Wagercapping - Follow Up Articles

[Ted Craven]

Besides a methodology for analysing pace, arguably one of Doc Sartin's greatest achievements was the concept of 'Wagercapping' - a method of integrating the various readouts of the Methodology software with bet-time odds offered, together with 2 horse wagering and tight financial and factor record keeping.

Maybe wagercapping is not suitable for all people, or at all tracks - and it certainly helps to develop a sense of when to not bet (to Win) at all, or bet in vertical or horizontal exotics. But Doc sure thought and wrote a lot about it in his attempt to help people become winners.

I'm gathering a series of Follow Up articles written under the non-de-plume of The 'Capper, generally on the subject of wagercapping or decision making in the context of the Methodology. I'll post them here from time to time on an ongoing basis, along with anything else I come across in the vaults on this topic.

Ted

[admin]

Ted that sounds like a very helpful project
I look forward to reading it

[Ted Craven]

Magnetism of the Odds On Favorite (Follow Up #71)

Post time approaches. The handicapping process is complete. I have the print outs. There is a list of horses, BL/BL odds and M/L odds. The choice is clear from read outs and corollaries. Investments in the #4 and the #1 are indicated, BUT the #4 is 8/5 on the morning line and at the second or third flash is at 6/5 and dropping. The #1 opens at 9/5 with a morning line of 5/2. What to do? What to do? Look at the third BL/BL horse, the #6, M/L 5/1 opens at 10. This horse has little in the way of corollary support. Post Time is getting closer. The favorite continues to get action, now at even money. Can all this money be wrong? Can all these players, insiders and outsiders, “smart money” and not, not know a sure thing? Even at even money the ROI is still 100%. What to do? What to do? Post time is getting closer. 4/5. I can’t stop from being drawn to this overwhelming favorite. Indecision starts to set in, there is no value in dutching a 4/5 shot.

I could single him. What to do? What to do? Is he really that good? I could pass the race. Yea, that certainly gets me put of the dilemma. It also negates an opportunity for a profitable return. Is he really that good? I need help. What kind of a race is this? Let’s see, a $10,000. claimer. Well that helps. Pretty inconsistent at this level, still, some do win and look at all the people betting on him. What to do? What to do? It’s almost post time. I have been thinking about this horse so much I can barely break away to look at my options and my read outs. He has to win, doesn’t he? I am being dragged in by the pull of the odds, the magnetism of a “sure” thing, the ‘horsy’ chat of the players.. I take a deep breath and snap the rubber band on the back of my wrist. The “Doc” says this will snap me back to my objective. I return to the thought that in ALL races the betting favorite only wins 1 out of 3. And if the #4 beats me I really will have made the better Iong-term investment by going against short priced favorites.

What to do? What to do? Post time is upon me. I look again at the read outs and make out my bet card. The investment will be using the now 4/1 #1 and the 9/1 #6 in the 60/40 Dutch. The bet is in. There is still some doubt about the favorite winning this race. Odds-on is the biggest magnet going. It seems to drag on every player’s pocket, especially when it is a top ranked “figure” horse. BUT I cannot earn consistently if I lose 2 out of 3 at short odds. I let all these thoughts go as the bell goes off. The tote machines are locked. The race has begun. The favorite is now 3/5. Anxiety increases. As they turn for home the #1 has the lead and Mr. Odds On is playing catch up and will not get there. Winner #1 pays $10.60. The #6 did get up for third. A nice mutuel for the larger portion of the dutched investment.

I had the read outs. I had the horses. I got sucked into the magnetism of an odds on favorite, just to have a win? Just to avoid a loss? And almost waited toolong to get in the winning wager.

The ‘Capper here with a race day reminder use the methodology, work the plan, be profitable. 'Til next time.

[Ted Craven]

RECORDS AND RECORDS (Follow Up #72)

“PSSSST. HEY BUDDY. OVER HERE! YOU LOOKIN’ FOR A WINNER? I GOTTA HOT ONE FOR YOU - CAN’T MISS!”

Looking for an absolute in handicapping? How about ‘bet the horse with the jockey, it will win today’. Boy. That’s one we could certainly single. Only which one is it? How do I know which horses to bet? All this data. All these columns. Early. Late. Energy. Median Energy BL/BL. SPN. TS. TPP. Fractals. Seems pretty easy to become confused. Underlay. Overlay. And the column that is not there. The column that is the most important to me and to you, the ROI. Return On Investment. The Doing is Truing column. If it is always in the red or loss side it does not make much sense to look at any of these other indicators. Unless of course I use a day at the races to make a few business deals to cover the losses and they get written off, like they do with a business foursome on the golf course. So how do I know which horses are contenders and which are pretenders? How do I find not the ‘sure thing’ but the ‘right thing’? RECORDS. It is my RECORDS that show me which factors are the most predictive at this time. That lead me to the winners window. That tell me that there is no ‘sure thing’ BUT that do tell me where the bettable winners are coming from. Without them it is like starting over with each race on every race card. Any advantage I hoped to have gained I have given back if I do not keep records and USE them. Without them I lose the intuitive Sight into how MY handicapping is selecting contenders and winners. Winners I might not have had if I had not had some ‘extra’ information to use as a guide. And it is not information I could get from anywhere else. It is MY data. Like the horse who shows # l’s in TT and HE and with the highest SUPPLEMENTAL readout only a 3 in Entropy and is #3 BL/BL. The Record sheet says this is a PRIMARY Win candidate and it ranks third on BL/BL.

Records point the way to these wins for me. I am not stuck when it comes to decision making and Setting time. My RECORDS have led me to the winners window. Lots of # l’s and #2’s for the top two contenders. The top BL/BL horse is 5/2. The second one is 3/1. That gets us to the 1,2 and 3 BL/BL horses. The records say it is the 3rd BL/BL and one of the other 2. I go with the top horse. The race runs. The #3 BL/BL wins and pays $12.60. The top horse is still running and the second horse places. I get the win. Without the records I sit around with a win bet on the place horse as well as the also ran, and an “I shoulda, woulda, coulda” on the tip of my tongue. And what about the other RECORDS? The ROI! It is no accident that the one thing all the “experts” and “wanna be” experts agree on is keeping accurate RECORDS. They are talking specifically about money invested and money returned, the ROI. This formula does not depend on any esoteric criteria or hype or mumbo*jumbo. It is merely the amount won divided by the amount wagered PERIOD. The shared exacta box ticket with the next table, the flyer on the speed horse in the race I did not handicap (looked like the only front runner in the race and would run off and hide), the $24 ticket on the Pick Six carry-over. All of these “Extras” must be included in an accurate and True investment record. They are a drain on the ROI and must be included so we are not clouded into thinking we are doing better than we are. And if we lie a little, if we cloud it up with “I’m about even”, or “I did O.K.”, it is as if an employee has returned a portion of his wages to the company. Or he took a momentary, voluntary cut in pay. Yeah. Right. This is the Absolute Bottom Line and is the measuring stick of handicapping success or failure.

Ainslie, Mitchell, Meadow, Cramer and Beyer to name a few along with the Doc are all advocates of RECORDS. Especially records on investments and outcomes. And if you want to make it your occupation do not forget to add in ALL the money invested AND the cost of getting the bet made, (the Form, admission, transportation, and program).

The ‘Capper with a race day reminder work the plan, be profitable. ‘Til next time.

[Ted Craven]

FEAR LOSING, KNOW NO PROFITS (Follow Up #73)

FEAR - False Evidence Appearing Real. Howard Sartin Ph.D., reads physics books, books on chaos math and even spiritual works and relates them all to success in horse race handicapping. Well I happened to be reading in a different field and this definition of fear looked like it came straight from an issue of the Follow Up. It did not. It came from a book entitled “Conversations With God, Book 3” authored by Neal Donald Walsch, I have heard the phrase before, before the time I started looking beyond the mainstream for success in short term pari-mutuel investing.

Just look at that definition. False Evidence Appearing Real. It brings to mind the readouts of all those short priced favorites two thirds of which end up running up the track with a lot of somebodies money going right with them. It brings to mind the sense of anxiety when the Confidence to support the Corollary evidence wanes in the face of ALL that money on the favorite. How can so many people be so wrong. False Evidence Appearing Real is how. They cannot break through their fear of NOT having the winner especially when it is so ‘obvious’ to the players who are ‘playing’ (not investing) all that money, they cannot break through their fear that what seems so obvious a certainty is a bust, they cannot see the race instead of the horse (as in I cannot see the forest for the trees).

How do we beat False Evidence Appearing Real? For starters how about with the three C’s? Consistency, Corollary and Confidence. Consistency in not jumping all around to find not the contenders but to find actual investment interests. Corollary in using the indicators paying off for you now, not the win pool designated favorite. Confidence in knowing that even if I lose this race I am still going to win at a 65%-75% clip and that by chasing this race I will jeopardize the validity of these, my personal, statistics. By not making investments below the odds that we have determined to be profitable for us. For most this is 5/2 or 3/1. By hiding those contenders that will not get us this minimum return.

Fear to profit? Fear to lose with a short priced horse coming off a winning race with a career best number? Fear to ignore “classic” handicapping maxims? The fear to leave behind these fears keeps us entangled in continual losses. The Methodology has given us the tools we can use to surmount the pull and drag of FEAR. Dr. Sartin has also shown that handicapping tomes are the least effective sources of handicapping success.

These tomes represent the classical, left brained, linear approach to handicapping. And through some twenty-four years of research, observation and implementation Dr. Sartin has shown that this is not the way for horse players to evolve into handicappers. Many of us want to know where the Doc gets his ideas, It appears to me he gets them from anywhere and anyone who has something to say about self improvement exclusive of a medical model paradigm. He is always providing not only the credit to other sources but encouraging all of us to read it for ourselves so we may receive the full value of these resources and possibly enhance our personal and spiritual lives as well as improve our handicapping success. Deepak Chopra and his Indian Ayurvedic approach to improved spiritual health and Candace Pert’s Molecules of Emotion are two examples we can use in order to go beyond the box. To go beyond the box of classic handicapping mentality, to go beyond the box of linear thinking, to move from horse players to handicappers.

Use the Methodology and ALL its resources, especially the non-traditional references to overcome FEAR and multiply the number of your trips to the winners window.

The ‘Capper here with a race day reminder....work the plan, be profitable. ‘Til next time.

[Ted Craven]

BOXED IN? (Follow Up #74)

BOX? WHAT BOX? This is horse race betting not a feel good about yourself social confab. So what is the box and why is it important to me, the handicapper? The answer to the first part is pretty simple. It’s that riddle you get sometimes about connecting the nine dots using four lines without lifting your pencil or re*tracing a line. What it does have to do with horse race handicapping may be another story and not quite so easy to accomplish.

Let’s start with another story, this one about a baseball player. His name is Ozzie Smith. Ozzie Smith characterizes thinking and doing outside the box. Ozzie’s box? Major League shortstop. Any one who followed baseball before Ozzie probably has their favorite shortstop or remembers some great fielding plays in their own right. My favorite was Luis Aparicio of the Chicago White Sox. Luis made some dazzling plays. And what constituted a great play in the pre-Ozzie era? It was getting to the ball and knocking it down and HOLDING the runner to one base. Now along comes Ozzie and he is not satisfied with knocking the ball down no matter how tough it was to get to. He wants to throw the runner out. And he does so, with regularity. Ozzie Smith does this so well that he gets into the All-Star game hitting under .200. Amazing! But his fielding will more than compensate for his lack of hitting. After this the other infielders began stretching their limits, and before long they too began making some Ozzie-like plays by not only getting to the ball but throwing the runner out Now back to the box and handicapping.

What has happened here? One player has redefined the edges of not only great plays but also of normal day to day expectations. He stretched the boundaries by going outside the acknowledged limits of the game. He went outside the box.

Handicapper’s have a huge box to get outside. Mainstream handicapping fills up the box, inside the lines with speed figures, trip notes, class levels, jockey winning percentages; trainer winning percentages, 900 numbers, tout sheets, captivating jargon, par times, angles and more angles. All with the allure of easy money and the envy of all our friends. So what is outside the box? Winning! What do we have that we can use in order to overcome all this bias, to ‘cap outside the box? Like Ozzie we have ourselves and a guide with a direction which takes us outside the box. It is what we have and we have to use it. There is the Follow Up and Doc Sartin and, his programs. And there is each one of us. For it is not enough to have these tools and support if we are unable to wield them to isolate the contenders and to make the successful, winning investment. Winning has to become more important than hanging out in the ‘box’. The winning feeling has to become more important than the rush of disappointment at backing a non-winner, more important than the excitement of rationalizing and attracting other losers to commiserate with, to share the losing story with and to rage at the ‘reason’ for our defeat. Winning must became our prime motivation. Winning must become our highest state of exhilaration.

Winning has to be OUR drive. Howard Sartin can only do so much. After all he is in the business of helping clients succeed not in creating dependencies. Sartin has provided the tools for us to move outside the box. It is now up to each of us to use these tools. We have to develop our own feeling about winning and how each tool in our hands will bring that feeling of exhilaration and success to us, will move us outside the box of mainstream handicapping paradigms. We are the craftsmen that will create our own masterpieces with these tools and our intuitive use of them. Our masterpieces will be created outside the ‘box’. And as we all know there really is no better feeling than winning days at the track.

The ‘Capper here with a race day reminder...work the plan, be profitable. ‘Til next time.

[Ted Craven]

Ready.....? WIN! (Follow Up #75)

Sounds easy doesn’t it. We all know it really isn’t. And then when we do win and win regularly we start doing things contrary to what we did to create the winning and POOF we are right back in the losing mold again. It’s what we did that breaks the winning habit.

One of the biggies that I encounter are those who fall in LOVE with a horse. They forget all about paceline selection, all about corollaries and certainly all about Synthesis and BL/BL. They forget or choose to ignore the little consistencies in their handicapping that produced the consecutive winning days, weeks, months, cycles All of a sudden after a steady increase in their bankroll they become clairvoyant. Or so they think. Imagine! All the work to get it right, paceline selection, odds/value determination, the dutched bet, passing certain races, and correct use of Synthesis. It suddenly goes down the tubes and all this winner thinks he needs in order to win is the Racing Form and a few minutes???

He will not be a winner for long.

How do we keep the win streak alive? Use the Methodology. Do not give in to the drive to be one of the crowd, to know who will win without doing the work. Dr. Sartin has given us the basic tools with which to win. Once we overcome our bad habits and start winning by using these tools there is still work to be done. Championship teams do not repeat by staying static. They continue working, working harder not to become complacent and return to the bad habits that kept them from winning in the first place. To stay in the winners line in handicapping may be even more difficult. And it requires continued effort. Strive to make sure the new, winning habits are not eroded by complacency and the adulation of the few who see you continuing to return to the cashiers window. And all they want to know is who da ya like this time?. After all, handicappers and horse players alike are Ill looking to delve into the same money pool. We, however; are willing to do the job to get there and to stay there.

How do we keep on top of our winning? One way is by looking at how we can better use what we have. When was the last time you bet on more than two horses in a race? More than three horses? Never? In the Follow Up we see time and again how even a small wager can put us ahead if we look at how, when and why we use multiple bets in our winning strategy. This strategy will never win for you unless you use it the first time. Make it a new, good, winning habit. A recent example was a race being simulcast in from Gulfstream Park. I had worked the race down to four contenders. The lowest odds among the four was 9/2 going up to 25/1 for the number four BL/BL horse. Going back over the read outs and the past performances I could find no way to eliminate any of the four. So I bet them all. I put 50% more on the 9/2 horse to even out the return should he win. The wager is $9.00 using the minimum and the longest odds horse does win and returns $52.00. Does it sound foolhardy? Could you do it? Am I betting against myself? NO! And I do NOT use this strategy every race or even every day. However, I am not afraid to use it and it is a profit maker. In this case it netted a profit of $43.00. It will not always win and the longest shot in the group will not always win, however, since have LEARNED to make this adjusted, uncommon investment I am much farther ahead. Both. In win percentage and in Dollars earned. This is one way I stay ahead of the break even point. It is part of how the Methodology can work for each of us. It is how the Methodology works for me.

The KEY point is to not try and change the program or the horses the program gives us as contenders and winners. In order to optimize the winning potential of the programs CHANGE the way YOU look at how you use the results. The program finds the horses it is up to you and me to best use them.

We can not be ready to win if our approach is to take the Methodology program results and try to fix them using “mainstream illogic”. We cannot be ready to win if we cannot change our bad, losing habits into profitable winning habits We cannot be ready to win if we are not open to accepting the cutting edge handicapping advancements inherent within the Methodology. We cannot be ready to win until we know that we go to the track in order to go to the bank rather than having to go to the bank in order to go to the track. We have to be in the winning mode not just today but everyday.

Till next time. The ‘Capper with a race day reminder ... work the plan, be profitable.

A post script to recap the Kentucky Derby. The Kentucky Derby field was the perfect setting for the multiple horse wagering strategy mentioned earlier. With the favorite at 9/2 multiple winning bets was the way to go. Once the horses are entered in the program we face the question about how to bet them. Questions come up about legitimacy of races in New York and in Kentucky and Florida. Does it matter? The horses DID run those numbers. Can they be ignored? Remember these are three year old horses still improving. I ended up betting not 4 but 5 horses to win! I used Adonis (18/1), Charismatic (30/1), and the field (11/1) all at $10 and Stephen Got Even (5/1), and Menifee (7/1) at $15 to assure a profit on the race. Once again this proves to be a successful approach as Charismatic lit up the boards at $64.60 with the third highest mutuel ever at Churchill Downs for the Derby. I have $60 in the race and take out $323 for a profit of $263. The program works. The approach works.

A Reminder ... work the plan, be profitable.

[barb craven]

TOOLS, TOOLS, TOOLS (Follow Up #76)

"Our doubts are our traitors.” This quote comes from none other than that famous 16th century handicapper William Shakespeare. Shakespeare a handicapper? I don't think so. However, his words certainly identify the bane of many a horse player in any betting venue, and we see it repeat itself again and again, race after race. Can I be right? Have I overlooked some key factor? How do we overcome our doubts? Use the TOOLS of the Methodology.

What are the tools of the Methodology? First on the list is the Doc himself. Without the Doc there are no programs and there is no Follow Up. Second is the Follow Up which you need before you receive any programs. Next are the programs. And following the programs are manuals, tapes and videos. And last but not least is the Office staff. They are all there for us to use, to help erase any DOUBT we may have as we approach the investment windows. Into a handicapping toolbox place the programs and manuals.

Let's look now inside our toolbox at the programs. The programs are our tools, items that you and I can use to do the WORK of handicapping horse races for profit. They are not black boxes or crystal balls. Of and by themselves they are not much good; with the proper handling they allow us to create masterpieces of winning mutuels.

Opening the tool box I find Synthesis. This is a very special tool. Unlike a hammer or a screwdriver which have very specific and limiting functions Synthesis is more like a power drill. With the drill you can do a variety of tasks ranging from sanding, routing, polishing, sharpening and even hole drilling and screw insertion and removal. With Synthesis you have the ability to look at past performances from a variety of aspects-- fractals, entropy, energy, graphs, primary corollaries and secondary corollaries, and Bottom line Betting Line. As a product of and for the handicapping revolution Synthesis is a tool that incorporates previous profitable programs. It does not leave out aspects with which we have become familiar, aspects like POR/POH, Both/And, and Pace Potential. Synthesis then is a multi-faceted tool developed for our use without abandoning successful techniques but incorporating them for our use.

Masterpieces are created by craftsmen who know how to use their tools. Our masterpieces are double digit mutuels, triple digit exotics and beyond. Each of us must be the craftsman who is able to use the programs, to erase all doubts as we invest our unlovable assets.

Each craftsman has their own specially, some technique or approach that singles out their work making it unique. And so it is with Synthesis. Each of us as a handicapping craftsman wi11 find the combination of corollaries and pace line selection that produces winners. It IS work. It DOES payoff.

Like a craftsman who can see the finished product before he begins, we must visualize the results of our efforts. We must not be swayed by the noise around us just as the craftsman is not swayed by the work of others. He may be influenced by the work of other craftsmen, what he actually sees not what he hears, but he still creates his own product. And he is neither swayed nor influenced by drawing board ideas which have not been validated maybe never even tried. Nor is he swayed by what everyone else is doing. Like Buddy Alvarado we must eschew the mainstream and rely on our own abilities to convert past performances into current profit.

We are the craftsmen who will use Synthesis. Just as we are individuals so to will our approach to the windows reflect a personal, unique use of the handicapping process. Just as some craftsmen are able to create so much more from the same raw materials and the same tools so some of you will be able to use Synthesis in approaching the exotic wagers in a much more profitable manner. Some of us will be mechanics. Some of us will be artisans. We can all be profitable. It is up to each of us; and, like any trade, it is relative to the manner in which we employ our methods.

Work and insight help us to see how the races will unfold, where there is a profit to be made, when to pass a race or to invest. We see this in the Follow Up where we, the clients, both provide information and receive information based on the reports of other clients. It is not fantasy. The results are there. The results are repeated time and time again by Methodology craftsmen who use the tools as guides and do the work that turns out the masterpieces.

The latest addition to the tool bag is the Wagering Decision Form or WDF. Here is a program that will let us see how we handicapped each race. It is a tool that is an add on to Synthesis.

It shows where our Bottom line Betting Line contenders actually finished the race. It is another aspect of the Synthesis program that provides a record keeping function for those of us who sometimes get behind in recording our data. With WDF there is a print out that allows us to see from which of the five Bottom Line Betting line levels the winner came. Using the print out we can see the tiers where the winners are coming from as well as be able to see how the winner looked in both primary and secondary corollaries. The important aspect for craftsmen is we see from which tiers and combinations of corollaries the winners emerge as a result of OUR information input and decision making.

Inanimate are the tools. They are lifeless inorganic things. It is up to each of us as handicappers to bring these implements to life - to patiently sift through the past performances selecting the lines and contenders from which the winners will emerge. Confidently, not hastily, use YOUR skills to discern the most profitable and most probable winners from the several readouts available to you.

In order to be a profitable craftsman we must be able to invest from our own successful wagering history. If you do not have a successful history then use the tools to create one and let winning be your new habit, a habit fuelled by your personal triumphs and confidence.

USE the tools. Wield these tools according to the guidelines. Apply the results of the tools to the final outcome - a successful wager.

Eliminate doubt from the list of traitors to your parimutuel success.

The 'Capper here with a race day reminder .... work the plan, be profitable. ‘Til next time.

[barb craven]

OUT OF CONTEXT, OUT OF TIME…. (Follow Up #77)

“These are the times that try men’s souls”….Thomas Paine,
during the midst of a three day loosing streak (Common Sense)

“Et tu Brute??”.. Julius Caesar, Inquiring of his good friend Brutus whether he also had Charismatic in the Derby ($64.80)
(from William Shakespeare)


INTO THE POOL

Handicapping thoroughbred races for profit, not merely for fun, is an endeavor that is not natural to most of us, especially if we have grown up with the bias against gambling found in a Judeo-Christian environment. Many horseplayers, attempting to make the transition to profitable wagering, appear to lack a link which would allow them to apply knowledge from other successful arenas to wagering for profit. Most cannot do it, and they end up supplying the winners share for those who are able to do it. One approach to creating the link, for some is to present an analogy which allows them to see how use of knowledge from a previous successful venture can be applied to a different field or endeavor and to make a successful transition to the new undertaking.

It is summer. It is hot outside, a good time to spend some time by the pool. Even in relaxing moments I am frequently struck by thoughts about making successful short term equine investments both to improve my own "portfolio” as well as how to help others overcome their inabilities, fears and anxieties and move over to the winning, profitable side.

It is summer for most of us; and, being out by the pool, I have been watching people, mostly children, and their approach to the swimming pool, especially the non-swimmers. The pool is a big challenge to them. I think learning to swim and actually getting into the swimming pool have similarities with entering the pari-mutuel pool. Like learning to swim and learning to handicap for profit, each of us must let go of previous fears and anxieties.

We must learn to trust in another's instructions and guidelines. And we must follow those guidelines as given until we are successful before we can begin to use the new skills and abilities to their fullest potential. In swimming we must learn and trust that the water will support us if we LEARN to float--we will not need to stand on the bottom or grasp the side of the pool. We are able to float by using ourselves and some instruction, however, no one can float for us. With handicapping we must learn to unlearn our past; that the knowledge we had before is no longer the best way to achieve success; that no one else can successfully invest for us.

You can see the fear in the eyes and faces when the non-swimmer lets go of the pool edge and ventures out towards a familiar, trusting hand. The head is up, the eyes are open wide, and the breath is being held as long as possible, until the safety of the outstretched hand is reached. At the windows you can see the fear as the player vacillates between selections right up to the time he reaches the parimutuel clerk, listening to the bets being made in front of and around him, ready to abandon his first (or second) choice to the whim of some other bettor. He has no trust and no confidence and will ask the same question in the very next race of an entirely new set of bettors.

The want-to-be swimmer, by emulating successful swimmers who are there swimming,along with some instruction or coaching will soon lose their fear when the safety of the edge is no longer in their grasp. The horseplayers with their biases, egos and psychological hang-ups have little chance to become winners. They choose not to learn. However, with a DESIRE to win and to profit a handicapper can evolve into a successful wagercapper (Doc's new word). Then like the fledgling swimmers when the water is over their head the bettor will be as confident of his safety in the pool as is the swimmer. The handicapper will be able to invest with a confidence not known before, in the betting pools. He will be able to return from the betting windows after making successful investments waiting for the next opportunity rather than hoping to find the leprechaun with all the winners.

Swimming, unlike horse racing, is not a stochastic event. It does not change. Certainly strokes get better; some swimmers are faster than others. Some aspire and make it to the Olympic Games. Others become surfers or SCUBA divers. The basic skills are the same. Handicapping for profit takes some basic skills and allows us as individuals to utilize them to our own unique insight and quest. In Vox Populi and throughout the Follow Up we see how some of us are successful pick three players, some pick six winners and some are winning exacta investors. All of these feats come after understanding and putting into practice the basic guidelines of the Methodology.

First we become winners. Then we look at how we can maximize our investments in the exotic pools. In the swimming pool we learned to float, to breathe and to swim. We may go further and learn to breast stroke, back stroke or the
butterfly. First we have to learn to crawl. Always start with the basics.

In order to shift from non-winning to winning DO NOT jump into the exotic pools without an ability to win straight bets. DO NOT jump into the swimming pool if you cannot float. Understand and be able to do the basics. In both cases it is a matter of survival, in the swimming pool literally life's survival depends on it, and in the betting pool financial survival depends on it.

Swimming pools are inanimate creations. The water in them will support whoever is able to learn the skills which will keep them afloat and propel them through the water safely and confidently. There is no age restriction, gender bias or color code. If you have the skill and you practice the method; you will survive.

The tote machines are absolutely fair and unquestionably democratic. They do not care who puts a winning ticket through them. If it is a winning ticket you will be paid. The test is to write the winning ticket. The Methodology has the guidelines to allow each of us to create the winning tickets. However, it is not a black box method and requires some learning, some practice, some understanding and some diligence. It is not magic. To the uninitiated it looks like magic. It is certainly magic to the players huddling around the windows asking the winners and the losers "Who do ya like?" These players like anyone else's selections more than they trust their own.

The Methodology provides the teaching needed to learn to handicap successfully. Follow the guidelines. Do not get pulled under. Succeed in the parimutuel betting pools.

The 'Capper here with a race day reminder …. work the plan, be profitable.
'Til next time.

[barb craven]

THE GIFT (Follow Up # 78)

‘Tis the season to show we care by giving gifts. And to receive gifts. What do you tell others you want? What do you get for yourself? Take a few minutes to think it over ..... OK. Now here is my suggestion. Give yourself the gift of winning. Once you give this gift to yourself you can use it over and over again. Christmas can be everyday!

Horse players are simply amazing. They attune themselves to any variety of “mainstream” theories and apply them in any variety of ways .. When they continue to back losing selections they continue to go through the same losing process, achieving the same old results - losing. Then the law of averages steps in, and they win a race. Rather than trying to understand what they did right to get the winner, to repeat the winning event, they exult in their system and return to their same old losing pattern. They end up lamenting and whining that the horses do not run to their system. Imagine that. They want the horses to run to the criteria they have selected. Is this how you look at the races? Do yourself a favour and become a Wagercapper. Be a winner.

Magic? Clairvoyance? Luck? What are you looking for to reach the cashier's window? If you are looking or wishing for an external helping hand to isolate profit generating selections you are in for a long, disappointing and losing wait.

What do you NEED to win? Most of all you need yourself. You make the decisions. The cash through the windows is your cash, earned at some cost to you. Why give it away based on someone else's whim or supposed "inside information? That money is too important to me to let me let anyone else invest it in a stochastic event like parimutuel investing.

What do YOU do that prevents you from being the winning 'Capper each day you go to the track or OTB? After all if you always handicap the way you have always done it, you will win what you have always won. Or the converse is also true, you will always lose what you have always lost. Approach the races with the knowledge that you are going to win. And understand that it is YOU who is going to win.

Having done enough of my own muddling I share with you a couple of personal somewhat abstract aides to my Wagercapping. PATIENCE. I remember in the not so distant past how little time I had to handicap a card from the time the Form arrived at the newsstand until I was arriving at the track just before post time. Now with the advent of computerized downloading and the Validator I can get through an entire card in the time it previously took me to work a single race (about 45 minutes). I was impatient before to receive the Form to work a nine race card. I am impatient now to get through as many races as possible, somehow believing that more is better. NOT SO. I learned that I must still spend the time to evaluate each race in its entirety before moving on. What good does it do to overlook a major factor or even a seemingly insignificant factor and lose a race even if I have handicapped another 20-25 races? It does not do any good. It is self defeating. Doc calls it the Thanatos complex or death wish. It is certainly a losing wish when I give in to it.

One of the joys I receive from handicapping, and I am sure you do also, is to see the important factors in the past performances and use them to enter the correct pacelines and contenders into the program. It is the solving of the mystery of who is going to win that thrills me. It is the collecting of the winners share that rewards me. However, there is the pitfall on the other side of impatience, doing a race too quickly, and that is spending too much time on a race. Overanalyzing a race can be just as deleterious to ones bankroll as under analyzing it. Doc's computer programs help out with this one. Enter the contenders, run the program and utilize the readouts. Simple. Easy.

How many questions can you ask yourself about the contenders in any given race? And how many times can you re-ask them? Will he get the lead? Will he break well? Will the outside horse press him? Is he fit off the layoff? Is he well meant today? Will a speed duel set it up for a closer? These are, for the most part main stream questions. The computer will take care of them for me. I know that, I can not win every race, even though I do not invest in a race with the thought of losing, it does happen. The computer sorts out the majority of the questions for me, and remember most of the questions are main stream ones which the programs take right out of the equation. If I am not comfortable with the contenders, I pass the race. It does little good to continue to obsess about contenders, trainers and infinite possibilities. Plus, if I am overanalyzing then it does start to cut into the time I have for the other races, available in which to invest.

As a computer-using Wagercapper the worst time for me to overanalyze is not the night before the race or the morning of the race but in the time between races. It is this time when I review the next investment that I begin to look for insights that just are not there. OR I look at a race I chose not to invest in and again start to look for an unfindable key. This is a great time to input the data from previously run races into the Wagering Decision Form.

Forget the past. I mean leave behind your old handicapping axioms. Leave behind the par and time charts. Leave behind the 'authorities and experts’. Leave behind your personal biases. Yes, even leave behind yesterdays Methodology. Get with the new. Get with today's Methodology. Use what the Methodology gives to you, to each of us. Do not get caught up with trying to 'discover' the one nuance everyone has been seeking and has not found. Use what we have now, today. Change your outlook. Change your approach. Change the size of your bankroll.

This is the gift giving time of the year. It is also the beginning of a new year, a new era. As the year ends, allow yourself to make the changes necessary to being a successful Wagercapper. Give yourself the gift of WINNING. It Can be a transformational gift. One that keeps on giving. One that sets you free.

The 'Capper here with a race day reminder .... work the plan, be profitable. Til next time.