I'm not embarrassed!

peter m,

2 - 7% POT is certainly achievable. There wouldn't be too many big players around who have better figures than that. If they do, they aren't turning over very much.

In regards to form factors, you can certainly rule out any nonsense such as "using the first letter of the day to find in a horses name as a selection". Unfortunately there is a lot of those ridiculous systems posted on here. And to be honest I would discount everything that any person who posts that stuff says. It will get you no where.

pelicanpete,

Do you have anything to offer to the discussion in regards to Darky's claims of:

1) That no one can win long term punting horses

2) That no professional punter only backs 1 horse per race

If you do, would love to hear it, otherwise you should listen and try and learn.

pelicanpete,

The moderators have already rejected your false claims of me being Mr Barry, so why don't you concentrate on just the 2 points of discussion I have highlighted above, and communicate like an adult?

Darky,

It seems your problem is fairly simple. It's the problem most typical "bet at the local TAB" punters have.

You seem to think you need to find the winner of every race you bet on.

What you need is a method that selects a group of horses with a long-term edge. Whether that method throws up 1 or 3 or 4 selections per race is irrelevant. What is relevant is whether your method provides value selections long-term.

So putting it in simple terms for you, stop looking for winners and start looking for value.

Thanks for the reply lighthuman2010.

Re the first letter of the day and third letter of horse should be ''r'' I kind of figured they were a joke and were made tongue in cheek and to be taken as such.

I was refering more to form factors which are considered important and taken as Gospel such as last start finishing position , beaten lenghts, API, win%, place%, weight on or off, weight above limit, last 3 to 5 start total SP, days last start, fitness patterns etc etc.
Which are rubbish and overused and which are worth taking into consideration ?

Ultimately Peter, I don't believe there is a single correct answer to what to asked. Those factors can all be good and bad, for instance, one of my favourite 'gospel' factors is barrier draws. I like horses starting from unfavourable draws myself and do okay from them, and enjoy laying those in good barrier draws (obviuosly theres more to it than just the barrier draw), but I'm sure there just as many if not, who only consider the favourable draws to back, and lay the outside barriers.

Really, I dont believe there is any form factor you can say is rubbish and totally discount, its more a matter of trying to take all the info into account and making trying to make the right decision.

Peter,

They are all good factors to be considered, with some reservation.
I'm not going into much detail, there were books written about the subject, just want to give you some idea, I'm using.

Last start finishing position, what value do you put on a 10 len. third in a 6 horse race?

Beaten len. is important, BUT only in conjunction with the class of race and distance + number of runners, it tells you a lot about the horse's form, fitness.

win and place % alone are utterly meaningless, I can point out some horses with 90% place and 50% win, and take them even to a moderate city meeting and they will fail hopelessly.

Weight in my opinion is only important as far as the weight carrying ability of the horse is concerned, once you know that beyond a certain weight it can't win, that's it. Of course you have to compare ALL the horses in the race and then you can give advantage to those with lesser weight.

Weight above limit is misleading, again in my opinion, because the handicapper is badly handicapped by the lower and upper weight limits,
some horses would not have a chance even with the limit weight while the top horse should carry more.

Last 3 or 5 start, I use both, rely on the last 3 to 90% but I look at the last two years to confirm.
This I consider together with the days to last start.

fitness patterns: I have both of the author's (Peter Bent I think) books on this subject, and must admit I couldn't make any sense of it, of course it may just be that I'm a bit slow on the uptake, same as with time rating.

Regarding racing patterns, I studied them for some time and again couldn't make any use of it, I think for the simple reason that horses hardly ever race in the same class or distance every preparations in the same order.

Anyway, these are just a few thoughts, as I said there are many good books about it.

Good luck

No, sorry it was Barry Blakemore.
He wrote the "Key factor is fitness" and "Fitness the key to winning"

No matter, I didn't understand it anyway!

Good luck