The distance kills favorites. Every year, bettors forget. Belmont is where hype dies and longshots thrive.
It’s the third jewel of the Triple Crown.
Because achieving it is so iconic, and the actual winners so famous, it leads the betting public to thinking it can happen regularly.
Lucky Rebel horse racing bettors know better though.
There are a lot of other factors to winning the Belmont Stakes than headlines and hype.
Only 13 Triple Crown Winners in History
That’s 13 out of over 4,500 possibilities since 1919.
Translation: you can find a better bet for the Belmont.
Secretariat, Seattle Slew, American Pharoah, Justify.
Those are the names in recent memory, recent enough that casual horse racing bettors still have them in their heads when banking on another Triple Crown winner.
But for every one of them, there are literally dozens of horses we don’t remember at all who were Belmont Stake champions, relentless closers who shot down the Triple Crown dreams of much bigger favorites.
The Belmont is the race that offers the biggest hype if there’s a winner of both the Derby and the Preakness coming to Elmont (or Saratoga, while Elmont does renos).
It also offers the biggest heartache when favorites, especially Triple Crown hopefuls, get passed by longshot horses who have better endurance.
Heart over hype. That’s what Lucky Rebel players are banking on at Belmont.
Distance Exposes Pretenders
If a horse can be overconfident, it’s at the Belmont Stakes that he’ll get exposed.
And if they don’t have the capacity to be cocky, their fans can be.
A horse’s strong showings at the Derby and/or the Preakness can make casual bettors feel they’ve picked the right horse for the course.
This is where Belmont humbles them. Horses untested beyond 1 1/8 miles often fade in the final furlongs.
An elite 100m sprinter in the Olympics is specifically trained and tuned to run that distance. Put them in the 200m and only a small percentage will get the same elite results.
Same goes for the ponies.
The simplest way of looking at Belmont betting strategy can be summed up easily: play stayers and fade sprinters.
Proven stamina is required at the Belmont more than at any Triple Crown race.
But what casual bettors love is the hype of a horse’s early season success.
Triple Crown potential drives the hype machine through the roof of course, but even a hot horse that has won often in the same season, not necessarily taking both the Derby and the Preakness, catches an outsized amount of attention for the Belmont.
What is something only the smart money knows? This horse racing secret: most of the favorites for the Belmont Stakes crown are completely untested at the distance of 1 ½ miles.
That’s right. People are throwing their cash at horses they’ve never seen run that far.
What do we want Lucky Rebel bettors looking for when betting the Belmont?
Sometimes unlearning is the way to go.
Forget holding class. Higher-grade events do matter when it comes to generally assessing a horse’s ability in big races, but the Belmont pushes horses beyond their usual limits.
Omit speed. Like the sprinter example above, a horse can be lightning coming out of the gates but Belmont will burn them out. Top-end pace horses often end up in the middle or back of the pack.
Don’t rely on tactical ability. It’s great that an elite horse has a high capacity to rate. Even better that he’s highly responsive to the jockey and can position himself well. But again, that’s all out the window once the burn settles in for the final stretch at Belmont.
Smart money looks past the headlines, unlearns the unimportant stuff, and takes in a horse’s pedigree, their bloodline, and conformation to find a Belmont winner with a bigger payout.
Value Lives in Closers
Their names won’t end up in movies, and they won’t be passed on by previous generations.
But Belmont’s last two decades of racing strongly favor horses with stamina and late pace. And they have that outsider status that Lucky Rebel can identify with.
Last year, Dornoch – while not quite a nobody, definitely not a favorite – overcame 17-1 odds to win the race known as the Test of the Champion. (Yeah, we like “Third Jewel of the Triple Crown” better too.
The year before, Arcangelo took the race and paid 8-1. Creator in 2016, 16-1. Winner.
Aside from reading horse betting previews, which can be a crapshoot, you can dig into advanced metrics to measure stamina and closing ability/late pace.
Stamina can be measured by:
- Heart Index/Aerobic Capacity. A higher number (above 115) is better, showing superior stamina and aerobic fitness. The Belmont is the longest of the Triple Crown events. You want a horse that can last. Secretariat and American Pharoah were elite in stamina metrics.
- Lactate Thresholds. VLA4 is way of measuring the power to process lactic acid. That burning in your legs after two flights of stairs? That’s lactic acid. For horses, the better the process it, the more likely they can close out the 1.5-mile classic.
- Stamina Score. Measures the stride length at various parts of the race. Anything below 100 is a sign that the horse is prone to tiring later on in races. High SS above 100 shows they have the stamina to close.
Closing Ability has its own set of measurables:
- Last Fraction Speed. The horse’s split time in the final segment of a race. Lucky Rebel bettors looking to cash at the Belmont should look at a horse’s recent race history – Last Fraction Speed that is considerably higher than the average could be worth a wager.
- Closer Index. This tracks the horse’s net position gain in the final furlongs. Check the recent race history for finding a solid closer for the Belmont.
- Velocity Decline Profile. Now we’re getting serious. Biometric tracking-level serious. This tracks each horse’s velocity drop throughout a race. We’re looking for the horses that slow down the least.
Three horses have won the race since 2000 while sitting at 24-1 or higher.
Another six horses that were high-priced or mid-priced have also won since then, offering great value.
Belmont is for closers. And smart money.