2/3/2001 edition

Winning Betting Tips

Ignore jockeys

Blue Diamond winner True Jewels was rejected by Stephen Baster who rode unplaced Ebony Night instead. Kerrin McEvoy rode the winner instead. He also got the ride on Melbourne Cup winner Brew after a number of jockeys dismissed the ride.

Tipsters in the media often tell you that it is significant when jockeys choose one horse in preference to another. The fact is jockeys get it wrong many more times than they get it right. When doing your form analysis it is best to ignore jockeys' choices and rejections of horses.

Blue Diamond favourites - what happened?

Lonhro $3.50 and Faiza $5.50, the favoured Hawkes pair both ran unplaced despite the confidence of the Hawkes stable. There was absolutely no way Lonhro from barrier nine would win that race at least two out of every seven times. Yet that was what punters taking the $3.50 were saying Lonhro could do. In a wide open race we considered them both under the odds and poor value bets.

The Peter Hayes trained Langoustine $4.20 was apparently set for the race and failed dismally, finishing ninth in the field of 10, beaten eight lengths. So much for following well supported horses.

First up raffle

In a Group 3 1200 metres handicap at Rosehill Condotti, resuming from a spell, was sent out as $5.00 favourite. The race was an absolute raffle.

It was absolutely impossible to line up the chances or come up with any meaningful ratings. Nine of the 14 runners were first up!!

Palladium Star was also sent out as $5.50 second favourite. Needless to say both runners were unplaced. The winner, also first up was Ab Initio who started at $21.00 and led for the entire race.

Taking short odds in those races guarantees punting losses.

Amazing effort

Primrose Sands $1.70 won the 2000 metres Listed Parramatta Cup at Rosehill. It was her fifth win in a row this preparation. She has now started eight times and is undefeated. How much longer can Gai Waterhouse keep her going this preparation?

Not back

Connections of former top three year old Gold Guru were quietly confident going into the 1800 metres Group 2 Weight for Age St. George Stakes at Caulfield last Saturday and looking forward to a successful campaign in big races in coming months. After many problems, Gold Guru won an Open Handicap at Flemington two weeks earlier, his first win in nearly three years.

Those hopes must have been dashed. At Caulfield Gold Guru finished tenth of the 11 runners.

Trifecta trap

The New South Wales TAB is now allowing punters to take proportional trifectas. The way it works is as long as your outlay is a minimum of $5.00 and at least 1% of the cost of taking the trifecta with dollar units you get a proportional payout.

For example, boxing six horses with dollar units will cost $120. You can have the same combination going for $5. In this case you will receive 5/120 of the payout. So if the trifecta pays $120, the punter outlaying $120 will get his money back and the punter outlaying $5 will also get his money back. If the trifecta pays $600 the the punter outlaying $120 will have a collect of $600 for a $480 profit, while the punter outlaying $5 will have a proportional collect of $25 for a $20 profit.

This is great news for small and medium punters.

But the big trap is that many punters will now end up taking too many trifecta combinations.

If punters do that they will find that they will end up getting many returns when they "win" which are less than the small cost of their trifecta. Those losing "wins" will quickly mount up.

Next: Punt to Win 23/2/2001

Betting packages

Top Odds Are Important

If you regularly get poor odds you must lose.

Did you back any of these winners last Saturday?
If you did, see the prices you should have got.

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