There's no doubt we punters really pull the wrong rein at times against all the racetrack wisdom we have ever learned. Yesterday I took on Apache Cat by betting around him as I thought his heavy track form was not as strong as I would have liked for a pre post 9/4 favourite against a strong weight for age field. Once again the old mantra "in wfa races simply back the best horse" won against form line assessments and yours truly looks like a prize dunce. Fortunately I hesitated to take

There's no doubt we punters really pull the wrong rein at times against all the racetrack wisdom we have ever learned. Yesterday I took on Apache Cat by betting around him as I thought his heavy track form was not as strong as I would have liked for a pre post 9/4 favourite against a strong weight for age field. Once again the old mantra "in wfa races simply back the best horse" won against form line assessments and yours truly looks like a prize dunce. Fortunately I hesitated to take on Apache Cat on Betfair. All I had to do was press submit and I would have lost but a tiny bell rang in my muddled mind and it said "this is Apache Cat" and I resisted the temptation. What surprised me was the ordinary runs of the likes of Danlegh and Bank Robber however on heavy tracks we have to be forgiving for poor runs.

As I mentioned on Friday I started the "Pensioners Staking Plan" yesterday. Rather than swamp you with too many instructions in this blog let's just start with providing you with the Excel spreadsheet headings and some broad explanations. They are Reference Number, Date, Venue, Race Number, TAB Number, Name Of Horse, Objective, Divisor, Decimal Bet, $bet, SP, Bet Type, Result, Dividend, Race Return, Race Profit, Cumulative Outlay, Cumulative Return, Profit Or Loss, Amount, % Profit/Loss and Rule Off..

The total outlay for the day was $5.00 (based on minimum $1 bet) for returns of $5.90 which equals a POT 18.00%.
The bets were $1 win on Makeadreamcometrue @ $2.10, Driffield Gold @ $2.00 while the place bets were Brazen Hussey (Unp) , Bank Robber (Unp) and Posadas 2nd $1.80.

All the earlier headings up to Name Of Horse are self explanatory. The objective is $1.00 per race and the divisor starts at 2.5 which is divided into the objective. Thus the first Decimal Bet is 1.00/2.5 = $0.40c which is raised to the next highest $1 unit = the $bet column. Bet Type is either W for win or P for place with the horse becoming a place bet if the SP is $3.60 or more. The % Profit/Loss column is the result of multiplying the cumulative profit or loss figure by 100 and dividing the result by the cumulative outlay. For instance, if the Cumulative Outlay has been $120 and the Amount Profit is $15 then the calculations are $15 x100 = $1500 divided by $120 = 12.5% Profit On Turnover.

The key factor is to remember at any time the % Profit figure equals 10.00% or more we Rule Off and start again as we have made the desired POT.

Another major factor is to raise the divisor by 0.5 every losing bet. This has the effect of slowing down the bet size and is a very good safety brake.

As you learn this approach you may decide to extend the $3.60 cut off point I have set and you may want to raise the divisor by more after a loser. You may also wish to raise the desired POT, as well. These are personal options for you to consider based on your own betting.. Make your judgements as this experiment unfolds.