6/19/2009
Our latest Guest Commentator for Churchill Downs, Rick Needham, defies at least two horse racing handicapper steryotypes: he has never smoked a cigar and he doesn’t read the DRF. Known to many as TrackMaster® Rick, he brings more than 40 years of handicapping experience to bear to deliver a solid win percentage. His website features free handicapping videos for thoroughbred, harness and greyhound racing, each recorded in his home “studio,” sometimes with a baseball game still airing in the background. Wearing tee shirts and baseball caps that change color from day to day, he delivers his race reports with a deliberation almost at odds with his casual appearance and surroundings.
Needham began making racing selections online in 1982, which makes him one of the first internet handicappers. A self-described TrackMaster evangelist, he has been providing internet analysis through TrackMaster® since 1994, the year that TrackMaster software predicted the win by Go For Gin.
Perhaps because of his background as the child of educators, he is unusually generous about sharing his knowledge. In the Pennsylvania and Maryland areas, he gives horse racing handicapping seminars. For Case the Race, he offered to share some prepared comments on a number of helpful topics.
We selected a few of our favorites for this week. Here they are:
TrackMaster Rick's Boxed Exotic Theory
One of the most common email or phone questions that I get from the folks who download my reports which now appear not only on the TrackMaster website, but also on Equibase, YouBet, and TVG sites ... is "how do I use your reports?" And believe me folks ... that is a tough question to answer. The reason that it is a "difficult response" is the simple fact, that TrackMaster, and any other reputable horse racing web site, can only report "ROI's" (Return on Investment) based on a single win bet on the "top pick." My dilemma lies in the fact that I can not remember placing a win bet for many, many years (the "Future Wager" for the Triple Crown Races being an exception) ... I play "boxed exotics" ... Exactas, Trifectas, and Superfectas ... and the "bottom line" is of course that we are in a capitalistic society, and that horrible word ... "greed," clouds my logic. Quite honestly ... I am less concerned with which entry wins ... but can I get "multiple entries" to "hit the board."
Now, for the sanity of the folks that read my reports, I do put the entry that I feel will win "on top" ... so the "successes" of my reports which are posted on the "message boards" reflect those "top selections." You also need to understand that my personal ROI's, based on exotic wagering are often significantly higher than could be achieved via win betting alone, and some "discipline" is needed to extract those profits.
I go to the track with a "goal" ... and that goal is to "double my money!" I keep a record of travel expenses, admission expenses etc. and need to add that to my "goal" immediately. So if I play a three horse, $2.00 exacta box ($12.00 wager) in the first race, and I have spent $4.00 in gas, $2.00 to get in, and "whack" a $50.00 exacta in the first race ... believe it or not .. I quit! Do I meet my "double goal" ... rarely ... do I make a profit (after expenses) ... often ... I do indeed pay the IRS for this "pleasure" almost on an annual basis.
Random "exotic thoughts." There is no question, that the "most logical" wager in horse racing is the win bet alone. But here's how I "look at it!" Let's assume an 8 horse field .... common at most tracks .. even the better ones in California and Florida. My goal is not to pick winners ... but to eliminate entries that have no chance of "hitting the board." Using TrackMaster PLUS software, I try to eliminate the 3 horses that stand "no chance." That leaves five entries that we can now "focus on" ... I even use the "SCRATCH FUNCTION" included in the software so that I am not "tempted" to consider these three horses that I just eliminated. I now have five to consider, which means (assuming that I've wiped out the worst three), that I have a 1 in 5 chance of picking the winner just by "throwing darts" (and some of the folks that I have discussed this strategy with, use it for "WIN BETTING STRATEGY." That's a 20% chance of winning, which means that you will probably cash 2 or 3 tickets on an "average day" (just guessing from your "field of five) ... but some of those winners will be betting favorites which will not put you on the IRS' "most wanted list."
Now for some of the (easy) "math." On the average, the betting favorite, wins less than 1/3rd of the time at most tracks ... so .. I NEVER use the morning line favorite as a KEY ... this means that if I am boxing my three best choices in an exacta, that (assuming that they hit the board), that I have a 66% chance (or better) that the favorite will not win (may hit the board), and that my exacta or trifecta boxed effort will pay substantially better than a win bet. If the favorite wins, you may "win and lose" ... in other words, you cash, but lose some money ... but that is still better than betting on a favorite to win, and lose 2/3rds of the time! The "logical problem" with boxed exotic wagering is that in a 3 horse box ... you are admitting that even before the race begins, that you are making 5 losing wagers ... but then ... how many of you go to the window and make 6 WIN bets on an 8 horse field?
Another strategy to consider .. is to simply throw out the favorite from your 3-horse boxed, exotic efforts ... you will cash less tickets, but your average "payoff" will be obviously much higher. The track that I have the most success utilizing this strategy is Aqueduct ... during their Winter Meet ... especially with sprints! All of the sprints in the winter are at the 6.0 furlong distance (no confusion here ... all the same distance .. no 5½ furlong "drag races," or 7.0 furlongs "semi-sprints" to cloud those pace profiles .. I just love winter in New York! (But then ... also at Tampa Bay Downs, Gulfstream Park, Santa Anita, Penn National, and Turf Paradise ... the strategy works VERY WELL at these tracks also! See 'ya at the track (and at the cashier's window) ... "BOXING" is indeed recommended!
- Rick Needham Equibase/TrackMaster
Pari-Mutuel Psychology
For the novice visitor to a race track, the idea of pari-mutuel wagering, can often be confusing. However, for the more advanced horse player this general "confusion" can often lead to some dramatic, and profitable plays on some "emotional" races, and also on one very specific race each day ... the last race on the card! Since the term pari-mutuel is the type of wager that we are making, we are not betting against the track, or a fixed odd-line as in sports betting, we are betting "amongst ourselves" (which is exactly what the term pari-mutuel means after being translated from French). At a race track on any given day, the people who can be found going to the teller windows as the race card progresses have handicapping abilities which range from "Let's Bet on The Gray" - to "I like that horse's name" - to savvied horse players who spend hours the day before making sound handicapping judgements based on the traditional racing principles of speed, class and pace. Unfortunately for most, by the 8th race in a 9 race card, they are "in the red!" (Think about it for a second .. we would not have racing, or casino action, or wagering on sports events if the majority of the bettors made a profit) The 9th race then becomes crucial for a lot of folks who are losing, and their strategy of course it to hope to "get back into the black" with a tidy longshot (4-1 or better) win in the finale. Once again, the majority of these folks do not understand the "pari-mutuel concept" so their "shot wagers" of course depresses the odds on the longshot, making them a decided UNDERLAY, while the 2-1 or 5-2 entry that you had selected the night before (but probably would have not wagered on), will then become an OVERLAY as the odds on the tote board climb to 3-1 and then to 7-2. I've noticed in many years of handicapping that this "phenomenon" is more prevalent on the weekend, when the track attendance is often higher, and the patrons often are casual players out for an "exciting afternoon." The strategy also works well for "emotional races" such as The Triple Crown, or Breeders' Cup events ... just look what happened in The Preakness the year when Fusaichi Pegasus was bet down by the public who expected that they were witnessing the birth of a Cigar or a Secretariat, driving the price on the winner, Red Bullet up on the board. A similar situation happened in 1999 when the "fans" (and good fans they were - but not pari-mutuel players), drove the odds on Charismatic down in The Belmont Stakes, providing a huge OVERLAY on Lemon Drop Kid! You can certainly use this strategy to good advantage at an off-track facility on a daily basis, as you will often have the opportunity to wager on numerous "Race #9's!" Remember to wait until the final moments to place your wager, and that morning line favorite that you ruled out the night before because of a potential "poor payout" will suddenly become quite a value!
- Rick Needham
That Lasix Lift
For many handicappers, a couple of medications which are commonly administered to race horses (Butazolidin and Lasix) are just extraneous pieces of information that appear in their daily programs or forms ... medicines that essentially "part of racing" because "they all run on drugs!" I have heard that comment countless times at racing facilities, and I usually just ignore it, because a general knowledge of how and why these medicines are administered can lead to some "clues" in unscrambling the handicapping puzzle. Let's talk about LASIX today. Technically, the medication is called FUROSEMIDE and is is sold under the "trade name" LASIX. Many horses develop a respiratory bleeding condition during their careers, and LASIX, a powerful diuretic, that causes fluids locked up in the horse's body tissues to be released and expelled in urine is often commonly administered. The drug causes the horse's blood pressure to be lowered, particularly in the aorta and pulmonary artery, which allows for the horse's performance to return to the "normal level" and keeps excessive amounts of blood from entering the lungs. Many folks think that LASIX "juices up" a horses performance .. that is simply not true ... it can however, extend a horse's ability beyond what it normally would be (with blood entering the lungs). For a horse, there is a big side effect ... EXCESSIVE URINATION ... for the handicapper ... this side effect creates a significant WEIGHT ADVANTAGE as some Thoroughbreds can lose as much as TWENTY POUNDS of fluid during a good LASIX LEAK! The best 1st or 2nd LASIX play is on horses that have GOOD EARLY SPEED, but have shown in their past performances, a tendency to FADE after about 1/2 mile .. these are the entries that are usually suffering from bleeding, and that extra fluid in the lungs is hampering their performance ... since the LASIX has removed the extra fluid, they breath easier, and their performance is not enhanced ... is simply is NOT HINDERED! Entries that have shown little early speed ability will probably not change their performances at all after that "LASIX LIFT!"
- Rick Needham
Quick-Pick Longshots
Here's a "down and dirty" method of choosing some "playable longshots" that you might find interesting ... it's not a strategy that can be employed the night before, however you can certainly prepare yourself in advance while doing your handicapping using your TrackMaster software or a track progam showing recent past performances. The method requires that you keep your eye on the tote board, and have enough patience to wait until the "last possible moment" to place your wagers. Using your TrackMaster Software (the method works with all of our products), do a print out of the entries' past performances ... you don't need to print out a lot of "running lines" as you are going to be focusing on The Horses' Last Race Only. Put a "STAR" next to all of the entries in today's field that "went off" with pari-mutuel odds of at least 12-1 in their last start. Now ... keep your "eyes" on the tote board ... the math is simple ... you just need to know how to "divide by two!" As post time approaches, if any of your "STARRED" horses have been "bet down" to odds which are at least 50% of the post time odds in their last race, then you have a wager! Accept no less than 4-1 to keep it a "shot!"
Examples:
#6 BOOM TOWN went off at 20-1 in his last race ... 3 minutes before today's race he is 15-1 on the board ... no wager here!
#3 WILDTHANG went off at 12-1 in his last race ... 2 minutes before the start of today's race, he's 5-2 on the board ... no wager here ... 4-1 minimum rule is used.
#4 KEEPER was a 15-1 entry his last time out, and it's now 2 minutes to post and he's 7-1 on the board ... GET IN LINE! (the odds drop is more than 1/2 of his last pari-mutuel start).
If you have more than one "STARRED" entry in any race, choose the entry showing the biggest drop.
#2 MAGICMAN was 20-1 in his last start, and is 10-1 with about 2 minutes to post .. he qualifies .. however, #7 BARNEYTOO went off at 25-1 in his last race, and is now 8-1 on the board ... my wager will be on #7 BARNEYTOO!
Quite honestly folks, what often triggers these "odds drops" are the wagers being made legally by the backstretch workers who have seen these horses in training on a daily basis. Their wagers are usually not big enough to change these "shots" into "favorites" but it does not take a lot of money (especially at tracks where the mutual pools are low) to force the odds down. Be patient ... no, it is not a foolproof system ... however a couple of $25.00 bombs in a day will provide more profits than a handful of $3.60 winners!
- Rick Needham
