Let's face it, racing isn't exactly whiter than white. There has always been an accepted culture of insider betting by trainers, jockeys, owners and people in the know on UK horseracing.

It's inevitable, and horseracing provides a lot of opportunities for someone in the know to profit from, for instance, a horse not running quite as fast as it's capable of running. Something to do with that extra gallon of porridge it was fed this morning! As a gambler, you can study form all you want but the fact is if you are purely doing form study without any inside knowledge then you are making decisions without being in possession of all the facts.

However, this corrupt undercurrent of insider betting is actually a good thing when seen from a trader's point of view because it's what makes the pre race prices so volatile and so perfect for scalping.

The idea that someone knows something is at the front of people's minds when they see large amounts of money being placed to Lay or Back a horse on Betfair, and this is what makes the horseracing markets so good for short term trading. Such large amounts of money will instantly send the price soaring or tumbling, with scores of people desperately trying to second guess what's going on and piling in. The favourite's price in the last 5 minutes before the off can be extremely volatile, but there is nothing actually happening!

The only thing that's making the price move about so much is people's perception that something might be happening, of which they are unaware.

By comparison, tennis and soccer prices in the final 10 minutes before the start of the match are totally static. In Play tennis and soccer prices can be volatile whilst the match is being played, but that volatility is in reaction to what is actually happening on the court or the field. These In Play prices can be extremely volatile and as such cannot be traded with your whole bank as outside influences are affecting the price.

In the last 5 minutes before the start of a horserace however, there is nothing actually happening in the race and the volatility is enough to provide untold opportunities for a profit, but without the risk that the price will move whole points away from you. The price is only moving around because the corrupt nature of horseracing makes every market extremely twitchy and sensitive to any kind of imbalance in the bids and offers.

Like I said, watching a soccer team's price in the last 10 minutes before the game starts is like watching paint dry, it hardly moves at all. That's not because there's no money being traded either, the average Premiership match on Betfair will trade a lot more money than your average horserace.

The reason is that a Premiership match is perceived by everyone to be a lot straighter and people feel that all the relevant facts about each team are in the open. Someone coming in and Laying five grand on Liverpool just before the match doesn't spark panic Laying by everyone else. Such a bet won't even get noticed and the price can trade hundreds of thousands of pounds in matched bets without so much as moving a tick up or down.

As a result trading soccer, tennis, cricket etc matches just before the start of the match is not nearly as profitable as trading the horses for the simple reason that they are not as bent!

As a short term trader jumping in and out of the market trying to steal single tick profits here and there, you don't need to know why the price is moving up or moving down. The reason why it's moving is irrelevant so any kind of insider betting doesn't adversely affect the trader. It actually helps the trader because the opportunities come when there is movement and uncertainty.

However, as a gambler you are trying to predict, not follow, the direction of the price and as a result any insider activity can turn whatever form study you have done into a total waste of time, and money. Not knowing what is really going on when you are gambling on the result is a recipe for disaster.