How to size bets in units

Before units mean anything, you need a clear idea of what you are sizing against. A bankroll is simply the pot of money you have set aside for betting, money you can afford to lose without it touching rent, bills, or anything borrowed. It is not a forecast of what you hope to earn, and it is not “whatever is in the account this week.”

If losing that pot would hurt essentials, it is too large. There is no clever staking system that fixes that starting point.

Once you have a figure you can live with, our convention is straightforward:

1u = 1% of your chosen bankroll.

So if you set £1,000 aside, 1.0u is about £10 and 0.5u is about £5. That is only arithmetic, not a suggestion to deposit £1,000, and not a claim that those stakes suit you. Change the bankroll and the pound amount of 1u changes with it. The relative size on the card stays the same.

A £10 stake is a serious position for someone working with a few hundred pounds, and a small one for someone working with several thousand. If we printed pounds on every card, the advice would silently favour one reader’s budget over another’s.

Units fix that. Every subscriber sees the same 1.0u or 0.5u. You translate it into cash using your bankroll. The performance desk can then show one public book, graded in those same units, without pretending to know what anyone else risks in pounds.

A few practical points that matter once you start following cards:

A 1.0u release is asking for about one percent of bankroll. A 0.5u release is half of that. Smaller does not mean “we are less sure,” and larger does not mean “this one is special.” Stake size on our cards is a sizing convention tied to the release, not a confidence trophy.

It is also easy to forget that several open positions add up. Three 1.0u cards still in play are not “just three small bets” if your bankroll is modest. Size the week, not only the tip in front of you.

Finally: do not raise stakes to chase a losing run, and do not treat a quiet day on the channel as a reason to “catch up” on the next card. Selectivity is part of the product. Forcing action is how unit discipline dies.

Getting the stake right only helps if the price is still the one we priced. Every card includes minimum take prices (take floors), the lowest number we still consider acceptable for that release.

If the market has already shortened past the floor, skip it. Matching our unit size at a worse price does not rebuild the edge. You would be taking a different bet to the one on the card.

For example, a floor of 2.10 means 2.10 or better. It does not mean 2.05 because kick-off is close and you feel you “missed out.” You do not have to take every release. A price that has gone is not a debt you owe the next card.

The public book grades the stated units and the prices we work from when a tip is released. Your own results will differ if you take different odds, use a different unit size, or skip releases, and that is fine. Units make the record comparable. They do not remove risk, and they do not copy our P&L into your account.

Use the desk to understand the process. Translate units into pounds only after you have chosen a bankroll you can genuinely afford to put at risk. More on membership and how we talk about risk sits in the FAQ; more on reading the numbers is in How to read our performance desk.