The influence of inside info/graft

This thread reminds me of a story that the late 'King Louis' Miller liked to tell.

For the benefit of those too young to know or remember : Louis Miller was, for many years, Cape Town's most prominent, powerful & successful bookmaker.

Louis Miller started off as a punter. He studied form. A lot. On one particular Saturday he had identified a horse that he wanted to punt. He calculated, based on known form, what its price should be. It opened on course at or about that price. He struck his not inconsiderable bet and returned to his seat in the stands.

At that moment an acquaintance passed by and paused to tell Louis (not knowing what he had backed) that his selection has stood on a stone in the yard that morning and bruised his heel.

Shortly thereafter the horse began to drift as the 'graft' got out.

When the odds had doubled Louis went down to the ring and backed it again. The horse bolted in as he had expected.

This certainly adds credence to the idea that you should live and die by your own decisions. As my bookmaker always liked to tell me : 'Nobody made you do it'.

Huyssteen,theirs one examlpe of graphs down the drain.

There was a grey called Ludwig that ran with it’s head tilted to the left. He was a sprinter and he won a good few races. Legend has it that he was found tied to an old bath and that he damaged his neck by trying to get free from the bath thus the tilting of his head.

Muhtiman wrote:

Craig Pienaar wrote: Imo racing is not crooked enough , it should be so simple but mans greed always gets in the way ie trying to beat the punted horse , really irritating :sick:

.....what are you saying....all should stop trying to give better efforts so that the oner can be landed.....surely you jest .... as that is the epitome of crooked..... :ohmy:

If we all make money , I don't have a problem with it , everyday horses race needing a run , being prepped for another race etc

Their is inside info and so called inside info up to the individual to decide where the info is from and what to do with it... No doubt the info gets confusing when you hear to much and from to many sources.

Len Sham wrote: Their is inside info and so called inside info up to the individual to decide where the info is from and what to do with it... No doubt the info gets confusing when you hear to much and from to many sources.

The saying Chinese whispers must have originated from some race course in SA.

chicken n chips wrote:

Len Sham wrote: Their is inside info and so called inside info up to the individual to decide where the info is from and what to do with it... No doubt the info gets confusing when you hear to much and from to many sources.

The saying Chinese whispers must have originated from some race course in SA.

Chinese or Lebanese whispers ..

Len Sham wrote:

chicken n chips wrote:

Len Sham wrote: Their is inside info and so called inside info up to the individual to decide where the info is from and what to do with it... No doubt the info gets confusing when you hear to much and from to many sources.

The saying Chinese whispers must have originated from some race course in SA.

Chinese or Lebanese whispers ..

dont forget the Greek whispers

Feel free to add any other methods....

I have devised many methods over the last five years always trying to improve
Is in my nature to do things the best way and bear in mind 90 per cent of my bets are for places.

The method i have had most success with is when i go through the times of runners past runs in comparison to other runners that ran the same distance

Formgrids was my study tool and made note of the runner 's time and for insight and comparatve reasons noted the times of runners that were entered either for that day or a meeting in the future (a square next to the name on fg)

After some time doing this you get a feel about the horse 's chance and is truly great at testing the chance of the fancied runner.

I have found great value with this and not only does it assist with the race you busy with but in others and for meetings to follow

We often forget that many reasons why our horses win are due to the misfortunes of others.


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I have received much inside info , I have had to question a lot of it, and advise the insider to rather try their horse at another distance or track. Inside Info is not bad offhand, but ultimately it's just the insiders opinion - and he has others who are trying just as hard to beat him --- so at best insiders have a general idea a horses chances but cannot often state outright that a horse will win -- of course there are occassions when you jjust know you've spotted your horse correctly, or you've planned a hit properly - there still always remains the chance that someone else has done it better, or even unforseen events that might occurr in racing.

I have learned to ignore inside information , unless it confirms my own analysis.

One of the problems with insiide info is that insiders are only human just like all of us, they also develop bias, and they can become emotionally over-invested in a horse, over-rating it's potential - we can see that daily in the form card with some horses rushed into million rand stakes races and then ultimately coming back to earth.

Of late for some reason, (since joining ABC) i had started to be influenced by the tote - against years of experience which taught me to bet against first-timers, they have less than 30% srike rate, bet against favourites they have less than 30% strike rate - this cost me many value bets - which normally are the lifeblood of any betting activity.

So the oage old advice is to study the form yourself, make your own selections, and then use any inside information to validate or disqualify your own selection, use the tote or boards in the same way -- only to validate or disqualify your own selections - never make a selection based on inside information, toote or odds boards.

We at times are our own worst enemy.
Sometimes I go in blindly and have a bet on graft, yet if you dissect that particular race we could arrive to a different conclusion.
I guess that is human nature and I, personally, never seem to learn from my mistakes.