I'm sorry about that. I never really saw it as flaming but with hindsight. yes your right. Sorry about that Privateer. I thought I was just 'ragging'. No offense was meant.

I've gone out of my way to help fellow punters over the years only to be the subject of abuse and negativity. There is some wonderful information available on this site for punters prepared by people who have done all of the hard yards for you. Unfortunately, that punter mentality kicks in. You know the one, "yeah, right, THAT can't win! I can pick something to beat it." So you ignore the advice right there before your eyes and go with your own theories only to lose yet again.

A number of years ago, I spent months, my own long service leave, travelling back and forth 6 days a week, 10 hours a day to the Brisbane State Library analysing race results into statistics until I was almost blind! Finally, I came up with something workable and effective as a base method of horse selection that I still use today.

I've regularly shared some of that information here over the years, posted a contact email address and spent hours helping fellow punters only to end up copping a mouthful of inane abuse from a poster that I previously respected. I now wonder why I ever bothered.

Use this goldmine of information here at Propun wisely. Research it! Be flexible in your thoughts and lateral in your thinking. Be prepared to accept and respect the ideas of others and of course, never, ever, ever bet on a rain affected track!

Good luck

Privateer

Well it's been a good while since I've been here, but I couldn't resist dropping a post when I saw Mr Pareto had made a cameo...

Trust you're well Privateer?

I am a fortunate one that Privateer shared some of his learnings with and have been operating a simple little method for about four years now that has generated an average of 23% profit on bank per annum over that time.

But now he has got me intrigued with some other postings suggesting he has modified his method. I do pray that he has not found more holy grail?

Drop a line Privateer. I'd love to catch up.


Cheers,
Luckyboy

I'd love to see some up-front tips. Just for 1 Sat. would do.

privateer, if your still around would you care to expand on that statement,

i am interested purely because wet tracks have over a long punting period have made no difference to my bottom line, so im not having a go in any way, just interested in the logic

thanks in anticipation

I agree with Privateers statement on wet tracks. Any worse than dead 4 and I'm not interested. More water than that and the track conditions are never even, it's all over the shop. Not only that but horses are having muck kicked up into their face as is the jockey. Even form is out the window.

It always stumps me at the amount of punters who not only have no problems winning on wet tracks but even like them! Is it system based punting or form study?

Crash, all I can relate is that when I started punting & really had no clue as to what I was doing, the state of the track was never a consideration. It became so later on & I still recall the 1st time I lost confidence in a selection solely because of a slow track, didn’t back it & of course it won @ around 20's

I've backed plenty that obviously cant handle the going & I know I've done my bet after 400m, but I could say the same about plenty of others I’ve backed on good tracks that have missed the start, been checked, caught wide etc etc

anyway enough rambling, my point is that for all the bad bets I’ve made on wet tracks, their ratio seems no different to the bad bets I’ve made when its dry. The reasons for the poor runs may be different from wet to dry, but does that really matter? I dont think so

I guess the main difference to me is depending on the track, some of the weird biases wet tracks can produce. It throws another spanner in the works to deal with [as well s the other points I mentioned earlier]. Still, it doesn't seem to matter to a lot of punters. I know from my past experience though, to leave the wet tracks alone. Just my experience anyway.

G'day All. New to punting and thought i'd try to get some informed ideas from those with a better clue instead of blindly giving away my $$ to the TAB. Lookin at crash's system. can someone please tell me what 'must be 3rd or 4th up' means and where to find that info? best bets or daily papers? Thanks

Reaper.
Look at the number of runs after the X.

Cheers.
darky

ps.Dont forget WHIZ PUNT.

Bit weird posting this here and not under the system thread your referring to[?] If Darky's post has still left you in the dark [lol,lol, sorry darky] I'll post you a few clues there reaper ok?

thanks alot darky!!! happy to check out wiz punt. feel like such a novice askin, but stuck on a couple of points..

LAST 3 STARTS = 9 OR LESS???
SENIOR RIDER TO 1.5 KG APPRENTICE??
SAME CLASS OR DROP IN CLASS???

whats it mean, and what form guide do you recommend to get the info easily?
sorry to be a pain mate

324 last 3 starts = add up to 9 total [S or 0=10 each]
Senior rider [not apprentice] to 1.5kg= Apprentice with only a 1.5kg claim not 3 or 4kg claim.
Same class or drop in class: go on same weight as last start or less weight [up in class] than last start. More weight=up in class. Not always technically correct but close enough for a new punter to start off.

Go with the 'Winning Post" $4 [I still use it]. The 'Sportsman' or 'Wizard' will confuse you at this time.

Bet for the win only. Bet $1 for the win is good. Bet up to 3 horses in each race if you like cause the average devidend is $3+, so if any of those 3 wins you make a profit. Do not bet on races that has an odd-on pop in the race.

I should have said more weight = down in class. Just a typo.

LAST 3 STARTS = 9 OR LESS
SENIOR RIDER TO 1.5 KG APPRENTICE
SAME CLASS OR DROP IN CLASS (Up in weight)

Any other criteria?

How about must won at distance, prefer horses that has won track/distance?
Must be 4th up (or more) from a spell

Reaper.

I would stick to the Sportsman.

In the middle page "lift out "every bit of information is there "at a Glance"

Take the information needed as given out by the Sportsman Handicappers.

If you Add any more rules to this Good system you are only likely to "cruel" the method and effect the high strike rate and profitability.
DONT DO IT.

Good luck with it and thanks for your questions.

Cheers.
darky.

Surely you can add MUST OF RACED LAST WITHIN THE PAST 14 DAYS?

Blimey .If it raced LAST in the past 14 days it wouldnt fit the criteria of last 3 runs = 9 or less. .Ho Ho.

darky.

thanks alot for the tips fellas. gonna have a crack at it, as well as crashs one. seems a matter of intelligent filtering and not goin for the get rich quick, but look for stable increasing profits. found a staking plan called holy grail which SEEMS to be good idea. dont trust its selection methods though..

Wouldn't touch my system till Sunday. Too many races between now and then [too much $ exposure]. I don't touch Saturdays ever, but then again I've never tried the system on Sat.

thanks crash!!!. will follow the rules and keep it simple mon-fri. using this magicbet one for saturdays only (that's one of its rules anyway). so i'll have a crack tomorrow and start on yours next week. and i just wanna say that i appreciate all your help and advice. been reading over the last closed thread and think its great people like yourself who have studied obviously for years in racing and have a clue can share working ideas and selection methods that obviously work, and personally reckon that anyone who's jealous they haven't come up with something better to share apart from braggin, and wanna turn help/advice forums into a ****ing contest can go to ******y!!! don't need to justify yourself mate. if they can't come up with the same selections everyone else does by following the same rules, then tippin they bit short in the top paddock. cheers mate

can someone please explain what the various codes mean.. g1, g2 etc. c1, c2 c3 etc. LR, NMW, 2MWLY and so on. or know of a site that lists them and their interpretations entirely.

Although my system doesn't discriminate on barrier position 70% of profit comes from barrier 9 or greater.

Lower weights seem to give more value as people don't tend to go past saddle cloth 7....

G'day Grim,

All of those abbreviations are for the types of races. I'm not sure which website or paper you got those from but basically the "G" would represent "Group", the "C" = Class, "LR" = Listed Race, which is sometimes referred to a Group 4 race, "NMW" or "0MW" = No or Zero Metro Wins, and "2MWLY" = 2 Metro Wins Last Year.

With all these different ways of trying to classify each race, it can be hard sometimes to know the true quality of a race. Here's a rough list in descending order of significance:

Group 1 (eg. Melbourne Cup)
Group 2
Group 3
Group 4, also called Listed
Open
Class 6
Class 5
Class 4
Class 3
Class 2
Class 1
Maiden

I usually equate 0MW, 1MW, 2MW, 0MWLY, 1MWLY and 2MWLY races with being similar to a Class 5 or 6 race. There's also some races called "Quality" and "Flying" races. I believe they're considered to be somewhere between an Open race and Group 4 race, though I could be wrong.

To be eligible to enter a Maiden race, a horse must not have won a race before. To enter a Class 2 race, a horse must not have won more than 2 races before; it may have yet to win a race, may have won 1 race or even 2, but no more. And so on and so forth. When we get up to the Open and Group races, more parameters come into play. There may be minimum prizemoney earned restrictions before eligible to enter, and other rules.

Just a word of advice. I think the prizemoney on offer is a better guide to the quality of horses in the race. Sometimes you will notice a fairly lowly Class 3 race with $60,000 prizemoney, yet next week there will be an Open race with only $40,000 prizemoney. My point is, if an Open race is supposed to be better than a Class 3 race, why are there are times when prizemoney doesn't reflect that? You need to think like an owner. If you had a really good horse, you're going to enter it in the most appropriate race that offers the most money, so if your horse is eligible to either that Class 3 race or that Open race, you most likely going to enter it into the race with the most money, which was the Class 3 race. This is why I feel it's better to rank races by their Prizemoney, not Class.

Hope that helps.

Spot on Silver. Money means everything. Go with prize money as a class pointer [it's simple]. You'll go crazy otherwise. A $20,000 class 1 means more than a $10,000 class 6.

With Darky's system do you play it at all venues or just city events?

thanks silver. yes helps alot. so the various codes don't always mean..though they can do.. a handicapped race. been lookin for handicapped races, but noticed not all of them are listed as such.. i think. sorry, still in the learnin process mate.

crash, wanna ask ya.. when you say "3rd or 4th up" in your selection methods, would you include maidens, as in that it is actually the horses 3rd or 4th ever run?

has anyone ever heard of, or tested "the holy grail" system/staking plan? is it worthwhile?

No maidens, hurdles or races for 2yr olds. The system might work for maidens, I've never tested it. Who knows?

3rd or 4th up simply means it's either the horse's 3rd or 4th start ever, or 3rd or 4th start from a spell and that would probably depend on the form guide you use as there are different ideas about the amount of time a horses hasn't ran for which represents a spell. Just stick with the same source.

Hey Joel, you dropped off the planet mate?

Just wanted to say that I love the first post in this thread, you have obviously put a lot of thought into it.

Privateer

Mr QUADDIE,

With WIZ PUNT I am only using it on Saturdays.

Cheers.
darky.

G'day Privateer,

It does feel like I've fallen off the planet a bit...been so busy lately.

I had been feeling a little guilty that I haven't really contributed very much to this forum in terms of offering system builders possible angles. And though I love the process involved in trying to nut out system rules for a potential system, I just don't get much free time these days to do much full-on research. So I just wanted to post a couple of potential system rules that others might find useful.

One of the keys to any system is finding value. So the question is what are some things your average punter is going to look at in the form guide that might sway his bets one way or another, but are really either irrelevant in the outcome of the race, or if they do suggest a result, they are so overbet, there's just no value left in the selection (a system with a 50% strike rate is absolutely useless if the average price is $2.00 or less).

Here's a short list I've come up with:

Widest Barrier - they think a horse can't win from the widest barrier, so avoid it, which generates some value.
Lowest TAB #'s - they think the winners will only come from near the top of the list, and forget those near the bottom, which generates value in those lower TAB #'s.
Highest Money Earner - they overbet the horse with the highest prizemoney earned, which leaves no value.
Favourites - they overbet the favs, especially when they're trying to dig themselves out of a hole, so there's no value left.
Down in Class/Prizemoney - they overbet those horses that are coming down in class, thinking that well if they just raced against a better mob of horses last start, then surely it can knock off this lot, which results in no value for the selection. This one needs some consideration. If you were a trainer and confident in your horse that just raced in a $75,000 race, would you want it's next race to be for $100,000 or $50,000? In my mind, when a horse is coming down in class, it's because the trainer has little confidence in it, and is trying to compensate for that by giving it a lower field to race against. Regardless, these horses are usually overbet, and there's no value in them.

Anyone else have any tips for system builders to incorporate into their systems?

Anyway, thanks for your message Privateer. It's good to hear from you. Hope you have a good day today mate.

Regards,
Joel

To follow up on my last post, here's how those categories performed today in the 4 main tracks (Brisbane/Sydney/Melbourne/Adelaide metro):

The widest drawn horse in each race returned $69.10w / $52.80p, and had strike rates of 18% and 46% respectively over the 33 races. Good value to be had for both the win and place.

The lowest TAB # horse in each race returned $56.4w / $21.00p, and had strike rates of 6% and 15% respectively over the 33 races. Good value for the win bets, but the strike rates seem a bit too low. Maybe the mug punters have this one right...avoid the lowest TAB # horses.

The horse with the highest API (average prizemoney earned per race) in each race returned a miserly $15.80w / $24.60p, and had strike rates of 15% and 45% respectively over the 33 races. I think this is going to surprise some people. Yes, these horses will often be considered the best in the race because of the higher API, but they're just so overbet, they can't be trusted to turn a profit. Best to avoid these horses.

The favourite horse in each race returned $33.00w / $27.6p, and had strike rates of 33% and 52% respectively over the 33 races. It's just too risky to have to rely on such a high strike rate for the win just to break even. Best to rule a line through them.

The horses racing for less prizemoney today than they did last start returned $48.2w / $53.2p, and had a win strike rate of 13.4% for the 67 selections. Again, these horses are overbet, and lose all value. Like favourites, just rule a line through them.


So, what if we combined these ideas. What are the results of the horses that had the widest barrier, were not the lowest TAB #, were not the horse with highest API in the race, were not the favourite, and are not racing for less prizemoney today than they did last start?

20 selections returned $59.40w / $38.10p, and had strike rates of 10% and 40% respectively. Not too bad. The win strike rate is a bit low, so maybe it would be better to focus on place bets.

FYI, the prices are based on the TABonline website, and while I tried to be accurate in my calculations, I won't promise they're all correct, so if you happen to find a mistake, well...good for you. I basically just wanted to follow up on those ideas in my previous post to see if they might be worthy for others to incorporate into their system(s). Hopefully, someone will find at least some of this input useful.

And no I didn't bet those 20 selections today (unfortunately). :C

Thanks for sharing your observations Silver.

There are some very interesting stats there, that may have some futher potential.

Hers a plan that had some success, that I ran, as one of my many sysytems.

. Bet the 2 widest barriers in races with exactly 10 runners.

. We are usually betting 2 horses a race to win, bet same amount on each.

. Must be $4.50+ pre-post.

It had a 20% win SR with some amazing prices.

Cheers.

Bhagwan

Looking at Sydney races ONLY:

Runners 10
Barrier 10
Saddle Cloth <11
3 yo
<$4.10

Since 1/1/00
Selections 110
Wins 44 (S/R 40.00%) Places 74 (67.27%)
POT 19% LOT 2.15%

Since 1/1/05
Selections 48
Wins 23 (S/R 47.92%) Places 33 (68.75%)
POT 41.46% LOT 3.04%

Regardless of the horse's name or form, we just bet on whoever is in barriers 9 and 10 in a exact 10 horse field right?

Does anyone have any long term stats for this?

Seems interesting.

Also, it seems that favourites only win 33% of the time, so its best not to bet on a the favourite I assume.

Interesting Stats there Stix, well done.
Thanks for sharing your observations.

Hi Quaddi
My stats were over 4.5yrs
$4.50+ pre-post newspaper.

Stix's idea was horses less than $4.10


This crazy idea, even showed a profit betting the 2 horses for a place only for some outragously high divs.

Most pundits will say that it is impossible to show a profit betting 2 horses a race at place betting.

It would be interesting to see other pundits ideas based around 10 runners exactly.
No matter how crazy it may appear.
It's the crazy form horses that hits the crazy dividends.
We dont need many to recover losses.

For those who enjoy discrediting posters mad ideas, I advise them to place lay bets either not to win or not to place, on all these selections & just see what happens next, one may find a very rude suprise to their bank balance.


Cheers.

So we disregard, say, anything that has placed within it's last 3-4 starts?