Gulfstream Park recently announced its new wagering menu for 2011 and the changes have certainly got some tongues wagging.  Horse racing industry insiders will be watching to see if the new bets that will be available to horse players will be a success.  While race track revenues drop around the country, everybody is looking for a way to turn things around and perhaps even bring new people into the sport.  The sport, of course, is horse racing handicapping, an intellectual challenge.

One of the exciting wagers that GP announced is a ten cent pick six bet.  As you probably already know, the pick six is a wager in which the bettor tries to pick the winner of six consecutive races.  When all six winners are not chosen on a single ticket, Some of the pool is disbursed to those who hold a ticket with the highest number of winners.  For instance, if there are seven tickets with five of the winners, then those seven tickets each get an equal share of a consolation pool set aside for the consolation winners.

When the pick six isn’t hit for a few days, pools can sometimes reach dizzying amounts such as a million or more.  Once in a while a lucky horse player actually hits the only pick six winner and pockets the whole pool, minus Uncle Sam’s share, of course.  Exotic bet players dream of hitting the big pick six and when the pools grow, the betting becomes more frenzied and the pools begin to grow faster.  Sounds like a good setup for the race track doesn’t it?  Well maybe yes, and maybe no.

One problem with having all that money in the pool is that it isn’t in circulation at the track.  The way race tracks really make money is on what is known as “churn” in the industry.  Churn is simply the process of betting over and over again until your dollar is nearly gone.  For instance, when you go to the track with $20 and spend $5 on a bet, if you win, you get more than $5 back, but if you lose you lose it all.  Each time you bet, the track takes out 15% or more from your $5.

Even when you are winning, you are still paying that 15%.  Though mathematically speaking, taking 15% from a number over and over again will never completely take all the money, it does gradually wear it down until nothing or next to nothing is left.  While all those dollars are in the pick six pool they are not being bet over and over again by the bettors.  Therefore, it is at the expense of the race track and though they benefit from the advertising and excitement of a large pick six payout, they lose churn which means income.

A ten cent pick six might just fix that problem because with such low betting increments, almost any and all pick six combinations may be hit.  So perhaps, Gulfstream Park is covering an opportunity for bettors large and small to get in on the pick six and to have a fighting chance to actually hit all six winners, but at the same time, maybe they are sacrificing those huge pick six carryovers and the resultant publicity that goes with them.  It will be interesting to see how it all shakes out, but I give credit to Gulfstream Park for trying something different and letting the bettors decide what is best for them with their wagering dollars.