Most BSP Favourites go on twice. A point to win and a quarter or a half to place. People ask why I bother with the place bet when the win bet is where the money is, and the answer is that the place bet isn't there to make money. It's there to keep me in the game while the win bets do.
A favourite that doesn't win usually still finishes in the first three. That's what being the favourite means. So a place bet on a fancied horse lands far more often than it loses, at a price that's small, sometimes tiny. 1.3, 1.4, now and then 1.15. On a half point stake you're making pence.
Pence add up, and more to the point, they add up on the weeks when the win bets don't. There's a fortnight in every season where every one of my win bets finds one too good. The horse runs fine, finishes second, and the point is gone. On those weeks the place bets are landing one after another and the book goes down slowly instead of quickly. That's the whole job. Slow the bad weeks down.
It changes how the bank feels, too. A losing run of nine win bets is horrible if that's all you've got on. If seven of those nine horses placed, it's a run of nine where you lost about five points, not nine, and you can look at the next card with a clear head instead of a sore one.
I'm strict about which ones get a place bet. Not every BSP Favourite, and not at any price. Short enough that the horse is a proper favourite, big enough that the place return isn't a joke, and a race with enough runners that three places are paid. Eight runners or more. A place bet in a five horse race is a bet on the horse not falling over, and the price knows it. Members get both halves on the same card every morning, the quiet one and the loud one.
December's been a place bet month. Soft ground, small fields, favourites getting beaten by better handicapped horses up the hill at Cheltenham. The win bets have been slow and the book is about level, which on a month like this is a result. The quiet half of the list has earned its keep.
Lee
PS: no, I don't do each way. Separate bets at separate prices, and the place bet is on its own merits or not at all.
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More from the notebook: Why my reasons are one line · The results pick the method, not me