Interesting Article on TwinSpires - Horse Racing Forum - PaceAdvantage.Com

ScullyDog · 10-01-2013, 11:00 AM

http://www.paulickreport.com/news/ra...-me-the-money/

Robert Goren · 10-01-2013, 01:11 PM

In case you didn't know, ADWs like Twinspires have to eat the losses in negative pools. I am pretty sure we would see a lot more bridge jumping if they didn't.

PhantomOnTour · 10-01-2013, 04:55 PM

When I closed my XpressBet account a few years ago (don't ask why...it's a long story) it still had a few bucks in it and they said they won't pay me the balance because it's less than five bucks.
I totally lost my cool and began to threaten legal action and yadayadayada.
Long story short - I got a check for $2.35 about three days later.

Bottom line for me when dealing with any company is to raise holy hell and threaten to take my biz elsewhere. It usually works.

Pensacola Pete · 10-01-2013, 11:15 PM

I just closed my Twinspires account because of what I read in that story. I don't make place or show bets so their rule doesn't affect me. They are the most anal, take-all, give-nothing, scheming and manipulative (i.e. Players Pool scam that makes them money and loses money for those who feed it) ADW that's still in business. There are plenty of other ADWs who will welcome me. I know that some people don't have many choices besides Twinspires. I'm glad I'm not one of them.

ScullyDog · 10-03-2013, 10:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Robert Goren

In case you didn't know, ADWs like Twinspires have to eat the losses in negative pools. I am pretty sure we would see a lot more bridge jumping if they didn't.

I did know that, but wondered why they would mess with somebody if the amount was so small. I could see if he was placing huge show bets on prohibitive favorites, but the amounts the author speaks about aren't earth shattering. It doesn't bother me one way or the other, but I'm surprised he was on their radar.

Pensacola Pete · 10-03-2013, 01:32 PM

To make my position clearer, I could understand it if the guy was betting $100,000 to show on 1/5 shots in 5 horse fields. That's a good piece of change for an ADW to cough up. But the guy in the article was making $500 show bets --- and not all of the horses were negative pool payouts. They do millions a day in business. They get a fat cut of the take and give back next to nothing in player rewards. To tell a guy his max is $25 is so 1970s Vegas racebook classless that I won't use them again unless I move to a state that has no other options. I already had an issue with their Players Pool scam. This was the last straw.

Al Gobbi · 10-03-2013, 07:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pensacola Pete

To make my position clearer, I could understand it if the guy was betting $100,000 to show on 1/5 shots in 5 horse fields. That's a good piece of change for an ADW to cough up. But the guy in the article was making $500 show bets --- and not all of the horses were negative pool payouts. They do millions a day in business. They get a fat cut of the take and give back next to nothing in player rewards. To tell a guy his max is $25 is so 1970s Vegas racebook classless that I won't use them again unless I move to a state that has no other options. I already had an issue with their Players Pool scam. This was the last straw.

Twinspires still has basically the same wager interfaces they have now that they had when they merged the Youbet platform over to the site while others have significantly improved.

Hoofless_Wonder · 10-04-2013, 05:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Al Gobbi

Twinspires still has basically the same wager interfaces they have now that they had when they merged the Youbet platform over to the site while others have significantly improved.

I still find TS to be the best interface between TS, Xpressbet, the now defunct Youbet and TVG. In Illinois we're restricted from other ADWs.

I think the customer service at Xpressbet is best of those three, but their interface hasn't changed much either and is very cumbersome.

Robert Goren · 10-04-2013, 07:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pensacola Pete

To make my position clearer, I could understand it if the guy was betting $100,000 to show on 1/5 shots in 5 horse fields. That's a good piece of change for an ADW to cough up. But the guy in the article was making $500 show bets --- and not all of the horses were negative pool payouts. They do millions a day in business. They get a fat cut of the take and give back next to nothing in player rewards. To tell a guy his max is $25 is so 1970s Vegas racebook classless that I won't use them again unless I move to a state that has no other options. I already had an issue with their Players Pool scam. This was the last straw.

Another just for the record. There are several ADWs that will not take show bets if they think there is any chance of a negative pool even though the track offers it. Not even a $2 one.
If the story is true, there is one lesson to take the story. ADWs monitor your bets pretty closely. I would have thought a $500 show bet wasn't worth tracking. Apparently not.

FocusWiz · 10-04-2013, 10:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hoofless_Wonder

I still find TS to be the best interface between TS, Xpressbet, the now defunct Youbet and TVG. In Illinois we're restricted from other ADWs.

I think the customer service at Xpressbet is best of those three, but their interface hasn't changed much either and is very cumbersome.

I am probably hijacking here, but I was wondering which wagering interface you use at TwinSpires. I know these choices can be very personal, so please don't take this as an affront, I am trying to like their interface and I have not yet become comfortable with any of them.

I just started using them a week ago and became very frustrated by the "twinspires tv" experience which required me to scroll around tiny dropdownlists to choose a wager type and amount (yes, I know I can type an "o" to go directly to "other" but first I have to activate the control with my mouse). Likewise, the "Up Next" section shows only a handful of tracks at a time and is another scrolling pain (alright, you can tell I am not a "mouse" lover). Otherwise, the interface is functional and relatively clean. "Express & Pro" looks more promising, with more information at your fingertips, but wagering starts with amount selection and is a multi-step process that takes you back a step or two if you realize you want to change the amount. Thus, I have been using the "Classic" interface which (at least on my system) does not seem to remove old races from the "Race" dropdownlist in the wagering area after the race is over (in other words, long after race 2 is final, it still appears in the list of races (and if you choose it, you won't learn you've made a mistake until after you've selected the wager type and amount). I know I should pay attention and not choose them since it shows the current race in the upper portion of the screen, but should not be a programming challenge to keep these lists in synch. Refreshing the page does not fix this, though it removes any tracks added using the "Add Tracks" option on that page. The only way to get them to stick is to click on "wager now" select the tracks again on the main page and then re-enter classic mode. I guess I am still on a learning curve here, because there are a lot of features I really like and I have heard lots of good things about it.

Just based on my experiences, at this point I actually prefer the XpressBet "wagerpage" and BetAmerica "wagerpad" over what I've seen at TwinSpires. Both show all options in a single view and selecting a track in either one automatically gives you the current race by default. XpressBet also includes a "swap" feature which allows you to swap legs of a double or exacta wager (or individual legs of exotics with more than two legs).

I find I really miss the default to the next race when I am in TwinSpires and pick a track. I think they should populate the race dropdownlist with the next bettable race. I am never going to play a prior race but am more often than not playing the next race.

Which TwinSpires interface are you most happy with? Thanks for any suggestions you might have.

Hoofless_Wonder · 10-04-2013, 01:49 PM

Part of my preferences on Twinspires have to do with the interface I've used the longest, which is the "classic" menu which I believe originally ported in back in from the Winticket days.

It's true the current race doesn't refresh (a valid nitpick) - that may be a recent change/bug, as I don't recall that behavior several years ago. You simply have to reclick in the track to get that gadget to refresh properly to the current race. My other complaint about the classic menu is that occasionally when submitting a wager the transaction just dumps, but that probably has to do more with the backend database or the transaction handling versus the wagering interface. If near post time, this can be a real pain to reload/refresh the menus and resubmit - sometimes getting shut out. You are also correct about the "added tracks" not sticking - that's a pain, as well as some of the default wager values ($11, $12, etc) were removed recently for no real benefit. However, when working, it's the smoothest and fastest way to get a wager in - at least for me.

The Twinspires TV wagering menus are horrible - very slow, very cumbersome, and constantly needing to slide the gadget on the right hand side to display more than 8 or 9 horses. The Express and Pro menus trace their heritage to the old Youbet menus, which I never really liked - for simple online wagering I shouldn't need to install more code on Win-Doze. I haven't tried it for a while, but the last time I used it it just didn't seem quite as good as the classic.

The Xpressbet menus just seem cumbersome to me, which goes back to your comment about personal preferences. I don't like the "pop-up" of a separate menu for wagering, whether the beta style or non-beta. I'll give them credit with having many settings which can be configured to individual tastes, but I've never spent the time to tailor it too much - it should just be more intuitive to begin with. My biggest complaint is that the multi-horse wagers seem to take a lot of clicking to complete. It's almost as bad as code I could write.

TVG I barely used due to their per-wager fee, but now that they've gotten rid of that, I may go back and try them again.

I was hoping to explore some other ADWs soon, as I'm moving out of Illinois later this month (

). However, it looks like the sinister forces that restrict ADWs in some states are in effect in Washington, and I'll be stuck with "the big 3" for the foreseeable future....<sigh>....

FocusWiz · 10-04-2013, 02:05 PM

I have also settled on the classic menu on TwinSpires for now.

Regarding the popups (both XpressBet and Betamerica do that, though XpressBet has some other options which can incorporate everthing into a simple screen [with a slightly less functional wager pad]).The popups get especially annoying if they are hiding behind something and we are trying to get it to "pop up" again (unsuccessfully).

AmWager is nice for keeping everything in a single screen, but it take a lot of getting used to; especially having the video in a little movable window that cannot be totally off the page. What I don't like about AmWager is that once the race goes final, you can no longer see the final tote information (for example to see what the program information was and final odds for your horse or some other one). Theirs is the only one I know of where you can't see that information once the results are in.

Like we agreed, it is really a matter of personal preference. Thanks for the response.

PaceAdvantage · 10-04-2013, 02:07 PM

When using TS, I've become quite partial to the old YouBet format...

highnote · 10-04-2013, 05:07 PM

I have heard that some ADWs that give rebates ask their players to pay for their portion of the minus pool loss. That seems fair.

Ted Craven · 10-06-2013, 01:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FocusWiz

AmWager is nice for keeping everything in a single screen, but it take a lot of getting used to; especially having the video in a little movable window that cannot be totally off the page.

What I don't like about AmWager is that once the race goes final, you can no longer see the final tote information (for example to see what the program information was and final odds for your horse or some other one). Theirs is the only one I know of where you can't see that information once the results are in.

You can see the final tote info for all pools after the race is official on the Results page:

You can also open AmWager screens in multiple separate browser instances and display ONLY video feeds in one browser, tote streams in another, results in a 3rd, etc. If you have multiple monitors, you can drag the browser with video streams to its own monitor so you can see tote and video separately.

Ted