Can I Make Money Betting 2YO Outsiders?

We love to hit a bookmaker for six. 

The best way to do just that is to hit them hard in the pocket, just left of the cricketer's box (that's where they keep that mouse-trap wallet). 

I've written a few posts for Craig's Betting Blog. In fact, I've mentioned a few huge priced winners. One my brother nabbed years ago called Puggy. Betting on the exchanges he bet £20 and won £4,000. 

Amazing hey. 

When you hear people getting big priced winners it feels like everyone is doing it. Earlier this year Craig had a bet on a horse called Intimate Moment trained by Philip McBride. This daughter of Mustajeeb ran at Great Yarmouth, cruising home by three lengths. It won like a favourite. 

Guess the odds? 

33/1 

Take a look at the full result here. 

Once again, it makes finding these speculative-priced winners a child's play. 

But is that really true?

I want to know the facts...

There is only one way we can quantify the true chance of anything statistical and that is by running a study with data. This blog is dedicated to two-year-old horse racing. So we need to know how many two-year-old races are run over the Flat turf season (2019) which starts with the Brocklesby Stakes (March) and concludes about mid-November at Doncaster. 

In total, we are talking about 1024 races. 

I reviewed the winners starting price (SP) for all these horses. If backing these outsiders is so straightforward then the data should reveal horses winning at odds bigger than 20/1 are common. 

It's at this point you may want to stop for a second or two and consider that statement: 

''Horses winning at odds bigger than 20/1 are quite common''. 

What do you think?

If you had a multiple choice question and the answers were: common, unlikely, rare as hen's teeth. 

What would your answer be? 

This is what I mean about knowing the answer to a question rather than just imagining. You either know something or you don't. 

When I studied psychology I remembered a maxim: ''Without objective testing theories are only guesses however good''.

It's a fact. 

I think if someone had asked me the question of how many two-year-old winners won over the Flat turf season 2019 at odds over 20/1 I would have looked quite stupid. 

Why? Because I would have imagined the number was much higher than it is. 

So can you imagine the number of winners priced over 20/1?

Amazingly, it is just 9 horses, from over 1,000 races. 

It doesn't seem possible. 

But it's true.