My tactic is not to blindly back the improved bookie price just because it has gone up, it still needs to be close enough to the lay price, or where I think the lay price might settle.
It is hard to explain it, but when you watch so many of these races you almost get a sense of what is going to happen next pre-off… perhaps a bit like traders claim to be able to read markets. I am not saying that I am proficient in this, or that it is a tactic that others should follow, but it is working for me.
In the event that you haven’t layed and there is a mega-drift (which can happen) then you always have BOG to help you out although it can be a bit hairy tryng to recalculate your lay stake without knowing for sure what the SP will be.
If you are sticking to the fav and end up letting it run (not something I have ever done so far) then there is still a good chance that your horse can win and save your bacon.
There is clearly an element of gambling in what I am doing, but don’t forget that can go both ways and does not always cost you. Saying that, I have been burned by it, yes, so I would always advise caution and only to think about doing this if you can handle fast moving odds, re-calcs (or just knowing your numbers mentally) and are happy to accept the risk.
I will dig out my QL/QP on the last few dozen of these I have done and post them up – you will see that sometimes I have taken hits of £5+ because of the way I do it.
In terms of a real world case, today’s first race at Doncaster is a good example. The fav was priced at 2.20 all morning, with a lay price of 2.7 – 2.9
10 mins before the off Hills put the price up to 2.37, then another few mins later it went to 2.5 and then eventually (and what I was waiting for) it peaked at 2.75, so I jumped on board at that point. Stakes are irrelevant.
The lay was still flicking around 2.80 – 2.84 (which itself might be acceptable to some folk) but I held out for the lay to drop and placed my order at 2.74, which was duly matched with 1-2 mins left pre-race. I think it actually came in even more (must have done as the fav went off at 2.25 I think) but once I am on and matched I no longer care. If it hadn’t been taken, I already knew how much I was going to replace the lay bet with (often the full underlay to minimise QL when the horse wins, which is should do more often than not if it is still the fav).
Of course there are other dynamics and characteristics that you need to think about, like the actual prices you are dealing with (1.4 vs 2.8 vs 6.0) as well as how many other runners there are and what their prices are.
Sorry, that has turned into an absolute ramble and has cost me the chance to observe the market in the lead up to the 14:45, so I’ll leave it there and go and have a look at that now 🙂
HTH
