1989issue C101-3
Preflight checklist, time-stops, and stand-aside rules
Written capital-protection rules are most often abandoned when a setup is only marginally qualified or a trade is already open. The archive prescribes stand-aside at the margin, a time-stop during a planned hold, and a debrief after every close. Editorial reading: those checks form one cockpit procedure.
- Written capital-protection rules are most often abandoned when an entry or exit is only marginally qualified, or while a trade is already open and emotions are engaged.
- When a proposed entry meets only the minimum or borderline standard, the prescribed action is to stand aside.
- A planned four-day hold includes a second-day time-stop checkpoint and third-day mental-stop-tightening if expected movement has not appeared.
- After every closed trade, a debrief asks whether the result reflected disciplined use of a sound procedure rather than the system alone.
Written criteria fail at the margin
Written capital-protection rules are recorded as written-criteria so they can be checked when emotions rise. Those rules are most often abandoned when an entry or exit is only marginally qualified, or while a trade is already open and emotions are engaged.
The archive reports that departing from those written rules enlarged losses the original criteria were meant to contain.
Stand-aside is a prescribed output
When a proposed entry meets only the minimum or borderline standard, the prescribed action is to stand aside.
Fatigue, burnout, anxiety, or outside commitments that disrupt the established trading routine are treated as reasons to stand aside. Stand-aside is the prescribed no-trade output when standards are only marginally met or attention is impaired.
A time-stop reviews a stalling hold
A planned four-day hold includes an earlier checkpoint. If the position has not moved by the end of the second day, continuation is treated as a lower-odds choice.
Because capital-drain risk is described as rising with time in the trade, mental-stop-tightening is applied on the third day, with readiness to exit if conditions worsen. The time-stop is a calendar bound that reviews or exits a position when expected movement fails to appear inside the planned hold.
Unrehearsed variation is a capital-threatening error
Altering a live position or trying an unpracticed tactic mid-stream is treated as a capital-threatening error. An unrehearsed-variation changes size, method, or tactics with a technique that has not been practiced.
A debrief grades the procedure
After every closed trade, a debrief is used to judge whether the result reflected disciplined use of a sound procedure rather than the system alone. The debrief asks whether judgment followed the written procedure.
All readings on this track · 15 readings
- 1989Preflight checklist, time-stops, and stand-aside rules
- 1991Parameter windows for averages, option overlays and time stops
- 1995Three setup gates and a session-count clock complete a long bottom
- 1995Evaluating index futures OHLC reversals with RSI and time stops
- 1995A weekly two-close breakout and an eight-week time stop
- 2000Constructing breakout entry rules and time stops
- 2004Constructing action-reaction swing targets and time stops
- 2005Constructing breakout entries with trailing and time stops
- 2006Evaluating a restrictive range entry with a timed exit
- 2008Evaluating point-and-figure column breaks with time stops
- 2011Intraday gold swing with a daily entry limit, a time-stop, and a fixed stop-loss
- 2012Last-hour entries with a book-level loss bound and a next-open time stop
- 2015Precommit stop-loss, trailing-stop, and time-stop rules before entry
- 2018Auditing rank-rotation tests for time-stop and slot rules
- 2019Confirmation-first pyramiding with price and time stops