"You shouldn't lose on a 33/1 shot" so I thought I'd start by putting a bit more meat on the bones of why we are prepared to have a rag as a loser. Most hedging is done into the exchanges so consider the following example on a day when we are running a £500 liability which will apply to any horse regardless of price. Let's also say we have a currently liability of £1100 so we need to hedge it back to win £600 to get it to our max liability. This is an actual exchange market about 10 minutes from the off on an outsider and this, I would venture, is fairly typical outside of the big meetings.
- Back price is 34.0, Lay price is 36.0 so the mid price is 35.0 which is the approximate "100%" market price or, par price if you like. Remember I have to get the liability down by £600
- Available at 34.0 = £0.39 Liability reduction £12.87
- Available at 32.0 = £6.27 Liability reduction £194.37
- Available at 30.0 = £3.23 Liability reduction £93.67
- Available at 29.0 = £3.64 Liability reduction £101.92 (I still need to get my liability down by £197.11)
- Available at 28.0 = £6.22 Liability reduction £167.94
- Available at 27.0 = £4.56 Liability now covered
Now I'm not going to sit here and work out the exact price I've taken on average but, roughly, I'm betting a 35.0 chance at somewhere in the region of 29.0. Oh, plus 2% commission And that's still with a £500 liability.
If I wanted to put it into a reasonable profit to make sure I'm winning on a rag, I'm backing at an average of about 25.0. On a 35.0 chance.
A couple of caveats to that. Of course you can take what is available and wait/hope that it fills up again but that means hedging back earlier than is ideal to allow the market to fill back up. If it's a funny name on a Ladies Day somewhere, that's going to happen about 30 seconds before the off, if at all.
The 2nd caveat is that I'm not saying what we do is right- a standardised book takes shrewd money out of the book by having much the same structure regardless of the take, and that has implied value- but please bear this in mind next time you're tempted to say that you're not a "proper bookmaker" if you win on a jolly.
The 3rd and final caveat is that we lose on a jolly more often than not and we certainly have losers at the top of the market in every single race, with the possible exception of a hotpot.
And whilst we're on the soap box. 6 races yesterday for a sell out crowd paying 50 quid a head. Well done Musselburgh for generating a fixture, effectively out of a throwaway meeting (Ladies Day was a Saturday in June until fairly recently) which sells out every year. As a self employed family with 3 businesses I absolutely commend this. But they may struggle next year. We had many people coming up to us after race 6 to "bet" on race 7 which, of course, didn't exist. There was disgruntlement. A lot of it. And we weren't the only books to have a similar experience.
I know there is a need to increase field sizes, and rightly so. I don't have the figures since 1 July to see if this has been the case. But there is also a need, in my opinion, to support racetracks who are generating big crowds, regardless of the prize money on offer. I get the argument that the number of races allocated is related to prize money on offer but, again in my opinion, there must be an allowance for fixtures which are generating big crowds. I'm sad to say that the quality of the racing is irrelevant to the vast majority of people that go to these types of days- they just want to come along, have a drink, have a bet, see 7 races and dance to ABBA at the end. These make up a huge percentage of the racegoers of today and tomorrow, regardless of your own personal view on premier races, and their needs must be taken into consideration as well because, ultimately, you need a crowd or you become greyhound racing. I appreciate I am banging the same drum but the live sport aspect is being pretty much totally disregarded with every decision that seems to be coming out.
Furthermore (and finally!) as a sport, the more you ignore the needs of the paying public and the more that crowd sizes reduce (and they will, with the 6 race drip feed effect on customer satisfaction and the 10am/4pm starts which will become a regular feature from next year) the more you become reliant on the levy and the more power the off course giants will hold. Like the supplier who only feeds into one supermarket you are weakening your bargaining position with every bit of power you are giving up. It may take a few years, and it may be too late by then, so I hope they come to the realisation sooner rather than later and add some balance back into decision making which factors in the paying public before we lose them for good. 1) We're not on a great run at the moment. 3 losers and 2 of them were 1st and 2nd. The lower liability, Simple Star, was scant comfort especially as the smashed up, fast finishing A La Francaise who just failed, was a dreamy jackpot which went uncashed.
2) And again. You're clearly going to lay "Majestic Beauty" on Ladies Day and we did. We were done on a short head once more from Cover Point, again jackpot territory. Sinking feeling once more as Musselburgh yielded its 8th disappointment on the run.
3) Make that 9. Tafsir the best bet horse in the race with us for a max loss mitigated in part by virtually skinning the places. I wanted to go home.
4) Finally we took a step forward. Bicep, Poet's Magic and Manigordo all losers but Judgement Call was a tidy winner and we got a fair chunk back. Only 2 to go and we weren't covering expenses but at least we weren't behind in the book any more.
5) Monhammer and last week's heartbreaker, The Gay Blade, well punted. Sparkle In His Eye a decent winner though, perhaps, not as good as you would expect, as the name was cheeky enough to attract a few each ways.
6) Fifty Sent. There was no other horse. Apparently you should "Party like it's your birthday" or something and impromptu parties, presumably like birthdays, were struck up all over the lawns. We stood it of course along with Irv and a couple of rags and finally got a monster with Non Mollare who we were desperate to win last Friday as well, but all good things do come to those who wait, apparently, though we chose not to party.
And then the 7th race groans began and rumbled on. I don't blame them.
Perth next Saturday for us. Another massive day which is a race short. Until then...
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