Dr. Z's Beat The Racetrack -- republished

[Bill V.]

I saw this over at Paceadvantage

I hope Bill - Dr Z gets many orders, What a nice, very interesting handicapper he is.

Hope to see him again at Saratoga

https://www.amazon.com/Beat-Racetrack-William-T-Ziemba/dp/1635617219/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1530894674&sr=1-1&keywords=ziemba+beat+the+race+track

Best Skill to you

[gandalf380]

I also hope he is at Saratoga. I have been using his ideas for years and have consistently made money with his method.

[Ted Craven]

Charlie, Bill Ziemba told me he plans to spend the month of August in Saratoga. not sure if he'll join us, but I do plan on dropping by when I'm there.


And -- I'll return your copy of Beat the Racetrack which I asked him to autograph for you at Breeders' Cup last year :)


He's just getting over hip surgery last month so I'm not sure how mobile he'll be.


Ted

[MikeB]

I saw this over at Paceadvantage

I hope Bill - Dr Z gets many orders, What a nice, very interesting handicapper he is.

Hope to see him again at Saratoga

https://www.amazon.com/Beat-Racetrack-William-T-Ziemba/dp/1635617219/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1530894674&sr=1-1&keywords=ziemba+beat+the+race+track

Best Skill to you


I saw that too, and of course the discussion over there quickly dissolved into an argument about that book vs. others, especially Blinkers Off by Cory Fotias. Which is ironic, because Dr. Z. wrote the forward for the Fotias book.


But the good news is that the thread provided a link to a downloadable copy of the Fotias book. Free registration required.


http://www.predicteform.com/

[mick]

I had the pleasure of "chauffeuring" Dr. Ziemba around Saratoga last August and enjoyed our conversations. I've heard that Andy Beyer "bets with both hands." I have no personal knowledge of that but I can assure you that Dr. Z certainly does.

Glad to see that his book Beat the Racetrack is being reprinted. I think it's required reading for all employees of betting syndicates (aka "the whales"). For anyone who isn't familiar with it, it's about patterns of betting inefficiency in the place and show pools. The concepts are simple, although the book is a difficult read for those who are math-challenged (like me).

His thesis is that the public is very good at estimating the chances of horses to win, but not so good at finishing second or third.

Here are a couple of screenshots to illustrate the point.

[mick]

The first screenshot is from a race today at Thistledown. Twinspires has a helpful feature that provides the percentages of the pool that are bet on each horse. (Otherwise, you have to calculate the place percentage.) In this example, with a minute to post, 31.3% of the Win pool has been bet on the #1 horse while only 11.9% of the Place pool. That's a rather large disparity but does the #1 merit a place bet based solely on the tote action?

The second screenshot is of a chart I constructed using Dr. Z's formula for Place bets. (He also has one for Show betting but I'll save that for another day.) It's simple to use. Just find the horse's win odds or percentage on the left and follow it across to the horse's place pool percentage. At major tracks, the expectation should be 1.14 or more. At minor tracks, 1.18 or more.

In the Thistledown race, the intersection of 31% and 12% falls in the green with an expectation of approximately 1.78, so Dr. Z would bet #1 to Place. I bet him too and I think he ran 5th but that's horseracing. :rolleyes:

[mick]

Here's the formula for Place "Expectation". "Wi" is the amount bet on the horse to win and "W" is the amount in the Win pool. "Pi" is the amount bet on the horse to place and "P" is the amount in the Place pool. Of course, you work from inside each pair of parenthesis outward.

[Ted Craven]

Thanks for this Mick!


FWIW, RDSS Tote screen also shows these pool percentages, though rounded to whole numbers for the Place and Show pools.

46497

Ted

[mick]

It sure does! Looks like Blazing Buckeye (aka Rich Mathie) would be on for a Place bet. :D

[gandalf380]

Expected value for show betting

Ex sh = .543 + .369 ((wi / w) (si/s))

[mick]

Expected value for show betting

Ex sh = .543 + .369 ((wi / w) / (si/s))

They're easy formulas to plug into an Excel spreadsheet, whether you're working with percentages or the raw dollar amounts.

[vderdak]

I actually purchased his calculator with the formulas built in to tell you exactly how much to wager based on your bank you were working with and I did very well with it.

The issue I have now is the late money coming into the pools after the horses have left the gate, an advantage you think you may have can be completely wiped out with this last amount of money into the pools. This is why I think it's not a valid approach anymore.

When I used the calculator I did not have to worry about the final late money coming into the pools changing the advantage much since only money bet at the track determined the pools and under a minute bets were easy to place and the expected advantage did not change much.

[gandalf380]

I agree it is tougher to find tougher Dr Z bets at the larger tracks. However, since the pools are much smaller at smaller tracks, you have less late money coming in for place and show. Most syndicates are not going to bother with small pools. That being said, betting exclusively at Belmont and betting only place/or show, I am showing an ROI of 65% for the month of July. That is a small sample but shows the profits that are possible. It has been working very well also at Ft Erie.