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When is a bet on McCoy value?

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He's the best but that can make it tricky to know when to bet on him. Wayne Bailey runs the rule over McCoy...

Statistics - You either love them or hate them.

If you've read any of my articles over the past few weeks, you'll know I love them. Even if you're not interested stats, you will probably be aware of one trend, and that is the fact that Tony McCoy wins a hell of a lot of races!

Consider the following table, which shows the results of the national hunt jockey championship for the past twelve years:

1995-96 - Tony McCoy
1996-97 - Tony McCoy
1997-98 - Tony McCoy
1998-99 - Tony McCoy
1999-00 - Tony McCoy
2000-01 - Tony McCoy
2001-02 - Tony McCoy
2002-03 - Tony McCoy
2003-04 - Tony McCoy
2004-05 - Tony McCoy
2005-06 - Tony McCoy
2006-07 - Tony McCoy

Spot anything?

Ok, so it's no secret that McCoy is about the best jockey in the modern era, or perhaps of all time, but therein lies the problem for his fans.

The fact that McCoy is so good invariably means he's over-bet, and the layers learned long ago to shorten up the price of his rides. As much as McCoy likes to win, it's difficult to find any value in his mounts. So should we simply ignore all McCoy's rides?

Not quite.

Believe it or not, it is still possible to make a very decent profit by backing the Irishman in certain races. But which of his races have hidden value?

In cases like this, it's a good exercise to put yourself in the shoes of your typical punter. I'm talking about the annoying guy found in every bookie shop up and down the country, the type who seems to have an (ill-informed) opinion on everything.

What would he back? What would he avoid? These people have a major effect on the market, and on the prices that you're going to get. You of course, don't want to be a typical punter.
As pro-gambler Allan Potts stated:

"To be successful, you've got to bet against the crowd".

The opinions and myths espoused by the typical punter can be used to your advantage.

Most punters hate backing a horse that fell last time out, so that's a good place to start in our search for value. I'll always forgive a faller, but your typical backer is not so sympathetic, and the high prices of horses that fell last time out reflect this. So far then, we can conclude that horses that have McCoy on board, and fell last time out could be interesting betting opportunities.

The thing about McCoy is that he seems to learn from every race. Therefore, if McCoy himself was on board last time out when the horse fell, you can be sure that he'll try to rectify matters. That gives us two solid guidelines:

• Back Tony McCoy If the horse he's riding fell last time out
• The Jockey on board when the horse fell must have been McCoy himself

I took out the form-books and back-tested this theory. I'm glad to report the results (2000-2007) are extremely positive. As you can see, going against the conventional myth that fallers should be avoided has certainly paid dividends when we play in the right races:

Bets ...... Wins ...Strike Rate ......Return to SP .......Profit to £100 stakes

110 ......... 36 ........32.7% ............ 131.2% ............ £3,343

Broken down by year, 2001 and 2006 would have proved unprofitable. I'll always forgive unusual results in 2001 however, as the foot and mouth disease played havoc with the fixtures. The results for 2006 would have definitely showed a profit using Betfair prices.

Year ............ Bets ......... Wins ......... Strike Rate ......... Return to SP

2000 ............ 23 ............ 7 ............ 30.40% ............ 117.00%
2001 ............ 14 ............ 3 ............ 21.40% ............ 47.00%
2002 ............ 18 ............ 10 ............ 55.60% ............ 212.80%
2003 ............ 10 ............ 4 ............ 40.00% ............ 182.50%
2004 ............ 15 ............ 4 ............ 26.70% ............ 112.70%
2005 ............ 10 ............ 2 ............ 20.00% ............ 100.00%
2006 ............ 11 ............ 3 ............ 27.30% ............ 97.70%
2007 ............ 9 ............ 3 ............ 33.30% ............ 184.70%

Nobody likes to see a horse fall, but next time you see McCoy go down, let it be a reminder that there could be a good bet coming up in the near future!