Someone once said ''A fool learns from his mistakes, a wise man from the mistakes of others''.
Running Styles
Pace makes the race. When handicapping always look at the running styles of all the horses. Who are the front runners, who are likely to run handy (just off the pace) and who are the closers. Beware the race where you have one front runner, no off the pace runners and the rest all closers. The front runner can win wire to wire as he spread eagles the field. It's worth playing a couple of throwaway quartet superfecta tickets with the front runner bankered or singled in the first or second slot particulalry if there is a good price about the horse. Too many front runners in a race set the race up for the handy horses and the closers. Always look at the final fraction or last 400m time of a horse. It is indicative of its ability to accelerate. Combine that information with the pace of the race and you could take down a decent trifecta or quartet superfecta.
Money Management
The key to becoming a successful player is to manage your money well. The following are the crucial elements:
Betting Bank (Treat this as a business. Keep records of your wins and losses and amounts staked).
Stakes as a percentage of betting bank (1%-5% of betting bank per bet. Most professional players use 1%.)
Playing Strategy (depending on the odds you need a certain strike rate that will give you a profit over a given series of bets eg you play 10 bets, you win 6 and lose 4. At odds of 9-10 or 1.90 you make a profit at 100 flat staking units per bet. You staked 10 bets in total at 100 units per bet = 1000 units. You won 6 units at odds of 1.90 = 1140. Profit = 1140 minus 1000 units staked = 140 units). Players who play the pick six must divide their winnings by their stakes to get their odds eg they win 10 000, they bet 1000 units therefore the odds they won at are 10 000/1000 = 10-1. Now you have to work out how often do you expect to win and how much do you realistically need to spend in order to win the bet. In South Africa a realistic amount would be about R5 000 in my estimation in order to expect a decent strike rate in the pick six. R1000 is ok but you are covering fewer combinations and therefore your strike rate goes down which means you have to wait longer between wins. The question is how big is your betting bank? Perhaps you should be playing the jackpot or pick 4 as it is called in the US.
Losing streaks happen to every bettor, no matter how good they are. Players that chase their losses are DOOMED. A loss is a loss. Take it on the chin. Nobody wins all the time. If you know your win expectation, your odds then you do not mind a loss because you KNOW that the win is coming because you have done your homework.
