Horse Racing Betting Strategies For Beginners & Pro Bettors

Dutching is great for new horse racing bettors who are starting to experiment with bet styles beyond a simple win bet. It’s also an easy strategy:

• Place a first bet on a horse to win the race.
• Make a second selection in your chosen racebook.

This strategy introduces bettors to two things: risk and profit margins.

A Dutching strategy is naturally risky because you accept you will lose at least one bet. However, it also helps educate bettors on how to chase profit. If you’re confident that only two horses have a chance in the Preakness Stakes, then backing both runners to win covers more eventualities.

The biggest drawback to Dutch betting on horse racing is that you are guaranteed to lose at least one bet. You also run the risk of losing multiple bets on the same race. This could lead to a heavy loss and could affect your ability to wager on future races.

80-20 betting is ideal if you want a level of insurance in a race. If you feel like the favorite will probably win but still realize it’s worth throwing 20% of your stake on an outsider.

It’s also a good method when betting on multiple races.

The big drawback to 80-20 betting is the same as any Dutch bet: you could lose it all. This is particularly common in a race where there are three or four favorites to win.

Lay betting is great if you are confident a hot favorite will not win a race. They can sometimes be easy to spot. You might see a horse’s odds tumble into the negative before a race as other bettors throw their cash toward it. The horse’s odds might become so artificially depressed that you think it’s worth the risk of laying.

It’s also easier to pick a loser than a winner in horse racing. You could risk a lot of money laying a big outsider, to win a few dollars. Some bettors use this method to earn hundreds of small wins.

Exposure is the big problem in lay betting. If you lay $100 on Slow Freddie at +1300 and he wins, then you owe your racebook $1300. Expert bettors factor in this liability when they place lay bets. We encourage new bettors to think carefully before laying.

Lay betting can be a great method for earning quick, small profits when gambling against a no-hoper. However, the liability involved if that outsider wins the race is huge. We advise bettors to use this method with caution.

The Pick 3 strategy is ideal for squeezing extra value from your bets. You can back three heavy favorites together and get higher odds compared to three single bets. Your profit potential can skyrocket.

The drawback to a Pick 3 bet is that you have no insurance if one selection loses. We suggest bettors think hard about their choices, because just one loss results in your entire bet losing.

Bettors often use a show bet strategy to make a small, but regular, profit. The idea is to back favorites, or near-favorites, to finish in the top three at small odds. Your payout won’t break the bank, but you will score a return. Keep doing this over eight or nine races and your balance should steadily grow.

You could also use this strategy for wagering on outsiders, in the hope they sneak into third place and land you a big windfall. This is a riskier strategy, but the profit margins are much greater. It all depends on your level of risk.

The main drawback to show betting is that you get much smaller odds, compared to a win or place bet. We encourage bettors to weigh risk and reward. Is backing a horse at -400 to finish first, second, or third really worth it?

The main reason bettors use a trifecta strategy is because the size of the odds is huge. You can wager small amounts on multiple trifectas, win just one of them, and still walk away with a profit.

The size of the odds also means that low-budget players can test their luck on a trifecta without wiping themselves out. The high odds carry high risk, but bettors can mitigate this by reducing their stake.

The obvious drawback with trifectas is they are notoriously difficult to get right. Expert bettors can go days without landing a successful trifecta. We recommend that you have a sensible look at your budget and make sure you don’t risk too much on a single race.

Trifectas also rely on the big favorites coming good. Rarely will you throw an outsider into a trifecta, because they will likely ruin it. However, not all favorites live up to their rating, and there’s nothing more frustrating than seeing a high-odds horse beat your dead-cert to ruin your bet.