Where To Place Bets
1. How Often Does a Horse Run a Place?
Super Bowl LV takes place on Sunday, February 7. Kansas City Chiefs take on Tampa Bay Buccaneers, with the Bucs having home-field advantage. You can safely bet real money on the 2021 Super Bowl at any of our recommended online sportsbooks and betting. Feb 02, 2021 Bets on horse racing are not allowed, and you can’t bet on any college game that takes place within the District. Similarly, in Virginia, you can’t place a bet on in-state college games. And you can’t place a sports bet at all in Maryland: The state has legalized sports betting, but has not opened any sportsbooks as of yet.
Over the years, I’ve had a number of punters ask me about place betting strategies and whether they are likely to win. On the surface it seems like a good idea to find horses that you really like to win and then back them to place. You will enjoy more regular collects, turn what would have been some losing days into winning days and the profits will slowly accumulate, right?
Unfortunately, what is good in theory doesn’t often translate to practice and that’s certainly the case with place betting. The reality is that on average, the value in place betting markets is significantly less than win betting markets and is therefore much more difficult to profit from.
To properly analyse the merits of place betting you first need to understand how often a horse that has a certain chance of winning, will actually run a place.Consider an example where you like a horse in the market at $6.00 and believe it’s closer to a $4.80 or $5.00 chance. Do you know how often this horse can be expected to run a place?
In the example above, assuming your $4.80 to $5.00 assessed price is correct, you can expect the horse to run a place (1st to 3rd) 52% – 53% of the time.It’s easy to think that you like a horse so much and feel so confident about its chance of winning, that it’s almost certain to run a place, but the reality is far different.
The table below shows the historical place strike rate of horses based on their true win price / actual win percentage.
| True Win Price | Actual Win % | Actual Place % |
|---|---|---|
| $2.00 | 50.0% | 81.0% |
| $2.00 | 40.0% | 74.0% |
| $3.00 | 33.3% | 68.0% |
| $4.00 | 25.0% | 59.0% |
| $5.00 | 20.0% | 52.0% |
| $7.50 | 13.3% | 41.0% |
| $10.00 | 10.0% | 34.0% |
| $15.00 | 6.7% | 26.0% |
| $21.00 | 4.8% | 20.5% |
| $26.00 | 3.8% | 17.0% |
| $31.00 | 3.2% | 15.5% |
| $51.00 | 2.0% | 10.5% |
Note: This does not mean that a horse $5.00 in the market has a 52% place chance.
On average horses at $5.00 in the market only win approximately 18% of the time, not 20%. They’re true win price is closer to $5.50, which means they will run a place approximately 49.5% of the time.Once you have an understanding of the expected place strike rate for a horse’s true winning chance, you can work out the correct place price.
Two Place Prices
Where To Place Bets On Nfl Games
| Actual Win % | True Win Price | Actual Place % | True Place Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| 50.0% | $2.00 | 81.0% | $1.23 |
| 40.0% | $2.50 | 74.0% | $1.35 |
| 33.3% | $3.00 | 68.0% | $1.47 |
| 25.0% | $4.00 | 59.0% | $1.69 |
| 20.0% | $5.00 | 52.0% | $1.92 |
| 13.3% | $7.50 | 41.0% | $2.44 |
| 10.0% | $10.00 | 34.0% | $2.94 |
| 6.7% | $15.00 | 26.0% | $3.85 |
| 4.8% | $21.00 | 20.5% | $4.88 |
| 3.8% | $26.00 | 17.0% | $5.88 |
| 3.2% | $31.00 | 15.5% | $6.45 |
| 2.0% | $51.00 | 10.5% | $9.52 |
Where To Place Bets On Ufc Fights
Example: If you assess that a horse’s real chance of winning 20%, then it’s true win price should be $5.00 and its true place price should be $1.92