Racing Post Betting Guide: Graeme Rodway on pool betting

Racing Post tipster Graeme Rodway shares his wisdom on how to tackle various pool bets in the Racing Post Betting Guide.
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Introduction

Pool betting is commonly used by punters to place bets that give the chance to win a large amount of money for a small layout. That’s the big ­appeal.

The best examples are the Exacta (picking the first two in a race), Trifecta (first three), Jackpot/Scoop6 (picking the winner of each of six nominated races on a single day). The most popular pool bet available at every British meeting is the ­Placepot (picking a horse to be placed in the first six races).

Placepot

This bet offers the chance to win without even backing a winner. You need to find a horse to be placed in races 1-6 on a racecard. It isn’t as easy as it looks and the average Placepot dividend is £407 to a £1 stake. If you get really lucky, the bet has the potential for a huge payout and the record dividend stands at £91,774.50 for just a quid.

Quick tip

If you choose two horses in every race it will equal 64 lines (2x2x2x2x2x2), but my strategy is to have at least one race in which I include just one horse, the banker. That helps keep the cost of the perm down and opens up the chance to include three or more runners in another race.

My Placepot banker will usually be the most consistent horse on the card, one who can be relied on to run its race. I’ll go through the form and try to find a runner who has been placed in at least 50 per cent of its races.

You can pick more than one horse in each race and perm selections to give yourself a better chance. That is also the case with the Jackpot and Scoop6, although the more perms you make the more expensive the bet will be, but the greater the likelihood of a win.

Beware not to play too safe. Small dividends are also common and if the favourite is placed in every race the bet will almost always pay less than £20, and in most cases less than £10. The best way to bolster the dividend if you fancy all the favourites is to include the unnamed favourite along with your selection. Therefore, if your original selection goes off favourite you’ll double your perm. It also means that if the favourite creeps into third you’ll have it covered along with your selection. Using the unnamed favourite to bolster your perms and increase the amount of winning lines makes sense on a day when the market leaders look solid.

The other way to try to bolster the dividend is to leave out the market leader in at least two of the races and the shorter price the favourite, the better. I’ll often look for races in which the favourite is forecast to go off at shorter than 2-1 and then include two or maybe three against the market leader, in the hope it is unplaced. This is a risky strategy, but you don’t want to be sharing the pool with everyone and fielding against the favourite is the quickest and easiest way to eliminate some of the competition. And that should be the aim in a pool bet.

The Tote Jackpot requires you to find the first six winners at a meetingCredit: Edward Whitaker

Jackpot

This bet runs on the same races as the Placepot but requires picking the first six winners at a meeting nominated by the Tote. The minimum stake is £1 and multiples are allowed but at no lower than 50p. That makes it tough to keep the bet affordable if playing multiple lines.

This is another bet where I favour the approach of having at least one banker. With a minimum unit stake of 50p, perms can quickly become expensive and sticking with one banker and surrounding that selection with several well-covered legs is the way to go.

Finding the Jackpot banker is a little different to the Placepot. The Jackpot banker really needs to be the most likely winner on the card and, although everyone will be looking for the same, I’m happy to take a chance on getting a result in one of the other races in order to try to bolster the dividend, rather than taking a chance on the banker. I’ll often stick with one of the shortest-priced runners on the card, bank on it, and move on quickly.

Top tip

Don’t play it too safe – you might end up winning but there is a good chance you’ll get back less than your outlay

If the shortest-priced horses on the card do go in then the dividend will suffer so don’t be afraid to stick in a few outsiders in some of the other legs. Because only the winner counts, a massive outsider can often prove a skinner, taking out all bar a few units and leaving the potential for a massive payout. With that in mind, don’t be afraid to put in four or five different horses in the more competitive races in the hope of getting the results you need.

One of the toughest of all the horse racing pool bets, the Jackpot offers the chance for a massive reward but you will probably need plenty of perms to have a realistic shot at it and even then the likelihood of success isn’t high. Plenty of luck will be required along the way.

Scoop6

A similar bet to the Jackpot in that you are required to pick six winners. The significant difference being the six races are selected across the cards on a Saturday, usually made up of a combination of the most competitive on the day and those shown on terrestrial television.

Add to that a minimum unit stake of £2 and the bet becomes an extremely expensive one if you wish to select multiple perms, which is the only realistic way of finding six winners.

Given the high minimum unit, the best way to play it is with two bankers and coverage on the other four races. I attempt to turn the bet into a double, trying to pick two certain winners and banking on them, then filling the other four races with as many horses as my budget allows.

How you find your bankers isn’t easy as the races selected for this bet rarely contain short-priced favourites. But there should still be a couple of races that contain a clear favourite, so try to find the least-competitive races of the six in the bet and bank in those.

Even if all the favourites win and the results are favourable the payout is still likely to be relatively high given the competitive nature of the bet and there is a bonus pool into which all win fund winners are entered for the following week. To win a share of the bonus fund, you’ll need to pick the winner of the nominated bonus race as selected by Tote.

Should you fail to find all six winners, there is also a consolation place fund which operates in the same way as a Placepot. If you have a selection placed in each of the six races you can scoop the place pool, but if you’re playing this bet you’re probably in it for the lottery style windfall.

Exacta/Trifecta

Two of the most popular pool bets that don’t include multiple legs or races. Instead we just need to concentrate on one race and find either the first two home (Exacta) or first three past the post (Trifecta). We can use perms effectively here too by selecting several horses.

You can choose your horses in the correct order or any order and I’d usually perm my runners up to come home in any order. It’s hard enough to predict the winner of each race let alone trying to come up with the second and third as well, in the correct order.

Perm them up to make it easier and I usually look to get between four and five runners on my side if the race is competitive enough to allow that approach. Four horses in a Trifecta is 24 lines, five is 60 lines, and four in an Exacta is 12 lines, while five comes out at 20. It sounds like a lot but I’ll be aiming at races with between 15-20 runners in which the pool is strong. That way there is a lot of competition and the payout should cover the layout. Well in theory.

This is where we can apply some Placepot strategy. Look for consistent horses who can be relied upon to run their races and then surround them with runners who are well handicapped but less reliable. That way we have a couple of shots at a big price winner to bolster the dividend, while also putting in the more solid options alongside them with the places in mind.

We can apply this strategy to both Exacta and Trifecta but always remember the more perms you take the better the result you are going to need in order to make a profit and, like all pool bets, it doesn’t pay to play it too safe. If you want to play the favourite I’d suggest perming the market leader with some of the big outsiders in the field in an attempt to boost the dividend.

Expert View

Years of experience tell me that pools can be the most fun and rewarding bets but also the most agonising. If you take this route then you’re going to end up with any number of hard-luck stories. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve reached the last leg of the Jackpot or Placepot only to be denied a potentially life-changing windfall at the final obstacle. It’s so frustrating.

However, when you do hit the big one it’ll more than likely be enough to cover the majority of the losses and that’s the great appeal of pool betting. That chance to win big money from just a small outlay is something that generally isn’t on offer with the majority of bookmakers.

To sum up, it’s hard enough to find one winner, let alone the several needed to land some of these exotic bets and you will need to be tough to survive long losing runs. But the rewards are there if you can stick to your guns and not let the agonising losses get to you.