Monday August 17, 2009 20:27
The Curse of the Legitimate Favourite
Posted by slipperytoad as Betting Strategy
After a long string of 2nd places to market leaders (and losing bets in races I had no business punting in) I re-read one of my American handicapping books and came across a piece of advice that I had long since forgotten..
One solid piece of handicapping advice is to never bet against a legitimate favourite. Another solid piece of handicapping advice is to “never” bet on a legitimate favourite. What? That’s right. In almost every case, it is best to pass the race than to bet on or to bet against a legitimate favourite!
The reason we pass almost all races with a legitimate favourite is because the payoffs just do not support any kind of a profitable wagering approach. You will have a VERY hard time making money-playing favourites. And if you bet against them, they will often come in and ruin your payoffs.
Here is a profound piece of handicapping advice: If you want to make money at the track, your primary handicapping job is NOT to find the winning horse. Instead, it is to find one or more horses that will most likely finish ahead of the public favourite. If you are not already doing this and if you really let this sink in, it will, or at least it should, change the way you approach the whole handicapping process.
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Tags: Betting Theory
1 Response to The Curse of the Legitimate Favourite
bigdavestar
August 30th, 2009 at 19:09
You know, I never really thought about it like that. Sometimes when there is a big favourite I tend to have a large bet on that horse, i’m talking the likes of Kauto Star, Masterminded etc. But, the price is always ridiculous, thankfully i’ve never had a major loss (yet) but i’m sure one can’t be too far away.