$5 million for complete Derby order

[diablogger]

Hi, guys. Am I right on this?

Churchill is offering $5 million for predicting the exact order of the Kentucky Derby. In case you're getting your hopes up, that's 87,178,291,200 permutations by my count.

http://www.diablogger.com/racing/archives/000224.html#000224

I'm not sure if I'm calculating permutations correctly here.

[Kentucky Bred]

Box them all!

Kentucky Bred

[gillenr]

My calculator says 20!=2.432902X10 to the 18th power. If I can figure out how to do it in Excel, I'll check.

[CumberlandBluesHSH]

20!=2,432,902,008,176,640,000


in Excel...the formula is FACT(20)

[diablogger]

Thanks for the Excel tip.

Here are # of unique permutations for each field size.

1 -- 1
2 -- 2
3 -- 6
4 -- 24
5 -- 120
6 -- 720
7 -- 5,040
8 -- 40,320
9 -- 362,880
10 -- 3,628,800
11 -- 39,916,800
12 -- 479,001,600
13 -- 6,227,020,800
14 -- 87,178,291,200
15 -- 1,307,674,368,000
16 -- 20,922,789,888,000
17 -- 355,687,428,096,000
18 -- 6,402,373,705,728,000
19 -- 121,645,100,408,832,000
20 -- 2,432,902,008,176,640,000

So, in a field of 15 with a $5 million jackpot, even if you chose 5 million permutations to break even with a win, you'd still only cover 0.0004% of the possible permutations.

This really ticks me off. The Derby can be a great race for us every day handicappers due to the pool sizes. But this bet is going to siphon off money from the W-P-S and exotics pools, and for what? It's a crapshoot, basically the lottery applied to pari-mutual wagering.

[Derek2U]

Diablogger .... the key in that wager --- as in all wagers -- is
to isolate the contenders in the Win spot. In any derby field of
15 entrants, I could narrow the field down to 10 with 100%
certainty & say down to 7 with ~90%. And so, your permutation
table is of little use. You could take a horse like EmpireMaker
and, if you felt he just HAD to be 1-2-3, then you could position him that way. etc etc .... of course, its the etcs that matter here
and thats the rub, but don't disparage that payoff of 5mil until
you try reducing the possibilities by Not giving every outcome an
Equal chance.

[diablogger]

Derek, permutation tables are useful in showing that there's a non-linear relationship between field size and combinations.

This is important because the more combinations there are, the more you need to play in order to stablize your win/loss. In this case, there's one race a year with this bet. From my perspective, IT would be better for Churchill to offer this every week or not at all.

BUt go for it, if you like.

Wouldn't it suck for Churchill if the field finished in the exact order of public odds, ascending? Ouch.

[Observer]

Originally posted by diablogger
This really ticks me off. The Derby can be a great race for us every day handicappers due to the pool sizes. But this bet is going to siphon off money from the W-P-S and exotics pools, and for what? It's a crapshoot, basically the lottery applied to pari-mutual wagering.

From what I've seen, this is not a bet .. there is no wagering on this. Here is what the ad in Saturday's Racing Form says:

WIN $5 MILLION ON THE KENTUCKY DERBY, WITHOUT PLACING A BET

Register Now Through April 30

The Kentucky Derby $5 Million Pay Day. All you have do is visit kentuckyderby.com and pick the exact order of finish of all the Kentucky Derby horses. If you pick the exact Derby finish, you may win $5 million without even placing a bet! Register online now at kentuckyderby.com Game goes live April 30 at approximately 7:00 p.m. EDT.

That's exactly what the ad says .. including the typo where it reads: "All you have do is..." So, okay, now I'm wondering why they say: "If you pick the exact Derby finish, you may win $5 million without even placing a bet!" What's this "may win" supposed to mean?? Do you or don't you win for getting the order right?? Hey, you never know! (As the lottery saying goes) :D

I guess they say "may win" because in the fine print at the bottom of the ad, it says:

"Prize will be less than $5 million if fewer than 15 horses are in the starting field." .. But it also says "No purchase necessary." Oh, and one last thing .. "Prize will be awarded in thirty equal annual installments."

[PaceAdvantage]

In addition, I think if more than 1 person happens to get the exact order, they will have to split the prize, thus the "May win" part....

[Fatl@DMTC.Com]

You enter online at Kentuckyderby.com....no betting, purely online. God forbid if anyone actually would put money on a bet like this, I think this would be the only type of bet where you're better off at the slots.

[cj]

Why is a FREE contest getting ripped? It is free people, you don't have to play. Take a swing see what happens.

CJ

[diablogger]

Ah, thanks Observer, Fatl . . . the first media reports weren't entirely clear on this one, but that's a relief that people won't be getting duped at the windows with this.

I'm guessing, then, that each player only gets to choose one possible combination.