What is the deal with the late bets?
 

I've seen three races today where a horse was 6-1, 8-1 or near there some 2 minutes to post (from a morning line around the same) and look up on the board, after they win of course, and they were 2-1 or less.

I have no idea how this can be happening but this phenomena is new. It wasn't a thing even five years ago. All of a sudden a massive dump of money is coming in with almost no time to post and almost always on the right horse, no matter the morning line.

I know this has been discussed at length. Just tough to watch.

It's called late money.

BTW, I just finished posting 500 win bets on the VIP forum over the last 11 days or so. I had a positive 12% ROI at the end of the 500 run.

My whole goal during this "exhibition" was to hunt for longshots. As it turned out, my average win mutuel was over $20. Of course, my strike rate was only 11%

My point? I hit 55 winners over 500 races. NOT ONCE, do I recall ever thinking or seeing that one of my winners was bet down either right after, during or after the race. NOT ONCE.

If, as you are implying, there is PAST POSTING going on, why don't they ever seem to past post longshots? Are they not as worthy of past posting as some 9-1 shot that gets cut to 9/2 (which I personally posted about on here not too long ago)?

The simple answer to your question is that there are groups of well financed individuals employing methods that do DUMP a tremendous amount of money into the pools at the last second. And they are good ENOUGH at picking winners that YOU notice this. I know you don't believe any single person or any group could possibly be this good, but you may have to adjust some of your core beliefs because I can assure you, yes, they can be that good.

what tracks and how much Win money was needed to make this move?

Late money via simulcasting has been going on for around 30 years now.
If I had a dollar for every complaint I've heard about late odds moves,
I could have retired long ago.

Lately, I have seen plenty of horses breaking to lead for the first quarter
and have their odds increase in running. It's always happened in both
directions, no doubt. That's inevitable with the $ volume bet off track.

I don't subscribe to the conspiracy of past posting.
If I did, my last bet would have been placed years ago.

I have noticed this too. To be completely honest with you, I think at the majority of tracks there isn't anything fishy going on. Perhaps at smaller tracks there may be, with trainers and people "in the know" hammering horses at the windows in the final seconds.

My personal opinion is that it is happening more often and becoming more prevalent because of the increased ability of computers. Many of these odds drops are on overlays and horses with good connections. I believe it is people that are running computer programs designed to detect these overlays and bet them down.

Take a look at some late odds changes at Gulfstream, many times horses will dip from 15-1 to 8-1 and run up the field there. Maybe they are just delayed at updating odds, but it seems to happen a lot at that track.

I don't either.

Yes those businesses / syndicates can put $100 million- $2 billion (maybe more?) a year in wagers, and they pretty much have unlimited research/employees/tech tools to pretty much know even what the final odds will be.

You are right, they are "good enough" at picking winners due to the resources they have.

From my understanding, these are quite different from "whales". Whales are just people who place very large wagers and hope to recover their loses thru rebates. The "groups of well financed individuals" you speak of are the syndicate/companies who pretty much have incredible resources and are better at picking winners than whales.

I just don't see how any of that affects my game. I'm not wagering that kind of money, and if I can't find value in a race, I just pass the race. Oftentimes, that means whole cards.

I tracked the "ways I lose". It's not only about preparation, but when I'm at live racing, for instance, the urge to bet every race is a sure money loser.

Self control CAN be one of the most profitable behaviors/strategies.

Agree 1000%.

If you are willing to put in the time it takes, you can win at this game, of this I have ZERO doubt.

Even in the current environment.

But you must be dedicated and disciplined above all else. You must find the leaks in your game. You must define your method and stick to it. And you must handicap the RACES as well as the HORSES. Handicapping the horses is probably the easiest part of all of the above.

I'd guess that the majority of those horses bet down in the final dump do in fact attend the pace, with a decent chunk actually making the lead (but I don't have the data, and I could be wrong).

I don't think it's past-posting, but I do think that when a favorite will likely be the controlling speed, it fits a lot of the big-bet models for triggering a play.

I'm guessing that the whales feel that 'late' is the best time to hammer these.

(Pool manipulation aside)Late is the time to bet for the price that YOU(the whale) drive.

I have no idea how much if any significance is given to things like avoiding bad gate actors or very late negatives from the horse as well.

I have been betting a lot more tracks around the country the past month and you really see some strange stuff at the smaller tracks.

I bet a race at Hastings yesterday, the horse was 8/1 going into the gate, which I was totally fine with, he broke well and out the the gate flash was 17/1! Then about halfway down the backstretch he flashed to 6/1, which I still thought was fair. He finished second at about those odds.

I bet a horse at lone star, a bigger track than Hastings, horse was 8/1 and while never looking like a loser drifted up to 11/1 during the running. This was not shocking as the horse was in against name runners from top trainers on the circuit.

Usually though, they go down for me but its all over the board. The bottom line is the fluctuating tote makes betting for value pretty tough.

But win what? Crumbs? :rolleyes:
At 11%, I would not be betting much on anything, and I would rather get a part time job than have to live through all that work with so infrequent returns.

My new strategy is to only bet underlays.
Saturday, Bel R7 - the :1: horse was my pick and I made him 4-1 bet odds.
H won at 2-1 and it occurred to me that as long as the tracks allow some groups far better access to the pools than the vast majority of the bettors, there will be no overlays, but underlays are made by "them." So if something is much lower than I think it should be, then it is a bet. If something is an "overlay" it probably is not worth betting.

I did find two nice overlays Saturday - both at 9-5. The excitement damn near gave me a heart attack.

I did have 6 "winners" I did not bet because they were "underlays."
Those 6 underlays paid far more than my two overlays.

Those "chalk-eating weasels" are eating better than me.:lol:

.

Tracks have to make tough decisions about how they spend their money.
Things like modern software that would fix this problem, accurate timing systems, the salary of a half-wit to ensure the races are run at the right distance - all this stuff would benefit the players, but who gives a good GD about the customers? We told them to shut up and bet and by GAWD, they do!

To each their own I suppose.

I don't really care what the win rate is as long as it is making money.

It took me 11 days to bet 500 races. I had $124 in profit based on a $2 bet.

Make it a $20 bet and that's over $1,000 in profit in 11 days. Almost $3,000 a month...that's not a bad side income.

A $20 wager on a long shot isn't going to impact the price much at all even at the smaller tracks.

I will work on improving though, for my next 500 race run.

The win rate though can be tough, sure I can bet longshots that win at say 8%
-10% and can even make a profit over the long haul. Even at small increments its possible to have a very long dry spell and watching that bankroll shrink can get real tough. I think one needs s pretty sizable investment to withstand that pressure (100x bet amount, maybe 200x).

I hear you.

My ROI after around 360 bets was at a bigly 27%

The next 140 bets cut my ROI down by more than half...I hit that bad run that you speak of, and then some.