Playing To Win

MONEY MANAGEMENT CONTINUED

Sound money management principles also apply to the individual bets we make. When playing the gimmicks, we shouldn’t use so many combinations that we may lose even when one of our combinations wins. “Insurance” bets should be used sparingly. When our primary bet wins, they dilute our winnings, and when it loses, they too often simply add to our loss. Because of the way the mutuels are computed, it is usually best to bet longshots to win only. The potential place and show mutuels usually don’t justify their risk, because they are diluted by the shorter priced horses with whom they share the pool.

Never play a longshot in the first race of a double with a favorite in the second race. It is much better to simply bet the longshot to win. Combining a favorite in the first race with a longshot in the second, however, is okay. The reason for this apparent contradiction is simple. In the double, we are betting the proceeds that a win bet would have returned in the first race with a horse in the second race. It is one bet but think of it as two. If we actually collected the funds that winning 20-1 shot would pay, would we bet it all that a 6-5 favorite would win the next race? Of course not! To do otherwise would violate the “never bet a lot to win a little” principle. That isn’t the case when the 6-5 horse wins the first race and the longshot is running in the second.

Another bet that should never be made is a two horse exacta box combining a favorite with a longshot. Once again we are actually making two bets. There is nothing wrong with the favorite wins with the longshot half of the box, but the other half violates sound money management principles. When a longshot wins with the favorite running second the exacta mutuel isn’t great enough to justify the risk that the longshot will win but that the favorite won’t run second. Besides, there is nothing quite so discouraging as to identify a winning longshot but lose because the favorite ran poorly. A much better way to handle the situation is to simply bet the longshot to win and back that bet up with a straight favorite-longshot exacta.

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