Building Exactas through Elimination

In our last blog article we presented "The Process of Elimination" for the win bet.  Now let's look at how to build exactas through elimination.

We need to ask two questions.  Which horses in the current race can't win (in your opinion)?  Which horses in the current race can't come in 1st or 2nd (in your opinion)?

Let us assume (for example) there are 10 horses in this race.  Now let's look at all 10 horses one at a time keeping the two questions in mind.  In your opinion you conclude that all but 2 and 5 can't win. Next you conclude that all but 2,5,1,8,9,10 can't come in 2nd.  You can now construct your exacta as 2,5/2,5,1,8,9,10.  Note that we have eliminated 3,4,6,7 from our bet.  As a $1 exacta bet it will cost $10.

How does the elimination process differ from just picking the horses directly?  The elimination process  forces you to look at each horse and to eliminate horses one by one.  If you don't look at each horse in this way you may miss a horse with great potential.  When you overlook a horse like this you've let your ego override your logic when you exercise your opinion.  Spending the time to go through the elimination process can payoff with better constructed exactas and more winning bets.

Take the extra time and try it.

The Process of Elimination

Let's take a look at why all horses in a race are bet on.  Someone has a belief that a particular horse could win or possibly be in the money.  Every owner and/or trainer puts a horse in a race and has some reason or reasons to believe that his horse can win or be in the money.  There are odds associated with all horses in a race.  Every horse has been placed in a race for some reason.

For the horseplayer, what part do emotions play?  What happens when there is so much confidence in a horse that the toteboard is bid down to very low odds?  What is a "live" horse in the horseplayers lingo?  Is this not a horse that the trainer has gotten ready to win and that trainer is often very effective in doing this?

Is it possible to place a bet (and win) without knowing the answers to all of the above?  Let's start with the most basic of bets, the win bet. Suppose you place a $2 win bet on each of the horses in the race.  If you bet 'um all on one ticket your ticket is a winning ticket.  Depending on the final odds of the horse that won, you either made money or lost money on that ticket.  So it is possible.

Continuing with this logic, let's determine which horses are the least likely to win the race.  This is kind of a reverse engineering type of strategy.  Every horseplayer has an opinion about whether a particular horse could win the race. So use your opinion and rank the horses from least likely to most likely to win the race.  Now rather than betting 'um all remove the horses that you feel can't win (in your opinion) and only bet the horses that are left.  Maybe there are 5 horses left.  Or possibly 4, or 3 or 2.  If you are right in your judgment you have a winning ticket and have increased the  amount of money you have won.  This essentially is the process of elimination.

Try it and see how it works for you.