That's a good question, but one I'm not sure I can answer, as I haven't put much thought into it. My thought process is that many times you can get 6 ticks if you get a good entry, even if you get the direction wrong in the end. The idea is, get the 6 ticks and go to BE quickly to reduce risk. Sometimes you get stopped out at BE after the 6 ticks, and the market moves on in your direction anyway, so it can cost you as well. I'd rather get the 6 ticks, and reduce the risk. Also, if I hit it right, and it takes off, then I still get a piece of the big move. The best trades usually take off right out of the gate, but not always. You have to weigh the options and go with less risk, or more risk and more losers, with more big runs I guess.
Another option with two contracts is to still take the 6 tick profit, but not move immeidately to BE. If your wrong, you don't make any money, but the 6 ticks offset some of the loss, or at least allow you to have a BE trade if it turns against you.
Back to your question though. If I was trading only 1 contract, I guess you could still move to BE after 6 ticks, and then hope you don't get stopped out before the market continues on in your direction. You might go with 8 ticks and then to BE to give yourself more room. You might also just go long with the one contract and tough it out until you get a new S/R level, then move the stop to 2 ticks outside the new S/R level.
I'm sure there are many on here that are only using one contract, so they might be able to chime in with some suggestions. I've always used 2 cars, and when I can do this consistently for a while, I'll go to four or six or eight cars, and take 1/2 off at 6 ticks and go to BE and allow the other half to run. When you can make 6 ticks on 2 or 3 cars, that's 3 or 4 points per trade, even if you get the direction wrong in the end. Of course if you get a full stop though, it's a bigger hit to your account.
I've also used 4 ticks as my first target as well, but You need to keep your stop equal to your first target for money management reasons, so if you go with 4 ticks, you also have to use a 4 tick stop and I found I was getting stopped out too often, or else I couldn't get a good enough entry to keep myself outside the S/r area. Not sure if this helps, but that's the best I can do with my limited experience of using 1 contract.
