From Her First Marathon to the Futures Market, feat. Kendra

As we enter the 4th quarter of 2024, Kendra hit a big personal milestone that we have to talk about! For the trading portion of this episode, Market Mama Kendra speaks to her executions for the trading week of October 7-11, 2024, both in technical detail and in psychological impact. When we get into some of our technical systems regarding our day trading in a Market Mamas episode, we want to be very clear that we are not offering trading advice or technical support for traders at this time. But we will start to discuss how we see the markets and choose to execute as traders more and more with you all for the purpose that these real, data driven experiences are shaping us as traders in real time and hold tremendous value in hindsight analysis. For blog purposes on the website, we will not detail much of Kendra’s executions and the jargon she speaks to. To gain that, you will definitely want to watch the full episode on YouTube or what ever your preferred podcast program that you utilize.

For our new viewers that don’t know us, Kendra is a runner. She wasn’t always a runner but it was actually this evolution that started out of her just wanting to give herself an outlet or a break from the charts after her morning trade session. That quickly turned into her really loving the consistent daily physical activity and how it supported her challenges with managing her mindset and mood that fluctuates with trading each day. She’s been running regularly for over a year now. Earlier this year she started racing. Kendra ran a couple 5K’s, a 10K, and 2 half marathons. Her goal before 2024 ended was to run a FULL marathon! And naturally, Becky has been here for it all. Kendra looked back in our DM’s to help with her reflection on this topic and it was in July of 2023 that she messaged Becky so proud because she had jogged around the park nonstop two times. That was a big achievement for Kendra, as she was never a runner. Kendra transformed this year into what is called a hybrid athlete, as she’s learned how to combine strength and endurance training into her daily lifestyle as well. This was another evolution, as she realized running an hour a day felt great in the moment, but thinking in terms of the long game, her body needed more support to help prevent injuries and keep her running for the rest of her life. 

This will surprise no one that Kendra finds many correlations to the challenges and complexities in trading and running, and this race was no different. A week prior, Kendra got an injury on her run during training and it was an instant bummer. Thankfully, she literally started the audiobook Mindset Secrets for Winning, how to bring personal power to everything you do, that morning as she started out her run. One of the passages that hit really hard went, “Nothing has meaning, except for the meaning I give it.” So right after she hit the ground missing a trip hazard, and her knee, the same one she’s suffered from runner's knee before, took the impact, she was like you have got to be kidding me! Of course, her mind wanted to go into a panic mode that she was not going to be able to run her marathon, everything was for nothing, she wanted to cry, but she refused and like the book, she refused to give it that meaning. Kendra accepted this would change how she would go about training the remainder of the week, but she was running the race regardless and chose to channel gratitude that she still had a full week ahead to recover. A classic example of external forces sometimes being out of our control but how we respond to them being fully in our control. Another part of the book was “feed the builder and starve the wrecking bomb,” which she took as the choice to continue to build herself up rather than allow herself to succumb to doubt and self-pity. She did just that and felt stronger leading up to race day.

As for race day, it definitely felt surreal that she was realizing and actualizing this goal she set for herself. Now in terms of running the race, Kendra started entering the pain cave around the half mark. The knee inflammation was flaring up, she could feel a toe blister coming on and getting more and more irritated, so pace no longer was a priority and she just went into ‘I’m going to finish this race however I have to’ mode. At mile 18, the longest distance she had ever ran, she was expressing some disappointment in performance but trying to rationalize it being ok. Probably realizing there in that moment that she gave so little grace to herself and proper recognition for the bad ass shit she does. 1% of the world's entire population run marathons, and she was out there on her first attempt criticizing herself. Goodness, she was already planning in her head how she would do so much better on her next one! Kendra loved how before the race, it was something that she still had that itty bitty question of “am I really gonna be able to do this”, and there she was not even having made it to the finish line, but already knowing she’s for sure doing this again. It was a real-time upgrade in mind and body she was undergoing. So mile 20-26.2, Kendra really tried to be as present as possible and take it all in. By then, the sun had come out, the sideline supporters were getting more and more pumped for us, and it was a great vibe. Her mantra on repeat: “I can do one more step, my body is strong, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, I love running, I love distance.” Kendra made it to the finish line, got her medal and it was freaking amazing!

If you really think about it, there are so many correlations to trading woven throughout this journey of Kendra’s. It has always been said that a successful trading career is a marathon and not a sprint. And if that isn’t the complete truth. There are always setbacks, fears, trials, tests of strength, doubts, and so many small victories littering the journey to that finish line. Traders are at the mercy of Miss Market, and she can and will do whatever she wants. We can only control what we do. We must be the flexible, resilient, patient, dedicated followers of her moves and learn to go with each day’s flow. We are guaranteed to encounter setbacks and get to decide the meaning we assign. We get to focus on the lessons and experience from each day instead of the fears or trauma. And goodness, how easily we criticize our performance and fail to give ourselves credit for the very difficult task and challenges we face everyday as day traders. But we owe it to ourselves to choose to upgrade ourselves in trading every time we push ourselves through and beyond our previous levels of comfort. All of this will take time, months to years of training, growth, and perseverance through the ebbs and flows, peaks and valleys. But it is absolutely possible to become that 1%. And why not us?

A successful trading career is a marathon and not a sprint. There are always setbacks, fears, trials, tests of strength, doubts, and so many small victories littering the journey to that finish line.

Now, Kendra trades the Nasdaq futures index. She got back in town late Monday evening after her marathon and was pretty spent. Not pressuring herself to trade Tuesday morning, as she was getting back to life. So Kendra was just watching from her phone, checking out her trading mentors market update charts on discord, and it was shaping up to be one of her sweet spots for a potential trending day, for many reasons that Kendra reviews in thorough detail in the full episode. In not pressuring herself to trade that day, but more watching with open curiosity, she was able to identify a high probability trade that she did end up taking and it played out so nicely for her. Sometimes it sure seems that the times we don’t start out our mornings eager to trade, we get some of the best opportunities.

Wednesday morning, Kendra approached the market with a bullish bias due to where price was consolidating but did nothing but journal which really helped her not get ahead of herself. Once she broke through resistance, Kendra took her long setup from the previous day’s VAH (value area high) to HOD (high of day). While she wasn’t that happy with her entry, she fully accepted the risk and held through the pullback, giving her the room she needed as the order flow was also showing more and more buyers stepping in. Success again.

Thursday was for sure her most frustrating day. Two full pages of live notes coaching herself, and she ended up break even on her day. Throughout the mixed data, she supported herself by journaling things like “I am patient and purposeful, it’s not my job to get ahead and predict, I’m aligning my intentions with my actions, great work staying out of this, I can 100% not execute a position today.” Full coach Kendra mode! And then it was past her 7:30 cutoff and price still had not visited either of her levels, so she set an alert and thought she would just be done for her day. However, she did have extra time that morning due to her youngest not having school, and right before 7:45 her alert went off and all she knew was that she had been soooo patient, and so now it was go time! Well… All the patience felt like it was for nothing when her position was instantly red, huge pullback, with way too much risk to accept in that trade. She did still believe it in and her direction was good, but once she got in profit, she was too risk averse having over exposed herself to hold onto that position, so she moved her stop loss to BE (breakeven) and was taken out. Still seeing the trade in play, she entered again was in profit and again moved to BE and was taken out. Both times, Kendra wanted to hold for her profit target, but not accept risk, and that is not a winning strategy. Kendra has gotten much better at not moving to BE as much as she used to in her earlier trading, but when she’s doing that over and over in a session, it’s a clear signal she is off her game. For her style, a better thing to do if she is in that predicament is just freaking flatten both because both trades she could have walked away with decent points had she managed better. Aside from that thought, her greatest lesson was that some days really are best to just walk away, because sometimes extreme patience wears down your mental capital just as much as overtrading can. So although she waited patiently, she still wanted to trade. 

To wrap up her week, Friday was another awesome learning day. Kendra who predominantly has a Bullish bias, was very convinced bears had some business to do. Not without what she believed to be a good reason. Considering her data and according to her IF/THEN statement, she was looking for opportunities to short. But after we opened, price started to hold and consolidate around -2 band and bands were flattening out. This is her danger zone! Her data shows that she struggles when price is consolidating in lower bands, and still she got ahead and tried to push her short bias all the way as Miss Market was heading back up to VWAP. Every little sign of weakness, Kendra shorted again and thought it was finally going back down. But lost on those attempts. Thankfully, she was able to get in sync once price did make it above VWAP and price was accepted into the value area that was in her trade plan for a long opportunity. And it was indeed a very similar long setup from Thursday that she couldn’t nail. We know how the market repeats itself if we're paying attention and now she had even better price action. It was good to end her day on that solid trade. Kendra was out of mental capital for sure, price moved up to one more target but then ended up being an inside bar day so she was happy to channel no FOMO.

Kendra and Becky truly embrace that they are life long learners in general but especially as traders. This was a solid trading growth week with a net green P/L bow on top! We’ll take that any time. Thank you to everyone who is subscribing to our podcast, reading our blogs, and providing us feedback! We are here to talk openly about everything that may help us all level up within our lives, be it day trading or otherwise. We wish you all the very best for your lives. Happy Trading!