A simple pace handicap for successful horse racing betting
Speed handicap is still a very important and useful way to find good bets. Some lazy people use speed numbers and pay the price with low consequences and lots of failures. Pace users try harder, but they can find much better bets. Speeding is still as much an art as it is a science, as it involves some imagination as well as athletic ability.
So, if you want to be a successful horse racing driver, and make money betting on horses, you better learn handicap speed. Even if you have been warned, trying to make money betting on horse races is very risky and you should never bet money you cannot afford to lose. At first glance, getting in the way of speeding can be a daunting task. Feet per second, speed, graphs, etc. can quickly overwhelm you and seem hopelessly complicated.
Fortunately, it could be simpler. First of all, start with the four horses in the race that have the lowest odds in the morning class. The winner is usually found in these contestants. Since the winner of these runners is often the horse that will be leading in these four horses as well. There may be instances of fast fractions being shot early in the race, however, the true class and pace of the race will soon reveal itself and this horse is almost always one of the first four.
Look at the top four horses and start adding the numbers in each call-up column for each horse’s last four races. Put the total for each call above the column. For example, if a horse has 1 on a quarter call for his last race, 2 for the previous race, and 3 for each of the next two races, he will earn 9. So that’s for a quarter and a half call in a sprint race and a quarter, half, and three quarter call in a road race.
Now look at those four horses and see which one has the fewest number. It is likely that this will be your first runner or a horse that is very close to the lead. Take the top two places with the lowest score and they’ll be in contention early in the race. If two horses have very low numbers and seem to be fading, you may want to take a closer look at the other two horses and see which will run close enough to pick up the pieces at the end of the race and overtake those two horses.
On the other hand, if your front runners do not have super speed but only moderate early speed, the winner will often be among them. Handicapping horse races is a complex business, but a speed handicap can be simpler than it looks.
