It seems our tipsters are either helping out the bookies or just absolutely hopeless.
Thanks to them, I have found lay gold.
Many are very short prices and get turned over.
I can't say that anything untoward is happening, but I sometimes have my suspicions, as many of these tipsters are exbookmakers.
So before I get into any trouble, let's see if there's any other explanation as to why the performance is simply dismal.
If I am wrong, then they are simply over paid hacks, and any forum anywhere could do a better job.
To be fair, I had a look at their best bets only, and the performance is simply woeful.
What seems to be going on, and even went on in the sixties and seventies according to someone I know who worked for a racing newspaper, is that the best bet is the lay of the day, the value bets and roughies are the actual tips!
There has been considerable "pressure" to be popular and make your best bet something "others" can make a buck from.
As the money streams in for this false best bet, it's a win win situation
To make it look good the occasional "you can't leave it out" best bet sneaks in.
I mean you couldn't leave out a Northerly or a Black Caviar, that would be too obvious.

So let's see how one such harness tipster faired in his last twenty best bets of the day. Incidentally another exbookmaker

20 selections
5 winners
25% win strike rate.

Of course that doesn't look to bad, but wait, the majority of them were odds on favourites

So the win return on these Best Bets was $10.10
That's a loss of $9.90
or a loss on turnover of a staggering 49.50% !!!!!

On even money to odds on Best Bets ( remember these are supposed to be the specials, the very best of the day, the one's earmarked out of all the tips to follow, the cream de la creme, the professional punters banker bet).

Oh dear has it come to this, the tipsters are shafting the little guy who has his $2.00 on the best bet to buy his formguide and coffee the next day.

There is more to this than meets the eye, or I'm totally wrong and they are simply getting paid to pull tips out of a hat.
No wait, that would be more accurate!

So in an effort to prove that I'm talking bollocks, lets follow the Best Of The Best and record the performances.

For recording purposes, I'll record the Herald Sun tipsters best bets on Gallops and Harness and report in that way.
Each tipster is allowed to have his own Best Bet even if a couple agree.
Can't be fairer than that.

The old excuse that the poor old fellas have to tip every race won't hold water here, as this is the fairest way to judge, Best Bet Bonanza.

And here common folk and gentry are the lays today

Kyneton R5 1 Doolam Lover
Kyneton R6 2 Lightenuff
Kyneton R7 5 Rainbow Queen

Terang R1 Keayang Delight
Terang R4 Devilish Smile
Terang R6 Scareed
Ternag R8 Vesper Lynd

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LOL

Go get 'em Chrome!

Seriously, good luck. There is nothing like laying odds on faves and them falling over.

Well it all sprang out of looking at their performances from a backing perspective.
I couldn't believe how bad they were at picking shorties!

Then I remembered a couple of things.
Things people had told me about tipsters from working with them.
For example at the Age, they used to go to the races and the tipsters would tell them not to back the best bets. This is in the seventies and an account from a typesetter who worked there.
They were told to look at the roughies and value bets, not the best bets.
And it was understood that it was a warning of sorts.

Then we have a couple of exbookies tipping who went under, and it would behove them to tip for the bookies let's just say.

Tipsters don't win any accolades, they are on a meagre salary (most of them), it's like a freelance job. They are not held accountable for their results.
As long as they tip reasonably now and then, it's all good.
If you can put in a decent summary that sounds like you know what you are talking about, your position is fairly guaranteed.

So it would not be beyond the realms of possibility for a cash for comment scenario to appear attractive.
I'm not saying it happens, I'm saying it is possible to happen.
The tipping results stand alone.
49.50% Loss, on odds on favourites certainly makes one think in that direction.

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Chrome,

Its an interesting angle. Regardless of whether they do it deliberately or not their selections are likely to be overbet regardless.

I am guessing you have targetted certain tipsters by analysing their results. I would like to do the same but I am not sure where to get the tipsters from. For example I have no idea for the radio tab tips.

The only tipsters I can find are on the 2ky site (same as sky site). Do you have any other sources ? If you don't want to put it here publicly could you email me the tipsters who you think are worthwhile watching at betfinder @ exemail dot com dot au . I understand posting the data is fairly sensitive.

I did a post on this very subject on this forum some time ago.

Chrome is right.

They truly are miserable results.

Their SR over 150 bets that I checked was approx 22%
They were usually favs.
The average Fav wins 30%.
So how can they be that bad, one wonders.
One would assume their SR to be 30%+

Best bets can be found on the UniTAB site by looking for the tipsters selections which have an asterisk on top of the selection numbers Top selection.
I call them Star Bets due to the *asterisk resembling a star.
Sometimes its a +plus sign.

Example.
Todays selections Tue 20th Dec
Tam 5/3 2.90 L
Kyn 2/7 2.30 W
3/4 5.90 L
7/5 3.20 L

Loss -1.70
40% POT if laying at these prices.
25% SR

This is a fairly typical result


I found if one targeted any of these star bets by either tipster , priced...
3.50-4.90
Win SR was 19%
A level stakes profit of +36% POT was made by Laying them.

Go figure.

And these people work around the Horse industry 8 hours a day.

I am at a total loss as to why it is so.

__________________
Cheers.

You can use any tipsters you like.
I use heraldsun formguide online.
You can basically use any tipster anywhere, as they are all the same, as long as they aren't a guest tipster.
Looking at the results I also like to avoid those best bets that are top tips by others.

Point to note is that they can't help but tip some short priced winners, it's going to happen, but long term they are as Bhagwan suggested....hopeless.

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Nice work Chrome Prince - as a daily watcher of TVN, when a bit bored I lay any & everything Richy Callender sprouts as a 'good thing', cant go wrong

http://www.propun.com.au/archived_a...ce141006_2.html

I just found this pre Betfair in OZ, so I guess Neil had noticed the same thing.

__________________
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http://www.propun.com.au/horse_raci...ng_systems.html
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Video overview of RaceCensus here:
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Kyneton R5 1 Doolam Lover Lost
Kyneton R6 2 Lightenuff Lost
Kyneton R7 5 Rainbow Queen Lost

Terang R1 Keayang Delight Lost
Terang R4 Devilish Smile $1.65 (betfair weighted price)
Terang R6 Scareed $2.81 (betfair weighted price)
Terang R8 Vesper Lynd Lost (betfair weighted price $1.40)

Daily wrap:

Loss Backing @ Betfair prices 2.54 units
36.29% Loss on turnover.

Perhaps they should be renamed after a tea, aka tynee tips!

P.S. there were 4 tippers at Terang, guess who picked Vesper Lynd - our friendly exbookie, aka Mr. Consistent.
More cash in the bag

__________________
RaceCensus - powerful system testing software.
Now with over 399,000 Metropolitan, Provincial and Country races!
http://www.propun.com.au/horse_raci...ng_systems.html
*RaceCensus now updated to 31/03/2024
Video overview of RaceCensus here:
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Nice Lay results CP.