Here’s Something New: Odds Are That Those Who Wager on Horses Will Lose

Over the years, I had come to view the Saratoga racing season as a sure-fire source of profits. The betting opportunities were abundant and the bettors were relatively unsophisticated. I had made money there every year since 1978.

So I was thoroughly unprepared for the four weeks of torture that finally ended on Monday. I had 19 losing days out of 24. I rarely came close to making a decent score. I blew the equivalent of a medium-sized Mercedes-Benz. But what was even more distressing than this short-term loss were the long-term implications of what I saw and felt at Saratoga. The racing game has never been so difficult to beat.

Horseplayers have always been forced to overcome formidable odds, since the state and the track extract 17% or so from every dollar wagered. If a group of evenly matched poker players sat down at a table at which 17% was cut from each hand, the game wouldn’t last long because everybody would soon be broke. The same would be true of any casino game. But because racing is a supreme test of knowledge and skill, it is the most fruitful form of gambling. To win, a handicapper had to be at least 17% smarter than the crowd.

This wasn’t difficult when the typical horseplayer looked for “hot tips” and based his handicapping on myths and half-truths. But most handicappers today understand the factors that used to give a sharp player that necessary 17% edge--speed figures, trips, track biases, trainer patterns.

Moreover, the bettors in New York are getting help from various services that supply handicapping information.

The most significant of these are Len Ragozin’s speed-figure “sheets.” The subscribers, for the most part, are such big bettors that they have killed all the edges speed handicappers used to enjoy.

It used to be easy to get good prices on out-of-town horses shipping into New York. Now the “sheet” players have an accurate line on every shipper, even if he comes from Katmandu. When a maiden named Blinkers earned a big figure at Hollywood Park and then faced a fair field at Saratoga, everybody recognized his vast superiority. While he might have paid even money or better a couple of years ago, Blinkers now paid $2.80.

A friend of mine who is a full-time professional horseplayer in New York says he has scarcely seen any good betting opportunities since July, 1985. “I can’t remember the last time I found a horse who I thought was a cinch and went to the track knowing I was going to get 4 to 1.”

Indeed, the astuteness with which the crowd bets the right horses and avoids traps has become amazing. I thought I had a fairly sophisticated opinion in the Seneca Handicap, where I liked Talakeno to beat Southern Sultan, who had trounced him by 10 lengths when they met in the Sword Dancer Handicap at Belmont a month earlier.

A sudden storm had inundated the Belmont turf course, and all the jockeys came out of the gate riding very cautiously on the soggy going. Southern Sultan took the lead by default, set a ridiculously slow pace and drew away to what I concluded was a somewhat fluky win. Talakeno rallied to be a very distant second.

I thought Talakeno would turn the tables at Saratoga, and I thought I would get generous odds because the public would certainly bet a horse like Southern Sultan who had just won by 10 lengths. But the New Yorkers weren’t fooled. They made Talakeno the solid 3-to-2 favorite, with Southern Sultan a tepid second choice. Talakeno won, but the short price had killed the Seneca as a promising betting situation.

While any handicapper would be delighted to pick a winner in one race out of three, the public’s betting favorites won an extraordinary 42% of the races at Saratoga. Because the crowd is getting so smart, a tough game is becoming even tougher.