The Strategy of Bidding at 4:30 AM?

[mechanicalman]

Like many on this board, I'm engaged in bidding on items from the major AHs, including last night's MHCC. My approach is this: determine the items in which I'm interested, do some pricing research on VCP, and then set my "indifference price" for each item - essentially the highest amount I'm willing to bid whereby I won't be terribly unhappy if I lose. I bid those prices with a few hours to go before the "closing" at 9PM, and then go about my night because I generally find that sleeping makes me better at my job.

At 4AM I woke up to let our new puppy out, and I checked my email to find a "closing soon" message from MHCC. No outbid emails, so I thought I might bat 1.000. I went back to sleep and woke up to find bids at 4:10 and then 5:35 AM EST, the latter a full 8.5 hours after the "close" of the auction. In sum, I lost one and won one. I'm fully satisfied with the outcome, but I'm curious about the mechanics of it all.

My question is this: what is the thought or strategy behind placing bids many hours after the "closing"? I am not trying to pass judgment at all, and this is not sour grapes, but I'm trying to understand the rationale behind that strategy. Seems like Russian Roulette to place a last minute bid even 1.5 hours after the "it's getting late, guys" email. I fully understand the last minute bidding of eBay where you can win stuff by bidding $5 more than the next dude. But with 10% minimum increments, it doesn't seem like the ebay mentality would apply.

Anyway, I'm just curious what prompts someone to take that approach. I'm sure there are those on this board who do it and are successful - would love to hear - without judgment - the rationale.