Placing Bets On Horses?

[CokeTulip]

Can any AB member explain or recommend a link or book where you can get some clear, simple understanding about what you need to know to "get" horseracing

- backing horses
- the jargon used and its meaning
- types of bet and how to understand the betting system and the
- newspapers that are best for horseracing

Assume total ignorance!
Any help/ ideas all greatly appreciated. Thanks.

[Maydup]

The Racing Post is a good reference to both the racing timetable and the form. ("The form" being a description of how the horses performed in recent races.)

[FredPuli43]

Anybody who bets should be able explain the betting. There is very little too it. You need to know how odds are expressed; the second figure represents a bet, 'a stake', what you pay the bookmaker, and the first figure represents how many times you bet pays out when your horse finishes first. So 5-1 means each one pound pays you a profit of five pounds. 9-2 means you get four and half times (bookies normally think putting 4.5 - 1 is likely to lead to confusion, as it looks like 45 -1) And 2-9 is the reverse; if you bet £9 your profit is £2. 2-9, 8-13 and so on used to be called "9 to 2 ON " "13-8 ON" but this practice is dying out

[FredPuli43]

Place betting is where you bet that your horse will finish in the first three (or four; it depends on the race). You then get a quarter or one fifth of what you would have got for backing the winner. "Place only" bets are just that; if your pick finishes first you still only get the quarter or fifth. What you normally do is back "each way" If you bet , say £5 each way, the bookie takes £5 off you for the bet to win only and £5 for the bet to place only, total £10. If it wins you get both bets paying out. If is just placed, you lose £5 on the win only but collect money on the £5 place only

There is no need to know about doubles, triples, forecasts, Heinz bets or anything else in betting. Only people who think in terms of winning the pools or the like bother with them. Racing people occasionally try to guess the first and second in a race "a straight forecast", but only light heartedly.

[FredPuli43]

That leaves "the Tote". The Tote works by taking all the money bet in one big pool. It pays all the money, less expenses, to people who win. Now it may be there is only one person who has picked the winner (not very likely but often only very few do). That person would collect all the money set aside for the winning bet and if a few did they would collect a share according to what their bet was. Sometimes, therefore, a winning bet of £2 brings a profit of many hundreds, far more than a bookmaker would be paying. The Tote keeps part of the total bets for people who pick horses which are placed, with place bets. There may be many of these in the same race as that winner. This produces profits them which are often far less than a quarter or fifth of what they'd have got if their horse had won.

[Buenchico]

There's a website for everything these days ;-)
http://www.novicepunter.co.uk/index.htm

As well as the specialist publications (Racing Post and Sporting Life) the 'heavyweight' newspapers all have excellent coverage of racing, especially The Times.

[FredPuli43]

As to jargon, there is "Channel 4 Guide to racing" a book which explains it all. Having read that, you'll be saying " Three year old colt. His dam won over a mile, 40,000 guineas as a yearling, good walker, third foal, has a round action, carries head high, genuine sort, likes to hear his feet rattle, never raced on better than good to firm, will be suited by up to 10 furlongs........" and boring every one !

[CokeTulip]

Fred - thats so good... thank you. I'll go over it a few times but easy to understand and everything (will check out Bueno's site too).

Amused by your last post. Its doesn't sound so bad!. (As a child spent all my time at race meetings -getting paid by my father to jump in to the front of the Tote's cue to give him money - I think I understand now - always a few minutes before the race would start it would go mad(my father drank with them) and always stood back - I never really had anything explained but I remember the number of priests at the races - lots. My father was very into horse racing but it would take hours to get home after as he would visit every pub on the way to say hello.

[Hymie]

Step into your local bookies and look at the ratio of betting windows versus those paying out – that is all you need to know.

[FredPuli43]

Hymie, paying out windows have disappeared. Haven't seen one in years. Of course, there may be a reason other than that of modern technology meaning that a specialist paying out clerk is not needed !