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Thanks for your replies.
I suspected the Topspeed ratings would mirror the OR but wanted to be sure.
If you have the money it’d be useful getting hold of Raceform Interactive, otherwise the Racing Post site is okay for a small subscription each month. However, what really counts is how you interpret the form, whatever the source !
Be as hard as you like, I still think your betting approach is flawed. Remember Dick Turpin ?
Here’s a hypothetical Derby field :
1. The Derby’s Most Likely Winner : Evens
2. Next Most Likely : 2/1
3. Good chance : 4/1
4. Reasonable Shot : 6/1
5. Looks a bit outclassed : 9/1
6. Tilting at Windmills : 14/1
7. Class 4 handicap winner : 50/1
8. Class 6 selling winner : 500/1
9. Class 6 selling winner : 500/1Okay. This looks like a two-horse race between 1 and 2 with 3 and 4 holding an outside chance. Who cares what is a "fair" price for horses 5-9 !? But more to the point, how can ANYONE say what a fair price might be for the two selling class entrants, for example ? More realistic is to say : horses 5-9 have a combined chance of, say, 15% of winning this race. To nit pick as to which horse out of 7,8 and 9 has the best chance of
winning
is ludicrous and a waste of valuable time.
Your method appears to boil down to this : throw enough crap at the wall and some is bound to stick.
A punter should be trying to win more than 40% of his bets @ 6/4, 22.2% @ 7/2, 16.7% @ 5/1 and 11.1% @ 8/1; that is all that matters. It is up to him/her to find horses that fit the bill.
I agree with the above wholeheartedly, but I repeat : when can you be
sure
that 11.1% of your horses are winning at 8/1 ? Unhappily for some, not until they’ve pissed away their bank betting on 8/1 shots they
thought
should be 6/1 but were actually no better than 10/1, say.
Perhaps those punters would be better served waiting for 8/1 shots they believe have an excellent shot of winning, not merely a "chance", that’s to say a race in which by careful form study they’ve managed to narrow the field down to just a couple of live contenders.
The point I’m raising is a perfectly valid one, but you seem determined not to acknowledge that there is a problem.
Well, it looks like we’ll have to beg to differ on this one, but for the record :
I’ve never told anyone in this thread to back underlays. In the Racing Post example I gave I simply pointed out that backing the first three in the market was not an option ( all underlays ) while backing the fourth horse wasn’t particularly ssensible either since although
theoretically
overlayed was still a heavy favourite to lose.
Now, you say that the 8/1 shot should be backed. But here’s the thing : let’s say we repeat the race ten times and the 8/1 shot loses in all ten. Were we wrong in our estimate of its chances ? Who knows ? A ten-race sample is simply too small to tell, one way or the other. Well, what about a twenty-race sample then ? Better, but still not conclusive. And that’s just those we make 6/1 that are sent off 8/1 !
I note that Mark Cramer never advocated backing a horse at 100/1 simply because one thinks it should be 50/1. He always set a limit of 6/1 on his contenders, 8/1 in a contentious race. Any horse’s price he set above 6/1 was never a bet, even if he made the horse 12/1 and it went to post at 33/1.
When I back a horse I like to think it has a
very good chance
of winning, not simply
a chance
, and that doesn’t necessarily mean only ever backing short priced fancies either. Your method is all very well with years of racing experience behind you, but for a newbie its toxic as it soon begins to erode ones judgment.
Well, this was supposed to be a thread to help those new to racing. You would have to bet for a
very
long time before you could say with any confidence that your "value" selections were just that, value. In the example I gave from the Racing Post website the 8/1 shot finished fourth, with the three horses ahead of it in the market filling out the first three, as their very own betting line suggested. Now, was that the right bet or not ? Who knows ?! You could simply be throwing money away on horses you have no real right to be betting.
Henrietta Knight et Monsieur Roland Barthes. Volia !
[attachment=1:2cnort20]henrietta_knight3.jpg[/attachment:2cnort20][attachment=1:2cnort20]henrietta_knight3.jpg[/attachment:2cnort20]
The point I was making is that Gosden’s comments regarding a runner’s fitness cannot be relied upon. Don’t think there’s anything contentious in that, it’s simply a fact.
To elaborate, any backer who concludes that a "fair" price for a horse should be around 5/1 has no way of ever discovering whether he was right or not, as a single result can prove nothing either way, especially when as in this case a genuine 5/1 chance could only ever be expected to win one race in six anyway.
Gingertipster, do you
know
for certain that whenever you make a horse 8/1 they win approximately 11.1% of the time ? Do you have accurate records that show your estimates are usually in the ballpark ? You might, but I doubt it.
