davio

After last weeks shambles, which was eased somewhat with a bet on Grace I/R on the Saturday morning, we move on to the Humana (Bob Hope) Challenge and the Volvo Golf Champions.

And it’s with the Humana where we shall begin.

There’s tons of course form and player history to work with this week at La Quinta and a case can be made for about half of the field so let’s try and narrow it down and hopefully unearth the winner.

Two bets jump out for me this week and they are Bill Haas and Matt Kuchar.

Hass nearly went achieved back to back victories last year but was piped by Johnny Vegas and is a whopping -57 for the last two years. 25/1 has long gone but is still worth a punt at 20/1.

Matt Kuchar somehow contrived not to win last year but still had 2 2nds, 1 3rd and 9 top ten finishes highlighting his consistency. Couple that with T7 and T2 in the last two years and that makes him a worthy favourite in my book. The current price of 16/1 isn’t overly attractive so it might pay off to see if he drifts in the market as the tournament kicks off. Either way, make sure he's on your side.

At bigger prices I’ve hopefully found three that can reward us e/w.

First up: Ryan Palmer. He boasts 2 top 10 finishes around here and is a stand out 90/1 with Stan James.

Next we have Stephen Ames. He has 3 top 10 finishes around here and although 2011 was a year to forget the odds at 100/1 + are attractive to my eyes given his course form. He was playing well last week before a last day 75 put paid to his chances. With the cobwebs now blown away he can go well.

Finally we have a shot in the dark with Josh Teater. Around this course we have many a par 5 and Teater has impressive stats in 2011 on the par 5’s. 20th in Par 5 Birdie or Better Leaders, 6th in par 5 performance and a Par 5 Avg of -4.60. If he brings that form to this course then the 300/1+ on betfair may be made to look a wee bit silly.


Over in Europe with have the Volvo Golf Champions.

Only the second time this tournament has been played so we have little course form to work with. We are on the final leg off the mini South Africa tour so let’s have a look who steps up this week. Ooosty and Charl make no appeal at the prices and there are question marks about most of the field.

With that in mind ill look for some good old fashioned ‘value’.

Jiminez came T2’d here last year losing to Casey by just one shot. At 33/1 he = e/w value.

Raphael Jacquelin was T1 here after two rounds here before falling away to finish T44.

The three time tour winner is 66/1 and that’s too big in my book.