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All About Handicap Betting

The first thing to consider when handicap betting a horse race is know what's going on at the tracks you play. You must figure out what winners are doing, and only bet on horses that have the winning profile. You must also know the trainers, and their manipulations. You should be able to identify the jockeys they win with, and the jockeys they rarely succeed with. You must be aware of any track bias. In general, you should fully understand what wins and what loses at the racetracks you play.

Next is assess the ability of each contender. Those horses found lacking in ability are eliminated. Then determine the current form and condition of each of your contenders. Horses not meeting form and condition standards are then discarded. Now look for extenuating circumstances or angles. These include "hot stats" and other reasons, outside the mainstream of speed, class and form, that a horse should still be considered and then look for value.

There are handicappers who achieve rates higher than 33%, but they don't bet every race. They're very selective. That's their edge. The name of this game is not just picking winners. It's picking winners that offer value. You can pick winners at a rate of 25% and make a very nice profit. If your average odds are 4-to-1 and you're picking winners at the rate of 25%, you're making a very handsome return. Picking one winner in four and getting paid an average of 4-to-1 means that you're losing three out of four bets. When you win, you win four units and when you lose, you lose one unit. Hence, in four bets you gain one unit profit. That's a 25% return on investment (ROI). There are investment fund managers who would give at least one of their vital organs to get this kind of return.

Then make a Betting Line at the track. The question most often asked at a racetrack is, "Who da ya like?" It's typically answered, "I like the five horse but I'm afraid of the nine." This answer is vague at best. A much better answer would be, "I'll take the five at 5-to-2, or the nine at 4-to-1." Most handicappers refuse to bet on any horse other than their top pick. This is what keeps many of them from the win window. How often have you heard a handicapper complain after a juicy longshot wins, "I circled that horse - I had him!"? When you ask if he bet the horse, he answers in the negative. The reason he didn't bet the horse was that it wasn't his top pick.

You should always bet on horses that offer value and avoid the low-priced underlays. An underlay is a horse that is offering less odds than its probability of winning demands. If a horse has a 33% chance to win the race and he is going off at even-money, it's no bet.

An overlay is just the opposite. Consider the same horse with a 33% chance to win going off at 3-to-1. What a bargain. That's the time to "send it in."

Donot bet against the race favorite. Races are divided into two groups: races that have a legitimate favorite and races that don't. A legitimate favorite is the class of the field, the speed of the field, and is in form and condition to deliver his ability. Anything less and you have a vulnerable favorite.

You must have detailed records. The vast majority of handicappers haven't the foggiest clue about their performance. Not one in a hundred could answer the following questions: What is your overall win percentage for the past 200 races? What's your average mutuel for the past 200 races? What's your ROI in turf races? What's your ROI in dirt sprints? If someone were to wake you up in the middle of the night and ask you these questions, and you could answer them correctly, it's certain you're a winning handicapper.

The last commandment should be self-evident. This game is dynamic. It's forever changing. In the seventies, you could win a lot of money using speed figures to predict adjusted final times. Today, you'd be lucky to break even using these methods. (The published Beyer Speed Figures bear witness to the truth of this statement. If you bet the highest last-race Beyer figure, you'll win around 27% of the time, and lose close to 20 cents on the dollar.)

Thou never stop learning about handicapping. That's because money management is finite and mathematical. The truth of mathematics is absolute. In mathematics, what was true fifty years ago, will be true a thousand years from now. Once you learn the principles of money management, they're yours for life. My best advice on this subject is to read and digest Barry Meadow's Money Secrets at the Racetrack. It's a book devoted exclusively to the subject of money management. Once you digest its contents, you'll have solved a huge part of the thoroughbred handicapping-investment puzzle.

I hope these suggestions give you a better insight on what, how and why is needed to be done to bet on a horse race.