Too many numbers

[WinterTriangle]

Maybe I'm cheap, or maybe I just don't feel I should play a race if I don't have it somewhat "clear" in my mind, but I guess i'm astonished when I see people make wagers like this:
12436/1243567/12368957

I guess I *could* understand doing it in a pick 6 or something, but .....naw, not even then.

I was thinking about this with regrard to the Pick6 King, who appears, if it is true, to be what I call an "elegant" handicapper.

The software programmers of yore, who wrote "elegant" code....some of you techies on here might remember STEVE GIBSON, of Gibson Research, who wrote Spinwrite, one of the best hard disk (data recovery and drive maintenance) utilities ever written...hands down. (Still available, actually).

The whole program fit on a floppy, was written in assembly language, and people were still astonished (even in more modern times) because Steve would upgrade it, and it was still a brilliant program. Now, coders write applications and operating systems that are so bloated...it's like they are unwilling to do due dilligence to properly edit their code down to what is *essential*. It appears to be a LOST ART.

Are we seeing the same thing in handicapping?

I'm always amazed when I see, on some of the racing sites, supposedly "great" handicappers who give you a trifecta that looks like they threw in the whole kitchen sink. What would you need them for? "Anyone" can do that!
Just put every horse in except the donkeys. :) O

Does anyone else feel this way? I guess it depends what kind of player you are, but my style is to wager little to win a lot. If I can't sluice a field of horses down pretty well......I just pass the race. Because it means I'm just not seeing it.

[Garvin27]

Maybe I'm cheap, or maybe I just don't feel I should play a race if I don't have it somewhat "clear" in my mind, but I guess i'm astonished when I see people make wagers like this:
12436/1243567/12368957

I guess I *could* understand doing it in a pick 6 or something, but .....naw, not even then.

I was thinking about this with regrard to the Pick6 King, who appears, if it is true, to be what I call an "elegant" handicapper.

The software programmers of yore, who wrote "elegant" code....some of you techies on here might remember STEVE GIBSON, of Gibson Research, who wrote Spinwrite, one of the best hard disk (data recovery and drive maintenance) utilities ever written...hands down. (Still available, actually).

The whole program fit on a floppy, was written in assembly language, and people were still astonished (even in more modern times) because Steve would upgrade it, and it was still a brilliant program. Now, coders write applications and operating systems that are so bloated...it's like they are unwilling to do due dilligence to properly edit their code down to what is *essential*. It appears to be a LOST ART.

Are we seeing the same thing in handicapping?

I'm always amazed when I see, on some of the racing sites, supposedly "great" handicappers who give you a trifecta that looks like they threw in the whole kitchen sink. What would you need them for? "Anyone" can do that!
Just put every horse in except the donkeys. :) O

Does anyone else feel this way? I guess it depends what kind of player you are, but my style is to wager little to win a lot. If I can't sluice a field of horses down pretty well......I just pass the race. Because it means I'm just not seeing it.

I'm with you. What may not have been 'good for the sport' several decades ago. sure is now. And there will be more of it down the road. The game has become a venue for lottery-style wagering with a higher reward(?) in view. Players are entitled to these pools and certainly deserve to win when they hit. The deeper the exotic, the more luck (and cost) required. It's hard to say what the actual value of handicapping for many of these wagers really is, in reference to actually being ahead of the game, with direct reference to that 'handicapping'.

[Cadillakin]

Years ago there was a fast grey filly named Matching... I won't be able to relate this exactly because my memory is not sharp about the details...

Matching was racing at Santa Anita and she was in the 4-5 range. I had an instinct to bet another horse (George Vogel trained) whom I thought had a real chance to beat her.. but I wasn't sure how to play it... My horse was better than 50-1.

Back and forth, back and forth.. I'm mulling it over.. Can she really beat Matching or am I delusional? So, as post time approaches, and still not knowing up from down, I play a 20 dollar exacta box. As you might be guessing, the longshot won, and Matching ran out..

This one bet shaped my gambling future. It didn't make me better.. It made me much worse. My exotic play became sloppy. I covered everything, I covered my covers and then covered once more, just so I wouldn't be left empty handed... It has literally cost me thousands of dollars in profits over my lifetime..

I'm much sharper now, but still not as decisive as I should be. I'm a disciplined win better, which always keeps me afloat, but with exotics, I still lack a true killer instinct.

Regarding Mr Pick6, I doubt the truth of that story.. If it is so, he is not a handcapper, he is a soothsayer.. I have hit the pick 6 a couple of dozen times.. Most of my wins are in the 100/500-1 range with one score in the 1000-1 range... But this guy is supposedly winning bets that might regularly go well beyond 1000-1.. maybe even 10,000-1

Those kind of scores, IMO, happen only very few times, if ever, in a lifetime of gambling... Unless of course, one is literally throwing money by the barrel into the pools. So for me, the guy is either a swami or the extent of his wagering is not really being told.. but he is not a gambler that I can recognize..

[Dave Schwartz]

Caddilac,

Good post! IMHO, you have touched on an important area for handicappers: The personal baggage they carry into their handicapping/wagering!

I have had many discussions with players who were truly trying to recapture an early successful experience at the track that totally shaped how they handicap and bet.

The only way this can be overcome is with a concerted effort of logic that proves to them that their particular handicapping baggage is just not rooted in fact.


Regards,
Dave Schwartz

[CBedo]

I agree as well. I think many still need the psychological crutch of cashing versus getting value, and I must admit that I sometimes fight putting in non-value creating combinations in my wagers, especially when going through a losing streak. I even see this in the exacta or pick 3 pools. How often do you see someone bet a three (or even four) horse box in an exacta? How often do you really think they all have equal probability of winning and equal value from the payoffs? Not very often. Most of these types of bets just have too much overhead (too many losing combinations) to create value over the long term.

[46zilzal]

Read Malcolm Galdwell's BLINK and it will change the way you evaluate things.

Our adaptive unconscious is a strong decision maker "behnd the locked doors" or our consciousness.

[CBedo]

Read Malcolm Galdwell's BLINK and it will change the way you evaluate things.

Our adaptive unconscious is a strong decision maker "behnd the locked doors" or our consciousness.Personally, I thought Blink had some great stories, but Malcom Gladwell's assertions and how he tied everything together was terrible. There is another book, in response to his that is called THINK that I haven't read yet. I do agree with some of what he talks about as thin slicing.

[fmolf]

I agree as well. I think many still need the psychological crutch of cashing versus getting value, and I must admit that I sometimes fight putting in non-value creating combinations in my wagers, especially when going through a losing streak. I even see this in the exacta or pick 3 pools. How often do you see someone bet a three (or even four) horse box in an exacta? How often do you really think they all have equal probability of winning and equal value from the payoffs? Not very often. Most of these types of bets just have too much overhead (too many losing combinations) to create value over the long term.
i totally agree you definitely lose your value the more horses you use in your exotics...i always harken back to crist's mantra "bet a little win a lot"..or was it beyer?....some of these players with their computer programs are just palying percentages to make a small percentage on money wagered so it must work or they would not do it ...too mechanical for me no fun or satisfaction to it...we all know how good it feels to hit the exacta cold for a ten spot!

[CBedo]

i totally agree you definitely lose your value the more horses you use in your exotics...i always harken back to crist's mantra "bet a little win a lot"..or was it beyer?....some of these players with their computer programs are just palying percentages to make a small percentage on money wagered so it must work or they would not do it ...too mechanical for me no fun or satisfaction to it...we all know how good it feels to hit the exacta cold for a ten spot!

For sure! The ultimate example for me was the Funny Cide/Empire Maker/Ten Most Wanted Belmont. Off of my work (which looking back may have been flawed, lol) the exacta payoff for the Empire Maker over Ten Most Wanted was great value, but the Ten Most Wanted over Empire Maker exacta was underlayed (same dynamic with Empire Maker and Funny Cide), so I bet the two biggest exactas of my life at that time, Empire Maker over Ten Most Wanted and a slightly smaller Empire Maker over Funny Cide.

It also happened to be the first time ever my girlfriend had bet on a horse race, and because of the name and "how pretty his silks were," she had Ten Most Wanted for $2.....to show. When they started coming down the lane, it looked like TMW was going to get by Empire Maker and she is going crazy yelling for her horse. I don't think I've ever been as animated yelling "NO, NO! We want it this way! This way!" haha. She thought I was yelling at her and started yelling back at me, haha. Needless to say, Empire Maker held on, I bought her a very nice dinner, and all were happy!

[fmolf]

For sure! The ultimate example for me was the Funny Cide/Empire Maker/Ten Most Wanted Belmont. Off of my work (which looking back may have been flawed, lol) the exacta payoff for the Empire Maker over Ten Most Wanted was great value, but the Ten Most Wanted over Empire Maker exacta was underlayed (same dynamic with Empire Maker and Funny Cide), so I bet the two biggest exactas of my life at that time, Empire Maker over Ten Most Wanted and a slightly smaller Empire Maker over Funny Cide.

It also happened to be the first time ever my girlfriend had bet on a horse race, and because of the name and "how pretty his silks were," she had Ten Most Wanted for $2.....to show. When they started coming down the lane, it looked like TMW was going to get by Empire Maker and she is going crazy yelling for her horse. I don't think I've ever been as animated yelling "NO, NO! We want it this way! This way!" haha. She thought I was yelling at her and started yelling back at me, haha. Needless to say, Empire Maker held on, I bought her a very nice dinner, and all were happy!
great story ...did you give her her bet back...one reason why i am glad my wife does not bet on the horses....she prefers slots and roulette....when i try to explain to her she is throwing her money away we argue... :lol: i have stopped trying an sit in the horse parlor in atlantic city while she is at the tables...thank god she leaves me alone!!

[Cratos]

Maybe I'm cheap, or maybe I just don't feel I should play a race if I don't have it somewhat "clear" in my mind, but I guess i'm astonished when I see people make wagers like this:
12436/1243567/12368957

I guess I *could* understand doing it in a pick 6 or something, but .....naw, not even then.

I was thinking about this with regrard to the Pick6 King, who appears, if it is true, to be what I call an "elegant" handicapper.

The software programmers of yore, who wrote "elegant" code....some of you techies on here might remember STEVE GIBSON, of Gibson Research, who wrote Spinwrite, one of the best hard disk (data recovery and drive maintenance) utilities ever written...hands down. (Still available, actually).

The whole program fit on a floppy, was written in assembly language, and people were still astonished (even in more modern times) because Steve would upgrade it, and it was still a brilliant program. Now, coders write applications and operating systems that are so bloated...it's like they are unwilling to do due dilligence to properly edit their code down to what is *essential*. It appears to be a LOST ART.

Are we seeing the same thing in handicapping?

I'm always amazed when I see, on some of the racing sites, supposedly "great" handicappers who give you a trifecta that looks like they threw in the whole kitchen sink. What would you need them for? "Anyone" can do that!
Just put every horse in except the donkeys. :) O

Does anyone else feel this way? I guess it depends what kind of player you are, but my style is to wager little to win a lot. If I can't sluice a field of horses down pretty well......I just pass the race. Because it means I'm just not seeing it.


A very good post and my approach is very simple; and that is to be a very discipline gambler.

I do my handicapping before I go to the racetrack and decide on my bets for the day (usually 2-3) at win bets only of odds not less than 3-1.

If I lose, my comment to myself is “there is always another day.”

My discipline didn’t come easy nor did it come without a price. I spent many years betting exotics trying to hit the “big one” until one day at Saratoga a friend says to me: “Why not take the money that you are wagering on the exotics and bet it to win only?” I did and that was the start of me becoming a discipline gambler.

This game is about being a good handicapper and a even better gambler, but whichever you are; you must have discipline.