Horse Betting Sites
Horse racing, also called the Sport of Kings, has for centuries maintained a status as a pastime for the wealthy and elite. Times have changed, however, and today millions of people enjoy horse racing on TV and at live tracks around the world.
Best Horse Betting Sites
Betting On Horse Racing
Wherever you find horses running in circles, you’re also sure to find people betting on those horses. Horse racing is one of the few sports in the world that has always been closely related to gambling. Other sports look down upon gambling but horse racing accepts betting as a part of life. In fact, betting on horses keeps the entire racing industry alive and well.
Horse betting is also sometimes called pari-mutuel wagering because all the bets are placed together in a pool, the horse track taxes its commission out of that pool and then the bets are paid out at the end of the match. This differs than other types of sports betting in that the payoff odds aren’t officially calculated until all the winning bets have been determined.
Even though the payoff odds aren’t calculated until after the match, you will often still see odds listed before you make your bet. These odds are just approximations based on what the bookmaker believes the payoff odds will be. That’s also why the odds change as upcoming races approach.
Horse Betting vs. Gambling
For some people, horse betting is no different than gambling at the casino. They pick a horse that looks good, place their wagers and then hope for the best. For these people, you could consider horse betting gambling. They just want to add a little excitement to the sport and there’s nothing wrong with that.
On the other hand, horse betting isn’t always gambling. In fact, horse betting is one of the few forms of wagering in which skill has a major impact on your overall success. The more skilled you are at betting on horses, the more money you make. People who take horse betting seriously cannot be called gamblers any more than stock traders can be called gamblers.
How To Bet On Horses At Online Betting Sites
Getting stared with horse betting is easy. The first thing you need to do is find an online horse racing bookmaker that you trust. This is the most difficult part of the process because there are a lot of online bookmakers out there. Luckily, we’ve done most of the work for you and have already identified and reviewed the biggest and most trusted bookmakers on the internet.
Once you find a trustworthy online horse betting site, the next step is to sign up for an account and make a deposit. Most online horse betting sites have deposit bonuses that match your first deposit there on a percentage basis. For example, if you sign up at a site that has a 10% bonus and you deposit $100, the betting site would add an extra $10 to your deposit absolutely free.
After you have your account set up and funded, the final step is to pick a horse and bet on it. You’ll see a list of upcoming races and horses at your betting site. Just log in, choose your horse and choose how much you wish to wager.
If you have the right channel, you can then watch your horse race live on TV. Many horse betting sites also offer free streaming video of the horse races that you bet on. The streaming option comes in handy because horse races are often shown on channels that most people don’t already have.
Types of Horse Betting
There’s more to betting on horses than picking the winner. If you’ve ever been to the horse track or visited an online horse betting site, you probably already know what I’m talking about. There are more than a dozen different types of horse bets and those can be arranged in an almost limitless number of combinations.
Straight Bets
Straight bets are the simplest types of bets. They are easy to understand and the odds of winning are typically higher than with exotic bets. Of course, that also means that exotic bets offer higher payouts.
Win – This is the simplest bet of them all. You simply pick a horse and win if that horse takes 1st place in the race.
Place – You pick a horse and win if that horse finishes in 1st or 2nd place.
Show – You pick a horse and win if that horse finishes in 1st, 2nd or 3rd place. It doesn’t matter which place the horse finishes as long as it’s one of the top three finishers.
Exotic Bets
Exotic bets are a little more complicated than straight bets. These bets include multiple horses and sometimes even multiple races. Exotic bets are difficult to win but the payoffs are much larger than for straight bets.
Across the Board – This bet is similar to the show bet but it’s not the same. In an across the board bet, you win if your horse finishes 1st, 2nd or 3rd place. The difference is that in this bet, you are essentially placing a Win, Place and Show bet on one horse. This means that if your horse finishes first, you collect on all three bets. If your horse finishes second, you only collect on the Place and Show bets. If your horse finishes third, you only collect on the Show bet.
Exacta or Perfecta – You pick two horses to finish in 1st and 2nd place in the correct order.
Quinella – You pick two horses to finish in 1st and 2nd place but the order in which they finish doesn’t matter.
Exacta Box – This is similar to a Quinella in that you pick two horses to finish 1st and 2nd place and the order doesn’t matter. Not all horse tracks offer Quinella bets so this bet is created by choosing both possible combinations of Exacta bets.
Box bets are routinely used in combination with bets such as the Exacta, Trifecta and Superfecta so that bettors can bet on the top horses without having to guess the exact order. A box bet places a bet on every possible combination of finishing places. For example, a Trifecta Box would be made up of 6 bets in one because there are six different combinations of places that 3 horses can finish in.
Box bets are easier to win but they also cost more. In the case of an Exacta Box, the cost is twice as much as a normal Exacta bet.
Trifecta – You pick three horses to finish in 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in the correct order.
Trifecta Box – You pick three horses to finish in the top three places but it doesn’t matter in which order they do so.
Superfecta – You pick four horses to finish in 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th place in the correct order.
Superfecta Box – You pick four horses to finish in the top four places but it doesn’t matter in which order they do so.
Any 2 – You pick two horses and win if both of those horses finish in 1st, 2nd or 3rd place. The order in which they do so does not matter.
Double – This is a bet that spans across two races in one day. You pick one horse in each race and win only if both horses take 1st place.
Triple – This is similar to a double except you are picking three horses. You win only if all three horses take 1st place.
Pick 4 – You choose four horses from four different races and win only if all four horses take 1st place.
Pick 6 – You choose six horses from six different races and win only if all six horses take 1st place.