How you can improve your horse racing betting
Author: DylanFox Total views: 8 Word Count: 680
Professional gamblers will never tell you this - so I will. They never gamble. You will never catch one red-handed putting twenty quid on Forest Green Rovers to win at Oxford United on the off-chance it may happen. They play percentages and they play because they're sure of winning with good odds.
Horse racing has dodginess ingrained in it. From the Kieron Fallon scandals to a huge range of issues involving jockeys and trainers alike, horse racing - especially at the lower end of the scale - is something of a mug's game. When the stakes are lower, it seems the risks taken by jockeys and trainers are even greater. That is why I never, ever bet on a low-grade horse race (unless it's a pound here or a pound there for a laugh). I never put serious money on a maiden or a selling race.
I do, however, focus on two races per year - and make sure that I am armed to the teeth with information about my shortlisted horses. How do I get to a shortlist?
First of all, there's the Grand National at Aintree, run every April. I open an account with a bookie, get a free bet in the bargain and make sure that I've got the best possible odds for the horse I want. This often means getting in early, so ante-post betting is the norm. Usually in February, the bookies will publish odds on the Grand National after the initial list of about 100 runners is produced. Here's what I do to find my bet:
1. I eliminate all horses younger than 8 and older than 11. 2. I eliminate all horses carrying more than 11 stone. 3. I eliminate all horses that have not run at Aintree. 4. I favour all horses that have run at Aintree and won at this distance. 5. I favour horses that are 9 or 10 years old.
I'm playing percentages here, which means that you will not always win. Hedgehunter played riot with this by coming in at over 11 stone, but he was rightly the favourite that year. This list will give you five or six very good horses that prove that the Grand National is not the lottery people say it is. Even in the year where only five or six horses finished, mine came in second!
I love the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe at Longchamp because it's the final big race of summer, and I almost always find a winner! It's consistent, it's fair and it's exciting - here's how I find a winner:
1. Look for a horse trained in France 2. Look for a horse that has won the Prix Niel in September 3. Look for a 3-year-old with five or six runs under its belt 4. Look for a horse that knows (and knows how to win at) Longchamp 5. Don't pick a Derby winner
Now the Arc is a peculiar race for many reasons. Many trainers take a horse there after a long season and think that they can win simply on form - but this really is a late race and many horses are best at the start or in the middle of the season. Hence the "lightly run" factor. Derby winners come early in the season and very rarely adapt to Longchamp.
Longchamp is also very peculiar - so it takes a good horse to tackle that long, long straight - after such a huge curve. If you use this method, you will end up with one or two horses at most - and perhaps one or two outsiders that you like the look of over the age of three. As i said, this is a game of percentages, so always look at the history of the race as well as the history of each horse.
So follow this advice and you can apply it to other races - you will be able to take the past and project it into the future - knowing that by playing percentages you will up your game. And then you'll be a pro, just like the best of them!
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Before you open an account with a bookmaker and get yourself a free bet, make sure you read up on each bookie and the potential catches to their promotions from the Free Bet Bookmaker.
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