Where are you watching them shorten? Books or tote?

My personal opinion is that you should lay every shortener. I don't know where or how bookies come up with their prices, but they are generally pretty close to the mark.

I have sat here and seen many horses sit at about $6 on the books yet is paying $15 on the tote. Quite often I will be swearing at the tight bookie for being so miseable with his odds, until I watch the race and realise that the horse was never going to lose.

The thing with shorteners, is that everybody remembers the real shorteners that win. I remember a thread that copped a bit of flack a few months ago. It was Chucks lay of the day. It was backed in from $10 to about $3.80, and got up. Now on that occassion, the money was right. But for every time the money is right, there is multiple times that it is wrong.

I often sit here and watch a horse open at $2-3 favourites, and drift. I watch the price on BF and simply nobody wants it. Ends up you can get nearly $10 for this horse. Without providing statistics, it would be my bet that these drifters win more often than the shorteners.

I would personally prefer to back a horse that opened at $3 and I got $10 for, than back something for $3 that opened at $10.

Just an opinion though, won't provide any stats to support this....
Happy punting...

"would the fact that most winners drift in betting put an end to this?"


Well, it should LOL

Comment:

The bookies didn't do the form for you here!

I guess punters who relied on the bookies to do their form for them, and so lost on the race, should lodge a complaint with the bookies telling them to do their form better.

I also fail to understand how relying on bookies' odds can give anyone an idea of what odds is "value" for any selection. Unless the aim is to look at the bookies' odds and then try and catch a better price on the tote - with no guarantee of better odds - particularly if you are betting one of the favoured runners.

Anyway, who wants to consistently try and beat a 120% tote market?

Me. I find it so much more rewarding than settling with losing to a 120% tote market. If you don't try and beat it then what is the point? Maybe it will beat me in the end, but will be damned if I don't put up a hell of a fight....

Hi and firstly thank you to all the people who responded to the thread so far. I should have qualified the general sense of the statements by doing a little division :-)

Firstly, I am aware that there is a profound difference between Gallopers and Harness when following the money and I have since come to realise that this forum deals mainly (I assume) with gallopers.

Secondly, following the money needs to be clearly divided into two halves i.e. on course and off course, once again there is a profound difference.

I have many years of direct observation of both on and off course methodology, so I have no fear of making this statement.

Getting back to following money, the trots are the inverse of gallopers where most winners actually shorten and are very much in the red on an overwhelming number of occasions. Not much chance to get overs at the trots.

I accept the comment that some gallopers drift before they win, and I would like to place that into my off course comments further down this reply.

When you are on course (physically present at a racetrack), there is nothing equal to watching 'Heads' and 'following the money'. Clearly when the stable foreman or the runner for a jockey comes into the ring and claims a horses price with the bookies, you can bet it will do very well. Naturally, you have to serve your apprenticeship over time to learn these 'key' people, but in times of ever diminishing crowds, its not that hard.

Taking a line through this, there is also the situation where the 'smarties' find bowlers (people never been seen on a track before) to place their bets, thus not starting a stampede. Of course, the more astute of us, see this ruse and get on in even greater volume.

On a track, following the money is KING, and that is simply that, this is clearly distinct and different than following money on shorteners on the tote or even with bookmakers.

That is the other scenario that most of you replied to. This is a different art form, betting from home with a TV (or radio) and computer. When watching the pools there is an undeniable opportunity to make money but not on the day. Let me restate that, it is more about pools trends over time.

When sitting at home, you need to follow the money over a long period of time. If you retain the data you will see clear bias towards price points on both winning favourites to losing favourites and also for winning non-favourites.

Given enough time (data) you can make direct correlation between the volumes of money wagered when a fav wins to lose and vice versa and the averages of odds on offer (final tote price). The limitation is that you can only deal with empirical data and that restricts you to the 'Final' dividend, not opening prices. Because the money is pooled it is useless to factor in the opening 'bet' in any pool. Its only the final pool, less commission, divided by the live tickets that makes any difference.

The total pool is then a good guide (over time) to make comparisons against favs and winners that have both won or lost. Its all in the math v's amount of data you have. At the end of the day, your 'Best' scenario's can be used to advantage when you see a suitable race and the 'POOL' reaches the target you must have before you bet.

Given the pool is right, and you have a half decent bet selection criteria based on historical priced winners to pool volumes, you will see clearly when a suitable race becomes available to bet on. The horse (in this case) to bet on would be the horse at the price range (close to the close of betting) that met your criteria for that volume of pool.

This is no different than saying, only bet when your rules are all met, despite what system you use. In this case you are following money from a purely mathematical point of view, and couldn't give a hoot who the horse was.

As I said, there is a profound difference between these two styles (on course v's off course), but at the heart of each method is the money, not the horse. The horse of course is the medium via which the money is ultimately rewarded or lost.

Following the money does work, but not following the followers of the money, which was very astutely mentioned by a lister earlier. You must follow the smart money on course and there is only one 'BEST' smart money.

What if two camps think they can both win and both put on the 'Smart' money? You stop out of course!!!! I have seen this thousands of times, just stop out till the next race when there is only 'ONE' smart money. I do not mean the followers who run in at the drop of a hat when a bookie turns a horse in a point.

I have seem bookies turn the knob without taking a bet and then people will bet like crazy thinking that something significant happened to warrant the horse shortening. Of course, the bookie is just sucking you in, and when the money stops coming for it, he then turns it out again hoping to repeat the process over again.

Have you ever wondered why they have so long in between races? It's not to get the horses processed from race to race, it's to give plenty of time for the bookies to manipulate the swinging punters minds, by manipulation of those lovely little knobs which of course are dead in the water today and replaced by a keyboard.

I could (and should) write a book on this, but won't here because I believe that the essence of a good thread is that the replies are kept relatively short. This sadly is hard to do when trying to cover a topic as complex as the one in question here.

Btw, I respect and thank all that replied for them not being aggressive, you all made your points with clarity and your own opinion and that is healthy.

Tailwag

Trainers,jockey's,owners etc are all human,being in the know doesnt make you a smart punter all it does it give you a bit more confidence when you place your bet.

You could say these guys are over confident and let their emotions controll their punting pocket.

Tailwag i understand what you are getting at but feel it is a very dangerous game,all the same best of luck.

From personal experience in the greyhounds. Owners who have not backed thier dog to win the race, rarely have any regrets in doing so. I would say it would be much the same with the horses. But then again 90% of the owners back their horse anyway or have syndicates etc.

I dont think you can draw out too much on how much an owner backs their horse by. But if you were to know when they decided to put a few more on their horse this time, it might indicate they have more confidence. But not many people know the amount that is backed on his/her horse week in week out. So there goes that.

There are too many questions and not enough answers in racing. Thats what keeps people interested.

__________________
GO VOUVRAY

That is exactly my point, by careful observation over a long period of time, you can rate the actual 'heads' the permanent, pro punters, you can watch their results, learn their styles. To be honest, there are so few people going to the track now that you can almost name them all and define their styles, who they bet for and so on. Really, its easy to follow the 'RIGHT' people at the track and to filter out the 'Wrong' people. This is tantamount to having a computer make a ranking for you based on weather, barrier and so on. Instead of inputting data about weights and numbers etc. you are measuring people and their better than 'normal' strike rates.

Have you ever been to the track and seen the same bloke always winning and another bloke always losing? There is a very simple form of filter, you would ignore the regular loser and afford a higher ranking to the regular winner.

Perhaps I am not writing this well enough, but if you have spent your whole life on the track, you just can't help but come to the conclusions I have that when you see certain people bet, you go with them. Mostly you will get a good run for your money.

Tailwag

Following the money is about following shorteners ???

Is it really ???

Thinking is about being single minded ????

Is it really ????

Betting trends are about fluctuation and variation.

Markets travel in all directions,attempting to understand the pattern is the essence of following the money.

You dont have to get it right "every" time,,, that's the beauty of punting.

KV hang in there mate,,I'm coming.

My point was that serious punters betting for the win don't restrict themselves to 120% betting markets. They are outrageous. Top fluctuation bookmaker odds, particularly in Melbourne and Sydney, are regularly far superior - particularly for the horses most likely to win.

TF markets are consistently below 120%. They can often be below 110%.

For example, the last at Sydney on Saturday. The TF market was 105%. If I liked Lotteria, why would I accept $1.80 on the tote like hundreds of tote punters when $2.00 was available with the bookies? That's making 25% more profit.