Next Time Out Analysis

One of the questions we field on a more regular basis than most is “how do your selections do next time out?” Sure there are some which stand out, a big priced pick which doesn’t do the business for us and then a day or two later scoots home at even bigger odds. But we’ve never before monitored them closely enough to assess whether they’re genuinely worth following blindly.

So now we’ve looked at the next time out performances of each of our selections from this year, up until we went into our two month pause, on August 31^st. The results are quite interesting. There is a danger with this sort of approach that one may be inclined to back fit the results to find an angle which appears to be one which works, so before we approach a number of different angles, let’s look first of all at how each and every selection has done, assuming he or she has raced again, after the horse was a selection for us:

All prices are to BSP so it can probably be assumed that better returns could be had with prices taken earlier in the day.

First of all, of the 552 selections advised by us from January 1^st 2011 to August 31^st, 486 have run at least once since.

Here are the stats backing each and every selections next time out:

Bets: 486

Wins: 71

Strike Rate: 14.61%

Average Odds: 16.75

Average Win Odds: 7.35

Profit/Loss: +13.12pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +2.7%

So a profit, although not a great one! That’s a fantastic starting point though, and one to really work on. Let’s look at a great number of different variables now which may improve returns for us.

First of all, let’s strike out all horses which drifted from the price we advised in the morning.

Bets: 366

Wins: 51

Strike Rate: 15.03%

Average Odds: 16.17

Average Win Odds: 7.60

Profit/Loss: +33.85pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +9.25%

So a better result, that’s quite interesting, as one of the theories about why a horse may drift on track late on is that connections have seen the price gone and have waited for another day, but this shows that perhaps isn’t generally the case.

The following couple of tables will focus on these 366 horses which didn’t drift from the price advised by us in the morning.

First of all, backing all horses which start next time at BSP at 8.0 or bigger:

Bets: 218

Wins: 20

Strike Rate: 9.17%

Average Odds: 23.75

Average Win Odds: 14.16

Profit/Loss: +51.98pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +23.84%

So by that we can deduce that backing horses at 7.9 or shorter next time out (from the 366) has actually returned a loss, which shows up like this:

Bets: 151

Wins: 35

Strike Rate: 23.18%

Average Odds: 5.07

Average Win Odds: 3.85

Profit/Loss: -21.13pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: -13.99%

Interesting how a strike rate of 23.18%, with winners being fired in relatively often, is readily outgunned by a 9.17% strike rate above. Another example of how we should be patient when dealing with losing runs.

So let’s change tact for a moment, and look at ALL (regardless of drift) horses next time out which didn’t get placed for us (so should go off in theory a bigger price NTO):

Bets: 301

Wins: 35

Strike Rate: 11.63%

Average Odds: 21.05

Average Win Odds: 10.33

Profit/Loss: +44.23pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +14.69%

Not bad at all! So if we see a horse put in a stinker for us, perhaps we should look again next time out despite that.

Let’s run the same theory with the “on course drifters” struck out (leaving us with the 366):

Bets: 223

Wins: 26

Strike Rate: 11.59%

Average Odds: 20.24

Average Win Odds: 10.60

Profit/Loss: +40.02pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +17.95%

So a similar return, but with fewer bets, so a slightly better ROI.

What about those horses which placed for us, how did they do next time, first of all looking at ALL selections:

Bets: 184

Wins: 36

Strike Rate: 19.57%

Average Odds: 9.65

Average Win Odds: 4.45

Profit/Loss: -30.11pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: -16.36%

So horses which ran well for us don’t appear to be worth following. What about just the winners?

Bets: 72

Wins: 18

Strike Rate: 25%

Average Odds: 10.39

Average Win Odds: 4.73

Profit/Loss: +9.85pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +13.68%

So a profit there, although not a brilliant one. So it appears that those near misses for us (placed but not winning are really dangerous to follow next time out:

Bets: 112

Wins: 18

Strike Rate: 16.07%

Average Odds: 9.17

Average Win Odds: 4.16

Profit/Loss: -39.96pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +35.68%

So those near misses for us really appear to cause some damage if they’re continued to be followed (notice the average odds for them is 9.17 compared to 21.08 for those which didn’t place for us).

Let’s look at those last three tables purely looking at the 366 “non drifters”. We should see an improvement.

These horses went off at our advised price or shorter – and were placed for us:

Bets: 143

Wins: 29

Strike Rate: 20.28%

Average Odds: 9.83

Average Win Odds: 4.91

Profit/Loss: -6.17pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: -4.31%

So that’s much better than looking at all selections.

What about the 366 non drifters whittled down to just our winners, how do they do next time out?

Bets: 56

Wins: 13

Strike Rate: 23.21%

Average Odds: 12.03

Average Win Odds: 5.67

Profit/Loss: +14.69pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +26.23%

That’s a good ROI, and despite the shorter win odds a decent profit/loss. So those horses that don’t drift from the advised price and win for us appear good to follow next time out.

For completion let’s leave out those who are placed for us (but don’t win) from the 366:

Bets: 87

Wins: 16

Strike Rate: 18.39%

Average Odds: 8.42

Average Win Odds: 4.30

Profit/Loss: -20.86pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: -23.98%

So, so far, we can see that based on the year to date, we’re better off focussing on those horses which don’t drift from our advised price next time out, which are either unplaced for us or win.

This makes sense, in that the winners have shown they can win and perhaps deserve to be followed, and those who are unplaced will naturally most usually go off a decent price next time.

So let’s look at all horses which a) went off shorter or the same as advised and b) either won or were unplaced:

Bets: 278

Wins: 39

Strike Rate: 14.03%

Average Odds: 18.55

Average Win Odds: 8.95

Profit/Loss: +55.71pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +20.04%

That is pretty good, but let’s look again using the same filters, with horses 8.0 or longer at BSP.

Bets: 180

Wins: 19

Strike Rate: 10.56%

Average Odds: 25.77

Average Win Odds: 13.85

Profit/Loss: +70.93pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +39.41%

That is a fantastic ROI, but perhaps we’re missing out on some of the profits of those winners for us going off at a shorter price NTO than 8.0.

Let’s combine horses unplaced for us going out at bigger than 8.0 NTO, with the winners for us going out NTO at whatever price.

First of all, the table of those horses unplaced for us going out bigger than 8.0 NTO:

Bets: 155

Wins: 15

Strike Rate: 9.68%

Average Odds: 26.56

Average Win Odds: 14.93

Profit/Loss: +58.56pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +37.78%

So combining the above with the “winners for us going out NTO regardless of price” looks like this:

Bets: 211

Wins: 28

Strike Rate: 13.27%

Average Odds: 22.70

Average Win Odds: 10.63

Profit/Loss: +73.25pts (including 5% deduction on each winning bet)

Return On Investment: +34.72%

Looking at the results, there were numerous big priced seconds, including at 17.29, 19.75, 23.59, 32, 23.37, 35.9, 82.66, 25 and many more, so there really does appear to be something in this. And while we are staunch advocates of win-only betting, each-way returns appear promising. Based on the BSP prices (which we know is an inaccurate way of looking at it given the higher returns of win only bets in relation, but is useful nonetheless), a 100pt bank, betting 1pt e/w on each selection, turned into 280.92pts, an ROI of +42.87% - with a placed strike rate of 34.12%.

It’s possibly to boost results further by striking out very long odd horses (those priced at 50+, for example are 0/20, but of course this is a small sample and we would only need one of these going in at some point in next 29 efforts to turn this into a profit).

So what to do with this evidence? There certainly appears to be something in it, and of course profits could be boosted substantially if we were to take advantage of early prices and not rely on BSP. This would be an assumption on our behalf though; we do not have early price evidence NTO to go on to hand.

In the short term, we will do exactly what we have done with the 2011 results, and go through our 2010 selections next time outs, and take it from there. It will take a while to sift through them all, but if results are anything like this year then there certainly seems potential to boost our profits (and indirectly gain compensation for those horses which run unplaced for us in our original method!).

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