Drifters NEVER win

the RP comment summed it up: Mixed messages but, from top yard, market strength would be interesting on handicap debut

Crazy. I changed my bet to place only when I saw the big drift. I never learn. Nicholls at Wincanton has been a standard system for years but there is something about market moves that hypnotises most of us when it has no real relevance.

I post on all these threads, if you have backed a horse at your price, I would much sooner see the horse drift than backed in.

Load of bollox these people who miss a price and then jump on the gamble at the lowest ever price.

did the horse know it was a drifter?

Load of bollox these people who miss a price and then jump on the gamble at the lowest ever price.

yep 100%

I'd much rather be on a drifter near the top than the bottom though, it's not going to end well being on too many drifters before the drift.

Works both ways I started backing at 4.2 and chased it out till it hit 7 by which time I was in for close to a monkey,so I went from being quite confident in my bet to pretty much zero confidence and could not wait to get out.

Spark Plug was a big drifter last night

Drifters do win but for people that are on them, nowhere near enough of them do . If every horse you bet was a big drifter then you’d finish up in your nude. People that do tissues and actually stick to them are the real mugs these days . You know a clown when he goes on with shiite like “ how was it 5/1 , I priced it 5/2 “ or another beauty “ I had it 5lb in hand on my ratings “

You are better off at the top end on a drifter than the bottom end of a big gamble long run jim.

Far too much market paranoia on here, of course we all know there are dodgy goings on but nowhere near the extent that some would have you believe.

The main lesson is that it is equally likely that horses that shorten, horses that drift and horses that stay at the same price will win. There are so many factors at work that have nothing to do with stable knowledge or confidence. Captain Bucks shortened today purely because Nicholls had won the first 2 races which had no bearing on his chance.

I'm backing a drifterer tonight, but not yet.

It is nowhere near as likely that horses who drift willl win as often as ones that shorten . What a load of cokk that is.

jim

I'm talking about at what point/price you are on

horses towards the top of the market you are better off backing drifters near the off at the high than backing well backed gambles at the lower odds.

It's FACT and I've posted the data several times which usually ends up in rows about the parameters, ie what is a drift.

You are not better off getting on gambles at the last minute, if you think you are that's your look out.

Striding edge, the only thing I’m saying is if you continuously back drifters ,you will lose your bolloxxx. I’m not saying you should back ones that shorten, or stay the same price . It couldn’t be any simpler than that

You wouldn't do your b0ll0x at all jim. do some proper research say a drift is 30%+

look at horses in the top market positions and see if you back them after they have drifted what the returns are.

you are right that say backing 2/1 shots that end up bigger than say 3.9 in my above example at 3.0 on here is not going to end well but backing them near the top of the drift isn't that bad.

Have you any stats to back that up? It does depend on when you start recording the price I suppose. On course prices are seldom displayed until 10 minutes before the off while exchanges start 24 hours earlier.

That's where the problems come in sage, of course people will see a drift as different.

I have data for the bookies opening shows and moves from there till the off.this is what I was using before.

we'd all be laying the drifters blind if jim was right.

If You backed the ones that go for the proverbial in the last 2-3 minutes you will be in trouble,as Jimeen says an odd one may go in general you're a million,presumably this one today drifted all day which is a little different as like so many horses now they are wrongly priced up in the first place.

so lay all the big drifters in the last 2-3 mins

try it

this is actually quite easy to test if anyone fancies a fred on it?

say a drift is 30%+

Whats the price range please?

And while i'm at it presumably you're filling your boots backing them?

why would i be filling my boots backing them, after commission the results would be negligible

just say horses starting up to 4.0 or so in the last few mins that drift 30% +

Because you seem to suggest you will do plenty in laying them?,you could have a 5 the field race and something could go from 5's to 8's etc which to me would be just as significant as your 3/1 limit,anyhow you're obviously a stats guy,i work on course and see things differently,good luck.

I didn't say I'd do well laying them I said relatively speaking you would be better off laying the gambles at sp than the drifters after they have drifted.

I said there are always arguments about the parameters you have proved my point, whatever ones i say someone won't like them.

You set the parameters and we'll test it.

and gl to you too

Another masterclass from David Probert. I backed it because I always do if Probert is riding for Andrew Balding on the AW. Whether it drifts or shortens makes no difference and that one went both ways in the last minute before the off.

I would say you’d definitely win laying horses that double in price , particularly outsiders . I think anybody willing to lay 25/1 about horses that maybe were 10 and 12/1 will be right 99 times out of 100 .

You should test out your theory Jim with real data

OR lay the ar$e off these with sensible staking and sit back and enjoy the profits.

It’s not the way I bet striding edge , I’d have no bother backing or laying horses at virtually any price . When I don’t have any opinion in a race and I’d like an interest in it , I do quiet frequently try to identify criminal connections , of which there are plenty , and if one of their horses doubles or trebled in price , I’d gladly join in for relatively small stakes . I’d rarely lay winners adopting that approach by the way .

I've backed Captain Ryan in the last, hoping it goes much shorter in the run.

GL mate

Got a horrible trip

the drift told you saddo

sounded like connections didnt think it could win from that draw

winner 8's out to 10's

tbf, I believe most punters acknowledge that drifters DO win their share of races. What pisses punters off is any significant drift that is followed by a ride that matches it. A ride that says: sorry, you did your dough before the race began. The only chance you had was if all the opposing beasts dropped dead during the race, and even then, we'd most likely have told the jockey to jump off before passing the post. Granted, as stridey says, dodgy goings on are not as rife as many irate punters would have you believe, but what makes it easy for punters to lump them all together is the fact that so many blatant non-triers go unpunished. The stewards simply accept whatever lame excuse connections put forward.

Equine Flew and Stridingedge are spot on.

For horses that start out at, say, 12/1, and end up 9/2 SP, the punters backing them @10/1+(the connections) will be rich and the punters backing at sub 6/1 will be ruined. All about the price. The gambling stables do not have any certs, they just know the horse has a far better chance than the form says.

I have never systematically backed or layed drifters but I did have an experiment of laying steamers. I would note down the odds 20 minutes before the start and lay anything that dropped in price by 20% or more.

Did 662 races starting with a bank of £100 and finished on £279 (and paid £61 commission). It didn't seem worthwhile to continue but indicated that doing the opposite - backing gambles late on - does indeed seem a very bad idea.

Tracked progress on a spreadsheet...

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D38a5fo2a-w25-z8uCEALOnoqgloWvlS1lzLdnhoq94/edit?hl=en&pli=1&hl=en&pli=1#gid=0

Drifter  ..its INSIDE INFO...that's the owner  he pays the bills    2400 a month     trainer puts nothing in  jock the same   .. why should a punter know

Thanks tobermory for the data

Our views are often coloured by experience rather than hard stats. Whenever I take a price and the horse shortens, it usually gets beaten. When I take a price and it drifts they seem MORE LIKELY to win. I usually try to bet late but if I am busy doing something else when a race is run, I tend to use a site that gives me the price at the time I bet or SP which ever is greater. Betfair SP seems to be longer than the last traded price in many cases which begs the question of how do they calculate that.

A striding said, the definition of a drift is so hard to define in a fluid marking (do you take the opening price, the 10am price the time 1 hour before racing, and then what percentage does the market have to move to constitute a drift)?

This lack of definition makes it very hard to provide hard data of the facts.   Even then in racing they are not facts, just historical evidence for the sample you are looking at.

I would say with some certainty though-

* if you are backing a horse at 4.0 that starts at 2.8 you are winning.
* if you are backing a horse at 2.8 that starts at 2.8 you are losing
* if you are laying a horses at 2.8 that starts at 4.0 you are winning.
* if you are laying a horse at 4.0 that starts at 2.8 you are losing

All about beating the SP by the factor bigger than the overround/commision factor

Drifters near the head of the market from certain powerful yards (Henderson, King, Hobbs) rarely seem to win but that general rule has never applied to Nicholls trained runners. No empirical evidence to support that, just years of personal experience!

To go back to the original post, if I’d backed the horse in question I wouldn’t have been as concerned about the drift as I would’ve been if it was trained by someone other than Nicholls.

depends why they drift. 

Yorkhill (11-8 to 7-4), Melon (5-2 to 7-2) and Carter McKay (11-4 to 9-2) - never winning.