I can't help but feel fully responsible for this. Someone must have taken my blog post from June 28th, How To Save Horse Racing, very seriously. Or at least, that is my story and I'm sticking to it.
Laurel Cuts Meet Takeout to 10% Across the Board
Date Posted: July 18, 2007
In a program billed “Ten Days at 10 Percent—Racing’s Best Bet,” pari-mutuel takeout on Maryland’s live races will be cut in half during Laurel Park’s 10-day summer meet that runs from Aug. 10-23.
The takeout will be 10% on all bets on all live races conducted at Laurel, plus the legislated percentage to be allocated to the Maryland Million Fund, resulting in a blended rate of approximately 11.4%.
“We want to get people focused on the Maryland product during a very competitive period,” Maryland Jockey Club president Lou Raffetto said. “We hear a lot of talk about what reduced takeout can do for business, and this seemed like the perfect time to experiment with the concept.”
The lower takeout is an even better deal on the trifecta, superfecta, and pick six, for which the standard takeout rate would have been 25.75%. As a result, payoffs on those wagers will be 20 percent higher.
“It will be like having a built-in rebate benefiting the $2 bettor as well as the $2,000 bettor,” Raffetto said.
The Maryland Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association negotiating committee, chaired by Dale Capuano with members John Alecci, Jerry Robb, Katy Voss, and Richard Hoffberger, agreed to the plan. Raffetto commended the Maryland THA for its willingness to cooperate.
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OK, so it isn't exactly 10%. But it is very very close.
Presque Isle Downs to off $500,000 a day in purses
Highlights:
Meet runs from September 1st to September 29th
25 racing days, 8 races a day; Post time 5:30
$5000 claimers and $10,000 maidens will run for $24,000 purses
1 mile track. Tapeta Footings surface.
It will be interesting to see if Woodbine loses horses to Presque Isle.
BETTOR BEWARE
Ellis Park has a 4% takeout for their Win 4 bet. However, if you bet with WEG, you get the rip off takeouts. Todays Win 4 paid $1746.10 for $1 at Ellis Park, but only returned $1364.20 for lemmings who bet with WEG. So much for common pool wagering.
5 comments:
How do you bet the pick 4 at Ellis? It doesn't even show up on the menu on the SAM machines at Woodbine and it isn't in the program. I guess it's only available through HPIbet. Maybe they don't want to listen to the complaints after we realize how much we get chopped.
I don't bet on Ellis Park, though I started doing daily track variants for the track just in case I figure out how to.
Yes, WEG doesn't address track takeout anymore. They are ostriches when it comes to what the horse player really wants.
I wonder if other Magna tracks are going to follow suit on this 10% experiment.
If I could, I would support it big time.
i noticed the WEG announcement to use AM tote and the Great Cdn announcement to use Scientific Games for tote technology were very close together... what is up with that?
Probably coincidence. I don't think these contracts happened overnight.
Lower takeouts should become the norm, as a means of putting the rebate shops out of business, since the discount then becomes universal. Otherwise, we get "Ernie Dahlman Poker" where you have to ante up but he doesn't.
The ideal takeout is probably 7.5 percent.
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