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[Jeff P]

Interesting topic.

Valid points Steve. IMHO right on the money.

At the risk of looking like I'm piling on (which I'm not) a while back I looked at my records from the past year and saw something that surprised me. Show wagers - in races where I was deliberately playing against bridge jumper horses that my program considered vulnerable - that single category had the highest pre-rebate roi of any wager category spanning the preceding 12 months...

Which brings me to a very important point. There are a lot of different ways to reach profitable play. For every blanket statement about things like wager type, handicapping methodology, computer program vs pencil and drf, class levels, track or venue, surface, distance, track condition, rider, trainer, workouts, medication, equipment changes, etc. there are bound to be exceptions. The minute somebody proclaims "THAT" can't possibly work - there's a pretty good chance somebody else is out there making some variation of "THAT" work (whatever "that" turns out to be.)

IMHO wager type isn't the difference maker. Positive expectancy of the individual wager is what's important. There's a concept that I call Strength of Play. In JCapper each potential win wager can be measured according to certain metrics. You have probability. You have payoff based on the odds after the pool reflects the amount of all bets including yours. From that you can calculate expected value. The higher the probability and the higher the expected value the higher the Strength of Play. The higher the Strength of Play the higher the percentage of bankroll you can safely bet... much like Kelly.

There are situations each and every day where Strength of Play is sufficiently strong (a positive expectancy exists) to justify wagering in many different pools... win, place, show, exacta, tri, super, double, pick3, pick4, pick5, pick6... did I leave anything out?

The important thing is the ability to analyze Strength of Play so that you can differentiate between good bets and bad bets. And then muster the discipline to make (predominantly) only good bets. Btw, that last part is harder than most would think.



The following areas are the critical elements to success - at least for me:

1. Selection Process

2. Play or Pass Decision Making

3. Bet Sizing

4. Ticket Structure/Backing Your Opinion

5. Carrying Your Edge Into the Long Run

6. Discipline

It's been my experience that far too many players spend far too much time and energy focusing on area #1. The more I play and the more experience I get under my belt the more convinced I become that areas 2-6 are far more important than area #1. (But that's just me.)

And sure as I type this out and hit the submit button there's bound to be somebody out there winning decent money (hell, MY money on some days) and their strong point is going to be in area #1 - and they probably have no idea whatsoever it is I'm talking about when they hear terms like Strength of Play or Play or Pass Decision Making. <G>


-jp

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