Making Par

Since Last Post P/L: £19.30

Monthly P/L: £527.75

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A frustrating week has seen me make hardly any progress with greed stunting my growth once again. After a consistent performance in the first 3 Premier League darts matches on Thursday, I totally crumbled in the Taylor v Barneveld matchup. The market hugely favoured Taylor and I was always looking for a swing the other way. The result? My false hopes allowed me to get my fingers burned and it was only after a concerted effort in trading the Masters that I've managed to get back to where I was.

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I'd done my homework and before a ball had been hit I was confident that Tiger's price of 2.42 was way too short. The guy is a machine and he'd been in great form but I'd noted that since the course had been lengthened in 2006 his best round had only been a 70. I accepted that if he hit 70 four days on the trot he'd probably win but I thought that it was unlikely and so it proved. Friday and Saturday I struggled to make a slight profit but my strategy remained the same going into the last day - to lay Tiger at the soonest opportunity and for the lowest price possible.

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I jot down my thoughts as I trade to help me understand why I'm doing the things that I'm doing and I followed this process again during the 4th round. Here's a snip-it of my ramblings just in case you're interested:

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19.29: Price on Tiger too short at 5.30. Two easier holes ahead but if he pars both he should drift very quickly. A big 30 minutes ahead. Need Immelman to get off to a steady start.

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19.38: Bugger - Immelman bogies the first!

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20.18: Tiger drops back to -4 and I can't see any way back. Too hard a course and too many players in front of him. His price is now 12.50.

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20.32: Tiger birdies the 6th and his price crashes back to 8.00 which is surely too low. Not getting involved...yet!

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20.42: Opposed Tiger at 7.60 and sure enough he drifted back to 8.80 pretty quickly - did I get out of this one too early? His price is now 9.20. Will I get another chance to go against him?

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20.54: Time to switch my attention to Immelman - 2 shots clear - can he hold on?

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21.18: Thoughts about who will win have gone out the window. Immelman's price is so volatile I'm just chasing the movement.

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21.43: Immelman is 5 shots clear and it looks like the others are throwing it away. Time to call it a day.

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By just reading my thoughts back on that 2 hour period it surprising how useful I find it as I can almost picture each trade in my head and my thoughts at that time. Okay, it may not be Camtasia but it seems to be a useful tool that's working so I'll continue to use it with the slower moving sports.

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Here's a list of my full results for the week:

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Rugby Union

Heineken Cup - Outright Winner : £12.00

Gloucester v Saracens : £6.51

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Darts

Wade v Mardle : £21.39

Part v Lewis : £15.90

Manley v Jenkins : £23.99

Taylor v Van Barneveld : £137.93

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Golf

Shell Houston Open : £68.24

US Masters : £169.68

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Some great sporting action in there and the week ahead looks great too. It's the start of the Indian Premier League cricket and I really hope all the hype lives up to expectations. I have a feeling the tournament will either turn out to be great television or utter garbage - I've a feeling there won't be an in-between.

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