Longshots In The Bc Races

[Bobtailnag]

I stumbled on an article shortly after the BC last year which, if you like to wager, you might find surprising. Since the inception of the BC in 1984 there have been 1577 betting interests. If you had wagered $2 on every one of those 1577 entries you would have invested $3154 and received in return $3093. And if Frans Valentine had not been DQ in the 1984 Juv Filly race, the return would have been $3197 – a $43 profit. We who have been wagering on the ponies for some period of time know how difficult it is to maintain a positive ROI and yet as far as the BC races go, you could just about do it by betting every horse in every race.

The writer, who apparently was also a bettor surmised that if you betting every horse yielded a break even proposition, who no handicapping involved, that there must have been a lot of big payoffs over the years. So he looked a little closer and discovered that if you wagered only on the huge long shots ( His definition of “huge” was horses going off at 20/1 and higher) you would have made 613 wagers at $2 each – cost $1226, and you would have realized a return of $1588.20 – a positive ROI of 30%.

I think what makes this information a significant revelation is that this didn’t just happen for a couple of years, this happened over a span of 25 years which should cause you to think this is might not just be a coincidence but a pattern that is likely to continue to occur. So I decided to look at all his data and do a little more research and speculation on my own.

We all have discussed the state of the breed in North America due to the top breeders switch from breeding for stamina and class to breeding for the sales ring. I think you all might agree that today we have fewer top runners who stay in top form, stay healthy and more importantly, stay consistent. If this is true, then we should see an increase in fewer of the top 3 or 4 betting interests winning and more long shots getting the top spot. Have we?

In the past 5 years, 1999 thru 2003, there were 184 horses who went off at 20/1 or more in the BC races and those$368 in bets would have returned $669 – a positive ROI of 82%. Now get this – that 82% ROI includes 2001 when NO 20/1 horses won a race. Even with missing a whole year and wasting wagers on 37 20/1 shots – you still would have almost doubled your money.

I went a little deeper. I wanted to try to refine it a bit more so that I might be able to lower the number of 20/1 horses to consider when looking for those elusive big odds horses to consider for the exotic wagers – and I think I found something and the reason why it might be viable.

Going back far enough to cover the years when the breeders new “sales ring” mentality was evolving I discovered that a) there have been no 20/1 winners in the F&M Turf (But there have only been a handful of those races to date). B) In the past 15 years there has only been one 20/1 winner in the Mile and that was Domedriver in 2002 – the year Landseer broke down at the head of the stretch – and I might be wrong but I think that the favorite, Rock or Gibralter, was behind Landseer and had to pull wide to avoid the falling horse, and we all remember that RofG was closing like freight train and almost won it anyway. C) Since 1991 there have been no 20/1 winners in the Turf. The 3 turf races combined only had 1 20/1 winner in 15 years and that ONE might have been caused by a falling horse.

Why just the turf races? Think European. They still breed for stamina and class, they have been kicking our tails in the grass races, and everybody knows it so they get bet heavier.

My bottom line here is that if you play the exotics and/or the PK-3’s and/or PK-4; and if you like to use multiple horses on top, you might want to look for any reason what-so-ever to put one of the 20+/1 runners up there because it just might be one or the 2 or 3 looong shot winners on the day – and from what this data says, the odds are very strong we will have a couple of theM this year – and they will do it in the dirt races.

[smitch124]

That is really an astounding fact when you think about it. Bet every horse and basically break even!! Wow!! This is certainly food for thought and great info. Thanks for the post!

I will look harder at the longshots on the dirt!

[SCFAN]

great post keep'em coming

[Underdogs]

Good post. I will play a few and see what happens.

[Sooner4Life]

Good Post, So many good horses in the Breeder's Cup that even 25-1 odd horses are legit contenders.

[WildKat]

Great article!! I told some of the guys at the off track site and they were suprised, Thanks, kbar