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escorial<br>you can say all you want about a winner being a winner but that is a short term view and to make this game pay a long term view is what is required<br>example<br>1/5 leeds ..9/2draw..9/1 northampton<br>now this would be the odds or as near as damn it for this match…..your way of thinking correct me if im wrong is that backing leed would get you a winner..and a winner is a winner………now nearly all the time you would be on a winner but on those occasions when a draw or northampton came in it would outway all your winnings<br>now look at it from a value point of view<br>1/50leeds..33/1draw…40/1northampton<br>a winner is a winner you go leeds<br>betting to value i go the draw<br>it dosent take a genius to work out who would make the most cash to level stakes after say 100 bets like this(or long term)<br>of course this is an extreme example but the principles remain in tact<br>of course for the average person it is hard or near enough impossible to price an event accuratley therefore making it a hopeless task to find the correct value in the event<br>
(I’d like to come back and read more of this thread when I get a chance but…)<br>The main problem that I see with the value argument is that each event is only staged ONCE. <br>Ok, you can argue that over the long run consistently getting 6/4 about a "true" EVENS chance will pay off but they are still separate events.<br>To win in the long run you need a strike-rate which is higher than the average odds you bet at. So, most importantly, regardless of odds, you have to pick winners!
Nev, interested in your posting.
I’m with you in finding it fairly difficult to distinguish between a 10/11 shot and an 11/10 one, and also have shied away from short odds betting for many years. My two reasons would be betting tax and contrariness. With the tax gone, I’m only left with my dogmatic cynicism for favourites.
I’ve been trying to soften the cynicism into scepticism.
On a ‘value’ front, and using the mathematical conundrum that is the Kelly Criterion, finding a bet you believe should be 10/11 that is 11/10 you should actually stake 9 points.
To put this in context that is broadly the same as you should be putting on a 7/1 chance you think should be 4/1, or a 12/1 chance you think should be 5/1.
Like you, I’m still more excited by the latter than the former (greed probably), but it’s food for thought for me at least.
Hi everyone.<br>Great topic by the way. I have to say, the prson I have agreed with more on in this topic is James. I agree with him 100% on the value issue. I have had a stinking run recently on Max Punts. Im an infrequent poster, probably on average only once a fortnight. But I post these bets because I believe the RP forecast, which is the only guide I have, is around about 10% incorrect over 10/1, 15% wrong under 10/1 but over 2/1 and 20% under 2/1. When I say this, I mean if a horse is 20/1 in the post (5%) and I have it in at 6’s, I make that roughly a 11% difference so i bet it. Same again, if I price up a horse at 4/6 (60%) and the post has it at 7/4 (37%), it goes in as a Max, therefore even accounting for some error on my part which is inevitable where form is envolved, I wil always have some sort of edge. I know its long winded and after about 15 maximums and a very poor run, Im about 1 point down on bets posted on here thanks to 2 lame horses and a faller. But, because I have so much confidence in my system, I am cetain that come lets say June, Ill be showing healthy profit. Just my 2 pence worth:cool: :biggrin: ;)
james i didnt read your bit earlier about the dice table the coins etc etc but that sums it up nicely for me<br>and people still say a winner is a winner…..look at the example folks the coin merchant will get loads of winners his 1st 3 bets might be winners but long term he will LOSE fact<br>every year stanley racing offer odds on who will kick off the cup final and go 5/6 each of two….last year a bloke in the local shop was boasting he had the winner in my eyes he is a mug a mug you might ask but this man backed a winner and a winner is a winner …yes it is short term but long term it dosent work like that…do u think the punter wins or loses regulary<br>escorial you keep saying a winner is a winner then the same must be said for a loser is a loser….work it out mate if you can<br>
Even thought I am a believer in value betting the coin analogy though it illustrates the maths of the argument is not really very applicable to the real world. We have to bet on much more subjective events and here there are far more ways than one to skin a cat. If you saw a bookie offering 6/5 heads 4/5 tails and 9 times out of 10 the coin kept coming down tails would you still keep backing heads ??
It was Razeen yes.
I think he wanted only the serious gamblers to go for his competition or something like that. He didn’t want people that just wanted to give it a go – they had to be serious.
Still, three people isn’t many and, as a few people thought at the time, it was (and is) a good idea. It would good to see people try it out and interesting to see the results.
escorial the only difference between me and you is that i dont bet on horses but professional gamblers do and they use this value thing and they make thier living at it you dont i rest my case<br>where people get this value thing wrong is not that its the wrong approach its that 99.99% of people couldnt price an event/race up accuratley<br>
As Escorial says there is more than one way to bet and bet well it is not necessary to price up every event yourself to find value. If esc says he wins money by simply picking winners then I for one am prepared to take him at his word and if this continues over time then he is certainly finding value by his method.
The essential difference between the coin toss analogy and a horse race is this if I toss a coin and it comes down heads we still know tails was an evens chance. In a two horse race with both horses at evens if A beats B by 2l the chances are that B was never an evens chance in the first place. The vast majority of winners in horse racing were value before the off .Plenty of big priced winners win fair and square on merit on the day and in truth should have been that evs shot it is just generally very very difficult to tell beforehand unfortunately !!
sorry rather than posting about the coin perhaps i should have posted about 2000 sentances on a horse race instead although id probably still be writing it now<br>of course a evens winner looks good value after the race but we dont live in the future do we
Hi Esc, in answer to your question
I divide runners into possibles and discards. And allocate percentage of book to each type.
My decisions re size of book I give to the discards depends on <br>1. Shape of race/price of short-list discards. (Discards can sometimes be very short-priced – eg Bindaree on Saturday)<br>2. Prices bookies give to discards (as a modifier)<br>3. My feeling about the day’s racing (good or bad for me), and my current feel good factor.
A (ridiculous) rule of thumb I use to good effect is to give each short-listed horse 1 point and each discard a third of a point, total and make a percentage. So, 9 runners 6 short-listed and 3 discards makes 7 points – makes roughly 14% a point, equals roughly 85% to the short-listed and 15% to the discards.
I’d modify this dependent on available prices for the discards. And then for how tight or loose I wanted my book to be, based on whether it was the sort of race I do well in, or whether I’m on a cautious losing streak etc.
I then price up the short-listed horses only, and look to see if I can find some value to bet on. In the above example I’d back any of the short-listed horses if I think I’d found ‘value’ but never one of the discards.
hope that makes sense.
Esc, I guess you mean the Great Yorkshire Chase ? Happy to do that for you Saturday morning.
I’ve also done today’s 2:30 Doncaster – only race I’ve looked at today (unless I lay Arctic Owl on betfair). Happy to share that with you as it coincidentally is a fairly neat example of my scribblings above.
10 runners. 3 ‘discards’ – the three outsiders. That makes 7 short-listed at a point each, and three discards at a third of a point each = 8 points, converted to percentages, means roughly 85% of book on short-listed and 15% on discards.
The best prices available on discards come to something like 15%. I’ll happily go to something like 12%.
<br>Prices on rest of runners – mine first and best available on oddschecker.com in brackets.
Ryalux 5/1 (4/1)<br>Samakan 7/1 (4/1)<br>Dream of Nurmi 7/1 (5/1)<br>Gun N Roses 8/1 (7/1)<br>Harfdecent 8/1 (8/1)<br>Merry Path 8/1 (8/1)<br>Nosam 7/1 (10/1)
It looks a pretty open race to me – I prefer races where I’ve discarded some of the short-priced horses. I initially went 8/1 both Samakaan and Dream of Nurmi, and only 6/1 Nosam, but have adjusted slightly as I am a bit cautious of going on a long losing run having had a really good week last week. (Pride comes before a fall etc).
It still means a win bet on Nosam at 10/1. (5 points) I can’t say that excites me, nor do I much think he’ll win, but that’s what my book tells me I should do.
I could also keep an eye on Harfdecent and Merry Path in case they drift to 12/1 or better, in which case I could put a couple of points on them. I probably won’t bother. <br> <br>Which should have encouraged most members to go and put their conkers on Samakaan!!<br>
Hi Esc :wave:
Do you come to your ratings by taking into account form and trainer form etc?
Tooting :wave: <br>Interesting book and i’d share your confidence about Nosam. I think perhaps he’s at his absolute best when racing after a short break. Need to check stats but i think he’s only won once after a break similar to todays and he only just got home that day.
So would you lay Samakaan if you were a bookie?
Robgomm, hi.
No, I don’t think I’d lay Samakaan – not at 8/1 anyway!
I have been experimenting on making a book on betfair over the last few weeks. But the races I look for are ones where I have a couple of relatively short-priced ‘discards’. Say, I’d discarded Ryalux – I’d lay him to be a fairly big loser, and also lay the horses that seem grossly under-priced (Samakaan, possibly Dream of Nurmi) so that I break even if either of those win, lose pretty badly on Ryalux, but win well on other 7 runners.
To be honest that’s a bit of a steep learning curve for me, but I am in profit on it so far. However, the margins on betfair are damned tight for layers. I don’t think I’d get anywhere near a fair book just attempting to oppose Samakaan.
I think your on to something there Esc (must be the cup-a-soup)…
The rain has definately helped out Gun’N Roses. Harfdecent won a 2m4f race round Musselburgh and the trainers rep said that the horse wouldn’t want to go any further than that trip – especially on soft.
I liked Merry Path but the rain came and might have ruined that one’s chances.
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