What do you mean by risk is 1% per trade? I do not understand that.
On my strategy testing code I noticed shorts doing better than longs
A trader can be a short or long trader. Some traders go any direction which their analyses points towards.
What I have noticed about trading is that you should use small amount of money to start. Like if you have $500, you can use $200 for trading and later average it and not go more than the leverage that will make the trading to be very risky. That will depend on the coin that you are trading.
Also it is good to trade with the money that you can afford to lose. You can be trading for days and be winning and later loss may come. Trading is good if you plan it very well and if you are nit greedy, otherwise it would be like gambling and waste of money.