One Hundred Hints for Better Betting [Paperback]

"One Hundred Hints" is the sequel to Mark Coton's best selling book "Value Betting". In "Value Betting", the author concentrated on outlining his insights into how to beat the bookmaker; in this innovative new book, he tells us how to capitalize on those insights, as well as identifying many of the bad habits which often spoil betting. It begins with a look into the mind of the professional gambler, then proceeds to examine all stages of the betting process, from preparing selections and assessing value, to the vital matter of accurate and consistent staking. The hints are interspersed with excerpts from the author's betting diary kept during the 1993 Flat Season, and with many amusing tales from over 15 years of serious betting, notably the years he spent formulating the ground-breaking "Pricewise" column in the "Racing Post." Refreshingly honest, and written in Coton's easily-accessible style, "One Hundred Hints" is part-confession, and part-celebration of the maddening business of betting, and should be ideal reading for anybody who has ever struck a bet in anger, or intends to in future!

Mark Coton turned down the chance to become a barrister in order to pursue what he hesitates to describe as a career in betting. Having worked for Trainers Record and Ladbrokes, he first came to prominence during his four years at the Racing Post, when he formulated and developed the highly successful Pricewise concept, as well as speaking out on behalf of punters in his Better Betting column. Mark wrote his best-selling book Value Betting after leaving the Racing Post in January 1990 and has since returned to the law by teaching part-time at the University of North London. In September 1991 he became chairman of the National Association for the Protection of Punters and has contributed to many publications both in that capacity and, after stepping down from the role, as a journalist. Mark' main form of relaxation is drinking the fine wine he purchased in bulk after Nashwan won the 2,000 Guineas and Derby in 1989.

Excerpt/Introduction
This book has been written with one leading assumption in mind – that the reader, like the author, wishes to profit more from his or her betting. To profit not just financially, though this will clearly be an overriding consideration, but also in terms of the enjoyment and satisfaction gained from the betting process. There appears to be an easy formula to hand here. If you win more, you are going to gain more enjoyment and satisfaction. No doubt. But for the purposes of this book, I am going to reverse the formula and argue that if you get more enjoyment and satisfaction from your betting, you are going to win more in the long run. Not that this turnaround will be at all easy to achieve. Far from it. For every punter who aims to bet profitably has to undertake the long and cheerless task of identifying and then rooting out all the bad habits which have been costing them dear.

Writing this book has helped me undertake this process and, painful though it has been, I can assure you it has been worthwhile. After 15 years of serious betting, I now feel more confident than ever about my ability to beat the bookmaker and beat him well. Although I had enjoyed some great success with my betting, notably during 1989 when a £20,000 coup on Nashwan was the highlight of an astonishing summer, I was aware that I had by no means mastered the system. This was proved the very next summer when I endured a devastating sequence of 49 losers.

In the spring of 1993, I decided to try to tackle the game head-on, by setting myself up as a professional punter for the six months from the Newmarket Craven Meeting in April to the Cesarewitch in October. The project was a failure.

After a two-month break, I printed out the year’s bets and began to analyse them. I reviewed my diary. I made a list of mistakes made, faults exposed and opportunities missed. The list of these faults and missed opportunities began to extend so far, I realised there was enough material for a book on them. Not the sort of book I had been hoping to write at the start of the previous summer, which was to be one full of decisive decision-making, of shrewd and heavily-backed winners, and of evenings spent sipping champagne on the lawns of luxury hotels.

A book, by contrast, which would be introspective, perhaps to a fault, yet rigorous and honest. One which would hopefully clear the fog surrounding our betting and enable us to approach the game keen, refreshed and full of a rare sense of purpose.

I have always had a deep conviction that the game can be beaten, and beaten well, and that conviction has been strengthened by writing this book. I hope that your convictions, whatever they are, will be strengthened too, and that you find much to entertain in the pages to come.