From The Horse's Mouth - Mark Van Deventer

Studying the form book in great depth takes time. And keeping a database of personal ratings, be they classic weight handicap figures or speed scores adds considerably to the workload, as well. Doing video analysis is also a helpful aid to diligent pros, but a laborious process.

Question - is there a short cut that casual racing fans can take to unearth plenty of winners without devoting many hours to poring through every nook and cranny of the past performances

Kingsley Bartholomew, a high-rolling pro punter and former bookie based in Australia, would say there is indeed a solution. He is a very sussed analyst, and I would recommend checking out the Wolfden website on which he, and a few select Ozzie horseplayers, make regular appearances.

He has proposed a four- pronged strategy that can help punters quickly come up with plenty of winners. It really is straight-forward to apply.

Bartholomew marks the following on his racecard checklist:

In each race, he highlights the mounts of the top four jockeys at any track.

Next, he looks for those horses saddled by the top four trainers at that same venue.

In a similar race-by race procedure, he focusses on the top four in the betting market.As a sort of tiebreaker, he isolates those horses that lead or press the pace and are usually positioned in the first four upon settling.

Horses that meet all four criteria are the ones he would back, assuming their prices are fair.

Simple as it seems, there is abundant wisdom to his approach.

Connections really do matter in racing and homing in on fit horses trained by the best conditioners or ridden by superior jockeys immediately eliminates those mediocre or battling practitioners who all too often find a way to somehow mess things up and just win too rarely to be serious factors.

The top four trainers and jockeys at most venues typically account for at least around 75% of the winners –it’s that stat Bartholomew uses to his advantage when creating an initial shortlist.

Likewise, on- pace horses typically outperform off- pace runners on fair turf tracks. Obviously, there are exceptions to that sweeping tactical generalisation but again he is trying to focus on rock solid candidates who seem sure to give their running and are not hostages to fortune from a pace/luck in running perspective.

That ties in with another key criteria – the betting market is not dim witted and is, in fact, universally the best predictor of outcomes over the long term. By concentrating on the first four in the betting the probabilities of one of them winning also reaches towards that “charmed” 70% + threshold.

The shrewd ‘’King” does take price into account and varies his stakes judiciously. Possessing a good gamblers temperament and applying sound money management principles remain important.

But the basic gameplan is to limit wagering action, when using his short form checklist, to the qualifying horse that best meets all four criteria in any give race.

As a suggestion, give it a try at your home track this weekend. It can be done super-quickly - and whilst, by definition, they won’t be long shots, you can be pretty sure that you will be on seriously live contenders with genuine winning claims.

Then log on to interbet.co.za when ready for punting. Interbet’s new exchange enables you to back horses at some of the best fluctuating prices - and not be charged any commission at all.