In Running Trading Tool User Guide
Races Tab and Form Guides
All images on this guide can be clicked to enlarge them if need be.
Races tab
The Races tab is where you find all the races for the day, all sorted by race time. You can expand and collapse all races by using the buttons at the top, or open just the races you want to look at by clicking the white cross on the left hand side.
You can see the headers for the race time, the course name, the race title, the winning prize money, the race class, the distance and the forecast going.
When you open any race itself, you can see the headers for the horse name and the betting forecast price as a decimal so 4.50 is 7/2, 11.00 is 10/1.
After this you have the number of days since the previous run, the draw if it a flat race, the official rating, jockey name, number of wins the horse has had, the number of races the horse has had and the win percentage.
Following this you start to get into the in running data that will help you to find your trades, starting with the average run style. The run style is how the horse has run before and we show this as a 1 for horses that lead, 2 for horses that run behind the leaders, 3 for horses that run in midfield and a 4 for held up horses.
The tick drops are the number of 'ticks' a horse drops in running as with the prices on Betfair. If a horse drops from 15.0 to 14.5 that is just one tick. A horse that drops from 6.0 to 4.0 would be 20 ticks. You can see the number of ticks if you use the ladders on betting software such as Fairbot, shown on the image below.
So the average tick drop is the average from all previous races for each horse.
This is followed by the ShortInRun and ShortInRun Return columns. You can read all about these on the Short In Running tab from the menu at the top.
The Green and Gold columns are also explained in detail from the link on the menu and then you have the DOBRatio, DOB% and DOBReturn columns. Dobs and Dobbing are explained from the menu but briefly, a DOB is when a horse halves in price in running and if successful, is equivalent to an Even money bet. So therefore, you have the number of times a horse has DOBBED from its past races, this number as a percentage and then the return you would get if betting a £10 stake on all races for a horse to DOB, or half in price in running.
Again this is explained more on the DOB tab link above.
Once you get used to what all of the columns mean, the race cards will give you a very nice overview of how horses are likely to run and whether they are likely to be a good back to lay bet, or possibly a lay to back bet.
Form Guides
Once you have a race open, you can click the black cross to the left of each runner to open the in running form guide. You can still view the overall data for the other runners in the race at the same time plus you can open more than one horse at one time. Winning form lines are highlighted in yellow.
Here you get to see all run styles and tick drops for each run, along with more details such as how far a horse was beaten, the headgear equipment it was wearing such as cheekpieces (P), tongue tie (T), a combination of headgear and an * means it was the first time wearing this one or combination.
You can also see the race type, FLT, AWF, CHS, HDL or NHF and whether the race was a handicap (1) or not (0).
After the jockey name you have the lowest price the horse hit in running, the BSP, the industry starting price, the Betfair place price and the BSP%Diff.
The BSP%Diff is the percentage the horse has dropped to in running, from the BSP at the off. So for the second row down for Good Friday Fairy, you can see that the horses dropped to 31.02% of it's BSP.
You can turn this round and say that in total it dropped 68.98% but we show this as the amount a horse DROPPED TO. For a horse to have DOBBED, the BSP%Diff will need to show below 50. You can see that for this horses run at Ffos Las on 12 May 2023, the horse didn't quite DOB as it only DROPPED TO 50.14% of it's BSP, or a drop of 49.86% from it's BSP.
Once you have understood what everything means, you will be able to find a strategy to follow that will simplify your in running trading, by seeing with horses are going to drop in price, roughly by how much and those that won't.
By looking for horses that run well in their races instead of for the winner, you can make smaller yet regular profits and on multiple races every day.
Green and Gold Percentages
On the software you will see a lot of numbers highlighted in Green and Gold, as well as a Green% and Gold% amount on the Settings.
These form the basis of the in running data for you and highlight the horses that you will want to be looking at.
The green numbers show when a horse has dropped to your chosen Green percentage amount from the BSP, the Gold to your chosen Gold percentage amount from the BSP.
When trading in running you are looking for horses that drop in price in running regularly so that you can back these horses and lay them at shorter odds for a guaranteed profit.
You can select two percentage drops on the Settings tab, the lowest is the Green and the higher the Gold.
The figures chosen for these will show the percentage the horse has DROPPED TO of the BSP (Betfair Starting Price)
If the BSP is 10.0 and the horse drops to 50% of this in running it will drop to 5.00 as 5.00 is 50% of 10.0.
If the BSP is 14.00 and the horse drops to 75% of this in running it will drop to 10.50 as 10.5 is 75% of 14.0.
The default settings are set to 50% Green and 75% Gold and by opening up a horses form from any of the tabs, you will see a number of figures in the far right hand column (In Play Low Percent), highlighted in Green or Gold.
This column shows the percentage of the BSP each run has dropped to.
Default Settings.
Taking the default settings, if a horse has dropped to 50% of the BSP or more, then it will be highlighted in Green.
If a horse has dropped to between 50.1% and 75% it will be highlighted in Gold.
With the Green default set at 50% this means it will highlight horses that have successfully Dobbed and a horse with lots of Greens is a horse that you would be looking out for when finding potential Dobbing trades.
You can change the settings for Green and Gold at any time on the Settings tab and this will change all of the data output on the software.
You can play around with the Green and Gold settings but don’t put them too close together or don’t set the Green figure too low, otherwise you will get very few results that are highlighted.
The Green figure must (or should) always be set lower than the Gold one.
If you look at any of the horse name lines on the software, you will see a percentage figure under the columns GreenPercent and GoldPercent. These numbers show the amount of times a horse has run to the set Green and Gold percentages in the past, for the number of lines of form you have chosen in settings.
Going by the default settings, the GreenPercent column is highlighted for a horse in Green if it has run to at least 50% of the BSP or more, 50% of the time or more. The GoldPercent column is highlighted for a horse in Gold if it has run to at least 75% of the BSP or more, at least 75% of the time.
Back to Lay Tab
The Back2Lay tab helps find horses that often run well in their races, allowing you to back them at the start of the race and then lay them at a lower price in running, as the price of the horse drops, for a guaranteed profit.
Once the horse has dropped to your chosen in running price, you make your profit, the bet is complete for you and then it doesn't matter if the horse goes on to win or not. It is an easy way to make small, yet multiple profits every day rather than having to keep finding horses that have to win, all of the time.
You can change the settings at any time to suit your own preferences but the settings shown below give a good example of the sort of settings you will want to be looking for.
When looking at Back2Lay trades, you want horses that run well during the early part of the race initially, so that the price on these drops during the race, so the three settings give you three ways of finding such runners, very simply and very quickly.
Dob%: This means you want to only show horses that have Dobbed, or halved in price during a race, in at least half, (50%), of all of their previous races. The >= means greater or equal, so greater or equal 50%.
Horses that often Dob, often run well and often drop in price in running so I would suggest 50% here is a minimum.
For more information on Dob trades, use the link 'Dobbing Explained' at the top of the page.
Run Style 1 & 2: The Run Style figure is a number given to a horse that shows how it ran at the start of all of it's races. Run Styles 1 and 2 are for horses that led a race or horses that ran just behind the leaders. Horses that run prominently will be the focus of those trading on a race and will be the first to shorten in price, which is what we are looking for here with the Back2Lays.
I would suggest 75% is a good starting point for this setting. You can always change it to see more or less horses in your Back2Lay list, if you have too many or too few.
Win%: This simply shows horses that have won at least 20% of all their previous races. If you start going up to 33% here or more, you are likely to find horses at very short starting prices and this won't leave very much for the price to drop.
Go to 10% or below and you are looking at the majority of horses, so by choosing 20% or 25%, you are looking for horses that have a good win strike rate, know how to win and therefore know how to run well, which will help those looking for Back2Lay trades.
Once you have set your chosen settings, click Save in the Settings panel, return to the Back to Lay tab and refresh the page to get the new list.
On the image above, I have opened the form guide for the horse at the top, Good Friday Fairy. Hopefully most of this explained on the Form Guides link above but as this is especially regarding BacktoLay trades, I will give some details here.
*InPlayLo is the lowest price the horse ran to in running.
*BSP is Betfair Starting Price.
*ISP is Industry Starting Price, or just SP really.
*PlaceBSP is the Betfair place price.
*BSP%Diff is the percentage the horse has dropped to in running, from the BSP at the off. So for the second row down for Good Friday Fairy, you can see that the horses dropped to 31.02% of it's BSP.
You can turn this round and say that in total it dropped 68.98% but we show this as the amount a horse DROPPED TO. For a horse to have DOBBED, the BSP%Diff will need to show below 50. You can see that for this horses run at Ffos Las on 12 May 2023, the horse didn't quite DOB as it only DROPPED TO 50.14% of it's BSP, or a drop of 49.86% from it's BSP.
*The DOB Return is the amount of profit or loss for a £10 DOB stake on each run, less any commission which is set at a Default of 2% on the Settings panel. A successful DOB bet is effectively a bet at Evens, so if you stake £10, you will win £10.
You can see that the horse has run 9 times and has successfully DOBBED (shown in Green), 7 times. This is a profit of 7 x £10 = £70, less 2% commission = £68.60. It has also failed to DOB twice, so that is a loss of £20, therefore the DOBReturn for Good Friday Fairy, is £48.60.
Lay to Back tab
For Lay2Back trades you are looking for horses that don't often run well in their races and whilst they may shorten a little in price during the race, they will generally go out in price at some point, often quite early on, allowing you to place a lay bet on the horse at the off and then back it at a bigger price, guaranteeing a profit, whether the horse goes on to win or lose.
It is an easy way to make small, yet multiple profits every day rather than having to keep finding horses that you don't think will win, as placing a straight lay bet can be quite risky to your bank if a horse does go on to win.
Hit the Settings link and choose your own values, to help find horses that are not going to run well. Good opportunities for Lay2Back trades.
You can change the settings at any time to suit your own preferences but the settings shown below give a good example of the sort of settings you will want to be looking for.
When looking at Lay2Back trades, you want horses that don't run well during the early part of the race initially, or at anytime overall, so that the price on these increases during the race, so the three settings give you three ways of finding such runners, very simply and very quickly.
Dob%: This means you want to only show horses that have Dobbed, or halved in price during a race, in only 65% or less of all of their previous races. The <= means less or equal, so less or equal 65%.
Horses that don't often Dob, often don't run well and often increase in price in running so I would suggest 65% here is a minimum. You may want to try 50% or 40% but this may restrict the number of horses shown on the list.
For more information on Dob trades, use the link 'Dobbing Explained' at the top of the page.
Run Style 3 & 4: The Run Style figure is a number given to a horse that shows how it ran at the start of all of it's races. Run Styles 3 and 4 are for horses that run in midfield or are held up. Horses that run towards the back of the race in the early stages will be the first to increase in price, as the main focus will be on those running at the head of the field. This which is what we are looking for here with the Lay2Back trades.
I would suggest 75% is a good starting point for this setting. You can always change it to see more or less horses in your Lay2Back list, if you have too many or too few.
Win%: This simply shows horses that have not won any of their previous races and is very much the starting point for horses that aren't going to run well during a race. You could go up to 5% or 10% but want to try and stick to horses with a very poor winning strike rate.
Once you have set your chosen settings, click Save in the Settings panel, return to the Back to Lay tab and refresh the page to get the new list.
From here you can trade these blind, or click the little black arrow to the left of the race time and date, to see the drop down for the form guide and look into the form a little, to confirm the horse will be a successful Lay2Back trade for you.
D.O.B tab
The DOB tab is to help you find the best Dobbing opportunities on the day.
A DOB is a 'Double Or Bust' trade, where you place a back bet and then set a lay bet to be placed at half those odds, for twice the back stake. If the horse halves in price in running, you win your stake amount, plus of course your stake returned, so it is effectively an Evens money bet.
Finding a number of successful DOB trades each day can be a simple way of trading for profit and you do not need a huge strike rate to make just 2 or 3 points profit every day at whatever your chosen stake, be it £20, £50, £100 or whatever.
You can learn more about this type of trade on the Dobbing Explained link at the top of the page.
The DOB tab, only shows horses that have made at least a £20 profit, when dobbing all of their previous races. You can change other factors in Settings, such as only show horses that have run at least 5 times before, which has been done on the day of the image below, which has been sorted by the DOBReturn column on the far right.
The DOB Return is the amount of profit or loss for a £10 DOB stake on each run, less any commission which is set at a Default of 2% on the Settings panel. A successful DOB bet is effectively a bet at Evens, so if you stake £10, you will win £10.
If a horse has run 9 times and has successfully DOBBED 7 times. This is a profit of 7 x £10 = £70, less 2% commission = £68.60. It has also failed to DOB twice, so that is a loss of £20, therefore the DOBReturn will be £48.60.
The horse at the top of this list, Glen Kiln, has run 8 times and DOBBED every time, so that is £10 x £8 = £80, less 2% commission making a total DOBReturn of £78.40.
You could simply work your way through the day, trading all runners with a better than £50 Dobbing profit, shown in the column on the far right but you probably want to be a little more careful than just trading all these horses blindly as some may be going up in class or trying a new distance or going for the first time.
Short In Running tab
This feature highlights horses that have often hit a low in running price in their races.
You can use this information to confirm horses that do run to low prices in running for back2may trades or use it to place straight lay bets at low prices for less risk.
The default on the Settings is set to highlight horses that have run below 3.1 when they had a starting BSP of 6.0 or bigger and when this has occurred, it is shown as a pink cell in the ShortInRun column.
On the Settings panel for this, you can see the Short In Run Low default is 3.1, the Short In Run BSP default is 6.0. You should leave the first ShortInRun at 0.10.
The BSP price must be higher than the Low price and it is suggested that the higher price should be at least 1 or 2 points away from the low price.
The reason for this is that we are looking for horses that hit low prices in running and if a horse goes off at 3.5, it is very likely going to hit 3.1 at some point as this just a few ticks and doesn’t really tell us too much.
A horse that goes off at 6.0 or bigger has to drop by at least 38 ticks to hit 3.1 and provides more valuable information about the horse and its capacity to run to a lower price in running.
You can change the lower price to whatever you choose to see how often a horse runs to your chosen in running low price. When you change it in settings and click Save this will change all of the stats and highlighted pink cells on the software.
Using this information.
There are three ways you can use this ShortInRunning information.
1. Find a horse that hits your chosen in running low price often but doesn’t win very much and you can place a lay bet to keep in running at the low odds (3.1).
You could place set and forget bets on these horses each day at 3.1 using bet placement software, with a rule to 'keep' the bet open once the race has started. If the horses don't hit 3.1 in running you will get your stake back and you will find many winning bets where the risk of winning is low as the odds are just over 2/1.
2. Find a horse that hits your chosen in running low price often and does win often, or is well handicapped and/or suited by the race conditions and back it to win. We know this horse often runs well and close to winning because it hits a low price in running on a number of occasions. If it is also well handicapped or favoured by conditions, it may have a chance of going close.
3. Use the information to confirm that this horse does often run well and would be a good back2lay trading opportunity.
On the ShortInRunning tab itself, it shows all horses that have hit the low amount (3.1) from the high amount (6.0), at least 5 times from the number of races selected.
This ShortInRun Return amount works out the profit or loss if you had traded the horse in running every time for the ShortInRun price, (default 3.1).
The Settings Panel
The Settings panel is on the main Settings link on the Menu, along with the Race Card Settings and System Builder Settings. It allows you choose what you see on the tabs, so you can home in on just the types of horses that you want to bet or trade on.
On the main Settings tab image below, there are three different setting points that you can edit. One for the calculations, one for the runner displays and one for the race displays.
For MinRuns you probably want to set this to 5 or 7 or maybe even 10, as horses that have only runs a few times may not have enough race data to be able to their in running pattern. As a default, this is set to O but do consider changing this if you feel it is wise.
There are two values to highlight on the cards, Gold and Green. These simply highlight when horses that have DROPPED TO, your chosen percentage from the BSP in previous races. Default is 75% and 50%.
With Green set to 50%, this highlights on the card in green, when a horse has halved in price, say from a BSP of 10.0 to at least 5.0 in running. This is also called a DOB trade. If you set the Green to 33% it shows horses that have DROPPED TO a third of the BSP and is known as a TROB trade. See the 'Dobbing Explained' on the links at the top of the page for more info on DOBS and TROBS.
The Gold value should be set higher than Green and can show horses who have not dropped as much in running but have consistently dropped a number of ticks. This is useful if you want to Back2Lay horses that regularly drop say 12 or 15 ticks, for small yet multiple successful trades each day.
ShortInRun highlights runs in pink on the card where a horse has started at a BSP of at least your chosen ShortInRun value, then traded to at least your chosen ShortInRunLow value - and then not gone on to win.
Some horses often run well without winning and this feature highlights horses than can be laid before the off at a low price to 'keep' in running. So if set to 3.10 you could place a lay bet on a horse at 3.10 before the off, knowing that if the horse trades at this price in running, there is a good chance it will still not win. If it doesn't hit 3.10, or whatever value you choose here, then you will get your stake back. At this particular price of just over 2/1, you are not risking much of a loss on each bet.
The ShortInRun tab itself only shows horses that have failed to win when using your chosen values, at least 5 times. Horses to note on this tab are those that also have a low win strike rate. You can place your chosen bets on these horses every morning as a set and forget strategy, for hopefully a long term profit on a majority of successful lay bets.
Make sure you don't make your low price too low and keep a decent amount between the higher and lower values/prices that you choose.
Runner Display Settings, only shows runners on the cards that pass the following criteria that you choose.
So if you choose MinRuns 10 and MaxRuns 30, it means it will only show horses that in their career have run at least 10 times and no more than 30.
Min Green% 0 and MaxGreen% 33, would mean you will only see horses on the cards that have hit your chosen Green% in Settings, a maximum of of 33% or a third, of their races. So with Green% default set to 50% , it will only show horses that have halved in price, in a third or less of their races. A setting that could help you find, decent LaytoBack trades.
Don't forget to Save any changes that you make before closing the Settings panel.
Calculator
Here you can work out the odds required for any drop in price, number of ticks, percentage drop or profit aim.
You can access the calculator from all of the different tabs and it will open in a pop up in the centre of the page.
On the Back Calculation 1 below, it has been set up for a Dobbing trade, where the horse drops to 50% of the BSP and you win your initial stake if successful. The entry price or BSP is 20.0 and you are using a £10 stake. The exit price or lay price needs to be 10.0, to win your target profit which is £10 and in this case would be a drop of 20 ticks.
On the Back Calculation 2, it gives the percentage amount of drop. So here it shows that the lay price required when backing at 24.0 for a 65% drop, is 15 and this is 13 ticks in total.
You can set the number of ticks to offset required on most bet placement and trading software and this will work out the number you need to insert for you very quickly and easily.
The Lay calculation is there if you wish to lay a horse and then set an offset bet to back at a higher price in running, for a lay2back trade. So lay at 7.20 and exit, or back price at 11.0 for a 50% increase which is in this case 16 ticks.
Only the boxes on the left can be populated and you can play around with the figures to get any bet that suits you. Once you have entered a figure, just click any other white cell on the tab for the calculation to execute.
Dobbing Explained
Dobbing is a term used for a D.O.B back to lay bet which stands for Double Or Bust. Rather confusingly this doesn't mean that you double your winning profit as the name suggests, rather you double your stake on the lay part of the bet, to win a one point bet amount of your initial stake, so is effectively an Even money bet.
Place a back bet of your stake (£20) on a Horse at Betfair odds of 8.4. You then place a lay bet at half the odds (4.2) to keep in running once the race is under way and with double your stake (£40).
Results:
The horse doesn't hit 4.2 in running and loses.
£20 back bet at 8.4 and no lay bet triggered.
You lose £20
The horse does hit 4.2 or lower in running but still loses.
£20 back bet at 8.4 (+£148)
£40 lay bet at 4.2 (-£128)
£148 - £128 + £20
You win £20
The horse hits 4.2 or lower in running and goes on to win.
£20 back bet at 8.4 (+£148)
£40 lay bet at 4.2 (-£128)
£148 - £128 + £20
You win £20
A Trob is like a treble Dob, where you place three times your back stake on the lay bet at 33% of the back odds. Here you win twice your stake so it is a 2/1 bet.
Place a back bet of your stake (£20) on a Horse at Betfair odds of 12. You then place a lay bet at a third of the odds (4) to keep in running once the race is under way and with treble your stake (£60).
Results:
The horse doesn't hit 4 in running and loses.
£20 back bet at 12 and no lay bet triggered.
You lose £20
The horse does hit 4 or lower in running but loses.
£20 back bet at 12 (+£220)
£60 lay bet at 4 (-£180)
£220 - £180 +£40
You win £40
The horse hits 4 or lower in running and goes on to win.
£20 back bet at 12 (+£220)
£60 lay bet at 4 (-£180)
£220 - £180 +£40
You win £40
As you can see, once the horse hits the lower in running price and the lay bet is placed, it doesn't matter if the horse wins or loses, you still get your Dob or Trob profit. Finding the winner of a race can be a tough task as most of us know and making a profit betting this way is not easy, however when using the In Running Trading Tool to highlight those horses most likely to DOB or Trob, the strike rate increases greatly and winning money becomes much easier.
Dobbing - Even money trades and low risk betting.
With the rewards on a single winning trade being an Even money bet they are not as big as can be had backing a winner, however the profits are far more regular and as you can see, when you know which horses are most likely to Dob every day, you will find it easy to successfully trade and make profits too.
Dobbing is also very low risk as you are only risking 1 point per trade and a strike rate of better than 51% will see you making money in the long term, although you will get far better than this and make more money when using the software.
Different staking plans using the Dobbing horses.
There are a few other methods you can use, once you have found your horses to Dob with the In Running Trading Tool and the most common is as follows. Instead of placing double your stake at half the BSP odds, you place the same stake at half the odds and this will then play out as follows;
If the horse doesn't drop to half the price in running, you lose your 1 pt stake amount, just as before. If the horse drops to half the price but doesn't go on to win, then your bet is effectively cancelled out so that you win nothing and you lose nothing. If the horse does win the race however, you win a part of the original profit amount, so with odds of 8.4 and 4.2 and a £20 stake, you would win £84.
To work out the profit just multiply the second odds by the stake, so 4.2 multiplied by £20 = £84.
If you prefer to win a little more but less of the time then you may prefer this way of betting and the selections will still be found for you every day by the In Running Trading Tool.
Suggestions for Trading In Running
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