Betting on horse racing… a game full of differing opinions and angles, none of them strictly right or wrong. If you’ve been playing the game for years and know the ropes, you might not take much from this. But if you’re dipping your toes and just about keeping your head above water, you probably will. Everything here is based on my own experience. Hopefully you take enough from it to make your time with the game more enjoyable — and more sensible. It’s a long one, but worthwhile. Grab a brew and settle in.
1. Choose your stakes — and stick to them
The biggest factor in betting is how much you choose to stake. Racing might be centuries old, but the modern landscape treats it more like a cash machine than a sport. Price boosts, free bets, trainers acting as “ambassadors” — all geared to drain pockets quickly.
Set a strict point value per bet and stick to it. Whether your point is 50p, £1, £10 or £100 doesn’t matter, as long as it’s manageable.
My staking model is simple:
The IWAC
1pt – 1pt Win or ½pt Each-Way
The in with a chance. For unknowns, long shots, maidens and pedigree angles — situations where variance is high.
The Bet
2pt – 2pt Win or 1pt Each-Way
My most-used stake. Keeps things steady in the highs and stops panic in the lows.
The Max Bet
5pt – 5pt Win or 2½pt Each-Way
Rare. Reserved for top-confidence bets. I have maybe four or five of these over the course of a year.
If you stake £50 at 2/1 but only £5 at 25/1, you’ve not backed the bigger bet properly and your 25/1 winner isn’t really a 25/1 winner in your pocket. Consistency is everything. And for any point system to work, you need to be consistent, commited and have a proper betting bank — preferably around 100pts when starting.
Betting Banks and Points Systems
How much you stake on a bet has to come from you. Nobody, not even a close friend or relative, can tell you how much you should be betting. Your stake needs to come from what you can afford and, more importantly, how much you can bet without letting it effect you emotionally.
The points system became widely adopted in British racing publications and betting newsletters long before the internet era and by the 1980s and 1990s it was standard in tipping services, but it has proven a valueable tool for punters too, as the system puts a very clean and clear value to your betting performance.
Starting off a betting bank can be a tedious task, as it can feel slow to build up if you suddenly start using very small stakes comparitively to what you may have previously bet. However, I think most, if not all, would be surprised at just how sustainable it is and how fast you can start to increase stakes in line with your betting bank.
Starting off, you want a bank 100x your stake, so;
- £100 Bank = £1 per point
- £1,000 Bank = £10 per point
- £5,000 Bank = £50 per point
Losing runs have been felt from every bettor, now matter the odds you play and you must have a cushion in your betting weaponary in order to swallow one. If you don’t and you are instead depositing before every bet, you will soon have a very dubious bank statement and likely some questions to answer, be it the wife or the mortgage broker.
My longest run without a winner was 49 bets at £10 per point and even with a betting bank to cushion me, I can assure you I was feeling the pressure. Yes some of them were each-way bets which placed and they weren’t all negative net, but that is a brutal long run without seeing that instant jump.
The key to maintaining a rigid mentality during such a run was being level headed with my level stakes. I knew it couldn’t last forever of course, but I also knew law of averages would soon take me a turn and I’d at least begin to level out.
2. Never place a bet expecting a return
The best advice I ever received: “Once the money leaves your hand, consider it gone.”
Expecting to “get it back” leads to chasing, and chasing leads to disaster. There are endless variables before a horse even sets foot on the track: going changes, jockey changes, stalls issues, breaks, in-running trouble, falls, errors, you name it.
Sometimes these break your way too. Be gracious in both directions. And please — never ask for a refund because a horse fell or got stuck in the stalls. You play your chance and take what you get.
3. Look beyond the odds
Never let odds dictate your view of a race. Approach the form without knowing the prices. If you know a horse is 1/2, you’ll justify it. If you know something is 50/1, you’ll dismiss it. Both are mistakes.
A clear example: at Kempton, I watched a filly parade who stood out effortlessly. I’d already decided she was the pick — until I checked the price: 66/1. I hesitated and ended up staking my £7 spare change, instead of a proper bet. She bolted up at 50/1 under a hands-and-heels Richard Kingscote ride.
The best read of the entire day — and the price talked me out of doing it properly. Don’t let the market override your judgement.
4. Keep it simple
Ditch the muggy multiples. We all love the £10→£1000 dream, but constantly chasing accas is a surefire route to bleeding your bank dry. It’s hard enough landing one winner, let alone four or five.
Have the occasional pop if you want, but singles are the only reliable route to consistency.
5. Pick your races carefully
Betting every race on the card is madness. Some races are minefields:
- Maidens
- Novices
- Juvenile contests
Full of unknowns and unexposed types. If you’re inexperienced or using a limited bank, skip them entirely.
Handicaps offer better opportunities. But the best races to play, in my experience, are the higher-class contests. Better horses run more consistently, hype creates false favourites, and outsiders drift bigger than they should.
If you can find a reason to oppose a short-priced favourite, don’t be shy.
6. Know why you’re placing a bet
Most people backing horses have no idea why they’re backing them. A tip on social media with only the horse name, course and time is useless. You don’t know:
- why it’s fancied
- what its running style is
- what to watch for in-running
- the Trainer or Jockey angle
How many times have you lost with a horse, sworn it off, then watched it win next time? You didn’t understand the first run.
If you don’t know the angle, you can’t learn a thing — win or lose. That means you’ll keep repeating the same mistakes.
7. Don’t get carried away — up or down
Every bettor goes through purple patches and horror runs. Treat both the same. Good spells tempt you into complacency. Bad ones tempt you into panic.
Losing runs are inevitable. Hugh Taylor once mentioned a run of around 40 straight losers during a fabulous feature on attheraces. As above, I’ve experienced a losing streak of 49 and only recently suffered 27 straight defeats. Several unlucky, more beaten fairly, some that shouldn’t have run. Staying calm and sticking with it brought four winners from the next eight, all at healthy prices.
A level head recovers. A panicked one spirals further.
8. Choose who carries your money
A bet is never just on a horse — it’s on a horse, a jockey, and a trainer.
All three have form cycles. Horses go over the top. Jockeys dip in sharpness. Yards go cold. Illness, confidence, circumstances — everything plays a part.
“Horses for courses” is a cliché for good reason. Certain horses act better on certain tracks and surfaces. Pedigrees indicate preferences. Jockeys have tracks they excel at, and tracks they struggle with.
The more you understand these patterns, the better your bets become.
9. Stop thinking you’re cursed
You don’t jinx anything by placing a bet. It’s just the nature of chance.
Everyone has muttered “it’s always me” after a stinker. But thinking like that will only make the game harder. The ones you didn’t back will win; the ones you did will fold. Hindsight is useless.
Focus on the next bet, not the last one.
10. If you use a tipster — choose wisely and stick with them
There are thousands of tipsters online. Most aren’t worth your time. The worst are those tied to bookmakers through affiliate schemes — they earn when you lose. Avoid them completely.
Find someone honest, realistic, consistent — and stick with them. No-one avoids losing runs. Jumping from one to another after every loser guarantees long-term failure.
Recently, one clown online spent days hyping a “sure thing” and charging people for the privilege. The yard had barely trained a winner in years. When the horse finished second, the bloke still celebrated “info places”, despite the each-way bet being a losing one. When questioned, he blocked me. Says everything.
If someone genuinely had winning information, they wouldn’t sell it for £20.
Racing can be profitable if you play it properly, respect the sport, and actually learn it. If you’re only here for a quick buck, you’ll be disappointed. If you embrace the complexity, you’ll enjoy it far more — and your betting will improve naturally.
Bonus: Never jump on the crest of a wave
To summarise the above, punters can and tend to be their own worst enemy. Their stakes will be all over the shop, they’ll convince themselves the next one wins, they’ll talk yourself into betting one at a short price and out of one because of a big price and they’ll bet in all the hottest races of the year at the likes of Cheltenham Festival, the Grand National and Royal Ascot. And they wonder why they are always down?
The game is tough, even for the most seasoned punters. Even when you are the most hardened bettor who plays by their own strict rule book, it takes constant reminders and dedication to keep on track. Only then will you give yourself a long-term chance at turning a profit.
Else, your rolling the dice.
Happy punting,
