I am hopeful but also saddened to see that b track products such as plainridge have found the answer before Woodbine Yonkers and other major league racing venues. Just one big track humour me with a 10 percent takeout win 4 and not these guaranteed win 4,s where the guarantee is fairly if never exceeded. At my local off track the most naive of the customers actually think they are getting something when their is a gaurantee.

Unfortunately the horsemen groups and track operators who keep inventing these guarantees are happy to keep fooling the same customers they already have confused. The only pools that your old customers are participating in are any of the carryovers where their is free money on the table which will reduce the takeout on the new money. As one of your confused customers told me the other day " Its hard to not put a little bit onto the pick 4 when the payout is guaranteed."

I tried to explain to him that the bet was no different unless the pool amount was less than what was bet into the pool and that the guarantees just happen to be slighlty below what is bet most time in those pools. I then explained that even if 75000 plus is bet into to the pool they are guaranteeing the pool with your own money because of the takeout. After I finished he looked at me with a dazed look and asked me "Who do you like in the first leg." Good luck I am glad he is your customer and not mine.

Mr.Bechtel,

Your post is spot on. For the last year or two i have been shouting from the hilltops that the business model in the race game is not flawed but broken. There are other people such as yourself, Mr.Robinski and a handful of others that have taken the time to also post. The much larger problem though is there is thousands upon thousands, not hundreds but thousands of people who feel the same way but will never post on this type of forum expressing there opinion but they have spoken loud and clear with there wallets by rejecting the race game and there excessive takeouts and going to the greener pastures of sports and poker. They may not win but they must feel that they at least have a chance of winning.

At times i just scratch my head and say what is it going to take for the race track managers, boards of directors and other people in a position of power in this industry to catch onto the fact that charging 20 to 30% takeouts no longer work. They got away with that in the 60's and 70's because they were the only game in town. Well guess what you are no longer the only game in town. you haven't been the only game in town for a long time and you will never again be the only game in town. Racing disappearing in quebec has not done it. Racing all but disappearing in alberta has not done it. The big m which is by far and away the most important track, being on the verge of closing hasn't done it. The wager being in a free fall for over 10 years hasn't done it and last but not least empty grandstands has not done it. What catastrophic event is it going to take to sharpen them up.

There will come a time where they will look at takeout but not because it is the right thing to do or the smart thing to do but because they will have been backed into a corner and there is no other options left. They will find out the band aid solutions that they are currently coming up with will only slow the bleeding down a bit but will never stop it. When this time comes you have to wonder if it will be to little to late. This is something that should have started 5 to 10 years ago. When the time comes when they are backed into a cornor with no other options left but to address the take out issue they had better understand that competing means competing not half competing like droping take outs to 15%. That will not do it, you either compete or you don't and that means a 10% max in every pool at every race track in north america.

This week I finally decided that after 35 years I have had it with horse racing. I lost $6000 betting online this week. Does that bother me? Of course. But it's not so much the fact that I lost it as rather HOW I lost it that made me decide enough is enough. I am sure many people who read this will just call me another sore loser, or a poor handicapper. But I like to think that after 35 years I know a little something about how to read a program. I am frankly just sick and tired of putting my money on horses who's drivers/jockeys just don't move or don't even give you a race.

I am tired of trying to figure out how 30-1 shots who previously showed dismal form are suddenly going wire to wire in fractions faster then they have ever gone.
I have grown tired and more importantly very suspicious of so many things I see in racing that it no longer is enjoyable to me nor do I feel I am getting anywhere near any sort of value for my money. Therefore I have decided enough is enough. I would rather take my chances on any other form of gambling OTHER THEN HORSE RACING. Quite frankly I don't care if Woodbine or any other track goes broke nd shuts it's doors. In my opinion it's what they deserve for continuing to cheat their customers.
For the record I have bet proline tickets the last several weeks and cashed each time. Why? Because the teams actually try to win.
Why give money to hrose racing when they give you no shot.

Gee how many 1000,s of bettors have warned that this was coming and would/will spread to horse racing!! Meanwhile the racing industry does the Ostrich while it happens!

Everybody who didnt read the article one year ago about Iowa dog racing get the sequel Florida dog racing or what could happen to Ontario racing if we continue to frame the popularity of racing with the amount wagered. The politician has concluded that the popularity of dog racing has declined because the amount wagered or handle has declined thus get rid of dog racing because nobody will miss it. Neither the racetrack owners or the OLG have a vested interest in promoting to the government that the decline in handle on horse racing is not a sign of popularity in harness racing it is a condementation of an unpopular costly form of wagering. Gamblers are not stupid and will find forms of gaming where they can overcome the advantage of the house or the other players. So instead of constantly talking and promoting the concept that their has to be a way to find more stupid people who dont know what we take it might be more constructive to spend our energy on improving the gambling product to bring back our old customers. In fact if I owned a racetrack other than Weg I would probaly tell any politician who would listen that due to the lack of interest It might make sense in Ontario to rethink the slot subsidy to horsemen. It is horseman and their organizations who need to get the gambling product changed and the message out that it is not horse racing that are dying but the gambling model.