Take A Few Words From The Wise

Our methods man kicks off with some choice quotations this month

Horses are not machines, but that has never deterred many sorts of men, mostly either very clever or very foolish, from searching for the perfect racing system. They have never found it and I venture to suggest, they never will.” Statistician: Top 10 Flat Racing Systems, 1971.

“To bet or not to bet… is the question facing every backer. Before every betting decision a vital factor – choice – distinguishes the attitude of the bettor from that of the punter. He alone decides whether or not to bet, and what, when and how to bet. The punter is oblivious of having a choice… And so with this stern warning it must be left to the backer’s own counsel to accept the challenge and decide whether to ‘To bet or not to bet’”, Peter Braddock: Braddock’s complete guide to Horse Race Selection and Betting, 1990.

“…a great many firmly believe that systems are the poor relation of value betting and the more conventional approach to solving the racing problem… for many bettors their reluctance to use systems is due in part to the perceived simplicity of such techniques… gowever it is important to remember that a system is not designed to predict the winner…” Peter May: In Search of the Winning System, 2013.

The search for the perfect winning system will never end. Statistician’s words appear to deride the system backer, but he was merely pointing out that there is no such thing as the perfect system. Peter May has yet to find it, despite writing about such methods for a long time. The simple truth is that we all want to find the perfect system as it would make our punting lives easier. No thought involved: tick, tick, tick… another winner in the bag. But it doesn’t work like that.