Most racecards come with ticks now. Course winner, distance winner, in form, trainer in form. A horse with five ticks looks like a certainty, and plenty of punters simply back the one with the most.
The trouble is that ticks overlap. Won last time. In good form. Comes here on the back of a win. That's three ticks for one fact, which is that the horse won its last race. It's worth knowing. It's still one thing, and the market knows it too.
So when I write down my reasons for a horse, I check they come from different places. One from its past. Has it already shown it can win against this sort of field? One about today. Has something changed in its favour, like the trip or the ground? If both reasons turn out to be the same good run described two ways then I've only got one. I treat it as one.
That matters more than it sounds. When I went back through my book looking at what my strongest bets had in common, the horses backed for two genuinely separate reasons stood out. It's the thinking behind Select Value, the smaller set of main win bets where the evidence is strongest. I won't publish exactly how a horse qualifies, but the idea underneath is simple. Agreement only counts when it's real agreement. Select Value is there for members who want just those bets.
Even that has a catch. Two opinions built from the same form figures can agree all day long and still be one opinion. Two ways of reading a race that both lean on the last run will both like the same horse for the same reason. So I'm not counting votes. I'm checking where each reason came from.
Try it on tomorrow's card. Take the horse you like most and write down your reasons. Then cross out any that are the same fact twice. If you're left with one it might still be a bet. It's a thinner one than it looked, though.
Lee
PS: there's a race to practise this on in my free guide, How to pick the right favourites.
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More from the notebook: The same distance can ask a different question · What Select Value leaves out