A Nice Carryover and Some Carry-Math

Mike Antoniades is a horseplayer, who happens to write press releases for a track. Oftentimes they are interesting press releases and this is one of them.

Not only do you learn about a good carryover tonight, you get to see some carryover math.

Low takeout Balmoral Pick 4 carryover swings huge advantage to players on Wednesday
                 Tuesday, December 17, 2013 - by Michael Antoniades, Balmoral Park racing analyst

   Balmoral Park handle this Wednesday will get a giant boost because no bettor was able to select all four winners on the Sunday Pick Four or the top five finishers in the Ten cent High Five. Both of these Wednesday wagers will now have guaranteed pools. The Wednesday Pick Four pool will be seeded with a one day carryover of $28,237 and Balmoral Park along with the United States Trotting Association will guarantee a Pick Four pool of $75,000.

   With the low takeout of 15%, the Balmoral Pick 4 will offer the rarest of gambling opportunities which is to play with a substantial gambling advantage. Simply speaking, the amount paid back to the winners will exceed the amount wagered on the bet if the final pool is less than $216,474.  Based on the extraordinary value of the bet, the Balmoral Pick 4 this Wednesday is from a statistical gamblers view one of the must plays of the year. The following example is based on a variety of final pools starting with the guaranteed final pool of $75,000.

Final Pick 4 pool       New money        Net pool after 15% takeout   Players advantage        

$ 75,000                      46,763                         67,985                   plus  45.2 %
 100,000                      71,763                       89,235                   plus  24.3 %
 125,000                       96,763                       110,485                  plus 14.1 %
 150,000  l                  121,763                         131,735                   plus  8.1 %              
 175,000                     146,763                       152,985                   plus  4.2 %

    Using the $75,000 guaranteed pool, you would have $67,985 returned to the winners after the fifteen per cent takeout even though they wagered only $46,763. This would create a surplus of $21,222 which would be added to pay off the winners. The $75,000 pool would create a players advantage of over 45%. This statistical anomaly occurs with the combination of low takeout and a substantial amount of dead money in the pool.

    Therefore we will go with an estimated pool of $125,000 which will still give the players a 14.1 per cent advantage (see above chart). Clearly there is ample reason to believe that players will respond strongly to this wagering opportunity. And that is not all. The Ten cent High Five also has a one day carryover of $13,893. The USTA and Balmoral will offer a $40,000 guaranteed pool on the Wednesday pentafecta which is also the final leg of the Pick Four. The Pick Four is on the Final Four races and starts with race seven at approximately 9:15 central and ends with the High Five finale on race ten at approximately 10:25 central. 

   Balmoral Park and Maywood Park, with the help of the USTA Strategic Wagering program and Track Master offers free deluxe twelve race program pages for the Pick Four and High Five on every racing night at www.ustrotting.com.