Knowing when and how to toss the race favorite by reading the tote board
 

* NO HANDICAPPING INVOLVED.
All one has to do is 2 things:
a) Identify the first 2-3 race choices; and
b) check the correlations between the exacta prices and the tote odds.

Someone once said the truth of mathematics is absolute, I think I heard or read that somewhere before. This method I'm going to show you I perfected in the late 70's. For 2 years I did nothing but chart the exactas and doubles at Aqu & Bel- no handicapping PERIOD. Back then all I had to work with was the tv monitors, so I had to write fast. Today I have the luxury of printing out all the exactas at any point in time, 12 horse field, no problem. To the best of my knowledge only 1 other person did what I was doing, a man called The Baron whom I never met. He was in the clubhouse, I stayed in the grandstand. Back then they called me Clipboard. I needed something to write on so I used a clipboard with my checkerboard squared paper.
Now you can do this method by identifying the winner or key horse to use in exotics also.
I recommend doing this with 3-4 minutes to post because just like tote odds, exacta prices will change also. For my purposes here I'm using the final screen odds and prices.
This example race is from MNR 10-17-22, race 4.
You'll notice the favorite[#1] is 1-2 and 2nd choice#2] is 2-1. The #4 was a distant 3rd choice at 9-1.
Now look at the exacta prices. So the #2 is 4x the price of the #1 on the board but only 1.5x in the exactas. Note how close the 1-4/4-1 combinations are in the exactas but not so with the 2-4/4-2 combos. THAT'S IT, THAT'S ALL U NEED TO KNOW to toss the #1 as the winner! Now you can take it a step further. Check out the exacta prices #1 w/ 3-4-8 and the #2 w/3-4-8. when checking the 3-4 and 4-8 combos you'll see the closeness of the later, not so with 3-4. Toss the #3. Also the 1-8/8-1 and the 2-8/8-2 have a further spread than with the #4. For the purpose of just trying to eliminate our work is done.
The race ran 2-4-8-1.

You've refined Al Illich's old secret DD play that he developed in the 40's. I used and refined his old system similar to yours by using the exacta grids as well. Your main difference is you focus on the top two betting choices, that have averaged. 54% to probably 60% of the winners these days. Illich used to play any odds, and I'm certain your method has more winners, but his method sometimes hit crazy prices.

I refined my method with exactas, similar to yours and even shared an excel program with a few players on here.
I also incorporated early money into the play, especially when the PP's looked especially bad. i know that makes no sense to good handicappers, but I still use that approach.
I've put several of my plays from that system here in the selections thread over the years. One notable one was the Ohio Derby winner several years ago, that ran second and won after a DQ. There was a lot of heated discussion on PA after that happened, but I didn't participate in that. I can't recall his name, but think he was a horse out of either First Dude or Mo ???

In all fairness back in 1978-79 I never heard of Al I. And yes I did not limit myself to short horses, I had plenty of prices. Just wanted to show here how to eliminate the favorite. See exacta grid for 1st at Keenland.

No I wasn't doubting that you just copied Al's method, it was pretty simplistic actually. I developed my own method as well, and in the last few years started to work on an add-on to predetermine fair odds something that Nitro does in his super secret tote plays. Or maybe I shouldn't mention the N-name.
edit: Oh, I missed that you also played higher odds too.

Hey I've always been hard luck. U wanna see Y. In today's 7th at Keenland, if I bothered to check the final fraction column, I have a completely different day. I used the Score ranking column.

I have been doing the same thing as you as far back as reading the monitors. I used a texas instrument hand calculator with a programable card slot. Now I cut and paste the WPS and exacta boards into excel and run the program from there with two key stokes. A few years ago I was able to automatically download the data from twinspires, but they changed the format and could not update my program.
I ran hundreds of what if scenarios. I seem to have settled in on a set over that last 1000 races..

all downloads are recalculated to account for track take outs, giving me the true probabilities.
the run time for that is about 2 seconds!!

American Ingenuity
 

Ah yes - the TI-59. Years ago, I participated in a joint US/USSR aeronomy launch off of the coast of Wallops Island. (The Soviets weren't allowed on the base because of security considerations). I was talking with a group of US and Soviet scientists. Something came up in the course of our conversation which required some very complex calculation. I pulled out my TI-59 with a wallet of program cards and loaded several programs into the calculator and performed the calculations. The TI-59 had a tiny motor which pulled the program cards through the calculator as the read heads read the programs and loaded them into the calculator. All of the Soviet scientists stopped talking and stared at the calculator as the motor give a little whining sound. One of the Soviet scientists said, "I know what your calculator just did. There's nothing available for any price in the Soviet Union that can do that."


Not surprising, since, at the time, the Soviets were using discreet electronic components whereas the United States had been using transistors and semiconductors for several years. Sorry to hijack the thread.

Good read. Thanks

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formula's play is based on his belief that the exacta pools are more efficient than the win pools

I've never seen any study showing this

I believe the opposite of this. that the win pools are more efficent than the exacta pools

much, much more efficient


.

Many a time ,

I also find the winner ......after the race


We all do it!

THATS NOT CORRECT

HERE ARE THE RESULTS FOR MY CURRENT STUDY. STARAIGHT EXACTA PLAYS ARE NOT SHOW. THEY DO NOT REPRESENT PROFIT.

DO YOU KNOW OF A STUDY THAT IS BASED ON POOL DATA PRIOR TO THE START OF THE RACE.. IF SO, PLEASE SHARE.

your data is in the initial stages....

as I see it , so far , its not looking too good

it may turn....

so lets hold off on finding something earth shattering

believe me ...every avenue has been looked at IMO

You are no ye reading it correctly. I wish we all had bet on those plays

This reminds me of the Bruce Willis movie Armageddon where they visit the Soviet space station and the Russian cosmonaut hits the equipment with a hammer or pipe wrench to get it to work.