Pens From FormHorse Select

Hi everyone, Paul Slattery of FormHorse Select here. I am going to be penning a series of articles in future editions of the magazine explaining a bit about how I operate and hopefully to help point you in the right direction towards finding your own winners. Maybe giving you some new ideas or help to look at things in a different way.

Now I am not saying everything I say is right, but they are my thoughts and methods which work for me over time. The betting landscape is changing all the time and things that worked even a few years ago don’t always work now and that is of course mostly to do with the odds getting more cramped or race conditions changing. So, we must be able to adapt as punters, change our thinking and not be closed off to new approaches.

When I first started on my own 25 years ago, I was using different methods to those I use now and in between times it has been forever changing somewhat. I will try and give you what I think are the most relevant factors now.

Despite what we are led to believe, it doesn’t need to be over complicated but of course the interpretation of the individual is crucial. This is why it is so difficult to win over time, we all make mistakes and get things wrong no matter how good we are. You may even notice after reading through everything that I go against what I have written sometimes. That is the puzzle of horse racing, not everything is clear cut, and each race must be looked on as an individual event.

Sometimes a horse may tick only 75% of the boxes but due to say negligible opposition or the odds we go ahead with the bet anyway. These are the hardest to take when they go wrong of course, particularly if they are short priced. It is hard to find the perfect bet, particularly at the kind of price we would like anyway! However, if we are patient and don’t force it, we can find some that are close to or at least near enough to be worth an interest. 

So, after you have established your angle or what you are looking for, let the bets come to you. That is rule no1.

Starting Point

Now first things first, we all need to start somewhere and for anyone that might be interested I can give you the books I learned from when I first started getting into horse racing. I still have them today. I think they are still available and in my opinion are truly excellent and well worth a read. They contain so much more than I can write here and will give you a head start on everyone else, covering all aspects and many you won’t even have thought of, believe me. They are pretty old now, but the basics are still relevant. Maybe there are more up to date books around now, I don’t know but these will give you a good grounding to start from if you want to learn about form etc.

The first book I bought, and this is not so much for the form angle and more entertainment purposes, was Clive Holt’s Be A Successful Punter; With Fineform As Your guide. He has a rating formula he used, very basic and not something I would advise following unless backed up by all other relevant form factors. However, there is a diary of a 3 month period when he was on course detailing all the bets he struck with reasoning and thoughts etc. It is very entertaining and a great read just for that alone.

Now I have started writing this I realised I have quite a few horse racing books. I actually have one on draw and track bias but it is at least 20 years old and now that all the low numbers are on the inside of the course (didn’t used to be) plus other factors, it is pretty much irrelevant apart from the obvious cases. The pace figures still generally stand up though, I think.  That one is called Betting on Flat Handicaps by John Gibby a Raceform publication. Still a decent book in its own right with a lot of good insight.

So that brings me on to the 2 main form books I used to learn about all aspects of form reading. They were How To Analyse Form by ML Midgley and Braddocks Complete Guide To Horse Race Selection and Betting. When you open these books, you will realise what you are up against.

They are not light reading shall we say but for anyone truly serious it is in effect a short cut to saving you money over time. If I was to choose between the 2 I would go with The ML Midgley book because he really does break things down to quite specific areas.

Just small bits of extra knowledge will give you winners you would never have found before.

So now we have read the books cover to cover (cough, cough) we are ready to tackle the most treacherous of racecards!

Let's move on….

Target Races

I know we are always told to specialise but personally I don’t rule out any race type. There are some I will rarely bet in and some I favour more plus some that I don’t know too much about, such as Hunter Chases.

The same applies to race distances. I prefer middle distance or staying type races but again if the race looks winnable I will bet in sprints as well.

It all depends on the odds and the shape of the race. I like weak, uncompetitive races where there are not too many possible winners, and many can be ruled out. The only exceptions to that would be on value grounds or the horse itself looking like a great bet on form.

I suppose my preferred races would be handicaps, maidens and novices on both the flat and national hunt.

Handicaps would probably be the easiest to sort out and I like finding horses ahead of their handicap mark in the right races. Maidens and novices need a bit more specialist knowledge in terms of knowing about pedigrees and trainer intent etc. and an area we are told to avoid as punters.

National Hunt Flat races are another we are told to avoid at all costs but I have had some decent bets in these as well over the years. With this kind of races we need more trainer track knowledge and to keep an eye on the market but a lot of them are quite weak, particularly at the Northern tracks.

The Odds

This goes back to where we need to adapt as punters and sometimes change our thinking.

When I first started out full time 25 years ago I used to bet basically any price down to 1/2. After a few years I realised I wasn’t making any money at the short prices and switched to bet almost everything each way. This served me well as I was able to take early prices in the betting shops in the morning at decent prices.

Unfortunately, after a particularly good few months in the shops I got banned from all in my local area. Limited to £25 at S.P. where I could get a bet, less than a tenth of my stake back then and obviously no good at S.P. The only place that would entertain me was William Hills where I got on well with the manager who didn’t like £2 punters as he used to call them!

If he saw me in the shop he would always ask me “anything good for today” so I presume he was betting what I put on or told him. He never seemed to phone any of my bets through and would seem to just take them, which always amazed me considering I was barred everywhere else.

As usual, like all good things it came to an end when the shop closed down a couple of years later. Probably something to do with his aversion to small punters! So basically, I was left with on course or online to get a bet on. I had already started losing online accounts by this point. They don’t like clever each way players even those playing in open handicaps.

What I did notice though was the accounts I used for my occasional short priced bets seemed to last longer and were easier to get on with less restrictions.

With more racing coming in and fixtures being added year on year all of a sudden it seemed easier to find stronger bets at the head of the market as well and that’s when I made the switch back to include shorter prices again. I don’t mind any price as long as I feel it is still value and it always amazes me when I hear punters and some pro’s saying they have a cut off price, say 2/1, they won’t bet below.

So, as an extreme example they are in effect saying that if Frankel turned up in a seller at even money they wouldn’t bet it because of the “rules”.

I do get it to a point because I kind of went down the no short prices route early on in my betting  life.

However, things have changed dramatically since those days. We have now so many smaller field uncompetitive races, particularly over the jumps that there are plenty of decent bets to be found. Of course the issue is still prices and value.

It is clearly harder to judge at the top end of the market. There is not so much margin for error if you want to stay ahead and it is not easy. You need a firm handle on the opposition. This is the key to winning and losing in this area. What I would see as value and still worth a bet someone else won’t but that to me is because they have not assessed the capabilities of the opposition.

That’s not to say I am always right but I don’t need to be, just enough times to beat the odds over time.

When Betfair came along and we were able to bet place only, well this opened up other opportunities.

For quite a long time I was making a steady income just betting place only but over the years the place odds have become a lot tighter than they were back then. I became quite used to betting at 1.3, 1.5 and similar prices to place but I was missing out on a lot of winning bets, too many I thought. So, I switched to use it as a cover bet mainly and found this to work well, getting the return for a win boosted profits and kept me looking for winners while betting the shorter ones win only.

I guess I have always been some kind of place backer with my early start as an each way punter. The place element (cover) is a steady way to build up over time with no dramatic swings in your bank.

When you are betting full time as your only income, it really does help to keep your head clear if you keep getting your money returned rather than losing. If you choose your horses and races carefully it is very hard to lose over time.

I have had some amazing periods of not losing over the years. Even months with no losing bets at all. I was betting less horses per month than now but this is still an effective tool to build up the bank. 

Discipline

I thought I would write a few words about discipline. Another thing that is often overlooked but will make the difference between being a winner or a loser.

Personally, I bet purely for profit and that is it now. I still love the game but it doesn’t bother me at all not having a bet. When I was going racing a lot in the very early days I would definitely have more bets because I was at the track and I know for sure I wasted a lot of money that I didn’t need to. I would say it is hard to totally eradicate the odd forced bet for anyone, even pro punters. Maybe I am wrong but I have yet to meet perfection in that way.

The key is to keep them down to an absolute minimum.

These are the bets that will pull you into the minus if you have too many of them. This is the harsh reality of betting professionally. To my mind there is no fun in losing at all.

All these preview shows for the big meetings, be it online or in print. How many of these guys actually finish in profit over the few days or week that is covered. Virtually none of them ever do, heavy losses incurred are the norm. I know because I have watched and read hundreds over the years.

These guys have access to the best info available and are experts in their own right but it just goes to show you how difficult these big competitive meetings are. If they can’t deliver then realistically who can. I am not saying don’t bet at Royal Ascot etc. but pick your targets carefully.

Now if you want to bet for a bit of fun, that’s fine but I am coming at it from a purely profit making exercise and I want to make things as easy as I can for myself and ultimately anyone that follows me.

That’s enough from me for now. Next time I will delve more into the form factors and the selection process.

Cheers.Paul