Level Stakes

The easiest staking plan to understand is simply betting level stakes.  In other words, each Top Rated selection is backed for the same amount regardless of the rated price and regardless of the price on offer.

Percentage (%) Staking

Slightly more complicated, but very effective is the percentage staking plan.  With this plan we bet a set percentage of our Bank and as the bank increases with winnings we can increase our bet size gradually.  This is the ideal way to bet if we have only a small Bank to start with.  For example.

Bank Size  21/2%  5%  10%

$400   $10  $20  $40
Assuming a win of 2 units in the first week it is then
$420   $10.50   (440) $22   (480) $48
You can see how with a few small wins a
Bank can build up.  At some stage you may wish to pay yourself a dividend.  This is always a good thing to do as it proves to yourself and others that you can actually win money at the races and that’s a good feeling.

If you are very good and can achieve an increase in your bank of just 20% each month your bet size will increase to over $70 and your Bank to just under $3,000.

Now that’s not bad for just one year.  In practice it won’t be that simple of course.  Some months you will win and some months you will lose.  You may go for two or three months at a time and find your Bank goes up and down like a Yo-Yo.  You must however, once having started, stick to your plan.

Betting To Prices

This is the favoured style of betting of the professional punter.  You make your bets according to your rated prices.  If your ratings is 2/1 then you bet 33 units to make 100 units return (99 actually but who’s counting?).  If your rating is 6/4 the bet would be 40 units to return 100 overall.  Of course if the price of your selections is above your rated odds (an overlay selection) you will get more, sometimes much more, than 100 units and if your selections is available only at lesser odds than your rating (an underlay) you will receive less than 100 units.

To operate this style of betting you will need sufficient bank to bet on at least twenty races.  If your largest possible bet is 53 units (rating of 9/10) then your Bank will be 1060 units and I would also have on hand a reserve Bank of the same amount.

Level Profit

The disadvantage with Betting to Prices is that you are very much dependent on the prices you achieve for your profit.  Whilst I could be accused of stating the obvious, these are the facts that you have to consider.  If you have a series of average prices winners your profit will be confined to minimal amounts.  any major advances to your Bank will depend on the occasional upset win

When we bet level profit, we are aiming to make the same amount of profit for every winner.  To do this we must place our bets according to the price that is available.  The reality of the situation is that whilst we are often right in our rated assessments we are sometimes so far out that it’s not funny.  Picture the situation when you have rated 5 horses in a race and not one of these horses is even close.  In spite of all our best efforts it will happen, fortunately only sometimes.

The benefit of level profit betting is that you will win the same amount of money from every winner but the amount of you bet will vary according to the price.  Let’s say you have rated your selection at 2/1 and the price at the track is 100/1.  You would imagine that something is wrong.  It may not be, but clearly you will have two problems.  One is to overcome the fact that 100/1 winners are extremely rare.  I personally have backed only a handful in a lifetime.  The second problem, and this depends on the size of your bet, is getting someone to take your money.

Most Bookmakers will bet the odds to $2,000.  With a 100/1 shot you will therefore be confined to a $20 bet.  If you want to bet say $300 or $400 you will find that your horse will drop to 33/1 or less just with the odd bet placed around the ring.  If you bet with the tote, you will also be affecting you own price, although perhaps not as much.  The effect is less obvious once we get down to the under 10/1 bracket, but betting just $500 on a 9/2 shot proved difficult to place in the interstate ring at Canterbury in late 1991.  Hopefully this was an aberration, but it highlights the point.  There are some critics of level profit betting, but it opens up a number of options for us including the common method known as dutching.

Firstly.  Let’s look at a single horse backed to win $100.  We simply divide the 100 by the price available e.g. if the horse is 4/1 100/4 = 25.  The bet is 25 units and if it wins we get 125 back i.e. 100 units profit plus our stake.  To perform the same exercise with more than one horse is a little more difficult but basically goes like this.

Let’s look at 3 horses A is 3/1 B is 4/1 and C is 5/1.  The correct stake to produce an even profit should either of the three win is simply 100 divide by the odds plus 1.  So..

A is 100/3 +1 = 100/4 = 25
B is 100/4 + 1 = 100 /5 = 20
C is 100/5 + 1 = 100/6 = 17

Our profit will be 100 less the total stake which is 62 units or a profit of 38 units.  To make an even 100 units we simply divide 100/38 = 2.6 and multiply this by the original stake for each horse to get our new outlay.  In this case, A is now 25 x 2.6 = 65 B = 20 x 2.6 = 52 and so on.

In this case we have outlaid 62 units to return a profit of 38 units.  It doesn’t matter what the actual return.  The outlay is always going to be 62% for a return of 38% and we really have to think about the wisdom of doing this.  In other words we must be really sure that one of our selections will win.  To succeed we will have to be right at least two out of every three times.

As an exercise I have set up two separate reports and compared level profit betting to the better known Betting to Prices.  The periods are Sept 89 and Sept 91.  Every horse was Top Rated at 9/10 and an overlay price obtained.  The first series shows 4 winners out of 13 (31%) and the second 6 our of 12 (50%) or overall 40%.

At first glance a page of figures is pretty boring, but it is interesting to note that even though the two sets of figures are two years apart, the consistency is there.  It isn’t stated but the majority of the horses that missed winning, still managed to make the place.

Here are the ratings for 28/3/92, the last racing day before this book went to the printers.
 

HORSE	PRICE	LP	RTN	BTP	RTN
Ali Boy	9/2	22	122	33	181
Atlantic Bve.	11/4	36	136	53	198
Don’t Look N.	13/8	61		53
Dark Chief	2/1	50	150	53	159
Dr Grace	7/1	14		36
Riga Raffle	33/1	3		33
Totals		186	408	261	538
In percentage terms			+119%		+106%

 

Three winners from 6 bets is good betting in anyone’s language.  You will note that the average level profit bet is less than the average overlay bet.  This is because we are only betting our Top Rated selections when we have rated them at 2/1 or less.  The minimum bet, if we are betting to prices is $33.  The minimum bet with a level profit method is going to be as low as $1 (for a 100/1 shot).

I believe, that in the long run, there will be no difference between the two methods.  If you bet overlays and find that there is a period where all the winners are at fairly average prices you will wish that you were betting level profit.  When a 20/1 shot wins you will wish that you were betting to prices.  What you must do is make a decision as to which method suits your style and bank to start with.  If you have a large Bank the Betting To Prices method will be quite O.K. because you can stand a losing or average period until the Big Winner comes along.  At the end of the year you will be ahead.

If you are starting small and relying on building a Bank, then the level profit method is more likely to increase steadily, allowing maximum growth.  The warning I always make is that you must keep a reserve Bank in case you encounter an unusually long run of outs, so that you can start again.

Progressive Staking Plans

I will only touch briefly on these.  My own staking plan Countdown To Profits is a very good plan with a minimal risk factor.  The profits will be very slow in coming but you will never be in any sort of trouble.  Thr Turf Monthly publication Winways has a number of less conservative plans that would suit the high strike rate you can achieve by rating your selections according to the factors I have given you.  These plans are not for the serious punter who attends the track and bets in substantial sums.  They are ideal, however, for the TAB punter who is going to be less aware of the prices available until after the race.  They also suit the punter who just wishes to work out some standout selections and follow them up on a week by week basis and those who are simply betting level stakes (they don’t wish to differentiate between rated prices).

The last remaining discussion on Staking is Each Way and Place Betting.

Place Betting

It is difficult to see how you can profit by betting for place only.  I do know that this method works, as a client of mine used it regularly on the Winform selections.  His first bet for the day was $50.  This bet was raised by $50 for each losing bet until a placed horse was encountered.  Once a placing occurred the next bet was $50 less until the bet size reduced to the original $50.  My client rarely had a losing day.

The real problem with place betting is that the TAB’s have introduced the practice of rounding down some years ago, which means that the dividends received now can be up to 7% less than you are entitled to.  The other problem, which was really created by this first one, is that place betting pools are declining as one by one, people are waking up to the rip off that has been occurring and swearing off place betting.

Each Way Betting

Now this is my favourite topic so watch out!  The profit you end up with by betting each way is going to be less than the profit you receive by betting straight out.  If that is true, and it is, then why would I recommend Each Way betting?

The simple fact is that the average person will react badly to backing loser after loser, week after week, and perhaps, month after month.  If your strike rate is say 33% you  could find yourself confronted with a losing streak of up to 20 or 30 bets in a row!  On the other hand with a place strike of 60% you are unlikely to encounter a longer run of outs than 8 or 9.

He who bets and goes each way,
lives to bet another day.

When betting each way with bookmakers (for the same reason I don’t advocate place betting an each way bet with the TAB is madness) you are guaranteed a fair price on the place part of your bet.  In fields of 5 to 8 runners you are guaranteed 1/3 rd the odds for the place and for fields of 8 or more you are guaranteed 1/4 the odds.

Naturally, the larger the field size, the less value such a bet has.  As an exercise you should compare the real place dividend you receive with bookmakers against the actual place dividend paid by the TAB.  You will, more often than not receive less than $1.50 for a placed horse at 2/1.  You will more often than not receive less than $2.50 for a placed horse at 8/1 yet the guaranteed bookmaker dividend is $3.00

If you are operating at a racecourse or if you have an agreed deal with an on course bookmaker such as Mark Read (it is legal these days to phone your bookmaker and ask him to place your bets for you at the track) then there are great advantages in betting each way.

The biggest advantage is a psychological one.  If I attend the races with $1,000 in my pocket (and that is not uncommon for a lot of people these days), and back nothing but losers, the fact that nearly every horse was placed is little consolation.

If, on the other hand, I go home with the major part of my back intact, then I can always come back next week and try again.  My confidence in my assessments is not dented.  I have not watched a 33/1 chance go down in the last stride and realised that I have come away with absolutely nothing for my efforts.  Given a choice I prefer to bet each way.