Show me the money!
This past Saturday, I originally decided to take a much-needed day away from the races. Yet, being the devoted horseplayer that I am, I nonetheless decided to take a late evening look, figuring I might find a minor stakes or a solid allowance race to capture my attention. Within minutes, I'd isolated a race that fit the profile: The Prairie Meadows Sprint. A quick analysis of the six-horse field revealed a heavy and legitimate favorite in Coach Jimi Lee, a winner of almost $800 thousand that, on paper, dominated a field of local allowance horses. It seemed like a lockdown bet for sure. As I searched the pools for value, my attention turned to the show pool, where I unsurprisingly discovered that the bridge jumpers had found another target. I didn’t write down the exact amounts, but, at post time, it was something like $97,000 bet on the Coach and only around $1000 bet on the others combined. Needless to say, Coach Jimi Lee dominated the field on the track, and the show bettors happily survived – taking the minimum payout ($2.20 in Iowa) and collectively forcing the track to pony over $9700 into their pockets.
Lately, I’ve become intrigued by these bridge jumping incidents. For those unfamiliar, the act of bridge jumping is a consequence of the mandatory minimum payouts for $2 bets, even if insufficient funds exist in the pari-mutuel pool to fund the payouts. Thus, a bettor could bet as much as he’d like into the pool and be guaranteed a 5% return ($2.10) or 10% ($2.20). While a bettor could always bet an inordinate amount of money into a pool and turn the payoff into the minimum, it usually only occurs in the show pool -- the only place where a bettor could theoretically determine that the reward is consummate with the risk. And, the consequences of failure, of course, are extreme – hence the term “bridge jumping.” Despite the small anticipated payoff, you’ll lose your entire investment if something goes awry.
Most handicappers I’ve met chastise this risky behavior – laughing loudly when one of these horses fails to hit the board. Yet, despite this public scorn, these incidents happen quite often, and typically, they’re successful – it only becomes a topic of conversation when they do fail. And, when failure occurs, it’s usually only due to catastrophe, such as breakdown or a thrown jockey – even a bad start usually allows a talented, dominant horse to get up for third. And, in the extremely rare cases where they do fail due to the competition of the race, such as Dubai Escapade in the Princess Rooney, it’s typically due to case of a miscalculated risk, such as the failure to consider that a horse was trying a new track (the tiring surface of Calder) and a new level (Grade I) or, in other cases, simply putting too much faith in the predictability of the unreliable non-stakes horse.
And, although hundreds of thousands tend to flow into these pools in the biggest races, I've never met this type of bettor, either on the track or in my conversations with handicappers across the country. And, yet, they clearly exist – throwing down their $5000 to win $250 week after week after week. At its core, it’s a strange sort of betting that goes against much of the current orthodoxy of wagering. It requires virtual perfection – a far cry from a long term philosophy encouraging overlay wagers that one expects to lose in the short term. One miss in 20 (at the common $2.10 minimum) renders any gains moot. And a second miss in 20 brings the losses to a level that would be very hard to catch. While it’s possible to balance these over time, the sheer loss of capital makes the long-term quite difficult to achieve without an immense bankroll. And, even with an massive bankroll, it’s hard to believe that profitability could result from these bets unless they were virtually fail safe – expected to hit over 95 times out of 100. And, in order to derive any substantial profit, a hit rate of 99% must be expected. Yet, these wagers happen and occur with great regularity – is it possible that some out there achieve this lofty goal? These wagers – when carefully chosen -- probably offer the closest thing to certainty in the entire world of racing. And, while the consequence of a loss is great, I often wonder whether the risk, when analyzed in terms of likelihood of happening, is really that large compared to other, more socially accepted wagers. Indeed, a precise show bet may be the least risky proposition – even when considered in terms of potential reward – in the entire game of racing.
But, even putting aside the mathematics of risk and the murky waters of assessment, these wagers fascinate me from the perspective of my favorite topic – the psychological side of the handicapping life. First, I can’t imagine that wagering like this is very fun. There’s no excitement in waiting for the expected to happen, the rewards are never very high, and the anxiety from the large potential consequences must be unnerving. And, despite the large size of the wager, it’s about as far from pure gambling as you can get. There’s no rush and no adrenaline boost from the big potential payday – a fact which inspires the playing of many of horseplayer. In addition, wagering like this goes against the short-term ego gratification that drives many horseplayers. There’s no feeling of outsmarting the crowd in an individual race when you merely echoed the crowd’s sentiments to an extreme. And, yet, with careful selection and not too much extreme bad luck, the bridge jumper can feel good at the end of the day – pocketing a profit – something that the typical horseplayer only does with a generous helping of luck.
So, what sort of picture are we left with of the supposed bridge jumper? To me, despite the moniker, the extreme show bettor is much less a risk taker than the typical horseplayer – an exceptionally careful individual, meticulously picking his spots to avoid the vagaries of luck and who is also free from the need to take risks for short term ego gratification. Indeed, in comparing this with the typical horseplayer, I’m left wondering who the real bridge jumpers are in this game.
Lately, I’ve become intrigued by these bridge jumping incidents. For those unfamiliar, the act of bridge jumping is a consequence of the mandatory minimum payouts for $2 bets, even if insufficient funds exist in the pari-mutuel pool to fund the payouts. Thus, a bettor could bet as much as he’d like into the pool and be guaranteed a 5% return ($2.10) or 10% ($2.20). While a bettor could always bet an inordinate amount of money into a pool and turn the payoff into the minimum, it usually only occurs in the show pool -- the only place where a bettor could theoretically determine that the reward is consummate with the risk. And, the consequences of failure, of course, are extreme – hence the term “bridge jumping.” Despite the small anticipated payoff, you’ll lose your entire investment if something goes awry.
Most handicappers I’ve met chastise this risky behavior – laughing loudly when one of these horses fails to hit the board. Yet, despite this public scorn, these incidents happen quite often, and typically, they’re successful – it only becomes a topic of conversation when they do fail. And, when failure occurs, it’s usually only due to catastrophe, such as breakdown or a thrown jockey – even a bad start usually allows a talented, dominant horse to get up for third. And, in the extremely rare cases where they do fail due to the competition of the race, such as Dubai Escapade in the Princess Rooney, it’s typically due to case of a miscalculated risk, such as the failure to consider that a horse was trying a new track (the tiring surface of Calder) and a new level (Grade I) or, in other cases, simply putting too much faith in the predictability of the unreliable non-stakes horse.
And, although hundreds of thousands tend to flow into these pools in the biggest races, I've never met this type of bettor, either on the track or in my conversations with handicappers across the country. And, yet, they clearly exist – throwing down their $5000 to win $250 week after week after week. At its core, it’s a strange sort of betting that goes against much of the current orthodoxy of wagering. It requires virtual perfection – a far cry from a long term philosophy encouraging overlay wagers that one expects to lose in the short term. One miss in 20 (at the common $2.10 minimum) renders any gains moot. And a second miss in 20 brings the losses to a level that would be very hard to catch. While it’s possible to balance these over time, the sheer loss of capital makes the long-term quite difficult to achieve without an immense bankroll. And, even with an massive bankroll, it’s hard to believe that profitability could result from these bets unless they were virtually fail safe – expected to hit over 95 times out of 100. And, in order to derive any substantial profit, a hit rate of 99% must be expected. Yet, these wagers happen and occur with great regularity – is it possible that some out there achieve this lofty goal? These wagers – when carefully chosen -- probably offer the closest thing to certainty in the entire world of racing. And, while the consequence of a loss is great, I often wonder whether the risk, when analyzed in terms of likelihood of happening, is really that large compared to other, more socially accepted wagers. Indeed, a precise show bet may be the least risky proposition – even when considered in terms of potential reward – in the entire game of racing.
But, even putting aside the mathematics of risk and the murky waters of assessment, these wagers fascinate me from the perspective of my favorite topic – the psychological side of the handicapping life. First, I can’t imagine that wagering like this is very fun. There’s no excitement in waiting for the expected to happen, the rewards are never very high, and the anxiety from the large potential consequences must be unnerving. And, despite the large size of the wager, it’s about as far from pure gambling as you can get. There’s no rush and no adrenaline boost from the big potential payday – a fact which inspires the playing of many of horseplayer. In addition, wagering like this goes against the short-term ego gratification that drives many horseplayers. There’s no feeling of outsmarting the crowd in an individual race when you merely echoed the crowd’s sentiments to an extreme. And, yet, with careful selection and not too much extreme bad luck, the bridge jumper can feel good at the end of the day – pocketing a profit – something that the typical horseplayer only does with a generous helping of luck.
So, what sort of picture are we left with of the supposed bridge jumper? To me, despite the moniker, the extreme show bettor is much less a risk taker than the typical horseplayer – an exceptionally careful individual, meticulously picking his spots to avoid the vagaries of luck and who is also free from the need to take risks for short term ego gratification. Indeed, in comparing this with the typical horseplayer, I’m left wondering who the real bridge jumpers are in this game.
posted by Seth Abrams at 5:52 PM
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