dfr contest player

[ronnie h]

should a player buy one,two ,three entry. turfway has one sat i plan to buy in with two entrys and start out with horses a,b ,c in case of scratch. i want at least the a horse on both tickets in how many races ? your advice helpful.any advice helpful

[Ken Massa]

Ronny, when it comes to the NTRA/DRF qualifying tourney's - I can only pass on the experience of Tommy Castillo = Enter every contest you can and buy as many entries as they allow. Tommy knew the law of averages would catch up to him eventually and he would finish well-enough to qualify after numerous efforts. That should be your primary concern - enter, enter, enter.

How to play those multiple tickets?

Two schools of thought - assume you buy in for 2 entries, which is typical.

1) start with entry "A" and play it all the way through. If you get hot or cold on that ticket, it will work out beautifully. In the "hot" case, you have all the winners on the same entry. In the "cold" case, you have not wasted any part of your "B" entry on losers. With all your losers early in the day on the "A" ticket, hopefully you will now get hot on the "B".

2) the other method is to play an "A" entry alternating with "B" entry. This is the most common approach. Start off by alternating your selections on each entry. When you do hit one - then that ticket becomes your "good" entry and start to focus your better selections on it. The negative side to this approach is that the "bad" ticket becomes a casual 'bombs away' entry and eventually you might hit one and be frustrated that it isn't on the "good" ticket.

Joe Hinson, the king of all tournament players used to get his whole family involved and buy as many as 8 entries in a tournament under all their names. He no doubt combined both approaches above effectively by shooting at any longshot with half a chance and eventually scoring a few bombs. Then those tickets became his prime movers and he could arrange his more confident picks on them later. The key for this strategy is to get an early score with a huge longshot 30/1 and up. Then improvise from there. Hinson, a top exec with FedX, is a genius at overall management.

Consistent tournament prize winners are not just good handicappers. They are masters of strategy and timing.

[tommyc]

Reddy: Man, sorry I didn't see your post in time to reply before the TP tournament...hope you did really well, we all are waiting to hear.

I probably wouldn't have done you much good anyway since I a totally "out of left field" handicapper and player...that's one of the reasons I don't get involved more on the board, my methods are pretty ridiculous to most good 'cappers and there is an abundance of those here..they'd laugh me out of town ! :-)

Best advice I can give you 'tho is to read carefully Ken's response paragraph about Joe Hinson.. he IS the best and I steal every bit of his tournament process that I can. He's come to think of me as his shadow, at every tournament he enters...there I am sitting at the next table .

I enter every tournament I can afford and usually play 2 entries. I noted that you said you had a-b-c preferred selections in each race...that's where I go into la-la land..I have NO preferred
selections, I only have preffered ODDS at post time and if my custom program sez a horse is even semi-alive and short of the glue factory..I fire.
My method is NOT recommended for those concerned with being "good" handicappers or with concern for LONG streaks without winners. :-)

None of that can be of much help to you but the main thing I would pass along is to determine how many entries you can efficiently administer during a tournament and get as many as you can...then set some odds parameters for those entries and work with your a-b-c horses at close to post time.

Best of luck, let us know how you did....

tommyc

[MikeDee]

On a realted tourny note.

Best of Luck to all HTR'ers that are heading out to the big tourny at the Orleans in Vegas this week!

[ronnie h]

thanks for the advice finish intop twenty had one dq and play bombs in last two races my best finish yet. next is the BRIS contest