5 Ways To Pick Winners At the Dog Track

Every greyhound handicapper has a method for picking dogs that they develop over the years. Sometimes it’s on purpose and sometimes it just evolves into what works the best for them. My method took decades and I still find ways to make it better all the time.

While there are many approaches to picking dogs, here are 5 of the most popular ones and a few observations on their success rate.

1. Look for the dog with the fastest time in its last race. This method isn’t one I’d recommend, because – as Professor Einstein said – Time is relative. How fast a dog runs in a race depends on what was going on in that particular race. There’s no telling how fast the dog will run in the race he’s running today.
2. Look for the dog who has the most wins. Hmm, unless you can tell that all those wins were in the grade it’s running in today and that the dog ALWAYS wins at this grade AND that all the dogs have run exactly the same number of races to compare it against, I wouldn’t recommend this approach.
3. Look for the dog who has the highest win percentage. This is better than looking at the number of wins, but it’s still only one factor. Even if you look at every race the dog ran where it won, this race today is a whole ‘nother situation with many factors that can affect whether it wins or not.
4. Look for the dog who gets out first AND gets to the first turn first. Well, how do you find that dog? Sure, you can see if a dog did that in previous races, but that was with different dogs under different circumstances. Can you see where I’m going with this constant harping on “different” here?
5. Consider all the factors: class, post position, running style, past performance at this grade and the probable interaction of all the dogs in this race. Take enough time to figure out what’s likely to happen in this race, given each dog’s running style, post position and speed profile i.e. early or late speed.

Yes, this last method is much more time consuming than just going down the page and picking the dog with the fastest time, most wins, highest win percentage or early speed. However, if a quick method doesn’t pick winners, it’s a waste of time and money. I’d rather take a little more time and use a proven system like The Two Key Trifecta System or The Marks Method. and get a good return on my time and money.  Wouldn’t you?

You can adopt a retired racer. In return for a family of its own, your greyhound will give you lots of love. Hey, you can sit on the couch together and watch the dog races. Who knows? You might even get some inside information from your fast friend.