I have been meaning to review False Favourites for a while, partly as I’ve heard a few good things about it, and partly because it’s been around for a long, long time – which invariably means it’s at least worth a look.
I also happen to be a huge fan of laying, as the high strike rates make for a comfortable ride. See my Lay Lucy Lay thread for the story of my own very public (and thankfully pretty successful!) attempt at a free laying service. (The final review is here).
Anyway, I’ve finally downloaded False Favourites. And it’s enormous. A 232 page monster to be exact! Which, I must admit, is a bit daunting….
…but still, when I start reading, I find that I can skip quite a lot. Because yes, it does have the obligatory introduction to Betfair, plus an awful lot of stuff about emotion and discipline and not betting if you’re short of time…. all of which is very commendable, but does feel a bit like padding, especially when you’ve bought a new system and just want to get on with it!!
Anyway, to business. What are my first impressions?
Well, to start with, you can’t really call this a system as such. That is, it does not describe a mechanistic process for ‘how to make money laying horses’. Instead, it’s more of a guide to the way you might study the Racing Post to identify possible losers – the False Favourites of which the title speaks.
I’m not quite sure how I feel about this. The sales page calls False Favourites “the ultimate laying system”, but it’s definitely more of a Guide: a very comprehensive one, but still a Guide. It might even be the Ultimate Guide To Lay Betting (only time will tell on that one), but it certainly is going to be tricky to test False Favourites in the same way I test everything else. The reason being that the results I get will almost certainly not be the same as the results someone else would get using the same guide and betting on the same races.
On the plus side, the thing I like most on first reading is that False Favourites is almost certainly bound to make you a better bettor (sorry about that, couldn’t resist). It draws heavily on the Racing Post website, but manages to avoid requiring you to access the paid-for bits… so you don’t need to incur any additional costs in order to benefit.
Somewhat unexpectedly, there is also a long section exploring how the Betfair markets work in the hours before the off, which may well be worth the price of the guide on its own. Being able to understand what moves markets is a valuable skill, so I intend to be trialling some of the advice here too. Whenever I find I can lock in a profit (and can get on to a PC to do so), I will trade out prior to race time.
This means the guide can be considered a tool for both layers and traders.
I will start laying over the next two days ( Thursday 12th and Friday 13th April). It might take me till Friday to get through the manual… it really is too long (and I say that as someone who produced a 54 page tome recently!). Stakes to be £10 a point, against a bank of £1000. The highest liability I’m allowed to lay at is 4.7, so I will only be exposing a maximum of 3.7 points per selection.
Wish me luck!
Lx
Hi Lucy,
Just wondering if you’ve started this trial yet?
Hi Marcus
Nice to hear from you!
I am currently on holiday in Cyprus and so unable to really test the system. That said, I’ve taken some time to leaf through the manual, which sounds easy but is far from it as it’s enormous.
You know, I’m almost wondering what the point of trialling this is. False Favourites is not a system in the sense that I understand the term. It does appear to be a very promising instructional guide, but then I’m not sure that is really what I was expecting when I ordered it. It is comprehensive in the extreme, and actually recommends a lot of the principles I personally follow in my own laying. So I am not criticising it, only wondering if it is quite positioned correctly in its marketing.
It does appear that it has evolved over time too, with different sections being bolted on over time as ‘bonuses’. This does make it something of a ‘bag of bits’ as (what appear to be) the more recent sections have not been smoothly integrated into the whole. In short, it could do with a bit of an edit! As it stands, it is full of valuable information, but is not that well organised and ultimately quite overwhelming.
I will have a look at it again when I’m back home but I’m tempted to give it a Neutral rating and leave it there. Sometimes life really is too short.
Lx
Yeah, I’ve read similar things regarding the size of it and it’s something that’s kinda putting me off purchasing it. Thanks for the reply, and thanks for the website! I’ve just finished reading through your TFT review, really good read! I’m tempted to get that one. Enjoy the rest of your holiday
I think I’m going to have to suspend the False Favourites trial. I’ve been back to it again this week and it is boring me to death.
The bottom line is – if you want a rules-based system, this isn’t it. What it is though is a deeply worthy, if far too rambling, introduction to the subject of laying, and it will teach you to focus on the right things..
One of the biggest problems with laying is knowing where to start. What matters most – class, distance, going, trainer… all of the above? Well, this system effectively gives you a way into the problem, with a scoring system that you work through with a pad and pencil on the one hand, and a copy of the Racing Post on the other. However, it’s a judgment call in the end as to whether to place a bet … so it makes it almost impossible to test rigorously as a system. Different punters will get different results.
So it’s going in the Neutral bucket. It’s basically worthy but a bit dull…
Lx