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An Edge

walsworth

walsworth

Journeyman
Joined
Jul 19, 2006
Messages
1,935
Location
North Herts
What exactly is an ‘Edge’?
Is it an ability to read form better than other people?
Is it a hot line to a stable?
Is it being able to spot particular trainers habits?
Is it the ability to regularly beat SP?

Or is it something entirely ethereal that is just out of reach?

Answers written on the back of a £50 note, please.
 
To me, an edge is a factor the market hasn't taken account of and, while that remains the case, it's profitable to bet using it.

It could be a number of things ranging from simple stable information that, for whatever reason, a horse has a better chance than its current market price implies to something more mathematical/statistical.

Edges of the latter kind can often be ephemeral - especially if you don't keep them to yourself, they gain traction among others and the market corrects, as it perpetually seeks to do.

For some, it's not enough to quietly win - they need to be able to boast about it.

But there's a price to pay for most things in life and the fatal price of foolishly telling people how you win (I've seen naive people goaded into it online) is your edge can evaporate.

There's a lot to be said for not actually caring what others think of you - "respect" is overrated, it doesn't increase your payouts - and consequently never revealing too much of what you know.

Give others an occasional taste of the dish if you really feel you want to, but NEVER give others the actual recipe.

As this post attests, I like to think that, over the years, I've perfected the highly-ignoble art 😂 of writing plenty without actually really saying anything - it enables me to have enjoyable conversation and friendly banter with those I seem to get along with without actually giving anything away.

In my (many) idle moments, I've put up various winners at prices (after I've backed them) here the last few months - I cba to actually go back and compile a list, once again I'd have to actually care what others thought of me to feel motivated to do that - but being honest the stated reasons why I had the bet often weren't the actual reasons why I had the bet, as that would be giving away the recipe.

Having spent 17 years in racing journalism, I could effortlessly make a written (usually bullshit) case for why virtually any horse in any race is a good bet every day of the week if I could be arsed to. 😂

What I talk about here isn't even 10% of what I actually do, or why I actually do it, as a punter - no one should ever assume anyone is ever sharing the sum total of their knowledge online with, let's face it, mostly a bunch of randoms, and I never make that assumption about anyone else either.
 
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A horse has an edge because (if) it can run faster than the others.
A trainer has an edge because they can decide when and where to employ said horse.
A jockey has an edge because (if) they have the tactical horsemanship to utilise said horse to best advantage.
A punter has no edge that can influence the result.

All a punter can do is judge whether a horse is likely to be the fastest at the weights, over the distance, on the course and on ground conditions. Then, whether the trainer has it ready to rock and has chosen to dance with it. Then, whether the jockey aboard has the jockeyship for the particular race.

If a punter wins more than they lose, they have an edge because of their selection judgement which, in turn, relies on their judgement about the factors they might use.
 
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To me, 'edge' is merely racing parlance for an uncommon advantage.

The likes of jinnyj has an edge because of her ability to read a horse's conformation and fitness levels.

I imagine a jockey's agent would have one because he is being told by the trainer and/or owner that the horse's chance is very possibly a winning one, something the general betting population wouldn't know.

I've always felt the likes of Pricewise and Paul Kealy have the advantage of being in receipt of information coming into the RP offices and they can griddle that mass of info for the occasional nugget. They also have the advantage of accessing prices before their selections go to print. I also imagine they have the advantage of special accounts with certain bookies, just as some trainers and owners do, allowing them to bet in exchange for sharing their info.

Maybe it's just my imagination running riot a bit - you all know how much I like a good conspiracy theory (which is probably grounded in cynicism about the game) - and maybe I've just read too much Dick Francis...
 
I was only at the Racing Post 1988-1994 and at that time Tom Segal hadn't even joined and Paul Kealy was a local copy taker more or less straight oit of school who was determined and ambitious and got a foot on the ladder by joining Derek McGovern's sports betting team, which was a good move as McGovern and Dominic Chapman will have taught him plenty about the newspaper game.

Paul's a genuinely decent bloke in my book - I still say hello to him if I see him at the races, which isn't often as I seldom go.

There were elements of what you speculate about at play in 1he time I was there, Maurice, and Paul is a savvy guy on a survivalist level, evidently happy to have made an entire career out of being at the RP, and I'm sure he absorbs any info he gets like a sponge, as any smart operator would.

But you can have your biggest bet of the year that knowledge in the betting industry exceeds that in the RP offices and knowledge among professional punters exceeds both.
 
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Desert Orchid said:
To me, 'edge' is merely racing parlance for an uncommon advantage.

The likes of jinnyj has an edge because of her ability to read a horse's conformation and fitness levels.

I imagine a jockey's agent would have one because he is being told by the trainer and/or owner that the horse's chance is very possibly a winning one, something the general betting population wouldn't know.

I've always felt the likes of Pricewise and Paul Kealy have the advantage of being in receipt of information coming into the RP offices and they can griddle that mass of info for the occasional nugget. They also have the advantage of accessing prices before their selections go to print. I also imagine they have the advantage of special accounts with certain bookies, just as some trainers and owners do, allowing them to bet in exchange for sharing their info.

Maybe it's just my imagination running riot a bit - you all know how much I like a good conspiracy theory (which is probably grounded in cynicism about the game) - and maybe I've just read too much Dick Francis...
Click to expand...
I'll pay you later.... ;)
Actually being steeped in the industry can have its advantages and disadvantages as sometimes I can over complicate things.
But I can read a race very well and actually if you have enough nous about you whilst working in a yard, you should be able to gage how fit or good a horse is just by sitting on it. Likewise my ex was able to tell what sort of ground, track and rating a horse would be. I can sit on a horse the week before a race and think "this horse is bouncing out of its skin, its happy and its up to run the best it can" and then you hope that the monkey on top will do as they are told in a race and that the race unfolds in a way that will suit your horse best.

The early days of Godolphin were some big pay days for some of the shrewder lads there. Many of them had punters who rewarded them favourably for good information and I trust that has been the case in many yards since the dawn of time. A lad I worked with at Cumani's was given a pretty nice car from his punter for info one season which isn't a bad reward!

Of course there are always yards who over rate their geese and they don't become the swans they are expecting. You just have to work out which yards these are and treat them with caution.

When I was at Cumani's I won the Five to Follow the first year I was there, simply by watching the colts do their third canter up Warren Hill (fillies only did two so we could watch them easily). I picked out Khayasi and Keefah plus Infamy (yes she was a filly but always needed three canters as she was more like a colt) and I think had about 15 or so winners. Cumani grudgingly gave me the prize at our Christmas party that year - he wasn't happy because he usually won it...:ROFLMAO:
 
Desert Orchid said:
I also imagine they have the advantage of special accounts with certain bookies, just as some trainers and owners do, allowing them to bet in exchange for sharing their info.
Click to expand...
I can't recall the spelling of the tipster in the 90's. ISISIS , ISIRIS something along those lines. He was proofing great profits and taking out huge adverts in the daily racing papers.
Later he apparrantly divuldged that he didn't know much about racing, but instead started tracking bookmaking firms and trainers. If Ladbrokes for example were ducking one from a a certain yard, he monitored the horse and over time built up a database of who was giving info to who. Once completed he was just checking teletext/ceefax or the printed EP's that would hold in the shops until 10:15am. So Ladbrokes don;t want to know and are goign 5/1 while most of the others are going 7's, but Hills are going 8/1, he'd tip it and tell people to get on wth Hills at 8's before 10:15.

I've been so impressed with the idea over the years since reading about it, I have attempted (a few times) to start my own recordings, but it takes far more dedication than I'm prepared to put in. I think if one was being 'supported' and a paticular firm were ducking constantly while also shortenign it themselves, it may save time waiting for those types. It's more for a computer wizard that can scrape the oddchecker pages every few minutes and get the computer to look for patterns.

To be honest, I'm not sure how true this Isiris confesion is, though it does have a strong whiff of logic about it.
 
Now that is what I call a good post jinnyj and I bet that you only back one horse in a race and either WIN or LOSE not like some who back 3 or even more in a race and then claim a good profit if one of them wins !! Remind me never to put YOU on IGNORE 😉
 
An edge isn’t something you whisper about in riddles. If you can’t articulate it, you probably never had one.
 
What Is an Edge?

Think of a horse race as a price journey.

Markets open the evening before at around 6pm. The first show is compiled by someone who’s probably spent 15–20 minutes on the race. Maybe less. Some races will be worse than others — much worse — but the chances of those opening prices being efficient are extremely low.

That’s why it’s so hard to get a bet on overnight. If you’re laying bets at that stage, you’re likely laying into negative expectation. In plain terms: you’re losing money.

Now, the game never stands still. The overnight market used to be soft money — lads with a decent source, a sharp eye for form, or just tuned-in punters who were ahead of the curve. But what’s crept in more and more is herd behaviour. They all end up on the same horses, not necessarily because the horses are wrong prices — but because the network of “sharp” thinking has become so uniform.

Where it gets really interesting is around 7am to 9am. That’s when the market starts moving — not dribbling, but proper movement. My guess? That’s the model money. Algorithmic punters who’ve priced up every race before sunrise and are waiting to pounce.

They don’t care what the trainer thinks. They don’t care about vibes or whispers or yard talk. They trust the numbers. And in the long run, they’re grinding out double-digit ROI.

Now here’s the bit nobody seems to talk about.

I think as things stand right now, there’s a big opportunity for a nuanced punter to bet into the market around 11am onwards — the window between the early herd and the late models. You’ll often find prices then that won’t be there once the biggest algorithms start firing with two minutes to post.

Because at the end of the day, that late money is the sharpest and most informed in the game. Those accounts are placing bets at or near the most efficient prices available. And if you can get in just before they do — with your own angle, your own judgement — you can still get value.

An edge is anything the market hasn't fully priced. And the market is smarter than it was ten years ago. But it’s also more crowded, more automated, and sometimes more wrong.

Which means edges still exist.

Now if you want to go the next level of how the market crashing for pennies can corrupt horse racing:

open.substack.com

Point Blank: Is Racing More Bent Because of the Model Men?

The last Sunday in October.
open.substack.com open.substack.com
 
Dingo Bingo said:
I've been so impressed with the idea over the years since reading about it, I have attempted (a few times) to start my own recordings, but it takes far more dedication than I'm prepared to put in. I think if one was being 'supported' and a paticular firm were ducking constantly while also shortenign it themselves, it may save time waiting for those types. It's more for a computer wizard that can scrape the oddchecker pages every few minutes and get the computer to look for patterns.
Click to expand...
I’ve had similar thoughts about analysing bookmakers odds to see which ones duck certain horses, or lay others. Like you, I haven’t got the energy to dedicate the resources required to do this to gain anything useful. Maybe I’m kidding myself, but I’d also rather like to convince myself that it is preferable to do the study and watch races to find snippets that help me to get my own little edge.

Your post also reminded me of one big bugbear I have about Racing and that is that it is permissible that Jockeys and Trainers can paid by Bookmakers. That just doesn’t look right in an industry that already has integrity issues and could be a big issue if any serious wrongdoing related to these relationships ever became public knowledge. The sport shouldn’t just look clean (obviously it isn’t fully), but should also have rules support this. Obviously, the information the Jockeys and Trainers reveal via Bookmakers is largely mundane and no one is going to get rich following it, but I’ve always worried that the day my Lucky 31 is going to make me a millionaire, the last leg will become a late non-runner. Then I’ll always have a suspicion that someone has had a “word”. Besides which, haven’t lots of jockeys and other individuals been banned over the years for their connections, albeit undeclared, with Bookmakers?
 
Mr Whatoxo said:
I’ve had similar thoughts about analysing bookmakers odds to see which ones duck certain horses, or lay others. Like you, I haven’t got the energy to dedicate the resources required to do this to gain anything useful. Maybe I’m kidding myself, but I’d also rather like to convince myself that it is preferable to do the study and watch races to find snippets that help me to get my own little edge.

Your post also reminded me of one big bugbear I have about Racing and that is that it is permissible that Jockeys and Trainers can paid by Bookmakers. That just doesn’t look right in an industry that already has integrity issues and could be a big issue if any serious wrongdoing related to these relationships ever became public knowledge. The sport shouldn’t just look clean (obviously it isn’t fully), but should also have rules support this. Obviously, the information the Jockeys and Trainers reveal via Bookmakers is largely mundane and no one is going to get rich following it, but I’ve always worried that the day my Lucky 31 is going to make me a millionaire, the last leg will become a late non-runner. Then I’ll always have a suspicion that someone has had a “word”. Besides which, haven’t lots of jockeys and other individuals been banned over the years for their connections, albeit undeclared, with Bookmakers?
Click to expand...

You can get a pretty good card if you monitor dramatic cuts the night before. When a bookmaker goes from 8/1 to 9/2 you are going to be ok taking 7/1 elsewhere.
 
Impossible to believe that most jockeys arent having some kind of bet if they are fancying a horse, I am sure that they have a good enough network around them to get the bets on.
I know I read somewhere that Mike Dillon (Ladbrokes) had a few special accounts for trainers and they could get on before he wiped the price, I think if memory serves Ted Walsh was one of the trainers on his books so to speak.
And not sure if its just an urban myth but many rumours in the 80's and 90's that Pat Eddery would get his bets on via his BIL Terry Ellis.
 
Slim said:
What Is an Edge?

Think of a horse race as a price journey.

Markets open the evening before at around 6pm. The first show is compiled by someone who’s probably spent 15–20 minutes on the race. Maybe less. Some races will be worse than others — much worse — but the chances of those opening prices being efficient are extremely low.

That’s why it’s so hard to get a bet on overnight. If you’re laying bets at that stage, you’re likely laying into negative expectation. In plain terms: you’re losing money.

Now, the game never stands still. The overnight market used to be soft money — lads with a decent source, a sharp eye for form, or just tuned-in punters who were ahead of the curve. But what’s crept in more and more is herd behaviour. They all end up on the same horses, not necessarily because the horses are wrong prices — but because the network of “sharp” thinking has become so uniform.

Where it gets really interesting is around 7am to 9am. That’s when the market starts moving — not dribbling, but proper movement. My guess? That’s the model money. Algorithmic punters who’ve priced up every race before sunrise and are waiting to pounce.

They don’t care what the trainer thinks. They don’t care about vibes or whispers or yard talk. They trust the numbers. And in the long run, they’re grinding out double-digit ROI.

Now here’s the bit nobody seems to talk about.

I think as things stand right now, there’s a big opportunity for a nuanced punter to bet into the market around 11am onwards — the window between the early herd and the late models. You’ll often find prices then that won’t be there once the biggest algorithms start firing with two minutes to post.

Because at the end of the day, that late money is the sharpest and most informed in the game. Those accounts are placing bets at or near the most efficient prices available. And if you can get in just before they do — with your own angle, your own judgement — you can still get value.

An edge is anything the market hasn't fully priced. And the market is smarter than it was ten years ago. But it’s also more crowded, more automated, and sometimes more wrong.

Which means edges still exist.

Now if you want to go the next level of how the market crashing for pennies can corrupt horse racing:

open.substack.com

Point Blank: Is Racing More Bent Because of the Model Men?

The last Sunday in October.
open.substack.com open.substack.com
Click to expand...

Every day's a school day. Cheers, Slim (y) :cheers:
 
I feel I can't really afford to think about things like that or I'd do my nut in. I only have a few hours per week I can dedicate to studying so have to be quite narrow in my focus.

I tend to focus these days on races, with not many exceptions, worth £100k, hoping that the prize money can exceed what an owner might be able to make from betting the horse.

I still see me pretty much packing it all in relatively soon. I'm already betting to much smaller stakes than I was ten years ago, which was half of what it was when I was working and I do sometimes find myself thinking when I see an obvious non-trier, "What's the point?"
 


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