How the Odds Can Signal the kind of Bet You Should Make

I have found that horse players have a tendency to place the same kind of bet over and over no matter what the conditions of a race are.  It usually is their favorite kind of bet that they have been successful making in the past.  This kind of bet may or may not be suited to a particular race but they make it anyway.  The wrong bet leads to lost money in their bankroll.

There are many kinds of bets that can be made today as compared to 30 or 40 years ago when the win, place and show bets were about it.  You have today not only win, place and show bets but exactas, trifectas, superfectas, doubles, pick3's, pick4's, pick5's and pick6's.  Every day for every track there are morning line (ML) odds on every race.  If you watch the tote board then you can record the tote odds and see how they change as you get closer and closer to post time.  Both the ML odds and the tote odds can give you a clue as to the kind of bet that may be best for this race.  A few examples may illustrate this.

Example 1
Initially by looking at the ML odds you can make a first assessment.  If you see a heavy favorite, say

                   1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8
                              4/5

The rest of the horses are 3/1 or larger.  A win bet on the 4 horse makes sense, except for the fact that the payoff may be very small for the amount bet.  A way to increase the size of the payoff would be to bet the exacta.  Bet the 4 horse on top to win and any of the other horses to come in second.  Note that the greater the tote odds for the second horse that places the higher the exacta payoff will be.

Example 2
Another example of using the ML or the actual tote odds to set up a bet that fits the odds again with say 8 horses might look like this.

                      1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8
                        1/1           6/5

Here we have two horses the 2 horse and the 6 horse that are co-heavy favorites.  The rest of the horses have odds of 3/1 and larger.  The 2 and 6 horses will most likely be competing for the lead in the early part of the race at least.  Again you could place win bets on both the 2 and 6 horses but the payoff may not be large enough to cover the cost of both win bets.  Let's go to the exacta again to increase the size of the payoff.  In this case the exacta bet would be.

                            2,6/ALL

We could expand the size of the payoff by going to a trifecta that might look like this

                            2,6/2,6/ALL

Note that the 2 and 6 horses would be in the win and place positions.  If either the 2 wins and the 6 places or the 6 wins and the 2 places then the bet pays off.  A hedge bet that I like is

                            2,6/ALL/2,6

This will take into account a higher odd horse slipping in and taking the place position which I have found often occurs.

Out of the Box Betting

The nice thing about betting on horses is that seemingly ridiculous bets can win a high percentage of the time.  Let's take the following statistic into consideration.  Empirical statistics show that the favorite horse in a race wins only about 1/3 of the time.  It doesn't matter if you choose the morning line favorite or the tote board favorite.  It makes sense then to study each race and figure out whether or not you believe the favorite will win.  If you believe the favorite will NOT win then the odds are with you because 2/3 of the time you will be right.

This approach to betting I'm going to call "Out of the Box Betting".  So how does one use this to his advantage?  Well, for one thing there is another statistic that can help.  Empirical statistics show that one of the first five morning line favorites will win about 85% of the time.  In a particular race that you are focused on, if you really think that the favorite will NOT win you can leave that horse out of your bet and bet just the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th morning line favorites to win.  Using $2 bets (for example) it would cost you ($2 x 4) $8 for the bet.  If the 2nd morning line favorite goes off at 3/1 or better you will at least get your money back ($2 x 3 + 2 = $8) from the bet.  If any of the 3rd, 4th, or 5th morning line favorites win you will make money on the bet.

There are an endless number of ways to play this "Out of the Box Betting" approach.  For example if you were to increase the size of the bet to $5.  This would cost you ($5 x 4) $20 for the bet.  If the 2nd morning line favorite goes off at 3/1 or better you will at least get your money back [($2 x 3 + 2 = $8) x 2.5 = $20] from the bet (compared to a $2 bet).  If any of the 3rd, 4th, or 5th morning line favorites win you will make 2.5 times the money on the bet.  Experience with this bet is important before you have confidence with increasing the size of the bet.  You must become good at determining whether the favorite will NOT win in a race.

Note that this bet will pay off about 50% (85-33=52) of the time.  The best way to prove this to yourself is to follow a track for at least a week making paper bets (not using any real money bets) and recording them, along with the results.  This will show you how good you are in picking races where the favorite doesn't win.  It will also show you whether you have made a profit or not after a week.  I always test my betting strategies on paper first before going live.

Better Payoffs from Exotics

In following up on my previous article, let's look at the kind of bets that transcend races.  The first one that I will discuss is the daily double.  In the not to distant past the daily double was just available in the first two races of the day.  It then became popular to include the last two races of the day.  It now has become so popular at many tracks that they now have what has become referred to as 'rolling doubles'.  You can bet them between any two races on the card.  So let's look carefully at what I will call 'Strategy #2', the rolling double strategy.

If we piggy back on my previous article where we showed that ML1 and ML3 both win about 30% of the time then a high return (but low cost) bet for Strategy #2 becomes for race n and n+1: (ML1, Ml3) race n WITH (ML1, ML3) race n+1.  For example if n=1 then the bet would be (ML1, ML3) race 1 WITH (ML1, ML3) race 2.  Further if ML1=horse 3 and ML3=horse 7 in race 1 and Ml1= horse 8 and ML3= horse 2 in race 2 then (using a) $2 bet would be a $2 daily double in race 1: 3,7 WITH 8,2.  This would cost $8.

Strategy #2: (ML1, Ml3) race n WITH (ML1, ML3) race n+1

Caveat Emptor:

I have also studied each of the races on a day's card.  There are usually 8, 9, or 10 races per day on a card at a track.  My empirical statistics have shown that some races work better than others for strategy #2 above.  I will break the races into two categories: #1 'the race follows the form most of the time' and #2 'the race that tends to be wide open'.  The races that tend to 'follow the form' are 1,2,3,7,8,and 9.  Races 4,5,and 6 tend to be 'wide open'.  I have found that using strategy #2 with races 4,5, and 6 are losing bets a large percentage of time.  Strategy #2 seems to be quite profitable with races 1,2,3,7,and 8.  Always look at races 4,5,and 6 very closely, particulary if there are over 10 horses in the race.  In fact be leery of any race on the card with over 10 horses in the race. Strategy #2 should not be used indiscriminately. 'Wide open' races are purposefully carded with lots of horses (>10) to make the race more difficult.

Horse Betting for Profit

Let's look at 'horse betting' like you would a business.  In any business you have to know some statistics related to the business.  You have to know the risk involved and where the odds are in your favor.  You also need a business plan.

I have spent time at the race track just observing the nature of people with respect to how they bet. You learn a lot about what NOT to do by picking up tickets on the floor after a race to see what LOSING bets were made for that race.  It is very revealing.  Try it some time.

For years I have collected 'empirical statistics' at specific tracks as well as across tracks. One statistic that holds true for most tracks in the US and Canada is that the morning line favorite in the 'long run' wins between 28 and 32 percent of the time depending on the track.  This is very useful if you looking at 'horse betting' as you would in a business.  There is one other 'empirical statistic' to go along with this one that is very important and most people are completely unaware of.  Here it is.  The third morning line favorite wins between 25 and 30 percent of the time in the 'long run'.  This is true across tracks.  Now how can this information be used to structure a betting pattern that can lead to a 'long run' profit if followed consistently?

To be a bit more specific let me introduce some symbols and definitions.  Let's define the 'morning line favorite' with ML1 and the 'third morning line favorite' with ML3.  From the empirical statistics above (of all the horses in a race) ML3 will win almost as often as ML1.  Both win about 30% of the time.  Just knowing these two empirical statistics gives you important information on structuring your bets inorder to have the odds in your favor.

Using the notation ML1,ML2,ML3,ML4,...,MLn 'n' stands for 'the number of horses in the race'. If n=10, then there are 10 horses in the race etc.  The morning line odds are always readily available for any race at any track. I have chosen, over the years, to stick with the morning line odds because of this fact.  [Remember we're considering 'betting' as a business.]  We need data that is always available and reliable.

Let me point out an observation that should be obvious.  ML3 will always be larger than ML1 (ML3>ML1).  Therefore the payoffs for ML3 are always larger.  As an example, ML1 might be 7/5 and ML3 might be 7/2. Don't be fooled, sometimes when the horse that starts out as the third morning line favorite (ML3) suddenly becomes the 'tote board favorite' when large amounts of money are placed on the ML3 horse before post time.

So let's take the information we have layed out above and propose a 'business plan strategy'.

Strategy #1: Place a $3 to win on the horse ML3 and a $5 to show on the horse ML1.

"Over the long run" this approach works well.  Note that depending on your tolerance for bet size this could be $6 to win on ML3 and $10 to show on ML1 or $30 to win on ML3 and $50 to show on ML1.  You decide.  I have tested the ratio over time and it is about right for a "long run" return on investment (ROI) of 15 to 20%.

Caveat Emptor:

I have also studied each of the races on a day's card.  There are usually 8, 9, or 10 races /day on a card at a track.  My empirical statistics have shown that some races work better than others for strategy #1 above.  I will break the races into two categories: #1 'the race follows the form most of the time' and #2 'the race that tends to be wide open'.  The races that tend to follow the form are 1,2,3,7,8,and 9.  Races 4,5,and 6 tend to be wide open.  I have found that using strategy #1 with races 4,5, and 6 are losing bets a large percentage of time.  Strategy #1 seems to be quite profitable with races 1,2,3,7,8 and 9.  Always look at races 4,5,and 6 very closely, particulary if there are over 10 horses in the race.  In fact be leery of any race on the card with over 10 horses in the race. Strategy #1 should not be used indiscriminately. 'Wide open' races are purposefully carded with lots of horses (>10) to make the race more difficult.

2012 Breeders Cup Races Fast Approaching

The 2012 Breeders Cup Races are fast approaching.  These races have the horses that are the cream of the crop - they are the best of the best.  This fact alone means that any horse in the race can win thus handicapping is, to say the least, very difficult.

 I have kept a very detail set of notes and empirical statistics from the 2011 BC races.  It's many times very informative to see what happened last year.  It should be noted that what happens this year may be very different than what happened last year, however, knowing the potential possibility of long shots winning in any race is a very important part of your wagering strategy.

Let me summarize last year's results and point out some of the interesting things that happened.  In the 2011 BC races out of 9 races there was only one race where the favorite won.  It was not a day to bet favorites.  All 9 races had 9 or more horses in each race, some had 14.  The favorite that did win was in the 6th race the BC Turf Sprint.  Corey Nakatani rode Regally Ready for the win.  A morning line 3/1 odds favorite that paid $6.60 to win. All the other races were won by long shots and in two of the races they were very long shots, 30/1 morning line.  These two races had Black Swan long shots that won.  They were races 3 and 10. Race 3 was the BC Marathon, a 17 furlong race won by Afleet Again and ridden by Corneilio Velasquez and paid for a $2 win bet $85.20.  Race 10 was the BC Mile.  It was won by another 30/1 morning line horse.  Jon Court rode Court Vision for the win and a $2 bet paid $131.60.

Although race 2 was not one of the Breeders Cup races, Hall of Fame Jockey Mike Smith won 3 races: races 2, 5, and 11. Mike won race 5, the BC Turf Sprint, aboard Amazombie a 5/1 morning line that paid $17.80.  He also won race 11 the BC Classic riding Drosselmeyer, a 15/1 morning line that paid $31.60 to win.

The Europeans won 2 races.  Race 4 was the BC Juvenile Turf.  Ryan Moore rode Wrote a 12/1 morning line for the win that paid $25.50.  Race 8 was the BC Turf.  J. O'Brien rode St Nicholas Abbey, a 9/2 morning line, for the win which paid $15.60.

Being from Oklahoma where Donnie Von Hemel has won the training title numerous times at Remington Park, race 7 was particularly impressive to me because Caleb's Posse came roaring to the finish to win.  Donnie was the horse's trainer and the horse was owned by Oklahoman Don McNeill.  The horse was named for Don McNeill's grandson.  Don McNeill was unable to be there because he is suffering from leukemia.  Race 7 was the BC Dirt Mile.  Caleb's Posse was ridden by Rajiv Maragh and paid $15.60 to win.

Race 9 was the BC Juvenile.  Ramon Dominguez rode Hansen to the win over Union Rags and paid $16.20 for the win.

Here are the summary of results in order by race with race number, morning line, and $2 win payoff.

Race 3 30/1 $85.20, Race 4 12/1 $25.50, Race 5 5/1  $17.80, Race 6 3/1 $6.60, Race 7 5/1 $17.80, Race 8 9/2 $15.60, Race 9  10/1 $16.20,  Race 10 30/1 $131.60, Race 11 15/1 $31.60

Let's look at some "what if you had" situations.

If you rank the morning lines odds for each race from lowest to highest odds here is one way to look at the results.  Associate ML1 with the morning line favorite,  ML2 is the second morning line favorite, ML5 is the 5th morning line favorite, etc.  If you had bet $2 to win on ML1,ML2,ML3,ML4,ML5 that would be a $10 bet in each race. You would have won in races 5,6,7,8,9 for a total of $74.00. Since you don't know which races will win you have to bet all nine races.  The cost for all 9 races would have been $90.00.  A loss of $16.  About 60% of the time ML1 to ML5 do win.

Instead, 'What if ' you had bet $2 win on ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13,ML14 for those races with 10 or more horses in the race.  In the races with 10 to 14 horses in the race which would include races 3,4,6,9,10,11 if you had bet $2 to win on ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13,ML14 you would have won the 3rd and the 10th race.  The 3rd paid $85.20 and the 10th paid $131.60.  Actually you would have bet ML10,ML11 a $4 bet on race 3.  You would have bet ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13,ML14 a $10 bet on race 4.  On race 6 you would have bet ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13 an $8 bet. Race 9 had 13 horses so you would have bet ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13 another $8 bet. Race 10 had 13 horses so you would have bet ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13 again another $8 bet.  In Race 11 you would have bet another $8 on ML10,ML11,ML12,ML13.  This was a total of $42 to win ($85.20 + $131.60 =) $216.80.

Now 'what if' you had "bet 'em all"  in each race with a $2 win bet, how would you have made out?  Well as it turns out it would have cost you $206.00.  You would have won $347.90. A Return On Investment (ROI) of 69%.  If you look at my previous article on my blog you would see that under the proper circumstances with 'wide open races' and 'very high class horses', this is not a bad strategy and can be quite profitable.

Good luck and have fun this year on November 3rd.

Making good use of the Morning Line (M/L)

One of the statistics available to the horse player is the morning line (M/L). It's available in the program at your local track as well as on the internet at http://equibase.com in the free 'entries' for every track.

The morning line is often overlooked and not given much value by both the beginning horse player as well as the seasoned player. I took a recent look at a large sample of race tracks around the country and found that at the end of the track meet that the morning line favorite won at the track between 25 to 33 percent of the time depending on the track. So on average let's say that the M/L favorite wins about 30% of the time. If you were to bet the M/L favorite all of the time you would expect to win 30% of the time. This is a pretty good average for a baseball player but it's a losing proposition for a horse player.

So what good is the morning line and is it useful? I say yes. I use the M/L as a base for comparison at the track. If you have a pad of paper with you at the track or at home while watching the tote board on your PC screen, it is very useful to watch the tote change on some horses. For example, if you see a horse in a race whose M/L is 4/1 and as post time nears you see the actual tote odds go down to say even odds or 1/1, something is going on here. There is a lot of money being bet on this horse. Why? There can be a lot of reasons which you may not know about but this horse should gain your immediate attention and you should factor this in your handicapping of the race before you bet.

Another use of the M/L, particularly in grade I, II, or III stakes races is when the M/L favorite is a heavy favorite at say, even odds (1/1). Sometimes the tote goes against the heavy favorite. It maybe 2/1, 5/2 or even 3/1. This tells you that the money bet on the horse does not match the M/L expectations. This should get your attention and you should take a second look at how you will bet the race.

I believe the morning line has some value if you integrate it in your thinking properly.

A Days Analysis at the Track

So many times a horseplayer goes to the track and at the end of the day he only knows he has less money in his pocket than what he went with. He doesn't really keep track of what happened that day. It may be just a blurr in his mind. I'm going to go through a little exercise that can give some control and insight into your betting.

I've started as simple as possible with just the win bet. I'll also pick a track and the complete card (all the races) for the day. I'll also choose the M/L (morning line) favorite for my pick in each race. (This is to keep things simple.) First, there is no way to tell which races that the M/L favorite will win so we must bet the M/L favorite in each race. Again, just for simplicity let's just assume we place a $2 to win bet on the M/L favorite in each race.

I have arbitarily picked Turfway Park on the 9th of January to analyze. Here is the analysis at the end of the day. Click here:
http://billwinters.org/BillsBlog/TurfwayWedJan9MLpicks.jpg
Note that the cost of our bets was $18 (that's $2 X 9 races). Note that the M/L favorite won in races 1, 4, and 8. Our winnings were $15.40. So we lost $2.60 for the day with this strategy.

As an alternative to the M/L I have also done an analysis using the P/L (Profit Line) that is available to you with a Twinspires account (http://twinspires.com/). Click on http://billwinters.org/BillsBlog/TurfwayWedJan9PLpicks.jpg
to see what the P/L picks were for the same day. Note that the P/L pick won in races 1,2,4 and 6. Again note that the cost of betting the P/L pick in each race is $18. However, the winnings amounted to $25 so the net winnings for the day was $7.

What does this analysis tell us? First, we know where we stand at the end of the day. Secondly we are adding some discipline to our betting strategy. We also gain some insight into the lack of rewards of going with the M/L favorite all the time. I also picked a slight variation with the P/L picks to show how sensitive your betting can be. It may be the difference between winning and losing for the day. This should in no way convince you that the P/L will always produce better results. (This would need to be tested over a long period of time. I've been working on this.) However, it does show the sensitivity of outcomes depending on how you bet. This is what I am trying to illustrate here. I am also trying to show you how to raise your level of awareness in your own betting.

May luck always be with you 'til next time.

Tote Picks

What are tote picks? How valuable are they? When you go to the track and watch the monitors for each track you'll see that the odds start out at the beginning with the morning line odds. As money is bet on each of the horses the odds begin to change. The tote board now begins to reflect the opinion of each of the bettors in aggregate.

Over the years I have kept track of the odds on each horse in the race as the tote changes and as you get closer and closer to post time for the race. It's an interesting exercise if you have never done it. All it takes is a pad of paper and a pencil. You just list the number of the horses vertically and then record the time (minutes before post time) at the top. You then copy the odds from the tote board each time recording the minutes to post.

Here is a sample of what that might look like.

........M/L 18m 15m 12m 9m 6m 3m
1........12.....10.....11....10....9...10....9
2.........8......9.....9......8....7.....7.....7
3........2....5/2...5/2....2...2...9/5..9/5
4.......4......5.......4......4...3....2.....8/5
5......20....99....80...50....30....25...22
6......10....20....15.....14.....15.....12...11
7........6......9......9......8......8.....8.....7
8......30....70....40...30....28....25...22

Notice that the 4 horse began to take some significant money bets beginning at the 9 minute mark (9m). Money continued to be taken on the 4 horse and at the 3 minute mark he became the tote pick at 8/5. The morning line favorite was at 9/5. Now this doesn't mean that the 4 horse will necessarily win but it does indicate that the betting public believes, for whatever reason, that this horse will win. The 4 horse (tote pick) and the 3 horse (morning line favorite) should be in any exotic bet you make.

In a later post I will point out some tote pick patterns that can be very useful, especially when you combine them with some handicapping.