'Beating SP' - Does it matter?

[Sheerluck Holmes]

So, i've now struck just over 100 bets in my flat thread, and showing a small profit, so things ticking along nicely ... I've been keeping track of the odds taken on each bet and the SP and I've noticed I'm 'beating SP' by an average of 1.5 betting points per bet. (N.B. The odds have been better at SP in 15% of my bets.) Does this mean in the long run I'm more likely to be profitable? I do try to always look for the elusive 'value' in my bets, but does this mean I assume I am finding 'it' in the majority of my bets? Just wondering if any of you more knowledgable punters have any thoughts on this - is this a good thing or just a meaningless stat/quirk? Thanks. :ok

[Trotter]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? I don't know if there's any mathematical study been done (it would be amazing if there hasn't !) but my impression is that if you bet the evening before or in the morning you nearly always beat SP......because the bookies shorten up all the prices before the SP is declared. And of course you can take a 'best price' amongst the bookies whereas the SP by definition is the same price all around and none of them can offer 2 points higher ! Common sense would indicate that if you are beating SP you are getting 'value' but it depends on whether SP represents 'value'.......SP might be shocking value and by just beating it you're just getting slightly less shocking value.......

[Custom Cut]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? I think it's crucial to at least get level with SP but I know of plenty of punters who manage to do well despite backing some drifters. Generally though this is in big races where all the horses are 'trying'. Probably not a great idea to back drifters in low grade all weather racing. If you're going to measure against SP though, don't do it against the industry SP, do it against the betfair starting price. This is because it uses a 100% overround/book percentage. Often the industry SP vastly overestimates long shots chances. If a horse opens up 16/1 on track and 20 on betfair and drifts to 40 on betfair it will probably only go to 20/1 on track. You can get betfair starting prices each day in the betfair timeform results page if it's recent or archived here if it's old. Such is my effort to avoid drifters that I won't back anything significantly bigger on betfair than what it is with the bookies.

[calculus]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? As far as I can see, you have to consistently beat SP in order to make a meaningful profit in the long run. While (as Trotter has highlighted) beating SP is no guarantee of "value", as early prices can contract to a ridiculous extent, I think you'll find it very difficult to make more than a nominal profit unless you're beating SP by at least 10-20% on a regular basis. The problem is that, in the vast majority of races (i.e. everything outside of the really big meetings), the markets are so fickle that the real juicy value can only be had well in advance on the early prices (i.e. the night before) - the influence of the exchanges combined with no shortage of clued up punters ensures that the status quo is quickly enforced with regard to any stupidly overpriced runners. The point with which I get particularly disgruntled is that certain firms who price up races early (365, BFS, PP, etc.) use the modus operandi of making a half arsed effort of pricing races up and then let the punters show them where they have gone wrong - they then cut the prices and eventually restrict/close the accounts of said punters - obviously taking prices the night before is no guarantee of beating SP and you do not necessarily have to have your accounts closed provided you use some savvy but it if you bet most days then it is really the only way of getting sufficient value on a regular enough basis to make profit. Dunno if that made any sense...

[smaxwell76]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? I have studied this pretty extensively and kept records over the course of 5000+ bets over 18 months and can beat SP by an average of 40% resulting in a 10%+ ROI, as Aidymac says tho the trade off is frequent account closures :(

[BillyHills]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? Personally i think its quite easy to beat the SP, whether or not that is due to the weight of money is open to question. I fear unfortunately it's mainly down to a very tight market place, bookies no longer wait for a big bet or several smaller ones before they shorten horses up, they just follow the online market guides like oddschecker and betfair. Perfect example the other day, the guy from 365 was on ATR talking about the Derby market the day before the race, he said they had shortened up that O'Brien horse that Moore was riding, not because they had taken anything for it but because they thought that would be the one the shrewdies would back in the morning. Its total bollox, too much information availability out there these days. Of course you can beat the SP in every race if you like but if your backing losers it won't make much difference so at the end of the day while the price is important its not the main component of making money. I'd say your doing fine Lee with those figures mate.

[calculus]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? Just to contextualize what I said, beating SP is obviously not the goal per se, but it is the by product of backing horses at the right prices - and if you're not backing horses at the right prices then you simply cannot profit in the long run. Assuming (and it is a questionable assumption) that SP is representative of a horses "true probability" of winning then you cannot profit in the long run if you are not consistently getting your money on at greater odds. Also, re BH's comments, I don't see anything wrong with cutting a horses price due to tertiary events such as jockey bookings, the presence of the a top jockey clearly influences a horses probability of winning - and in the case of a Coolmore Derby runner also indicates that the horse will be ridden to win (i.e. not a pacemaker) - and I think bookies obviously need to account for this in their prices.

[calculus]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? Hypothetical scenario here (bear with me)... You're betting on the toss of a coin and it's priced up as 10/11 Heads and 8/11 Tails on the early prices... By the time of the "off" it's priced up as 11/10 Heads and 4/7 Tails... and Tails wins at 4/7. If you backed Tails on the early prices you have still beaten SP and could be forgiven for believing that you had got "value" but that is obviously not the case and you would lose money in the long run if you consistently got your money on at such prices. What I am trying to say (I think) is that picking the "right bet" is not enough on its own, you also need to back at the right price and just because you are beating SP it does not mean that you are getting actual value (i.e. a bigger price than the probability of success in reality). However (back to the real world now!), given the way betting markets operate if you are not beating SP on a regular basis then it is highly unlikely that you are getting a any value. Perhaps it is easy to beat SP (and I'm not 100% convinced on this) but I honestly believe that it is far from straight forward to consistently get value.

[Sheerluck Holmes]

Re: 'Beating SP' - Does it matter? Thanks for all the input chaps, all great stuff, going to read through again in the morning with fresh eyes/brain. :ok As you all guess, I do strike all my bets the evening before, but that's not me trying to be clever - I'm at work early most days and the evening's are the only free time I get. Thanks again.

[Valiant Thor]

Im in BH's camp. As long as your average winning odds are greater than your strikerate,then it doesnt matter if you beat sp or not. You can beat the sp on every bet but if they all lose then to quote Morrissey "What Difference Does It Make"

[RussP]

Echo the sentiments of others. The whole SP & value argument does not sit comfortably with me at all. Ultimately, I don't like backing below 5/1 as that's not an EW price (the type of bet I prefer) but, other than that, I'm just looking for winners. End of. Maybe it's a rather naive attitude but it works for me.

[mowgli77]

I had 5 win bets at Pontefract the other week, beat SP on all of them but ended up with 4 seconds and a third. Unfortunately beating SP doesn't always put food on the table, I went home penniless and had beans on toast for a week. :) It seems that most errors are made early by odds compilers, especially in some of the races they price up at about 5pm the night before but the most significant market moves seem to be about 5-10 mins before the off. Look at Scalzo yesterday, the sort that people are likely to back on course and the sort where a gamble looks likely. I'd already backed him in the morning at 7-2 and got on again at 11-4 but then I saw him walking around the parade ring with 5 legs, coltish in the paddock and wished I hadn't backed him. I thought he might drift but he got absolutely smashed in to 7-4 favourite. Not getting involved with what look to be bad value bets is probably more important than beating SP. I wouldn't have backed Scalzo at 7-4 in a handicap. Before the race he looked like a potential group performer and I had the race between him and Twilight Son. Most people that backed Scalzo probably beat the SP, certainly anyone backing it early morning would have done so but it's worth nothing when it runs a stinker. Back the right horses at the right prices and you'll make a profit. There are a lot of punters believe "a winner's a winner, whatever the price" and will back any horse at any price. Long term they'll lose. Maiden races stand out for me, there are so many that run a half decent race on debut and then go off at ridiculously short prices next time out and flop (usually trained by Mark Johnston). Martini Time would be a perfect example recently at Pontefract, Evens was available, went off 8-11 and was 9th.

[smaxwell76]

I'm not sure i agree with those that think that it's more to do with finding winners than finding value. Since a horses' SP is driven by the opinion of thousands of punters it will 'on average' end up at a price reflecting just slightly lower than it's true chance of winning the race. If you can 'on average' beat the SP by a big enough percentage you will be getting a price greater than the true chance of the horse winning the race and as such guarantee a profit in the long term.

[Valiant Thor]

I'm not sure i agree with those that think that it's more to do with finding winners than finding value. Since a horses' SP is driven by the opinion of thousands of punters it will 'on average' end up at a price reflecting just slightly lower than it's true chance of winning the race. If you can 'on average' beat the SP by a big enough percentage you will be getting a price greater than the true chance of the horse winning the race and as such guarantee a profit in the long term.

Regardless of what amount you beat the sp by if the horse doesnt win in the correct proportion to its odds you get nothing, zip, nada. Simply by beating the sp does not guarantee a profit long term,that would only occur if you beat the sp on every horse and the overound as well. I wish I had a pound for everytime ive heard punters in the bookies saying "I new that would win but I went for the value" as they throw yet another ticket in the bin. Im far from an expert at making an odds line but I do know my what my strike rates are in certain types of races so if the horse is priced near my sr I back it simple as that, I dont give a monkeys about beating the sp.

[calculus]

But, as others have said, if you accept the assumption that a horse's true probability of winning is equal to it's SP (or more realistically, the SP is slightly smaller than the true probability of the horse winning) then it stands to reason that you will profit in the long run by beating SP by a sufficiently big percentage. In the case of horse racing it's not an exact science because there are so many uncontrollable and intangible variables but it's basic mathematical probability and is an irrefutable fact. I think part of the issue is that the term "value" gets bandied around a lot these days and I am not convinced that people always understand what it actually means in all cases.

[arsenalfh]

I experimented with tissues at the start of the year and since I was beating SP most of the time I thought I was getting value and would be profitable in the long run. Then the weeks drew on and I wasn't picking any winners so I did some research and changed my approach with some success. Now I look for bets that I'm confident can guarantee a return and whether it's by winning or placing. If you're not confident your bet can win then what's the point? Obviously I also look for value before placing a bet or you're not going to win in the long term. I don't swear by the exchanges but I find that they're a helpful tool to use as a punter. I like to see my selections get some sort of support on the exchanges before placing a bet as you're going to need a massive edge on the market to be profitable if your selections are much bigger on Betfair. That being said there are plenty of horses which get support on the exchanges but are no value in my eyes so you can't just rely on beating the BSP.

[south_eastern_ram]

But' date=' as others have said, if you accept the assumption that a horse's true probability of winning is equal to it's SP (or more realistically, the SP is slightly smaller than the true probability of the horse winning) then it stands to reason that you will profit in the [u']long run by beating SP by a sufficiently big percentage. In the case of horse racing it's not an exact science because there are so many uncontrollable and intangible variables but it's basic mathematical probability and is an irrefutable fact. I think part of the issue is that the term "value" gets bandied around a lot these days and I am not convinced that people always understand what it actually means in all cases.

This, pretty much. Swap SP for Betfair SP though. On course SP's are laughable a lot of the time and manipulated by weak on course markets. Beat Betfair prices and you will be a winner, of course variance plays a role and that can be brutal.

[mowgli77]

I think part of the issue is that the term "value" gets bandied around a lot these days and I am not convinced that people always understand what it actually means in all cases.

Value is in the eye of the beholder really isn't it and doesn't just relate to racing. Artwork is a great example. I was at York races last week, there was a huge canvas oil painting for sale at around £600 and under it was a smaller, crappier looking painting but it was priced at £2,000. I'm no art expert but the 2nd painting didn't look "value" to me at that price yet to someone else it might have done. How many would say Sole Power was value for example today if he was priced up at say 6-4 in a huge handicap? There was a donkey race recently at Beverley and the bookies were betting to over 200% over round. The favourite was evens but had won the last 2 renewals. Value? :eek

[calculus]

I agree, the whole thing is subjective and like I said there are no end of intangibles to deal with. What I really meant is that there seems to be a mindset, largely perpetuated by the likes of Tom Segal and his ilk, where the term "value" implies a large price - e.g. backing a 20/1 shot is "backing value", this is obviously not necessarily true. Value can be had at the shortest of prices and the biggest of prices can be terrible value. The real subjective part is defining the true probability of a horse winning.