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Old 03-05-2019, 12:53 PM   #16
biggestal99
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Originally Posted by acorn54 View Post
i salute you. most years i lose at the horses, that's okay, it's my thrill money i spend. maybe your investing acumen is better than mine, but i can't complain about the investing strategy i use. i dollar cost averaged into a S & P in my working years, and i dollar cost average taking my money out, in my retirement. i have gotten 10 fold what i put into the index fund, with no attention being paid to it. i can't say that about my horsebettting.

I think the way you play the stock market is the way you should play horses.


How did you pick that particular fund?


how did you approach funding it?


That is a good beginning.



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Old 03-05-2019, 12:53 PM   #17
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I think people are losing interest in everything other than big events. The crowds and handle are still huge for the Derby, BC, Belmont and a handful of other major events, but only the hard core players care about day to day racing.

I think that's true of many other sports also.

Some people just love a certain sport and follow it closely all the time, but there are so many entertainment options people gravitate to the playoffs, finals, main event etc... and less towards the day to day action.
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Old 03-05-2019, 04:47 PM   #18
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I think you guys kind of misinterpreted what I'm trying to say. By handicapper I mean just people that are interested in the sport. I was just taking a guess from what I observed at my home tracks in my state. It's probably not that way everywhere though. I'm pretty much an online player when it comes to wagering, so I kind of know what you mean by that. If I go to the track there is too many distractions and with the way I handicap now most of the time I use free information and don't even use a drf.
We are almost all on online players now.

I just came back from a week in SoCal. Really wanted to get out to the track. Even stayed in Pasadena so we'd be close. But between bad weather, all the added costs, and the fact that it just isn't a very good deal, I decided to go to the zoo instead.

But the big problem is (as someone else mentioned) the lack of young players.
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Old 03-06-2019, 06:49 PM   #19
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In my opinion I don't see too many younger people 20's-30's going to the track much. I'm sure this varies on what time and what days you go though.
They go to Del Mar.
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Old 03-06-2019, 06:50 PM   #20
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We are almost all on online players now.

I just came back from a week in SoCal. Really wanted to get out to the track. Even stayed in Pasadena so we'd be close. But between bad weather, all the added costs, and the fact that it just isn't a very good deal, I decided to go to the zoo instead.

But the big problem is (as someone else mentioned) the lack of young players.
You would have enjoyed this week even more.
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Old 03-06-2019, 09:35 PM   #21
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You would have enjoyed this week even more.
I don't understand.
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Old 03-07-2019, 07:14 AM   #22
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I don't understand.
No t-bred racong at all this week in So Csl.
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Old 03-07-2019, 07:41 AM   #23
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Racing will continue to decline, as the economy declines, since it's an entertainment business. There are many other factors in play, but the trend is clear - the masses just don't have the disposable funds for expensive hobbies in the same quantities as in the past, and it affects many other forms of entertainment - NASCAR, NFL, NBA, eating out, new cars, pricey cell phones, pricey TV packages (cord cutters, anyone?). With just the cost of staying alive and employed or on government handouts getting more difficult each day for many in the middle and lower classes, the squeeze is on.

This forum represents an older and wealthier demographic that's, to be blunt, dying off, and I think many here are sheltered (for the moment) from how bad things really are out there. The younger generations behind those of us who are boomers are saddled with college loan debt, declining wages, and with entire career fields that are disappearing. Their opportunities are limited. With the rise in socialism and growth in government and more and more of the masses wanting handouts, I don't see racing getting any tax breaks to lower handle and help grow the game. It will be labeled as an "evil boomer hobby", and the younger folks will avoid it.

Racing will survive in some form though. If I had to guess, I'd say 20-30 years from now, horse racing will be in two venues - a very small circuit for the wealthy owners, who will race their limited stock for very short meets at Sar, CD, Kee, Bel, GP and maybe Del Mar. The races will have small fields, decent purses, and will be unaffordable for most. It will be the sport of kings, in a sense. The other form will be at the other end of the economic scale, with cheap local horses competing for very small purses at county fairs, or blocked off back roads again in Louisiana. Even then, it will only be the relatively affluent who will be able to own the horses, as the rest of us will be scrambling for a slice of moldy bread and a cup of cold gruel....

That's my two cents.
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Old 03-07-2019, 08:32 AM   #24
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Racing will continue to decline, as the economy declines, since it's an entertainment business. There are many other factors in play, but the trend is clear - the masses just don't have the disposable funds for expensive hobbies in the same quantities as in the past, and it affects many other forms of entertainment - NASCAR, NFL, NBA, eating out, new cars, pricey cell phones, pricey TV packages (cord cutters, anyone?). With just the cost of staying alive and employed or on government handouts getting more difficult each day for many in the middle and lower classes, the squeeze is on.

This forum represents an older and wealthier demographic that's, to be blunt, dying off, and I think many here are sheltered (for the moment) from how bad things really are out there. The younger generations behind those of us who are boomers are saddled with college loan debt, declining wages, and with entire career fields that are disappearing. Their opportunities are limited. With the rise in socialism and growth in government and more and more of the masses wanting handouts, I don't see racing getting any tax breaks to lower handle and help grow the game. It will be labeled as an "evil boomer hobby", and the younger folks will avoid it.

Racing will survive in some form though. If I had to guess, I'd say 20-30 years from now, horse racing will be in two venues - a very small circuit for the wealthy owners, who will race their limited stock for very short meets at Sar, CD, Kee, Bel, GP and maybe Del Mar. The races will have small fields, decent purses, and will be unaffordable for most. It will be the sport of kings, in a sense. The other form will be at the other end of the economic scale, with cheap local horses competing for very small purses at county fairs, or blocked off back roads again in Louisiana. Even then, it will only be the relatively affluent who will be able to own the horses, as the rest of us will be scrambling for a slice of moldy bread and a cup of cold gruel....

That's my two cents.
I don't have the ability to really break down this post without getting into politics, but GAMBLING overall is growing massively, so your "everyone is too broke to gamble" idea is obviously wrong and directly the opposite of reality.

People love to gamble, they just don't want to wager on horse racing because there are a lot of better options.
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Old 03-07-2019, 08:43 AM   #25
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Originally Posted by Parkview_Pirate View Post
Racing will continue to decline, as the economy declines, since it's an entertainment business. There are many other factors in play, but the trend is clear - the masses just don't have the disposable funds for expensive hobbies in the same quantities as in the past, and it affects many other forms of entertainment - NASCAR, NFL, NBA, eating out, new cars, pricey cell phones, pricey TV packages (cord cutters, anyone?). With just the cost of staying alive and employed or on government handouts getting more difficult each day for many in the middle and lower classes, the squeeze is on.

This forum represents an older and wealthier demographic that's, to be blunt, dying off, and I think many here are sheltered (for the moment) from how bad things really are out there. The younger generations behind those of us who are boomers are saddled with college loan debt, declining wages, and with entire career fields that are disappearing. Their opportunities are limited. With the rise in socialism and growth in government and more and more of the masses wanting handouts, I don't see racing getting any tax breaks to lower handle and help grow the game. It will be labeled as an "evil boomer hobby", and the younger folks will avoid it.

Racing will survive in some form though. If I had to guess, I'd say 20-30 years from now, horse racing will be in two venues - a very small circuit for the wealthy owners, who will race their limited stock for very short meets at Sar, CD, Kee, Bel, GP and maybe Del Mar. The races will have small fields, decent purses, and will be unaffordable for most. It will be the sport of kings, in a sense. The other form will be at the other end of the economic scale, with cheap local horses competing for very small purses at county fairs, or blocked off back roads again in Louisiana. Even then, it will only be the relatively affluent who will be able to own the horses, as the rest of us will be scrambling for a slice of moldy bread and a cup of cold gruel....

That's my two cents.
why all the doom and gloom,the economy is fine,its just that racing has not changed with the times that contributes to its decline.People will gamble,maybe not racing since to learn how to play is too costly to get started with the learning curve along with the high expense to attend at the track.
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Old 03-08-2019, 01:16 PM   #26
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Horse racing in California? Put a Fork in it, it's done.
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Old 03-08-2019, 02:17 PM   #27
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Thoughts on horseracing...

In what other legal gambling game can the bettor participate without ever leaving the comfort of his own home? Do we realize what sort of an advantage this is that horseracing has been allowed to monopolize? You fire up your computer, and the entire horseracing word is opened up to you...with free past performances just a mouse-click away. Can we compare this to the bygone era of 30 years ago, when the horseplayers were forced to drive to faraway locales in order to bet on a handful of races a day? And that was when the game THRIVED...while the game today is counting on political subsidizing maneuvers in order to survive? How does any of this make any sense?

People love to gamble, and they always will. But this love that the public has for gambling is too obvious, and does not allow for any gambling monopolies to exist for any length of time. Due to the insatiable appetite that our politicians have for money, different forms of legalized gambling get introduced to the betting public...and then the good old "survival-of-the-fittest" routine sorts things out from there. If you give the customer what he wants, then you survive, and might even prosper. But if you alienate him...then you will suffer.

Horseracing struggles today because it can't compete with the other much-more inconvenient forms of gambling that are available today. Today's gambler needn't be "introduced" to this game, as the horseracing industry thinks; the gambler today is already well introduced to this game...and he shuns it bacause he considers it to be a bad gamble. It has nothing to do with the "economy", or the supposed "complexity" of this game when compared to other forms of legalized gambling. In business, it's all very simple: offer a dubious product at an excessively high price...and you are doomed to failure. And in gambling, the lesson is even simpler: "People won't gamble with you if you have a shady reputation".

If the politicians didn't intervene and handed casino licenses to the racetrack operators, then our game would already be dead. Think about that. And the coroner would have identified the cause of death for what it really was. A SUICIDE.
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Old 03-08-2019, 03:10 PM   #28
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What indicator could you point to that shows horse racing interest has increased? Betting? No, because A) the number has declined by nearly 26% from a peak in the early 2000's and B) the number has probably decreased a hell of a lot more if it weren't for computer batch betting.
Absolutely. Looking at year by year numbers from the Jockey Club:

2004 - 15.1 bn
2005 - 14.5 bn
2006 - 14.7 bn
2007 - 14.7 bn
2008 - 13.6 bn
2009 - 12.3 bn
2010 - 11.4 bn
2011 - 10.7 bn
2012 - 10.8 bn
2013 - 10.8 bn
2014 - 10.5 bn
2015 - 10.6 bn
2016 - 10.6 bn
2017 - 10.9 bn
2018 - 11.2 bn

So steady decline from 2004 through 2011, and then staying pretty steady since then. That 2011-2012 timeframe is also when whale betting really picked up, and has certainly propped up those numbers.

Hard to get an accurate number on how much handle whales are putting in (they use so many different outlets, offshore accounts, what qualifies as a "whale" anyway, etc). But from my own experience I know it's at least 2 bn a year, and probably closer to 3.

So, remove 3bn from any of those recent figures, and you find that normal betting is down nearly 50% from 2004. The industry can pretend to ignore this and point at small increases over the last couple years...but under the surface, there's trouble brewing.

Even more concerning, these whales are close to a point of diminishing returns themselves. As more "dumb" money leaves the pools (either being chased away for various reasons, or voluntarily leaving for something more appealing like sports betting), you get to a point where the whales are cannibalizing each other. At that point they'll pack up shop and move to wherever the public goes. Then we'll see the bottom completely fall out of US racing, and everyone will pretend that they never saw it coming.

Last edited by AlsoEligible; 03-08-2019 at 03:11 PM.
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Old 03-08-2019, 04:03 PM   #29
Robert Fischer
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Don't know if the following landmark events had anything to do with (feel free to add your own)


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2004 - 15.1 bn (POKER BOOM)
2005 - 14.5 bn (POKER BOOM)
2006 - 14.7 bn (POKER BOOM)(BARBARO)
2007 - 14.7 bn
2008 - 13.6 bn (BC SYNTH) (RECESSION)
2009 - 12.3 bn (BC SYNTH) (RECESSION)
2010 - 11.4 bn (CASINO PROLIFERATION?)(MEGA MILLIONS PROLIFERATION)
2011 - 10.7 bn " "
2012 - 10.8 bn" "
2013 - 10.8 bn" "
2014 - 10.5 bn" "
2015 - 10.6 bn " "
2016 - 10.6 bn " "
2017 - 10.9 bn " "
2018 - 11.2 bn " " (JUSTIFY TRIPLE CROWN)(CRAPPY LATE-SEASON WEATHER)
2019 - ??.? bn " " (IMPROVED TAX LAWS) (SANTA ANITA BREAKDOWNS)
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Old 03-09-2019, 12:37 AM   #30
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I've played the horses for 35 years - Southern California, mainly. Sat in the grandstands and on the benches at Santa Anita and Hollywood Park when the crowds were overflowing. Moved to Tahoe and played at Caesars and Harveys race and sports books, and had to get the sportsbook supervisors to put a reserved seat at one of the tables to guarantee a spot for race day weekends.

Stayed up for hours with my Tomlinson figures and Helm ratings, as well as a marked-up Daily Racing form. I loved it!

Then the following happened:

--5, 6 and 7 horse fields, with scratches on top of that.
--Jorge Navarro and his open disdain for fair play and laughing at the realization that he stiffed his "bookie" with "the juice".
--Horses at Gulfstream Park not getting to the gate until 6 or 7 minutes after "zero minutes to post".
--Tampa and Santa Anita following GP's lead with their own delays.
--Odds changing in deep stretch.
--Herding where jockeys aren't held accountable
--the jockey in Louisiana (Smith?) who claimed light-headedness and got away with it when he clearly threw the race.

And this doesn't even include the breakdowns at SA (drug induced?)

Thank God for Oaklawn Park...and, to a lesser degree, Woodbine.
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