Another Laying Method

[JAR]

Here is a laying system I sometimes use. Check each horse in a race in turn.

1. Filter by trainers – ensure trainer is in the bottom 20% of the track trainer strike rate, as listed in the Sporting Life.

2. Filter by placings – ensure horse was placed worse than 4 th last time out and did not win its previous race.

3. Ensure horse has not won over today’s distance or going.

4. Last two races must have been in a lower class of race than today’s race.

5. Not in top 3 of newspaper form ratings if a non-handicap or in the top 6 of the weights if in a handicap race.

6. Ensure the jockey is in the bottom 20% of the track jockey list.

7. Horse must not have raced in the last 31 days.

The remaining horse with the shortest odds is a lay bet in the race.

Staking

use 1000 units.
lay odds of less than 2.0 (betfair decimal) stake …… 16 units
lay odds of 2.01 to 3.5 stake ………………………….. 10 units
lay odds of 3.51 to 4.4 stake ……………………………. 6 units
lay odds of 4.41 to 8.0 stake ……………………………. 4 units
lay odds of 8.01 to 17.0 stake ………………………….. 2 units
lay odds longer than 17.01 stake ………………………. 1 unit.

I have used this over a series of 50 bets and so far it is in profit. I realise that for a laying system a much larger series of wagers is needed to test the system. When the lay bets win (ie not a successful lay) they seem to do so in single bets followed by a successful lay.
I would like to use a better staking method but I cannot think of one for the moment. Most staking methods I know apply only to win bets or are too complex to use.
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[dave jay]

Looks good John .. why don’t you just match backers stake to £2 ?

[Matron]

Good luck with this.

I tend to stick with "handicaps" with a price of nothing over 5.0 on Betfair.

I am using similar tactics to you.

I tend to "trade out" though – before the race has started if I am lucky !

Regards- Matron

[JAR]

OK Dave Jay not sure what you mean by.. why don’t you just match backers stake to £2 ?
If you mean level stakes of £2.
I could do that. If you stick rigidly to the system it does tend to produce lays at short odds without much variation. However I am not too disciplined in that when a horse is almost a qualifier on my system perhaps its trainer strike rate is too high so it is in the top 50% of track trainers yet it is opposed by a strong first favourite leading to longer lay odds than usual. My staking means I can still back it and not care about the odds. It allows me to use my system but not to stick exactly to the exact method if other horses in a race lead me to lay horses that almost qualify in my system. I know this is a sloppy way of using a system but that’s me.

If an almost qualifier is at shorter odds than my usual system selections I don’t care as that usually means I’ve found value in the lay bet.
If an almost qualifier is at longer odds than my usual system selections the staking plan ensures I can lay it and not risk too much of my bank.

When I have more results in I will probably do a comparison of level stakes against my staking method to see what difference it makes.

Clive Holt in his book Winners Back Winners recommends variable level staking for use with his fineform formulae for win bets. So I just turned this around to use it for lay bets. I’ ve not yet examined any other staking methods for lay bets.
I am not sure if the Fineform formulae works anymore as racing seems to have changed.

I am beginning to think lay betting is the way to go. There seems to be fewer non-handicap races nowadays. Those that exist often produce shock results, for win bets, where form goes out of the window.
For instance the Pontefract 3.40 on Monday 22nd won by Siberian Tiger the horse with the longest SP in the Racing Post and the penultimate worse RPR.
Other horses Bazergan and Latin Lad had 9 and 4 tips in the selection box while Siberian Tiger had no tips at all!
A computer program of mine rated it the third best horse in the race so I knew that it was value odds. But I just could not bring myself to back it. Still at least I didn’t lay it.
You would certainly needed to have traded out of a lay on this one, as Matron does.

[dave jay]

Laying by just matching the backers odds to a fixed amount is very simple, it’s the default lay on Betfair.

If a horse is 2/1 (3) and you lay to take out £5 it will cost you £10, an evens shot will cost you £5.

[JAR]

So, if I understand you correctly, you lay to a fixed liability and Betfair does the calculation for you.
Seems as good a method as any and I think it will give approximately the same results as the table I use.

[Author]

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