Auto paceline templates /Betting real money testing it
 

I know Ted is working on a paceline selector template for the new release. Dont know any more about it (honest!).

I put together a 3 tiered template and figured I'd test it with real money making 2 buck win bets using the TS conditional settings of 9/2 odds minimum at 0 mtp.

The results you see reflect 7 days of betting and just shy of 200 win bets as the other days I am elsewhere away from racing.

Only thing is my "template" is hand picking right now(hours of work looking at ALL tracks) and not automated so I am hoping the template will help in this area.

I for one am in the minority I guess as I definitely DO want a first look at the races I am interested in. But I want the look to be MINE and nothing else. Not interested in last race, best of last 3, best ever etc etc.

I have my own "rules" and they simply involve:
TPR screen
Days since last race
Blf
surface (dirt,poly,turf)
structure

Here is hoping the new version RDSS will be able to help :)

screenshot shows my win bets for the month of October using the autoline/contender/TS conditional bets at 9/2 minimum odds with 0 mtp.

I guess rebates with this volume might be nice but I still don't see it man.

Days
 

Hi Rich .
Is this 7 days or 17 days
Also your rebates would help pay for 7 or 17 days of data files from every
track.. RdSS is not cheap. What is the cost for "Bill from Brooklyn"
to be able to download all thse tracks ??

and what approximatly is your handicapping time worth

Bill

Hey Bill
The bets were made over 7 days this month.

What I meant about rebates is this: at smaller tracks (Mnr,Rp,Ct, Zia etc etc) there is a point where betting larger wagers actually has you betting against yourself in a way.

Let's make an assumption for discussion purposes ok? Lets say I can easily(assuming RDSS template gives me what I need saving countless hours of manual input etc) bet 700 horses to win a month using my "setup".

Lets also assume that I can make a + 5% ROI on all these bets before any rebates.

So I have made 700 win bets in 30 days. Let's also assume that $20 win bets (after bank has built up and still only 1% of bank is being bet per wager. Anything more is suicide according to Pizzolla and I agree 10000% ) are made.

That is 14k a month bet. Lets take a 6% rebate. that's 840 clams back on that + 700 bucks profit on the actual wagers.

total return risking 14 large a month is 1500 bucks. Not for nothing big deal.

Now read on other sites about all these astronomical sums being bet monthly and I cant "get there from here".

What I mean is if I increase wager size to larger amounts (especially the smaller venues where MOST of my plays are) I am betting into myself and reducing odds quite possibly.

I have had this discussion with Ted privately and told him that CJ over on PA is the ONLY one who sees what I described above happening.

He has stopped betting these smaller tracks for the exact reason I outlined above saying "its not worth his time with the small pools" and has taken to only playing a few larger venues and increasing significantly wager size.

I honestly don't see it but I am not the smartest bulb in the fixture.


As far as costs for "Bill from Brooklyn" or whomever that's for them to find out Bill. I have a 9g a year tax bill on the house here. I have to take care of my business. Trackmaster blessed me with a comp account and I am looking for/exploring ways to exploit that plain and simple.

Drive safe!

Richie,

Could you expand on the information you provided above please? I'm not sure I completely understand. Perhaps part of that comes from the fact that I do not use RDSS, so when you say "3 tiered template" I'm not sure what you mean.

Also, when you talk about "rules", you mentioned some areas in general. Would you consider being more specific?

What did you mean by," I guess rebates with this volume might be nice but I still don't see it man"?

Lastly, are you suggesting that a template is forthcoming that will import from RDSS and make selections on an automated basis?

Thanks.

I'll leave the details on Richie's hand-done 'automation' to him, but for the record, he is referring to the planned 'Paceline Selection Strategy (PSS)' feature I'm working on, where you compose a set of rules to guide the software to (optionally) pre-selecting a line (or lines) for each horse. Though I haven't gotten into it yet, this presumably continues on to automated eliminations as well (e.g. all but top 5 CPR or Total Energy).

A simple PSS would be 'last line' - no brainer. Another would be 'best of last 3' similar distance (e.g. within n furlongs), similar surface (do you mix Poly and Turf), etc, etc. Lot of moving parts, but trying to set up a user-defined template where you roll your own, make your preferred caveats, etc, etc. Let's see.

Re automated wager submission - upload to the conditional queues of those ADWs providing an upload feature (TwinSpires, PTC, Ubet), or direct interface with each ADW via API or other browser automation (an extension of existing tote interface).

Ted

Thanks for the reply, Ted.

Pool-sized bet limits
 

Hi Richie,

The level of performance you demonstrate here is excellent and consistent with some of the other longitudinal studies you've posted. Re the problem of pool-sized bet limits, William Benter touched on this problem in his article in 'Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets' but didn't present the algorithm he was using to handle it. In fact, one of Benter's main reasons for playing the Hong Kong tracks was that the huge mutuel pools allowed him to place his average bet - 250k - without cutting into his odds. The important point he makes is that it's possible to reduce your bet size to extract the maximum gain without cutting into your odds.

So the logic behind what CJ is doing is correct. But it is still necessary to know the minimum pool size needed to make your max (or average, if you're flat-betting) bet. This is not a question I often deal with, since I mainly play only the big circuits for just this reason, but I am checking into it because I'm also interested. I will post a more accurate answer when I have it, but Benter's article implies the optimal max bet is a bit less than 1/2 of 1% of the total win pool. So clearly even $20 maybe too big at some small tracks.

My general response to this problem would be to work from the bottom up. With a $20 flat bet, I would guess that many tracks are still playable. Play the high-volume multi-track approach, and as your bank grows, start dropping tracks whose average mutuel pools are too small too sustain your growing bet size. Eventually, of course, you will only be able to bet into the biggest pools. Even without increasing your bet-size the scheme you've laid out implies an annual return of 900% - not too shabby. So, the progress from small tracks to large would be fairly quick.

One thing I'm not clear about - you mention an 18% ROI for the betting sequence in question, but only 5% when calculating your betting scheme. Maybe you just wanted to be cautious, as far as betting goes, but do you think an ROI of 18% or something close to it is unsustainable? I think if you extended the sample to 1k or 2k races you would find it within the range of possibility.

In any case, good luck with this. If your're interested in checking the Benter article, it's included in William Ziemba's 'Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets', which is available in preview at Google Books.

Cheers,

B Jennet

Hi "Ftl"
I am breaking each horses entire pps into 2 cycles that involve days since last race. After getting a number on a horses 1st cycle (if I get one at all) I open the pps to the 2nd cycle and allow for "x" amount of improvement over cycle 1.

This is my realistic maximum performance capability for TODAY'S race.

I am only working the following races and passing all others:
1) Open Claimers (NO conditions of any kind)

2) Starter alw where the horses have started for a claiming tag in last year(NO other conditions attached to the race) etc.

3) Nw3 and Nw4 lifetime(NO other conditions attached to the race)

That is it.

Every track, Every surface, Every distance (omitting only 5f races).

Hope that helped :)

Thanks "B" for the info on Bentner and betting. I will definitely check out the Google preview.

The 5% is just complete cautious guesstimate.

Also to be honest this is completely boring and monotonous man. I have done no and I me no handicapping contenders/lines/wagers/matching etc. The horse is either in top 3 Bl/Bl after hiding to 5 1 at a time from the bottom of Bl/Bl up (super easy to program no Ted? ;)) or he's not.

My school stuff gets real intense starting 11/7 for 3 months so who knows. We will see what happens.

Very best to you "B" and stay cool

Rich

You're losing me here.
If you're able to maintain this volume of bets and return over the course of a year you could easily make over $100k betting $200 a pop.

And, what does this have to do with bettors that barely crack a positive ROI?
They need to put in more bets and bet more in order to make it worth while.

Doubtful anyone over at PA, for example, is close to your ROI over an extended period of time.

Richie,

Thanks for the reply.

John
That is exactly it man. You CAN'T bet 200 a pop at Zia,Remington,CT, Fl,FE
etc. You cant.

Hey also let me see what shakes after another 200 know what I mean? I do know day-day it has been remarkably consistent to the point where I have told Barb on the phone it's scary. PS - Now watch there is the Molokio! lmao

I hope that it can be programmed John cause then it becomes a simple matter where now it is REALLY a chore ok?

Dealing only with facts I worked countless hours picking lines/hiding to 5/entering conditionals at TS for 7 days to make what 10 beans a session? Only way to increase bets is from profits and % of bank and to grow to decent levels this is a ways off.

7-8 hour days doing all the steps I laid out manually is a big chunk out of my life now big guy.

We will see what shakes.

Keep kicking ass on the synthetics! #:1: there in my book NO question

RE: betting into myself
 

hi Rich,

projecting your bank has reached $20k ...will a $200 win bet really affect the pool for your specific track... and if it is...well you already know the answer im sure.:) must be a slow racing day!!! :)

Hey Big Man
Just did a rundown at your Woodbine and see its doing ok here!!
Not enough bets though.

;)

wager
 

Hi Rich
In no way did I wish to imply that your comp from trackmaster was not well earned and deserved. We all have issues outside of racing that must be addressed. I was unable to call you or reply back here as I was in court all day.
The reply's you have gotten as well as your reply back to me have helped me better see how what your doing could be a good way to make money

With all respect my questions were not meant to dwell into your personal betting ability. My question is more in, to me betting $2.00 win bets on 191 races in 7 days ( and I already knew your template specs) so I kind of know
you need to look at many data files to get to 191 races

All I wanted to point out was, Can a $2.00 better bet as easy and methodically as a $5 $10 $20 $50 $100. bet wagerer ? Can a $2.00 better
afford all the data files ? so I really was asking for a guesstimate
of what you would have spent on data cards? to get your 191 races

If your overhead is so high will your confortzone to bet enough money to
cover your non comped data file cost

Just looking at it from B from B's point of view

Go bombers
hello Mrs P

Bill

Hello Bill,

Hope you don't mind if I jump in here. I don't know exactly how much data files for RDSS are per card or per month, but an educated guess would be in the area of $150 per month on an unlimited basis.

Rich

Here are my overall numbers at WO. Keep in mind that I've had a bad couple of weeks recently as I've been busy with work and screwing up my wagering bigtime.

# of bets: 214 (it's actually much more than that as I usually play 2 number exactas which TS counts as single bets)

win%: 14.95

$1 ROI: +.046

What's interesting is that I started out 1 for 39 at WO, with the winner being my 1st play there. I continued 2 for my first 55 plays; and 3 winners out of my first 61 plays.


This is what happens when the data is accurate and I can just read the info off my charts. Accurate data means good decisions.

Guess the high takeout there isn't having an affect, huh?

No BS if that was me going 1/39 out of the box John I am done like burnt toast. Dead serious.

Awesome numbers and i know you are betting bit more than deuces ha!
:)

Awesome

Morning Bill!

I just looked and the unlimited for RDSS is 120 a month for the data files.

Mom says "Hi Bill Varone" :)
she is not too happy after last night's Yanks game :(

:)

When there is an auto paceline selector a unlimited data plan is really good. You can go through the races and look for good value bets. I think the most of us have not the time to select pacelines for all the racecards. Clearly a computer makes failures, but you can investigate if the paceline is a good choise. Everything gets easier and sometimes you get wrong paceline. But overall it is really good idea, because you have more opportunities to find overlays.

I am really looking forward for this feature.

Greetings
Tim

Consistent Paceline Selections
 

The major advantage I can see with an automated paceline method is that you will have a degree of consistency as opposed to zigging and zagging all over the place.

A person should have the ability to look at more races and more time for readout interpretation.

You are quite correct. I have been using automated pace lines for several years in a program of my own. Before you even get started you have to make a decision as to what you will be satisfied with as an end result. The computer does not “read” the form, it just looks at pace lines based on the criteria built into the program. Then you begin the constant trial and error making sure the program is picking the line you intended it to pick. And even when you are done “tweaking it”, until you actually run a very large sample of races, you really don’t know if you have been successful or not. Fortunately for RDSS users, Ted is doing the hard part. Once you have the ability in your hands all that is left is for each user to set up their own personal choices of pace line selection. That is where the users work begins.
As you said, it is consistent, so if you keep decision models based on the automated pace line selections you set up, those will be the results from which you will also make a decision on whether or not you like the parameters you used when setting up the automated pace line selection process. If, after gathering a very large sample of races in your decision models, you are happy with what you see, then you are “off to the races” so to speak.
I can tell you that in the beginning it was very hard for me. I was so used to making pace line decisions on my own that it seemed to me that I was always second guessing, but in the end I decided that I achieved what I was looking for, consistency. Computer programs don’t have headaches, bad hair days or outside feelings brought on by real world events, it just picks pace lines, the same way every day.
And, again, you are correct that this allows you to spend more time on interpreting your readouts and looking at more races.

Grass stakes at Belmont
 

Testing my selector template on today's NYB turf stakes at Belmont. Hope they run them with this being last day for the meet what would they "save it" for?

Anyway here is the 7th race "Ticonderoga" going 9f

Top 3 Bl/Bl (2,7,4)have good gap and own most of corollaries.

The #7 Love Code is highest ml odds of the 3 at 5/1 and also appears to be positionally advantaged looking at his EP style.

Mohawk
 

Belmont 9th:

Here is the 9f Mohawk on the grass

Big fav Banrock is no giant looking at the lineup.

Looking at top 3 Bl/Bl the #1 "Hanging" is top 3 total energy and best Deceleration. Nice combo going long distance at 8/1 ml showing.

lines
 

Hi Rich
looking at your lines choices you sure have no problem going way back
:eek:

GS on the Belmont weeds

There coming from Mars !!
fractals and chaos

Bill

My take on the 7TH
 

Hi guys...

On Pace and Cap Day we had seen Love Cove have a nice easy lead and then chucked it...and with the 8 & 9 in this race he'll probably have to run faster to stay closer to the lead..

The turf most likely be yielding with all the rain we had yesterday..

Why did MARAGH go to the #2 when he won twice on the #4???

Anyway..I think the 2 can close better than the 4 on an off turf..

#2 win...

gl

mike

Hey Bill!
Just came in from the park. Nice sunny day, women running amuck :)

Here are the 7th and 9th reduced to top 5 Bl/Bl after scratches

Hi Richie...

Just looked at the 9TH...

Bancock will be the big fav...I like the 5 he was in this race last year and lost by a length and a half with a trouble trip..coming in this race in form and maybe be the ex .

gl

mike

Race 7
 

Hello Rich and Mike

Yes Mike that was Pace and Cap day for love cove
line 2

Love cove
 

Looks like Love cove won this race last year -line 7

Race 7 Result
 

The key horse #7 goes 8/1 and places.

Exacta, tri and super are in final 5 posted after scratches.

Rich

I didn't play these races but I had the NYRA show on and it was mentioned that Bankrock had a perfect trip last out and that Pennington would be loose and tough to beat. Just before the race I pulled out the chart for their last race. (I've attached it below.)

Let's assume, that Banrock got a perfect trip because he was able to come through on the inside. I don't really look at pace in these races so I don't know whether the pace was supposed to be slow or fast. What I do know is what I see:

A race where there's only one horse that passes more than a single horse in the race. In fact, Banrock passes 4 horses in a race that went 1-2-3 (qtr & half positions) otherwise. In other words, HE, not the others, got the worst of it.

Now, I don't know how this relates to pace and I'm always puzzled by what the pace handicappers have to say. I'd rather let the horses and the race SHOW me how it was run (and who it favored).

Tri is top three APV in R.7
 

Hi Richie,

It seems to me, in stakes races, APV is often deadly. Clearly this was an extremely contentious race, although I had the winner as #2 TE off its last race, I liked the #7 better for the win. In any case standard Sartin practice would have made them both plays, given that the #2 and #4 were overbet, and possibly the #2 could be thrown out for its poor record on softer turf.

Thanks for posting this.

Cheers,

B Jennet

9th Result
 

The key #1 went 11/1 and had nothing.

Chalk wins and place horse not in mix.

Thanks everyone for jumping in etc :)

Back to the grind today
 

Today was the 1st day since I started thread (honest) that I jumped back in with my method as outlined in earlier posts. Why? Honestly it is brutal amount of work to do by hand man and I dont have the time like that anymore.

Very simple I do my lines for all tracks with my template then straight to Bl/Bl and hide 1 at a time from bottom up til there are 5 guys left. Then it is to TS conditionals and I enter all 3 top Bl/Bl horses with a 9/2 at 0 mtp conditional win bet for 2 beans.

Very simple and so far incredibly consistent hitting right around the 15% mark which I know is good % for higher odds bets. From 8 betting days with real money I have 7 winning days and 1 losing day betting ALL these horses.

This was day 8 of my auto template doing ONLY the races I described earlier. If you check the races/bets shown you will see they are EXACTLY the types I described with NO deviations. These are the ONLY races I am betting this month on my TS account.

:)

Updated totals thru yesterday
 

Well over 200 auto bets now with NO handicapping of any kind.

Ted here is hoping you can work some magic man stuff on the new release
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoZUQ0QC19c

It's very impressive Rich and I am certainly continuing work on RDSS 2.0. Looking forward to what you will do with a selection template like this!

I particularly like the consistency you seem to be reporting. What was it - just one losing day of minus single digit ROI - the rest positive?

Don't kill yourself to prove a point: it seems kind of unlikely that unless you get 'creative', you will all of a sudden lose large percentages of your bankroll daily. Even if you encounter a few more back-to-back losing days of single digits ROI - so your cumulative ROI reduces to +10%...what a shame ;)

I think TwinSpires does not permit Place Pool conditional betting, otherwise some of your bets could probably be made in the Place pool, what to speak of Exacta-as-win-bets. I'm pretty sure the proposed RDSS betting module will handle this. (Too bad I can't open a TwinSpires account :( ).

I know you are taking time to smell the roses too, and care for those around you. But I know you know how to work hard, and thanks for this inspiration!

Ted

Another take on autopacelines
 

Hi Richie,

Glad to see the excellent work is going forward. I just wanted to throw in a study I did of TE over the last few months that's a slightly different take on the autopaceline concept, in case some aspect of it might be useful.

I mainly began this to check what seemed to me to be the improved performance of TE, having switched from SpecPa to Spec 160. Filtering out races for 2yos, 3yos, all maidens, and all races under 10k, I selected pacelines by the standard Sartin best (TE for this study) of last three, same distance, same surface.

Over 1140 races (but with little change after the first 200), these were the win rates by TE rank:

1. .38
2. .25
3. .21
4. .10
5. .05

This confirmed to me that one of the big improvement of this software over earlier Sartin software whose results Doc tabulated in the later Follow Ups, is that it clusters more winners among the top 3 TE ranks. If you go through the many worksheets posted in the Follow Up, you find that the hit rates of the Top BL/BL horses (which are basically ranked by TE) taper off much more gradually.

As far as the average mutuel of the top three, by TE rank:

1. $7.40
2. $10.00
3. $12.20

This confirmed for me a truth that your study also seems to be finding, and that Doc asserted in one of his more honest Follow Ups, that most of the profits from using the methodology could only be found in about 20% of races. And that was 10-15 years ago, when prices were better. I would say that now, it's about 15% (talking only about win betting).

However the upside is demonstrated by your results. If you set minimum odds a bit higher, the profits are still there. When Guy first talked to me about the Spec software, he told me that by cherrypicking tracks and only playing horses at odds of 6/1 or greater, he was making 200% profit. I wondered if he had gotten hold of some medical marijuana. But after I began to see the average mutuels (which didn't change much) during my early period of my study, I simply adjusted the minimum odds at about two ticks above hit rate - TE- 1. 3-1 TE 2.5-1, and TE 3. 7-1. The results over 1140 races- 200% ROI. What's really strange about this is that it produced nearly the exact same ROI at each rank, even though there were many more plays for TE -1 than the other two. Now obviously this could be an outlier, but there was very little variance in the results.

I'm putting this out there so that if you or anyone else who's interested, can check this out against their own results and see if you get anything similar.

Best of luck.

Cheers,

B Jennet

Hi "B"
This is awesome stuff!

I was on the phone with Barb when I read your post and she told me she also favors total energy so she is for sure checking your post out going forward.

I'm definitely checking it out and I love your minimum odds layout cause unless you are getting a 3/1 on a strong top rank buck I can't make money on lower odds horses. Just going "gut feel" your odds minimums shown are totally in my comfort zone :)

Thanks for sharing and I will definitely let you know what I see going forward a bit

Tu Salute "B"!

Ted I know you are working tons of lonely hours behind a keyboard and screens to make something special. All I can say is DO IT baby do it!!!! :D
Really good vibes!

You are also a good friend to both Mom and me so I am very lucky man indeed. Now if we could only get your Mum home for a while to do some races!! :eek:

Listen to these 2 go at it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FlaY...eature=related