Hi LG

In the main it's all about identifying those factors that the market already values correctly and those that it doesn't. The answers to nearly all of this can all be found using your version of Axis.

__________________
Regards


Paul Daily - Ratings2Win Pty Ltd (Director)
R2W Axis - Axis is Australia's leading horse racing software and database; with sophisticated form analysis tools and accurate performance ratings that include Hong Kong.
http://www.ratings2win.com.au/

Hi Paul and others,

I'm about to read through the whole thread as i've got some spare time but wanted to reply to the last couple of posts first.

Essentially Paul what your saying (and correct me if i'm wrong) is that you do bet overlay's however you don't take a strict mathmatical stance on what constitutes an overlay or underlay. What I mean here is that you use whatever tools you have available whether it be subjective course knowledge, objective knowledge about the horse through facts and figures or mathmatically derived ratings (i.e. speed) and use them all to determine selections you may like in a particular race. You then decide if your getting value on these selections (overlay) and bet accordingly.

On a personal note approaching it this way makes a great deal of sense to me because its something you can relate to basically anything in life. If you go grocery shopping you unconciously decide if the steak your looking at buying is worth the price that Woolworths are offering, if its not you pass or if its 'cheap' or you deem it to have value you purchase it. The same goes when your comparing what new TV to buy, you weigh up all the options the TV has, DVD, HDMI, Wifi, place a value on all those options in your head and decide if the price the store offers provides 'value' to you or an overlay.

I work in the financial planning industry and the same method is used by many to determine whether to buy or sell shares. Weigh up the debt, industry, earnings, management etc etc, decide on what you beleive its worth and if thats more then the current price you buy.

All of these examples I believe are no different to picking a horse to back (or lay) and become profitable. Now i'm not saying i'm a professional and profitable punter however I definitely think the value or overlay approach is the way to go unless someone can show me differently (obviously mechanical works as well). Now the extremely difficult part of this process isn't deciding if something is an overlay or not, its arriving at the pricing point of the horse or field your looking to bet on.

Paul has (in my view) correctly stated the best way to go about this, and its to find the profitable or at least break even components of a horse or even a race type that the vast majority can either not access readily or typically ignore. Elements like barrier, 100 point tatts raters, last start winners or placegetters, radiotab's tips, particular jockeys, days since spell and weight are all examples of elements that are typically available right there for absolutely anyone to access or see on a screen when placing a quick bet 30 seconds before the jump and help determine a punters decision.

It's for this reason that I believe, without any solid evidence to post besides clearly stating its just my view from various stats i've used at since purchasing a database, that some or all of those elements i've posted as examples above can be either ignored or weighted lower in the punters decision process. The trick is to find and probably more importantly understand why particular elements of a track or horse don't just produce winners (i.e. strike rate) but produce PROFITABLE winners with CONSISTENCY. This is the path i've embarked on and only woken up to in the last probably 2-3 months since purchasing the database and while it still hasn't made me a profitable professional punter, i certainly feel i'm well on my way to being profitable.

Ask yourself this, if you had the following three stats infront of you what factor would you weight higher in your ratings or decision process (note the figures are just for example purposes and not actual stats). Also note the consistency figure relates to how many times the profit covers the largest odds winner.

1) Last Start Winners - 32% Strike Rate, 5% LOT, -2.06 Consistency
2) 7 Days since last start - 16% Strike Rate, 15% POT, 10.17 Consistency
3) Barrier 12 at that track - 26% Strike Rate, 54% POT, 1.63 Consistency

Some would pick Last Start Winners because of the high strike rate, lots would pick the barrier 12 at the track stat because of the combination of very high POT and reasonable strike rate, however it's the consistency of the profit with a reasonable track rate of point 2 that i've now started looking for. This is the point I believe Paul is getting at, find those factors that are rarely looked at by the wider market, are profitable, and consistently carry that profit without one or two large winners making up the majority of that profitable angle.

I've already written enough especially considering i'm far from professional and not even profitable yet, but the above touches on the process i've started going through and I definitely think i'm walking the right path now. I'm interested in others thoughts and note everything i've written is just my opinion and doesn't mean i'm right, but i certainly feel like its close.

In the regard to Double overlays I use Gary Crispes analyisis of prices and I can tell you that most Priced under $4 are invairably double that on the Fixed Tote (UniTab.)
Hence the question.

Thank you for your reply.
Much appreciated.

Hi darky,

Some might disagree with me, but if you are regularly betting to prices (using the example quoted) that have an assessed probability =<25%, and these are available more often than not at double that on the tote at jump time, then I suggest that they (the assessments) aren't much good. This is is no way a personal statement aimed at Gary as I have the utmost respect for him, but is made in the context of the math required to support your suggestion.

Why? Because the notion that anyone has assessments that are consistently able to deliver probability with an implied betting edge (ignoring the TAB takeout) of ~50% is absurd. Of course after removing the takeout it becomes even more distorted. The SP market is simply too accurate for these types of price anomaly to exist on a regular basis.

__________________
Regards


Paul Daily - Ratings2Win Pty Ltd (Director)
R2W Axis - Axis is Australia's leading horse racing software and database; with sophisticated form analysis tools and accurate performance ratings that include Hong Kong.
http://www.ratings2win.com.au/

Example

Bairnsdale
R 2 H 3 Asseed $1.70 Fixed $19

Grafton
R 3 H 1 $2.25 - $2.80

R 4 H 2 $2.70 - $9.00

Townsville
R 1 H 3 $1.70 - $4.70
R 2 H 5 $2.45 - $9.00
R 3 H 8 $3.20 - $14.00

R 4 H 4 - $3.70 - $7 Horse $7 $3.00 - $15

One hopes for a Miracle on both.

Hi darky,

Your post confirms exactly what I'm saying.

Combined probabilities in the assessments of 331.52% versus the market of 76.61%. I suggest that if you are betting to these prices consistently then it won't be long till you go broke doing so.

__________________
Regards


Paul Daily - Ratings2Win Pty Ltd (Director)
R2W Axis - Axis is Australia's leading horse racing software and database; with sophisticated form analysis tools and accurate performance ratings that include Hong Kong.
http://www.ratings2win.com.au/

Yeah.
Must admit I,m going along those lines with it.
Thank goodness the $7 win came up.
The age of Miracles is still with me.

Begs the question though - why put these asessed prices up if their that bad.

Darn good thing I,ve got a sense of Humour.

Hi darky,

They are based on the old Don Scott weight based ratings and are priced using an antiquated and totally out of date mathematical base. If you want to rely on information that is freely available in the public domain, is based in ideas that don't really apply or are irrelevant in today's marketplace then you get what you pay for or in this case don't pay for.

How can you seriously expect to derive a profit from something that everyone else has?

I suggest that you get your hands on proven and reliable ratings if you want to follow that course of action (trying to play perceived overs). Whether you buy ours or someone else's isn't the issue, just do your own research and start putting the odds in your favor.

__________________
Regards


Paul Daily - Ratings2Win Pty Ltd (Director)
R2W Axis - Axis is Australia's leading horse racing software and database; with sophisticated form analysis tools and accurate performance ratings that include Hong Kong.
http://www.ratings2win.com.au/

Had a look at your examples Darky. the D Scott method rated it at $1.70, Neural's $6.50 and Morning Line $14, so anybody's guess?? AND all sourced from the same website....please explain??

I favour the Morning Line as a LAY indicator....lol, that's how much I think of these ratings.

Hi All,

Thanks to those that have recently contributed their input into this thread. As a result of darky's questions and the subsequent responses regarding betting on overlays etc, we have come up with some interesting ideas.

The common theme in these posts has centered around the prospect of success or otherwise when betting overlays on ratings such as Don Scotts, Neurals etc.

A common mistake made by a lot of punters is that they are betting on ratings from which they have no idea of how they actually perform. So the question is: Does anyone on this forum maintain a list/spreadsheet of Don Scott, Neural or other ratings across all races for at least a 12 month period?
We are prepared to provide a complementary copy of our Axis Historical software (see website for more detail) to the person that has this information and is prepared to share the results on this forum for the benefit of themselves and others. This offer is obviously made on a 'first in best dressed basis'.

From this it will become apparent to everyone the exact strengths and weaknesses associated with these ratings so that at the very least those using them can make informed choices.

__________________
Regards


Paul Daily - Ratings2Win Pty Ltd (Director)
R2W Axis - Axis is Australia's leading horse racing software and database; with sophisticated form analysis tools and accurate performance ratings that include Hong Kong.
http://www.ratings2win.com.au/