Cheltenham betting

[mardigras]

Imagine a NZ meeting getting the same level of interest on a site like Betfair. Today we had individual horses with betting volumes in the 1.5 - 2.0m bracket. Even though I oppose racefield fees on turnover, that's the way they do it. 1.5 - 2% on that level of betting is $25 - $30k - that's not on the market - that's on just one horse within one market. At Cheltenham, on the win markets, that would be $70-100k+ per event from the win market alone.

This isn't even counting the volumes being bet elsewhere.

I know this isn't something NZ could achieve - we do well to get betting volume of $10k on an entire race through that operator. We should be embracing different operators for meeting different needs. Not thinking we can cater for every punter ourselves.

[Hesi]

2 questions

1.  Why is so much bet

2.  How does this 1.5 -2 million per horse compare with lesser meetings in the UK

[mardigras]

10 minutes ago, Hesi said:

2 questions

1.  Why is so much bet

2.  How does this 1.5 -2 million per horse compare with lesser meetings in the UK

1. Cheltenham has huge interest (as does jumps racing in UK/Ire generally).

2. They bet half a million on a win market for a 3,000 pound affair at Wolverhampton. For a half decent any day race it will be closer to 1m. For big races, the volume can reach 10m in the win market. (Such as big Cheltenham races like the Gold Cup, Classics, Grand National).

And the actual volume from punters is double that - I'm only counting the volume from the back side. Each back bet is matched by a punter who is offering the odds. So the market will show say 1m - but that is only 500k in back bets (and 500k worth of lay bets). I only count that as 500k.