favourite ? A 1.20 is a huge favourite, a 1.50 is a solid favourite, a 1.80 is still a little bit of a favourite, but there was some threshold which I had to define, where there was no value to blindly play a favourite for 2-0 win. That threshold was at (average market) odds of 1.64 according to my calculations.

So after some days of theoretical work, I finally started my test. I would now play every WTA favourite =<1,64 to win their match 2-0. I started with smallish stakes, but relatively quickly upped them, because the results were very good and I was sure, they were no fluke. Already after like 3 weeks, I was staking the max amount at most bookmakers. It has to be noted though, that the max stakes for set betting at most bookmakers are not that high and I always played early odds, where the limits are reduced anyway. I always shopped for the best odds, since there were quite some differences in the bookies. One bookmaker had a 1.80 for my bet, the other a 2.05. Huge difference and I wanted to max out my profits. I needed lots of money in all my bookmaker accounts to act quickly and get the best odds available.

As the months passed by, I was always fine-tuning the system. Some players weren't reliable favourites and more often than not going for mental walkabouts during their matches, resuliting in three-setters (but still winning in the end). Pavlyuchenkova was one of those. So I filtered out some players, that weren't profitable for this system. I also noticed the system doing rather poor-ish with grass tournaments, hardcourts were better than clay and all those things. I kept track of every single player, every single tournament, every surface and checked the results. I was able to create huge turnover and was operating with a 10% yield.

This goldmine lasted for around two years, until a) the market adapted and b) I was running out of betting accounts. The bookmakers changed their formula to compile set betting odds and thus they were way lower from that on. I re-calculated everything and came to the conclusion, that it was still profitable, albeit with a lower expected yield. But I was limited so heavily in nearly all bookmakers and wasn't able to place my desired stakes anymore and shopping for the best odds was very hard with only few bookmaker accounts at hand. Betfair was no option, since the set betting markets there have low volume (especially for early odds).

After the bookmakers changed their formula again, I realized that with all these circumstances the goldmine was depleted. I tried to work out some similar inplay set betting system, but failed. So after around 2.5 wild years with 2-0 set betting WTA favourites, I finally stopped.

I had a look, if that system could be applied to ATP, but no, you would just break even, so not worth the time. I did add WTA qualifying matches though, because my data showed them to be profitable as well and I often had some lack of matches in the weekends, since only SF and F were played then. With also betting the qualifying matches for the tournaments starting the week after, I had a full schedule every day of the week.

[verita1]

Thanks for sharing your experience, it is really useful for new gamblers.
Sorry if you have answered it before. What are the basic things that a new gambler should know?

[bbc.reporter]

@tyKiwanuka. If you were a sportsbook, what would be your odds on the withdrawal of the coronavirus quarantines in Italy after 1 month, 2 months, 3 months, 6 months and 1 year?

[Meowth05]

Is it worth living the life as a gambler? I mean there must be a lot of setbacks, but what are the difference of livng a life of not gambling?

[tyKiwanuka]

Sorry if you have answered it before. What are the basic things that a new gambler should know?

There is a little (bad formatted) glossary in the first post. Your question is mainly answered in this and this post.

@tyKiwanuka. If you were a sportsbook, what would be your odds on the withdrawal of the coronavirus quarantines in Italy after 1 month, 2 months, 3 months, 6 months and 1 year?

I guess you are refering to when sport events will start to take place again (?). It's really hard for me to give odds for that in Italy, because I am not digging deep into the happenings there. I am closely following everything in Germany though and I think, that Bundesliga will start again in May without spectators (see here).

For the bigger football leagues it is easier to resume play behind closed doors, because the teams there are not too dependant on ticket sales. Basketball teams for example, especially in Germany, are heavily dependant on ticket sales; it's a big percentage of their budget. Lots of teams have already laid off some players to save money. So these smaller sports will resume way later.

To precisely answer your question, here are my odds (no juice^^) for Bundesliga starting again:

In May
Yes: 2.00
No: 2.00

In June
Yes: 1.25
No: 5.00

In July
Yes: 1.10
No: 11.00

In October
Yes: 1.02
No: 50.00

In April (2021)
Yes: N/A
No: 500.00

I am not taking any bets though If at least Bundesliga doesn't start by April 2021 again, then the apocalypse has happened and we have other issues to think about than sports

Is it worth living the life as a gambler? I mean there must be a lot of setbacks, but what are the difference of livng a life of not gambling?

What is a life worth living in first place ? This is a very individual matter.

Most important thing is to do what makes you happy. Now this is not always easy, because you somehow have to earn money. Without money, it is very hard to be happy. I am not talking about millions here, but having enough money, to have a home, to eat, to pay your bills. To achieve this, the majority of people just does a job, that will guarantee this financial foundation. If people could achieve this by NOT working (maybe they are able to print money f.e.), like 80% would not be working. Or not work in that particular job or just do part-time or do charity work or whatever.

The life as a gambler is not always easy and it certainly isn't the right thing to do for most of the people. But I think I am more happy with what I am doing than 99% of the population. There are lot of setbacks - it's a rollercoaster nearly every single day, but I like it. I don't necessarily like the rollercoaster thing, but I like the advantages that come with me sitting in that rollercoaster on a daily basis. And there are setbacks with a "normal" job too. They are a bit different, because you will always get your pay no matter the setbacks, but a 9-5 job would bore the hell out of me. Having to deal with co-workers and bosses, being forced to be at certain places at certain times, spending 40+ years with something I wouldn't do in my spare time etc. For lots of people it's a compromise they take to have that financial foundation I talked about above, but for me this is no option unless I have to in the future. Then I would be one of "them" (and I am not judging "them", it's just not what I personally want to do in and with my life).

I have to deal with setbacks, that nearly all self-employed people have to deal with too. There is not that much difference imo and I like this quote regarding that:

If you don’t take risks, you’ll always work for someone who does.

Source: unknown

For more on why the advantages weigh out the disadvantages, see these two posts: 1 2

[bbc.reporter]

@tyKiwanuka. No, not about the return of sports events but the withdrawal of quarantines themselves by governments.

In any case, your odds appear to be very optimistic, I reckon. However, I would give that odds if the commisioner was Dana White hehehehe.

[Bttzed03]

Thanks for the glossary. I was able to find questions similar to mine.

I have almost the same thoughts with @bitmover's while I was reading his comment & questions, specifically the last part. I read your reply and you (OP) dodged some questions because they're too personal but I'd like to follow up on that it it's okay with you.

You started as a single (not married) and that might not be the case right now. Did that affect your life as a professional gambler? If so, how?

[tyKiwanuka]

@tyKiwanuka. No, not about the return of sports events but the withdrawal of quarantines themselves by governments.

Well, the withdrawal of quarantines and sports events starting to resume go hand in hand imo in the end. So those odds I mentioned (or compiled ) are somehow valid for relaxing quarantines too. But it's not like just flipping a switch and everything is "normal" again; it's a process.
At some point the economical consequences, and all that comes with it, are worse then the actual virus we are trying to fight with shutting down whole countries. So for Germany, I expect loosening of quarantine at 20th April (my odds for that to happen: 1.20) and Bundesliga starting again soon after. All this with keeping measures regarding social distancing, wearing masks, no spectators etc.

I read your reply and you (OP) dodged some questions because they're too personal but I'd like to follow up on that it it's okay with you.

You started as a single (not married) and that might not be the case right now. Did that affect your life as a professional gambler? If so, how?

All questions are fine (this is an AMA), but I won't answer every single one of them, since some too private matters don't belong in public for my liking. I can reveal my private life not being affected by my job though, it's pretty standard, without going too much into details. The pro betting people I know personally are all married and have kids - apart from one, that it is younger and still studying.
I emphasized multiple times, that pro betting is more or less a normal job in the end. It's just that these people are working from home and often in the evenings&weekends. But otoh they have quite some time for their kids during the day, which is something people with a regular job most of the time don't have. My friends with a normal job and younger kids/infants rush to work in the mornings, get home by evening and then maybe have one hour with their kids, before they (the kids that is ) go to bed. Bringing the kids to kindergarden/school and picking them up again, helping with homework, entertaining the kids on boring afternoons, going to doctors with them, driving them here and there etc. is something not a lot of fathers are able to do.
And since you have no boss, you own your schedule/time. You can always make time easily, if necessary or needed.

[bbc.reporter]

@tyKiwanuka. What news websites are you reading? 1.20 odds for yes is a very positive view, I reckon hehehe.

It might also be impossible because the situation is only very unpredictable. Human to animal transmission of the coronavirus might be happening everywhere.



A TIGER AT the Bronx Zoo in New York City has tested positive for the virus that causes COVID-19, and six other big cats are exhibiting symptoms consistent with the illness, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Sunday afternoon.

“It’s the first time, to our knowledge, that a [wild] animal has gotten sick from COVID-19 from a person,” says Paul Calle, chief veterinarian for the Bronx Zoo. The Malayan tiger, named Nadia, likely contracted the coronavirus from an infected—but unknown—asymptomatic zookeeper. “It’s the only thing that makes sense,” Calle says. The zoo has been closed to visitors since March 16.

Read in full https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2020/04/tiger-coronavirus-covid19-positive-test-bronx-zoo/

[tyKiwanuka]

@tyKiwanuka. What news websites are you reading? 1.20 odds for yes is a very positive view, I reckon hehehe.

It might also be impossible because the situation is only very unpredictable. Human to animal transmission of the coronavirus might be happening everywhere.

Hehe, lol, I don't have any insider news nor the phone number of Chancellor Merkel Denmark in the north and Austria in the south have already announced to loosen the measures in the next days. And while this is indeed unpredictable, I would call the situation under control for Germany. The 1.20 is mainly because you can witness a tendency from the media to push towards relaxing the shutdown, putting pressure on the politicians and authorities little by little. You can see and hear more and more (rhetorical) questions like: "When will we be allowed to go out again ?" The media has huge power

And as discussed gazillion times already, there is a threshold, where the economic consequences of a shutdown are worse then the virus itself and we are nearing that threshold.

[nutildah]

Reviving this thread for a minute:

I did a quick search through the topic and didn't find anything about it, so I wanted to ask you, how do you feel about e-sports gambling? Do you do much of it? What do you think e-sports gamblers look for when they are trying to find an edge?

Oh, also, what are you currently betting on these days? Most sports leagues have closed up for at least a while. I notice some eastern european leagues still going: Kazakhstan and Belarus don't seem to care about the virus at all. Same thing with Nicaragua.

E-sports on the other hand seem to be more popular now than ever! Business is booming for them.

Thanks, hope alls been good.

[tyKiwanuka]

I did a quick search through the topic and didn't find anything about it, so I wanted to ask you, how do you feel about e-sports gambling? Do you do much of it? What do you think e-sports gamblers look for when they are trying to find an edge?

E-Sports is actually a field where I never had a bet. This is a completely unknown world to me and one that also does not interest me, but where you can make good money imo, since these are relatively young markets, so lots of imperfections to be expected.

For the second question the obvious answer is of course value. I have to admit not being able to tell you, what could be angles in betting on E-Sports profitably. As with all sports, studying the game and watching as many games as possible should be helpful. Just by watching, you can extract a lot of useful information, which might help for future bets. Things like general approach to the game, strenghts, weaknesses, matchups, maybe even things like stamina etc.
With E-Sports, more than with any other sport, it is very important that you have actually done the sport yourself from my point of view. I can bet on Tennis never having touched a racket, I can bet on NFL never having worn shoulder pads etc. But betting on E-Sports never having played LoL for example, I imagine to be tremendously difficult. There is just so much more dynamics and unknown variables in these computer games. From time to time I stumble upon some E-Sports in TV and I have no idea what they are doing tbh. Someone who plays these games himself might see some patterns, that he could use for making bets. But not every expert in a sport is also good in betting that sport, so that is that, it takes both.

Oh, also, what are you currently betting on these days? Most sports leagues have closed up for at least a while. I notice some eastern european leagues still going: Kazakhstan and Belarus don't seem to care about the virus at all. Same thing with Nicaragua.

I am not betting for the moment. I had my last bet in the beginning of March, so a lot of time for my standards without one of my favourite things to do. I do regularly check out some outright markets, like I did with the US election for example (and where I opened a trade with Cuomo - not looking good atm ). I miss watching sports and having some bets, but I am not that desperate to take my chances with these few little leagues still running. I know a lot of people do (maybe out of addcition), but I am sure that I wouldn't be able to make any money there, so better just stay away. And it wouldn't surprise me, if there is also lots of fixing going on right now with more money involved and players on low wages.

I am looking forward to the NFL Draft and will dive into the betting markets the next days (already had quick looks in the last days). It's nothing where I expect to make huge money, but I assume to have a fair and good chance at least, with lots of information to be found.

Thanks, hope alls been good.

I am doing well all things considered, thanks. Hope you too

[tyKiwanuka]

A little bump, if anyone of you has any more questions


The last months of "unemployment" slowly but surely come to an end as more and more sports resume - though it's not the sports I usually bet on and/or make money with. The little addict in me showed up and so I couldn't resist to have some (more) bets in german football, where I was able to make little profits in the beginning, but the last two rounds were red, resulting in an overall loss after the break.

German Basketball will resume tomorrow with some strange tournament structure and a few teams even chose to not participate. The teams had to get their players back (mainly from the US) and a team like Vechta has only a very small roster now. There will be lots of surprises I think, but I didn't do enough research yet.

Then I am eagerly waiting for chinese Basketball to resume. It was initially to return in April already, but was always postponed further. And last but not least, I am looking forward to cycling, which will have a packed schedule in late summer/autumn:

8 August: Milano-Sanremo (Italy)
12-16 August: Critérium du Dauphiné (France)
29 August -20 September : Tour de France (France)
7-14 September: Tirreno-Adriatico (Italy)
30 September: La Flèche Wallonne (Belgium)
3-25 October: Giro d'Italia (Italy)
4 October: Liège-Bastogne-Liège (Belgium)
10 October: Amstel Gold Race (the Netherlands)
18 October: Tour des Flandres (Belgium)
20 October - 8 November: Vuelta Ciclista a España (Spain)
25 October: Paris-Roubaix (France)
31 October: Il Lombardia (Italy)
Source: https://www.uci.org/road/news/2020/the-uci-unveils-the-revised-2020-calendars-for-the-uci-worldtour-and-uci-women-s-worldtour

These are just the biggest races, there are many more smaller ones and I will have my hands full following them all All these races in a short period of time will change the dynamics dramatically. Doing the Giro&Tour double on a high level, is normally already not doable and now you have 3 GTs in three months, this will create mayhem. And the GTs will be short of a lot of very good riders, because they will choose to ride the one day Classics/Monuments instead.

[iTradeChips]

There is this one poker buddy that I know of who told me that his way of gambling is that he treats gambling as a business. He calculates his profits from a game then put some money back to his "bank" so to speak. If he lost on certain days, he will calculate again so that he will be sure that he can get his losses back once he wins on some games. And the cycle repeats until he can save enough to buy things he want or put money to their existing business. I want to ask if that is a doable strategy in living a gambling life as another source of living?

[tyKiwanuka]

Hmm, there are multiple ways to be successful and how to manage your bankroll. I don't have the golden way and I am certainly not going it; I am just going my way But step by step:

There is this one poker buddy that I know of who told me that his way of gambling is that he treats gambling as a business.

Treating gambling as a business is a good approach - you are investing in valuable odds/spots and there are a lot of people out there who do this (insurances for example and they are very good at it, because they are filthy rich ).

He calculates his profits from a game then put some money back to his "bank" so to speak. If he lost on certain days, he will calculate again so that he will be sure that he can get his losses back once he wins on some games. And the cycle repeats until he can save enough to buy things he want or put money to their existing business.

Re-calculating your bankroll as often as possible or needed is recommended to not overstake. What you do with your profits is a very individual matter and depends a lot on your circumstances. If possible, I would try to compound, because the bigger your bankroll is, the bigger you can stake and the more money you will make. But if you need to pay bills, then it's not always possible to compound; you have to withdraw some money regularly. And you should reward yourself from time to time for all the work you put in, i.e. have some nice holiday, buy a new car or whatever makes you happy.
There are also people, who pay themselves a regular income every month, no matter how they have been doing that month. If they win 10k one month, their wage will be 2k and if they only win 1k, there wage will still be 2k, but I am not a fan of that. Just take out what you need for expenses and compound the rest.

I don't like the term "he can get his losses back". You should never chase losses - just accept them as part of the game and move on without thinking what happened yesterday (same goes for when you had a very good yesterday). You shouldn't think in days in regards to your profit, but in months or even years. If you had a losing day, just re-calculate your bankroll and start fresh the next day as if it is your first day of gambling. Not easy and I fail with it as well, but thats how it should be.

I want to ask if that is a doable strategy in living a gambling life as another source of living?

I see not reason why it shouldn't I said before, that you don't have to be pitch-perfect in every sector, if you are gambling for a living, no one is. Some struggle with money management, others with discipline, then you have people with poor staking etc. Just try to give your best in every regard (and don't forget to improve every day !) and go your own way and not the way others want you to go or what is the "norm". You have to feel comfortable with what you do. And if you are more comfortable with some suboptimal staking it is better than feeling uncomfortable with optimal staking.

[STT]

The governments thing and taxing people unfairly sounds familiar and not that surprising.  I think a better system is to tax the companies themselves on profits made (indirectly this will always impact customers in some cost or less profit), not players especially not ignoring all their costs thats the worst kind of punitive unworkable tax but its happened before in history so I got little doubt its a thing.
    It might be a little extreme but would you ever consider I have to leave this country Germany or EU or wherever and move to a more hospitable regime.   People who are 'too lucky' must do this eventually I guess.    Not in gambling but I know of some who spend 50.1% of their time outside their home country to avoid being taxed 50% like you describe and though awkward its workable like that.

[tyKiwanuka]

It might be a little extreme but would you ever consider I have to leave this country Germany or EU or wherever and move to a more hospitable regime.   People who are 'too lucky' must do this eventually I guess.    Not in gambling but I know of some who spend 50.1% of their time outside their home country to avoid being taxed 50% like you describe and though awkward its workable like that.

Well, there is no income tax on gambling profits. Betting is considered a game of luck and thus it's not taxable here. The tax I have to pay, is directly at the bookmakers and it's officially 5% on your turnover. Most bookmakers have a model, where they pay the tax for you on losing bets (in fact they don't pay anything imo ). For winning bets, they take 5% of your profit and officially pay it to the State of Germany (in reality they don't pay anything again or just parts of it - they just increase their profit with it imo). Since this is an additional 5% I have to beat on top of the house edge, I don't play at these bookmakers no more.

There are also some bookmakers that have no tax at all for german customers, and they claim to pay all taxes from their money for you (again they don't pay anything imo). And then you have bookmakers that just don't care what Germany has to say, because they are sitting faaaaaaaaaaaaar away. This is all very chaotic, but I have adapted to it and where there is a will, there is a way. Mainly with agents.

So I never really considered moving to another country, at least not for betting purposes And with a lot of bookmakers it would make no difference for me anyway, since I have been kicked out or limited by most of them, so I can't bet there anymore no matter where in the world I live. I would need someone else to place bets for me on a non-taxed account and for that I can as well stay where I am.

I think a better system is to tax the companies themselves on profits made (...)

I am no tax expert, but afaik, Germany can't tax a company that sits on some offshore island, even if it is serving german customers. They already struggle with taxing companies like Amazon properly for the business they do here

[iTradeChips]

Hmm, there are multiple ways to be successful and how to manage your bankroll. I don't have the golden way and I am certainly not going it; I am just going my way But step by step:

There is this one poker buddy that I know of who told me that his way of gambling is that he treats gambling as a business.

Treating gambling as a business is a good approach - you are investing in valuable odds/spots and there are a lot of people out there who do this (insurances for example and they are very good at it, because they are filthy rich ).

He calculates his profits from a game then put some money back to his "bank" so to speak. If he lost on certain days, he will calculate again so that he will be sure that he can get his losses back once he wins on some games. And the cycle repeats until he can save enough to buy things he want or put money to their existing business.

Re-calculating your bankroll as often as possible or needed is recommended to not overstake. What you do with your profits is a very individual matter and depends a lot on your circumstances. If possible, I would try to compound, because the bigger your bankroll is, the bigger you can stake and the more money you will make. But if you need to pay bills, then it's not always possible to compound; you have to withdraw some money regularly. And you should reward yourself from time to time for all the work you put in, i.e. have some nice holiday, buy a new car or whatever makes you happy.
There are also people, who pay themselves a regular income every month, no matter how they have been doing that month. If they win 10k one month, their wage will be 2k and if they only win 1k, there wage will still be 2k, but I am not a fan of that. Just take out what you need for expenses and compound the rest.

I don't like the term "he can get his losses back". You should never chase losses - just accept them as part of the game and move on without thinking what happened yesterday (same goes for when you had a very good yesterday). You shouldn't think in days in regards to your profit, but in months or even years. If you had a losing day, just re-calculate your bankroll and start fresh the next day as if it is your first day of gambling. Not easy and I fail with it as well, but thats how it should be.

I want to ask if that is a doable strategy in living a gambling life as another source of living?

I see not reason why it shouldn't I said before, that you don't have to be pitch-perfect in every sector, if you are gambling for a living, no one is. Some struggle with money management, others with discipline, then you have people with poor staking etc. Just try to give your best in every regard (and don't forget to improve every day !) and go your own way and not the way others want you to go or what is the "norm". You have to feel comfortable with what you do. And if you are more comfortable with some suboptimal staking it is better than feeling uncomfortable with optimal staking.

I wasn't able to get his whole strategy in gambling but kidding aside he was able to buy a car and a house in the 7 years that I know him gambling weekly. It really baffles everyone in the neighborhood as he does not have a job and judging by my previous visits, he frequently visit poker sites and invests heavily in cryptocurrency. So I guess he is diversifying his gambling profits to other ventures which is good, I mean most of us know the saying "Don't put all of your eggs in one basket". After all those years he now has a small business and still gambles from time to time. But I was impressed that he was able to pull it off. I might not be able to gather the courage to do what he does but he is an inspiration to me as a crypto enthusiast.

[tyKiwanuka]

I wasn't able to get his whole strategy in gambling but kidding aside he was able to buy a car and a house in the 7 years that I know him gambling weekly.

Other people are able to buy cars and houses from the money they get for doing their jobs as well

It really baffles everyone in the neighborhood as he does not have a job and judging by my previous visits, he frequently visit poker sites and invests heavily in cryptocurrency.

Huh ? He has a job, you and your neighbours just don't see it as his job, because for you it's unthinkable to make a living out of gambling (read: investing). Parking some of your money in other investements, like cryptocurrency, is a good idea, since you don't always need all your bankroll at once. So, if you feel comfortable having your money in such a volatile investment, why not

I might not be able to gather the courage to do what he does but he is an inspiration to me as a crypto enthusiast.

It doesn't take a lot of courage. Other people take risks too, when they start some business, have a little shop or whatever and take loans for it. Gambling/investing for a living is a bit unusual yes, but it's a job like any other in the end.

[roosbit]

People say go big or go home meaning to commit everything you have so whats your take on this

to live off gambling, do you go for large lots or for the purpose of good account management you place a percentage of your a/c.

[tyKiwanuka]

People say go big or go home meaning to commit everything you have so whats your take on this

to live off gambling, do you go for large lots or for the purpose of good account management you place a percentage of your a/c.

I am trying to have a proper money management, I wrote a bit about it here and here.

I like a go big or go home approach in general, but it's not sustainable with professional gambling. If you go big in gambling, you won't have a home to go to longterm, because you will be homeless sooner or later. There is this saying, that betting is a marathon and not a sprint - I hate this saying by now, because I have heard it gazillion times, but it's very true.

No bet is ever 100% safe and you should never stake more than single digit % of your bankroll on any bet, as tempting as it might be. And something like 10% of your bankroll on a single bet should be a very rare event and only if you have very good information & insight, when the odds represent tremendous value and have a good probability to win. This will happen not very often in your (betting) lifetime The rest is just playing the long game and getting rid of the luck factor that every single bet has.

[Steamtyme]

Well now that live sports (no fans) have been back for a while, and with it live sports betting; I'm curious. How has it been? On paper I expect that most matches would have similar odds to what it would have been pre-pandemic, but I got to thinking about just how different games look. Not to mention the behind the scenes of practicing and out of game lifestyle for players.

Have you noticed or did you notice that there has been a major difference in teams and their performances, and/or that the odds on matches are a little skewed now or early on after the return. Any sports that were affected more so than others that you generally bet on?

[tyKiwanuka]

I was really struggling to answer these questions, since every sport/league is so unique with their very own dynamics etc. but tried my best

On paper I expect that most matches would have similar odds to what it would have been pre-pandemic, but I got to thinking about just how different games look. Not to mention the behind the scenes of practicing and out of game lifestyle for players.

Yes, the odds didn't change that much. The european football leagues still had home advantage priced in, but not as much as with spectators of course. Then you have leagues like MLS or Chinese Super League, which are played in neutral locations in a bubble and bookies just remove any home advantage and go on from there.

The games itself are rather boring to watch and even the players look kind of bored at times. This non-atmosphere often gives you the impression of players not trying 100%; there seems to be no urgency, even if down 0-1 in the latter stages of a game. It's missing the (home) crowd to push the teams. In general I would say that these kind of artificial circumstances favour the more skilled teams.

It's not easy for the players on a mental level since they only commute between hotel/practice facility/stadium and don't get to see their families for weeks/months or can just chill a bit at home.

Have you noticed or did you notice that there has been a major difference in teams and their performances, and/or that the odds on matches are a little skewed now or early on after the return. Any sports that were affected more so than others that you generally bet on?

No, not really. Once a sport/league resumes it's like in the beginning of a normal season, so not really Corona-related if there are some surprise results and upsets. After some weeks there are no secrets anymore, the odds get adjusted and it's as hard as ever before to find valuable spots.

I do think that Football (Soccer) and Basketball are more affected than Formula 1 or Cycling for example. In Football/Basketball there is a huge difference, if you play in a packed stadium/arena or in an empty place, where you hear every peep. The fans are more part of the game there and can even influence things a bit. A Formula 1 driver doesn't basically notice any fans/atmosphere during the race.

While Football/Basketball/F1 are on some regular schedule/rhythm, Cycling has a brutal schedule this year. They are doing inside 3 months, what they would normally do in 6+ months. Cycling is the hardest and most challenging sport imo and this super tight racing calendar will make for some super crazy results and good betting opportunities (hopefully).

[Steamtyme]

Solid answers, thanks for the insight. A few guys I work with have been glued to the Hockey games lately and listening to them got me thinking about this. They made similar comments to this.

The games itself are rather boring to watch and even the players look kind of bored at times. This non-atmosphere often gives you the impression of players not trying 100%; there seems to be no urgency, even if down 0-1 in the latter stages of a game. It's missing the (home) crowd to push the teams. In general I would say that these kind of artificial circumstances favour the more skilled teams.

I don't really follow many team sports so I really had no basis to go off. It made sense to me that without that stadium energy some might not be capable of mentally bringing their "A" game.

While Football/Basketball/F1 are on some regular schedule/rhythm, Cycling has a brutal schedule this year. They are doing inside 3 months, what they would normally do in 6+ months. Cycling is the hardest and most challenging sport imo and this super tight racing calendar will make for some super crazy results and good betting opportunities (hopefully).

This sounds insane, and likely to bring about more than a few injuries. I imagine the action will begin to get crazy somewhere around week 7, just a little past the midway point.  I don't follow anything with cycling but I imagine in a normal season, athletes attempt to participate in most if not all races in an attempt to qualify for whatever the Championship is.

Good luck finding the right spots. 

[TedMosby]

whenever I read something like "gambling for living", "betting for living", "professional gambler", my mind always thinking about a person who can constantly get profit from gambling.
did you even minus in one month? how did you manage that kind of situation?

[tyKiwanuka]

did you even minus in one month?

For sure I did. Every professional gambler will have had losing months; the exception are maybe arbers, when it comes to betting. One month is a too short period to get rid of variance all the time, thats why you should think more longterm than a month.

how did you manage that kind of situation?

The first post in this thread has some table of contents, where you can find posts about my journey.

[2double0]

A few questions I would like to add to your glossary would be:

Have you ever gambled on live casino games like Baccarrat or BlackJack? Do you know some tricks to reduce casino's odds in these games?

Have you ever made it to the slots? If yes, how was your experience with this type of gambling?

[tyKiwanuka]

Have you ever gambled on live casino games like Baccarrat or BlackJack? Do you know some tricks to reduce casino's odds in these games?

Have you ever made it to the slots? If yes, how was your experience with this type of gambling?

I think I talked about that already in the past, but probably not enough for it to make into the table of contents And maybe rightfully so, since there really isn't much to talk about. You can play these games, but you will lose money. It's fine to do it for entertainment purposes, but don't expect to get anything out of it (longterm). With some strategic play, you can reduce the house edge, but you won't win that way too, you will just lose less.

I don't like to play games, where I don't have a fair chance of winning anything and my opponent (the house in this case) always wins. I played BlackJack and some slots, but only when I got freespins or some bonus/free money for the Casino from a bookmaker where I play and they happen to have a Casino too. I have to admit, that it's maybe some fun to play these games, but the fact that I will lose, never got me really excited about these games fortunately. And imo these games are highly dangerous, because so addictive and can destroy peoples life.

We have loads of offline arcades (not sure about this term) here. In every little village you have them, and no matter at what time you drive by, there are always cars parked in front of them. Also look at how many online Casinos promoting their services in here (you wear a signature from one of them as well). They are making lots of money and there seems to be no saturation - because there are so many addicted players and the house always wins.

I can only recommend to never start playing these kind of games. It's better to play or Poker or do sportsbetting/-trading, if you are looking for a thrill, because these are skill games, where you can beat the house. And you are no gambler then anymore, but an investor - you are investing in good odds Hopefully.