Hi JFC,

With the aid of my mates twelve year old I attacked the maths in your link and came to the conclusion it only predicts the likely run of CONSECUTIVE outs, not the actual worst run. The worst run being the cumulative effect of maybe many runs of outs and what we really need to know to judge our bet size. (If this conclusion is wrong blame the 12 year old).
As you say knowing the number of bets is essential to working out the likely number of consecutive outs or for that matter the worst run. I suspect the figures Bagwhan provided are based on statistics and if I were at home and had my handy 3rd grade statistics book handy I'd explain how they are derived.
From what I remember integration was required to provide a formula giving the maximum number of outs from a sample size and a hit percentage so the book takes pity on the mathematically challenged and provides a table of approximate values. Using this table you can predict the likely number of consecutive misses at any percentage hit rate and sample size (number of bets).
This again doesn't help us with the calculation of our worst run. I believe this is what Bagwhan is providing when he says multiply the worst run of consecutive outs by 3.5. He does fail to tell us (as JFC point out) what number of bets his figures relate to.

I wonder though if Bagwhan's figures have any meaning without knowing the likely dividend we are going to win. Obviously if we have a 50% strike rate and an average dividend of $1.90 we will always end up losing our bank whatever the run of outs though we may succeed with an average divvy of $2.10.

I still reckon my random number program at the start of this thread takes a lot of beating. It takes everything except variably divvy into account and must be worth a fortune to everyone that bets on horses. When interest is at a fever pitch I might even market it unless that cursed "Risk of Ruin" thing is just as good as it is foolishly underpriced.

O.K. On holidays, starting to ramble, leaving now.

KV