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Nicola Horlick has had her day, she had to close her last venture and announce her retirement from active management, she has made that much of a mess.
Better to focus on a multi-strategy macro approach, like Soros! I’d imagine him to be a good horse-picker!
Surely punters should study form even harder, to identify value and backing the steamer before it becomes a steamer.
Of course a punter needs to be good at evaluating form.
Never a truer word spoken! Tranquil sea proved that!
There we have it then – the two most successful punters on God’s earth telling us how it should be done?
Jesus H. Christ – even my wife’s laughing.
True my record has not been too good over the last 6 months Reet. No getting away from it, it’s been disappointing. Everyone goes through bad runs from time to time. As I said, you still have to be good at evaluating form. So I suppose over that time I have not been good at evaluating form.
Of course if someone does not have an opinion it is easy to critisise.
Value Is Everything
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I agree having a look before racing some times tells a story but I have a rule of thumb which I find works well.
If racing has started and a horse is gambled on in an early race I take heed. If however a horse is gambled on late in the day I tend to ignore it and go strictly on form.
The reason is you don’t know if the horse is fancied or some punter has a 5 quid yankee on with 3 winners waiting on a 4th. Hills and Ladbrokes for example can send thousands to the course in minutes to reduce a liability they have and the horse could be and often is a complete rag.
Say a horse shortens from 9/1 to 4/1, why would anyone back it at 4/1 blind? At 9/1 it needs to be a better than 10% chance to be a good bet. At 4/1 it needs to have a better than 20% chance. May be once or twice the 4/1 is still value. But, those will be far outnumbered by the times it will be poor value. Therefore, a punter is far less likely to show a profit by following the money.
Surely punters should study form even harder, to identify value and backing the steamer before it becomes a steamer.
Of course a punter needs to be good at evaluating form.
Punters can make use of market moves when considering whether a horse will be fit after a break and / or likely to run to form.
For example Denman on Saturday. Well below form all last season after a heart problem. Yet well handicapped on Gold Cup winning form, but would he be capable of that sort of performance? The early market confidence indicated Denman was likely to run at least somewhere near his best. So it is possible to allow for that in our own tissue prices. However, this must (in my opinion) always be based around form and value.
Value Is EverythingTo much attention is paid to movers, of course betting and racing are synonymous but plenty of horses drift and win. Royal Charm was out to 9/2 today and won, Tripitaka was 5/2 out to 5/1 at Kempton Wednesday and won, Imbongi at Newmarket in the summer, Midday in the Nassau as another example but attention only seems to get paid to those that lose. Just look how the gambled on Cricket Boy faired today in the opener at Exeter never went a yard down from 3/1 in the morning to 11/10, the layers will dine well tonight. Many punters have no regard for price and will back a situation regardless which often creates falsley priced runners. Though it would be folly to completely ignore the market of course, it can paint part of a picture when the likes of Jim Best have 2 runners in a race.
I have a tendency to agree with TB and wonder what the stats are for overall (rather than one stable) drifters as opposed to steamers (hate that word..)
Carv?
But good point about certain stables…
I tend to do the form work a day before and then see how market is early. i only get concerned about heavy drifters rather than marginal. Nothing new, but it has to be combination of two…
Also at certain festivals (Cheltenham especially) a lot of heavily backed horses are just simply a matter of sentimental lemmings….
I’m a win single, level stakes punter, so I dont tend to get involved with market watching too much. Agree on many occasions drifters are probably nothing more than a reaction to other horses shortening, or a reflection of off course liabilities, rather than anything untoward.
I keep the pre race data because it helps me work out what the best time to submit my bets are, using it to second guess what insiders are up to would bore me to tears.
Obviously the significance of market moves varies across individual stables. You’d have won piles in the last 12 months backing Henderson and Hannon horses 10 minutes pre off if they subsequently shortened. Money has been significant in both cases.
The only problem with your drifter/steamer data CR is that it is retrospective and I supect that once it was clear the horse concerned was a steamer the value would have disappeared. I’m firmly in the ignore market moves camp and will bet at early prices if I see value and again in the prerace market if something dfifts to a value price. The problem with the latter is time, being able to sit watching the markets all day, only possible for the full-timers. One of the biggest drifters I saw live recently was Hercomesthetruth at Down Royal and it didn’t stop him.
The drift on Natural Action at Folkestone on Monday had to be seen to be believed. A strong 5/4 chance in the morning, though some of the money was tipping line cash, it was 7/4 about 15 mins before the off time and traded at around 4.5 for good money before sent of with a BSP of 4.1. The horse duly never looked to have a moments worry and drew clear on the bridle.
Normal Saturday service resumed as Poquelin, any price was a good one on the show, wins at 7/2f with the 2nd, 3rd and 4th in the market filling the places.
Atouchbetweenacara the ante post fav, friendless on the day, and running accordingly.
Agreed ratpack
Every Saturday the horses that look the "worst" value on the off are the horses that are filling the places.
My theory is it isnt so much that people are suddenly deciding that Poquelin, say, is huge value at half its morning odds come race-time, it is more that the horses that aren’t fit, fancied or trying are being laid heavily when the race time liquidity arrives, resulting in a natural shortening of the horses with a genuine chance.
It is pretty depressing stuff for formbook punters – no tissue compiler in the world would come up with a tissue that looks like the Betfair racetime market for a lot of these big races, but time and again the Betfair is being proved to be absolutely spot on.
It is pretty depressing stuff for formbook punters – no tissue compiler in the world would come up with a tissue that looks like the Betfair racetime market for a lot of these big races, but time and again the Betfair is being proved to be absolutely spot on.
National Hunt has been unbelievable since the last week of October. Back class meaning nothing, just follow the money. Stating the obvious, but National Hunt is all about stamina and if the horse is delivered unfit to the races (as many are) he’ll be laid accordingly.
This trend although not nearly as pronounced occurred in the same period last year, then normalised again from January onwards.
Really tiresome from a betting point of view, thank God for all weather racing at the moment.
I have switched my approach in recent years. I tend to look at those horse at the front of the market where the real liquidity exists in the market. I then workout whether the value is n laying or backing these horses, through form assessment, time, ratings, trainer form and whether its being backed. I only get involved in the minutes leading up to the race.
I know others have said this before and it’s been debated numerous times, but the market is a lot more accurate then say 10-15 years ago as more people help form the market.
Regarding the Big Handicap yesterday, I think I might have won the RUK competition to win up to £2,000 of bets. I know I selected the front three, but i cannot for the life of me remember the order I put Razor Royale and Skippers Brig. Hopefully in the right order!
which of the theories, systems, does 12.20 lingers yesterday fit.
exchange price, 9.00am open day 2.3.
12 midday 3.2
12.15 pm 3.4
12.20 sp 11/8. exchange 2.4
trots in after offices smash in to it.
happens too many times to suggest drifters lose.
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