Comments
GoSouthCourt OP t1_jctxhco wrote
I'm glad that you have enough discipline and treat the losses as price of admission! But unfortunately not everyone can manage that.
Take your example, if someone comes out ahead from the first two days by betting on the favourites, what are the odds that they think "well that's easy profit, I'll just bet on all the favourites from now on!" and proceed to lose all their winnings (and potentially more).
FeedsOnLife t1_jctx2mh wrote
I imagine there could be something to this. They have more time to develop and fine tune the odds. More time to gather information used to determine the odds.
GoSouthCourt OP t1_jctqopb wrote
Last week, Cheltenham hosted one of the largest horse racing events in the UK. Gambling plays a significant role at the festival, so I plotted the outcome of 4 different strategies that a gambler may implement during the event. They are:
- Favourite only: Bet £10 on the pre-race favourite of every race
- 2nd to 5th: Bet £2.50 on the 2nd to 5th pre-race favourite of every race
- All horses except Top 5: Split £10 across the horses that are not in the top 5 and bet on all of them equally (So if there are 10 horses, bet £2.00 on the 6th to 10th pre-race favourite)
- All horses: Split £10 across all horses and bet on all of them equally (If there are 10 horses, bet £1.00 on each of them)
The empirical expected values of the strategies are 73.5%, 76.3%, 61.8%, 70.2% respectively.
A few notes:
- Odds are calculated with Industry Starting Price, which is close to the median price of all major bookmakers in the UK
- If there is a tie between 1st and 2nd, the stake is split evenly among the two horses. No other tie in prices relevant to this calculation occurs.
- Gambling is a scam. You are expected to loss around £3 to the bookmaker for every £10 you gamble, which is far worse than most slots (they tend to have EV of at least 90%)
Source: https://www.timeform.com/cheltenham-festival/odds
Tools: Python's matplotlib, Excel
ImpliedProbability t1_jcxr6dd wrote
No one employs these strategies. This is a naive analysis.
Plenty of sharp money makes profit from gambling. Tony Bloom is a notable, high-profile figure who made all his money from gambling, and still generates large sums from it. He has been so successful in mathematically calculating value bets he is now the owner of Brighton football club, and the 'Asian handicap' exists because of him.
You have a very basic understanding of gambling and are coming at it from a biased angle that presumes to treat everyone like children that shouldn't be left to the consequences of their own bad decisions.
Thebitterestballen t1_jcxtdak wrote
Yeah, you don't really make money from any kind of gambling by playing the odds/maths alone but by playing the people or having more information than others.. My brother used to make money from online poker, but he was a very average poker player. His entire strategy was based on profiling other players to rate them as good or bad and then joining games that have a large number of bad players... My point being many people DO play in a simplistic way, if there are enough naive players you can take relatively more of their money.
krs1one1 t1_jcxy6kd wrote
I think your naive is you don’t think the vast majority of general population having a random bet AREN’T taking one of these strategies.
People who bet “seriously”, obviously not. But I’d be shocked if the vast majority of blow ins for. A big race weekend don’t either have a favorite or roughies approach.
ImpliedProbability t1_jd4fil8 wrote
They aren't. I've never met or heard of a single individual who either only backs the favourite, or backs multiple selections in each race based solely on price.
In conclusion: you're as clueless as the OP. Most random punters will have a look at form, names, trainers or jockeys. There is no-one who is purely looking at the prices like this data does.
krs1one1 t1_jd51kr2 wrote
I mean, I only played poker professionally for about a decade and my best friend for that entire time WAS bookie.
But hey. What would I know!?
ImpliedProbability t1_jd5fx8c wrote
Very little.
X to doubt.
Perpyderpy t1_jctu6a7 wrote
Because consistently successfully profiting through handicapping Horse Racing means not following any of these "strategies"
GoSouthCourt OP t1_jctvqad wrote
Of course if you know the ins and outs of the horse racing industry you can make much more informed choices and enforce much more sophisticated strategies than the wider public. But consistently successfully profiting from gambling with bookmakers is not a real thing. They would have restricted you well before you can consistently profit from it.
Perpyderpy t1_jcvd4i5 wrote
Perhaps that's true in the U.K. but being consistently profitable from Horse Racing is a very real thing in the U.S. The biggest issue for most is that the smaller casual player is not betting in a manner to potentially provide consistent long-term profits, nor are they accessing information/bankroll that the larger syndicates and groups have.
Edit:A bookie has no reason to automatically restrict you from betting because you win consistently, there are PLENTY of other people who lose consistently to pay you off.
iwtfb4L t1_jcw1axl wrote
alright, I'm still young. I got plenty to time to hone my craft. Where can I start my path on becoming the best horse racing handicapper in the world?
ImpliedProbability t1_jcxqvol wrote
What are you on about? Bookmakers have every incentive to restrict winning players and they do, rather quickly.
Perpyderpy t1_jcy4i3q wrote
Shouldn't have used the vernacular "bookie", which might be more region-specific. If you win 100,000 on a pick 6 will you be banned? What if it happened once a year? Or once every two years and still enough to be profitable? Once again, maybe it's a U.K. thing. Tracks do not ban players because they win, nor do online casinos/wagering sites, in the U.S.
Substantial_Sale9466 t1_jcwtv0r wrote
Yeah you are not getting restricted for winning at horse racing, I think the only thing they restrict you for is 21 if you are counting cards. And not many people can do that
ImpliedProbability t1_jcxqt67 wrote
Incorrect. Winning (value oriented) players get restricted very quickly, and recent "responsible gambling checks" are used to avoid making payouts.
Gman1111110 t1_jcxdj1j wrote
I looked each day to see if there was anything to bet on, there’s too many horses in most of the races, too much of a lotter, even then the favourites were very short priced.
rjsh927 t1_jcysf0m wrote
Moral of the story : quit while you are ahead.
ignigenaquintus t1_jcza3u3 wrote
Please lower resolution a little more.
PII-Throwaway-878 t1_jcttpph wrote
So what you're saying is that if I bet favorites for the first two festival days, I'll come out ahead. Shut up and take my money!
Seriously though, I will go to the track occasionally. Admission is nearly free, I'm allowed to bring a cooler with beers and sandwiches onto the apron, and there's a section for smoking (typically, cigars). Placing a small wager is part of the fun. I don't mind that there's a 17% rake (here). It's a small price to pay for a fantastic day out that allows me to embrace the socks-and-sandals phase of life.