If Carlsberg did tipsters, then it’s fair to say they may well do so in the guise of Laurence Lambourn, who many of you may be more familiar as the brains behind top tipster service Equine Investments.
Since April 2004, Laurence has been a constant scourge of the bookmaker, taking in excess of 2450 pts profit from 2652 bets during a 7 year reign of absolute terror on the odds compilers.
Such expertise does not come cheap and nor do opportunities come around too often to sample Laurence’s wares as his membership quotas are generally filled.
However, recently, Laurence was kind enough to grant us an audience where we were able to reap the benefit of his wisdom with a series of practical tips for SBC members looking to improve their betting performance.
Read a selection of our interview with Laurence here…
SBC: At the time of writing, you’d probably be considered to be the best racing service out there in terms of quality, consistency and returns but clearly, your process in getting there has had a few bumps and scrapes. What would you consider the most important lessons that a punter has to learn along the way?
LL: Discipline and good record keeping (as much detail as possible) – will help you to identify your most profitable/unprofitable areas. Consistency in staking is very important too. You should have defined staking rules written down and stick to them.
SBC: Would it be right to talk about your style of betting as a mix of form work, race reading and pace analysis? How do those three components work together and how would someone follow your example if they wanted to work in a similar vein?
LL: Yes, I record all racing and watch the previous days races the next afternoon after I’m done sending out any advices. I’m looking for horses that have run well despite any bias whether it be pace, track or draw. I make notes about each horse using the Racing Post online and attach from one to three stars depending on how well I thought the noted horses ran against the bias. Along with traditional form study, I use three sets of commercial ratings, two sets of speed figures and a pace program written for me that predicts the shape of how the race might pan out.
SBC: Can you give us a breakdown of how you price up a racecard and create and sift your shortlist of potential selections?
LL: It can vary slightly, but in the main I’ll be mostly concentrating on races where I have noted runners. Using normal form study I will quickly go through the race and get a general ‘feel’ for it and weigh up what sort of performance might be required to win it. Using my printed sheets with all the runners, ratings and pace on them, I will start with my noted runner and see if he might have conditions to suit (eg pace make up, draw, trip etc). If everything looks acceptable (remember there will be differing degrees of acceptance) I will note down on my sheet that he has a one star chance. It takes a bit of practice, experience and some gut feeling but I have a note in my head of how much I like him in today’s conditions. I will go through each runner making small notes – 1/2 chance 1/4 chance etc. I know it sounds complicated but this is how I get a price for my horse. In an eight runner race for example, my noted runner will have one chance there might be another four runners with half a chance each and the remaining three runners might have 1/4 chance each. So there are 3.75 chances which is 11/4 true odds for one chance, so I now know my horse is a true 11/4 shot. After building in a margin for error and profit I’ll likely want 100/30 or bigger, the bigger margin above my true odds the bigger the stake. It’s not always about one horse, one of the 1/2 chance horses for example might be well overpriced and I’ll be on that one as well.
SBC: Unlike most other services you seem to intrinsically understand the link between bet turnover and ROI. Can you explain that for us here?
LL: I know my long term edge is about 30% and I can find around 250 main account bets a year so if I’m wanting to make say 20k a year I know that £20,000/30% (ROI) =£ 66666.66/250 = £266.66 (this is the stake I need per bet).
Basically, for every £100 invested it will make me a £30 profit on average in the long run. If a service/punter has a 10% long term return on investment then they need 750 bets to get the same return using the same stakes for each.
Read More From This Interview
To read more from this exclusive in-depth interview with Laurence , you can find this in the SBC Winter Racing Annual, which is available to purchase here.
In a special offer, anyone also purchasing the Winter Annual will be given first option on membership of an exclusive new Equine Investments service to launch soon. With membership numbers expected to be strictly limited, if interested, make sure you secure your copy!
Pick up the SBC Winter Racing Annual here today