SYS3 Advised Bank Size & Expected Variance
Don't place a single bet on SYS3 until you have read and understood all of this in full
Here is our historical profit and loss performance of SYS3 as recorded to Betfair SP:
One can see a very healthy overall uptrend. However, it hasn’t been all plain sailing. For example, here are the main episodes of drawdown we’ve had since mid-October 2023:
At the time of writing, SYS3 was on a drawdown of nearly 12 points from its previous high. And less than a week before writing this post, the drawdown had briefly touched very nearly 36 points down from its previous high.
Advised starting bank for SYS3
The recommended starting bank for SYS3 is 200 points. That might sound overkill, but I always prefer to err on the side of caution, and it is better to be safe than sorry. It also removes a lot of pressure to operate a bigger bank (rather than sailing too close to the wind), which has loads more wiggle room to ride out losing runs. So the worst drawdown on record to date is around 36 points down from the previous high. 36 points off 200 is just 18% of the overall bank. Therefore, one would still have over 80% of their starting bank in hand. This is a massive safety net to ensure we have plenty in hand to sustain us just until things pick up and a new high is eventually reached. Even a 50-point drawdown would give you 75% of your bank (ample wiggle room) to mount a recovery. And if we hit a challenging losing run of 100 points (it could happen at some stage), you'd still have 50% of your bank left to mount a recovery. 50% is the sort of psychological betting level where people are liable to quit. Hence, I like to run a big bank in the hope that the drawdown never reaches 50% of the overall betting bank.
IMPORTANT UPDATE: SYS3 has since exceeded (by just over double the amount) its previous record drawdown (as expected) of 36 points. Please see this post for an update in this regard:
SYS3 is undoubtedly our most popular system. That shouldn't be a surprise to anybody, given that it's our leading system [Update: please visit this link to see a newer and more popular alternative version of SYS3] that has achieved the best overall results. Hence, I’ve chosen it as the data system to launch first and foremost here on Substack. It has performed the best historically in terms of points returned and its associated ROI% (return on investment) performance. One drawback SYS3 does have is its relatively low strike rate of approximately 16%. This means that on average, as a general guide (bearing in mind that variance never works like clockwork), for every 100 bets, we can expect 16 winners and 84 losers. Or for every 1000 bets, we can expect 160 winners and 840 losers. Thankfully, plenty of those expected 160 winners will come at big odds. The average winning SP for our SYS3 winners works out to roughly 7/1 or, better yet, 9/1 to Betfair SP.
Losing Runs
When you are running into 840 losers for every 1000 bets, you can be sure to encounter some long losing runs at times. Losing runs of 10 or more bets without a winner will be a common occurrence. For every 500 bets, you can expect it to happen at least 15 times, or for every 1000 bets, you can expect it to occur at least 30 times. And some of those losing runs will stretch well beyond 10 bets to 20 or 30 consecutive bets without a single winner in sight. In an extreme event, we might even go as far as 40 bets without a single winner. This is why we have a 200-point starting bank to ensure we have a big safety net to ride the inevitable ups and downs.
And please also be sure to read all of the following relevant post before deciding if to follow SYS3.
SYS3 Variance
The target strike rate for SYS3 is 16%. So on average, we are looking for 4 winners from every 25 bets, or 8 winners from 50, or 16 winners from 100 bets. However, variance will see to it that winners don’t come around like clockwork for 4 in every 25 bets. Winners tend to come in clusters, as do losers. For example, you might be lucky enough to get 3 winners out of 10, which is a short-term strike rate of 30%. But then you might hit a losing run of 20, and now you only have 3 winners from 30 (so your short-term strike rate has dropped to just 10% with only 3 winners from your last 30 bets). Then things might pick up, and you might find 5 winners from the next 20 bets. So now you’ve had 8 winners from 50 bets, which is a strike rate of 16% from your most recent 50 bets. This is how variance typically works; that is, the numbers generally settle out when given enough wiggle room to play out. I’m far more interested in how many winners I’ve hit overall for every sequence of 500 or 1000 bets than I am on a given day.
Income Disclaimer
This seems as good a time as any to drop the ubiquitous income disclaimer. In essence, past performance is no guarantee of future results. That is to say, don't assume any given investment (or betting system) will continue to do well in the future simply because it's done well in the past. You recognise that betting can be speculative, and ultimate responsibility for all betting decisions is down to you. And most importantly of all, you should never trade, bet, or invest money you cannot afford to lose.