The Very Best Way to Make Money at the Track
February 12th, 2008By Jude T. Feld
When I was asked to attend the 2007 Horseplayers Expo sponsored by Daily Racing Form, I was a bit skeptical. Not that I fancy myself a “know-it-all†when it comes to handicapping, but 48 years in the grandstands of racetracks around the globe has taught me quite a bit about the art of picking winners.
Wagering, mainly money management, has always been my bugaboo. I have tried many different money management techniques over the years – James Selvidge’s “Base Bet plus the Square Root of the Profits,†the “Carlton Sureway Method,†made popular by Ray Taulbot and even a “Due Column†type system that guaranteed a $14,000 a year profit if one limited themselves to playing horses at 5-1 or better and only wanted to make a dollar a race and used a $5 base wager. (It actually works – though sometimes you need iron-clad balls to bet a relatively large sum during a losing streak.)
Luckily for me, Barry Meadow, who wrote Money Secrets at the Racetrack, the bible of money management for horseplayers, was one of the speakers at the Expo. I came early to that seminar and stayed late, soaking the information in like a sponge.
“A handicapper can pick 99% winners,†Meadows said. “And go broke if he bets his whole bankroll on every race.â€
The light bulb came on for me.
This guy got it. I was hooked.
Meadows recommended to assign each horse its true chance of winning, calculate a true odds line based on those assessments (100% book) and then wager ONLY when the odds are 50% higher than your line says they should be.
This takes a little practice and might be more math than some folks want to do, but believe me, it is worth the time and effort.
Here is a chart to make it easier for you. BOOKMARK THIS PAGE or print out this chart and keep it in your wallet. It will make you profit from your handicapping if you are losing and make you more profitable if you are winning. If you have any questions, send me a note at racehorsereport@aol.com.
