Horse racing is one of the most popular and exciting sports for punters to place their bets on. But how can you ensure you place winning horse racing bets?
In this article, we’re going to look at a number of tips, tricks and strategies you can use to help increase the profitability of your horse racing betting.
Once you’ve read through and got to grips with our advice, it’s time to choose a bookmaker. Horseracingbetting.co.uk has lots of great options, and full reviews of each bookmaker as well, so you can make an informed choice about which is the best fit for you.
Alternatively you can check out some the top sports betting tipsters right away.
Let’s dive right in.
Tips to win horse racing bets
Let’s get straight into our top tips to win horse racing bets.
- Research your horses wisely
- Look beyond the favourite
- Stick to larger horse racing events
- Use betting exchanges
- Keep a betting record
Let’s check out each of these in more detail.
Research your horses wisely
Number one in our list of tips to win horse racing bets is to pick your horses wisely. In other words, research your bets before placing them.
As with anything in betting, it’s more effective to base your selections on thorough research rather than gut instinct.
Here are some of the things you should consider when completing your horse racing analysis:
- Racing form
- The competition
Racing form
So you’ve found a horse you like, now it’s time to do your research.
Similar to the importance of checking a football team’s form, it’s vital to check the racing form of a horse. This gives you a great insight into how a horse has performed in their last outings and throughout their career.
Analysing racing form is a skill in itself but it’s something that punters need to understand in order to select winning horse racing bets.
You can find valuable information at hundreds of different websites of which some do the hard work for you and provide recommendations and tips on certain horses.
If you’re left to do the research, the most important things to look out for when checking out a horse’s previous results are:
- Latest race results along with the position
- The going
- The distance
Latest race results
Recent race results provide a great insight into the form of a horse. However, a recent win doesn’t necessarily mean you should bet on that horse.
You also need to look at the number of other horses in the race along with other information like the going and the distance which we’ll look at below.
The going
What’s this nonsense about the going I sense you thinking…
For any betting beginners out there, this may sound like an odd phrase. However, the going is a key factor that you can’t ignore when placing horse racing bets. It plays a big part in the outcome of a horse race and therefore your bets.
The going is used to describe the ground at a racecourse. In the UK and Ireland, there are 7 grades of surface used in the racing industry:
- Hard
- Firm
- Good to firm
- Good
- Good to soft
- Soft
- Heavy
You may be wondering what these grades mean but it’s fairly self-explanatory. Hard represents little moisture in the ground whereas heavy indicates the ground is very wet.
Some horses perform better on certain ground meaning this is something you should definitely consider when placing your horse racing bets.
Before placing any wagers, I recommend you check the going of the racecourse. You can often find this information within the racecard at a bookmaker.
Here’s an example from Skybet.
The distance
Another important aspect to consider when researching your horse racing bets is the distance of the race. Similar to the going, some horses are built for sprints whereas others have better stamina and perform better in longer races.
The horse racing industry uses imperial units to measure distances so you’ll find races are measured in miles and furlongs. The shortest races are 5f (furlongs) and the longest is up to 4m4f (the m stands for miles).
You can check the race distance in the bookmakers’ racecard. To check a horse’s previous race distances and how well they performed, head to websites like the Racing Post.
Look beyond the favourite
Our next tip to win horse racing bets is to look beyond the favourite.
What do I mean by this? Let me explain.
Horse racing is one of the most unpredictable sports in the world, there’s so much that jockeys and trainers can’t control.
Anything can happen in a horse race and this is especially true when there are jumps involved. Races such as The Grand National are notoriously harder to pick winners on.
This unpredictability makes horse racing incredibly popular throughout the world and it’s also why betting on racing is one of the most exciting categories in the betting industry.
But what does this mean for your betting?
This means that odds-on favourites are not always going to win. In actual fact, favourites only win 30% of the time meaning outsiders priced at long odds often win races giving punters large returns on fairly small stakes.
All in all, it’s best to look past the most popular horses at short odds as they often don’t win and you could return a larger profit with longer odds.
Stick to large horse racing events
Another key horse racing betting tip is to stick to larger events where the majority of punters place their bets.
For starters, you can often find great value odds on more popular markets. The bookies are always looking to promote their latest offers and they generally do so during large horse racing events.
You’ll also have more races and therefore options to place your bets. This gives you more opportunity to place winning horse racing bets.
Smaller, less popular events are still a great option here and there but in general stick to more popular events like Cheltenham, the Grand National or Royal Ascot.
Keep a betting record
Next up in our list of tips to win horse racing bets, I recommend you always keep track of information surrounding your bets.
If you’re a regular visitor at The Sure Bettor you’ll know how often we talk about this betting tip. But it’s with good reason.
Using this technique has helped hundreds of bettors to increase their earnings in the long run. You’ll be able to review and refine your betting strategy in order to maximise your income.
Specifically you should record each and every horse racing bet you place.
This puts you ahead when looking back at your betting history and working out which bets were successful and which were not so.
Another piece of advice that one of our users suggested is to write down the reason you placed each bet. This can lead to more successful bets in the future
Use betting exchanges
Another betting option that you may want to consider is using betting exchanges to place lay bets on horse races.
For those of you that aren’t aware you can also back horses NOT to win a race as well as betting on them to win. This adds an extra layer of flexibility to your betting strategy that many punters take advantage of.
You’re far more likely to win a bet when you’re betting against a horse.
You can only place these bets at betting exchanges. However, these platforms are incredibly versatile and you’ll go on to love them as many other bettors do.
There are a number of different betting exchanges out there but my favourite exchange platform is Smarkets. They offer a great commission rate of just 2% and welcome any kind of bettor to their platform.
You can read our complete Smarkets review here, for more information.
Placing winning horse racing bets
As with any bettor, I understand you want to place winning horse racing bets as often as possible. Whilst it’s difficult to continuously win racing bets due to the unpredictive nature of the sport, it should certainly still be your aim.
Using the tips and strategies we’ve covered above, you’ll certainly be in a better position to place successful horse racing bets.
Let me know which horse racing strategies you’re going to use by leaving a comment below right now.