Second Class Racing – Final Review

We have reached the end of our six month trial of Second Class Racing and here are the final results:-

 

Profit/Loss:	+70 points
Strike Rate:	85%
Bank Growth:	70%
ROI:	14% *
Average number of bets:	2-3 bets per day
Cost:	£199.97/quarter or £599.97/year
VERDICT:	PASSED
Rating:

 

You can view full results here.

*ROI calculated here based on 1pt stakes. Calculating the ROI as a percentage of the total liability staked would give an ROI of 3.1% 

 

Second Class Racing – Full Review

 

Second Class Racing is a horse racing laying service run out of the Betchat stable of tipsters, with tips provided by a chap called Mel Gee. 

Mel and Betchat are the same team behind another service we are currently reviewing – First Class Racing. 

Whilst that service focuses on selective back bets in top class racing, Second Class Racing does the opposite – it provides lay bets at a higher volume and in all classes of racing.

Over the years we’ve found very few successful laying services – really the only one being Little Acorns – and its complimentary service, Little Acorns Gold, which passed a review back in October 2022. 

So we approached this review with a bit of trepidation to see whether another laying service could finally pass a review.

We wanted to give the service a proper look as there can be quite a bit of variance in laying services, so we followed the service for just over 6 months and proofed more than 500 bets in that time. 

Selections are sent out via Telegram, where Mel posts a screenshot from Betfair with this picks, which looks like this:-

So you take a look at those and then try to place lay bets at the same price Mel has got. 

The rules of the service are to lay at the advised price (always between 3.0 and 6.0) and not to take a larger price.

If a lay isn’t matched at the advised price, then it’s no bet. 

You do not select “keep in play” or “take SP” on Betfair and there is no trading – it’s a “set and forget” approach. . 

Not all of your lay bets will be matched but that’s okay – Betchat say that over the long run it should balance out in terms of missing both winning and losing lays. 

In our own experience that was very much the case – we did have a few selections that we weren’t matched on over the course of the trial but a few of those were losers (as in the horse won), so it was actually a relief to have missed them. 

There were also a few winning lays we weren’t matched on so overall it pretty much balanced out. 

Anyway, after six months and 500 bets, how did it pan out?

Well we are pleased to report that a profit of 70 points was made, which is no mean feat in laying terms. 

That was achieved with a very high strike rate of 85%, so the vast majority of lays were successful. 

As is often the case with these things however, the unsuccessful lays did tend to come in batches. 

Call it “natural variance,” “bad luck” or whatever you prefer, but either way it can be a little testing when you get a bunch of losers close together and your bank takes a significant hit. 

However, in the long run Mel always bounced back and produced good runs of successful lays to rebuild the bank and ultimately finish the trial with a very healthy profit.

Whilst they do NOT advise following the service at Betfair SP, we also tracked the results at BSP just out of interest. 

Laying all the selections at BSP would have given a profit of 70 points, exactly the same total as taking the advised prices.

Laying only those selections with a BSP below 6 (Mel’s cut-off point for a selection), would have given a profit of 52 points, which is mainly due to having less bets – only 334 compared to 500 following the recommended approach. 

Whichever way you skin it then it’s been a very good trial and we are pleased to award Second Class Racing a PASSED rating. 

That’s only the second laying service to have passed a review here at HBR (and still be operational), so well done to Mel Gee and the Betchat team! 

 

Service Breakdown

Ease of use: The selections are sent out by Telegram, usually around midday UK time on the day of racing. There is plenty of time to get the bets on and with around 2-3 bets per day on average the workload is very manageable. 

Availability of prices: As discussed above, there were some instances of prices being missed but overall this balanced out and wasn’t really an issue. 

Strike rate: The strike rate for our trial was very good at 85%, meaning a very high proportion of winning lays. 

Advised Betting Bank: A 100 point bank is recommended for following the service which seems reasonable to us and was more than enough to cope with the ups and downs during our trial.

Subscription costs: Subscription costs are quite high at £199.97 per quarter or £599.97 per year, so realistically to make it worthwhile you would probably need a betting bank of at least £2,000. 

That’s based on a recommended betting bank of 100 points, so that would be £20 per lay. 

For our review period that would have produced £1400 profit, minus just under £400 in subscription costs if paying quarterly.  

 

OVERALL VERDICT: PASSED

Making a profit from lay betting is very tough. Testament to this is the fact that only one laying service has passed a review here at HBR and is still going – Little Acorns. 

So it’s great to be able to say we finally have another successful trial of a laying service, with Second Class Racing producing 70 points profit at both advised prices and BSP. 

It achieved that with a very high strike rate of 85% and gets a firm thumbs up from us with a PASSED rating. 

With the subscription costs being quite high however we would recommend at least a £2,000 betting bank to make it worthwhile signing up. 

For those that are able to stake at or above that level, Second Class Racing has produced excellent results over a six month trial and is well worth checking out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Second Class Racing – Results Update

25th April 2024

It’s been an excellent month for horse racing laying service Second Class Racing, with a profit of 35 points made to advised prices since our last update.

That means they are now 60 points up for our trial overall at advised prices.

You can view full results here.

The rules of the service are to lay at the advised price (always between 3.0 and 6.0) and not to take a larger price. If a lay isn’t matched at the advised price, then it’s a no bet. 

There is no trading – it’s a “set and forget” approach. 

Whilst they do NOT advise following the service at Betfair SP, we have also tracked the results at BSP just out of interest. 

Laying all the selections at BSP would have given a profit of 40 points since our last update and a profit of 59 points for our trial overall thus far.

Laying only those selections with a BSP below 6 (Mel’s cut-off point for a selection), would have given a profit of 53 points so far.

So all in all the results have been pretty similar whichever approach you’ve followed.

 

 

 

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Second Class Racing – Results Update

21st March 2024

Horse racing laying service Second Class Racing has bounced back nicely lately, with a profit of 15 points made to advised prices since our last update.

That means they are now 25 points up for our trial overall at advised prices.

You can view full results here.

The rules of the service are to lay at the advised price (always between 3.0 and 6.0) and not to take a larger price. If a lay isn’t matched at the advised price, then it’s a no bet. 

There is no trading – it’s a “set and forget” approach. 

Whilst they do NOT advise following the service at Betfair SP, we have also tracked the results at BSP just out of interest. 

Laying all the selections at BSP would have given a profit of 21 points since our last update and a profit of 19 points for our trial overall thus far.

Laying only those selections with a BSP below 6 (Mel’s cut-off point for a selection), would have given a profit of 30 points so far.

 

 

 

 

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Second Class Racing – Results Update

12th February 2024

It’s been a tough time lately for horse racing laying service Second Class Racing, with a loss of 33 points made to advised prices since our last update.

That means they are now 10 points up for our trial overall at advised prices.

You can view full results here.

The rules of the service are to lay at the advised price (always between 3.0 and 6.0) and not to take a larger price. If a lay isn’t matched at the advised price, then it’s a no bet. 

There is no trading – it’s a “set and forget” approach. 

Whilst they do NOT advise following the service at Betfair SP, we have also tracked the results at BSP just out of interest. 

Laying all the selections at BSP would have given a loss of 36 points since our last update and a loss of 2 points for our trial overall thus far.

Laying only those selections with a BSP below 6 (Mel’s cut-off point for a selection), would have given a profit of 22 points so far.

Just a note to say I’ve seen a few comments in the group chat about the recent losses and whilst it’s fully understandable to be disappointed, it’s important to take a long-term view of the results. 

That’s why we always advise allowing for the full review to be completed before deciding whether to sign up to a service or not.

We tend to run reviews for at least six months these days – and often much longer – which allows us to get a really good look at a service and a big sample size of bets. 

Reviewing over these extended periods allows us to cut out the “noise” of short-term fluctuations and see whether a service has a clear edge over the market. 

So we have to give this one a little more time to play out before reaching a verdict. The recent losses have been tough to take but let’s see where they end up at by the end of the review.

 

 

 

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Second Class Racing – Results Update

9th January 2024

More strong progress lately for horse racing laying service Second Class Racing, with a profit of 16 points made to advised prices since our last update.

That means they are now 43 points up for our trial overall at advised prices.

You can view full results here.

The rules of the service are to lay at the advised price (always between 3.0 and 6.0) and not to take a larger price. If a lay isn’t matched at the advised price, then it’s a no bet. 

There is no trading – it’s a “set and forget” approach. 

Whilst they do NOT advise following the service at Betfair SP, we have also tracked the results at BSP just out of interest. 

Laying all the selections at BSP would have given a profit of 17 points since our last update and 34 points profit for our trial overall thus far.

Laying only those selections with a BSP below 6.0 (Mel’s cut-off point for a selection), would have given a profit of 37 points so far.

Whichever way you’d been following the selections then would have given a very healthy profit since our trial started. 

 

 

 

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Second Class Racing – Results Update

11th December 2023

It’s been a strong start to our trial of horse racing laying service Second Class Racing, with a profit of 27 points made to advised prices so far after six weeks. 

You can view full results here.

The rules of the service are to lay at the advised price (always between 3.0 and 6.0) and not to take a larger price. If a lay isn’t matched at the advised price, then it’s a no bet. 

There is no trading – it’s a “set and forget” approach. 

Whilst they do NOT advise following the service at Betfair SP, we have also tracked the results at BSP just out of interest. 

Laying all the selections at BSP would have given a profit of 17 points for our trial to date.

However, laying only those selections with a BSP below 6.0 (Mel’s cut-off point for a selection), would have given a profit of 29 points so far.

So will be interesting to see if that’s maintained during the rest of the review. 

 

 

 

 

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Second Class Racing – New Review

3rd November 2023

Today we are starting a new trial of a horse racing service called Second Class Racing. 

This comes from the same guy (Mel Gee) behind another service we are currently reviewing – First Class Racing. 

Whilst that service focuses on selective back bets in top class racing, Second Class Racing kind of does the opposite – it provides lay bets at a much higher volume (up to 12 bets per day) and in various classes of racing, not just top class racing. 

The results of the service so far have been very impressive:-

After 24 weeks the selections have:

• Made £1,421 to 10 stakes…
• Made an average of £59 per week…
• Made a Return On Investment (ROI) of 17.5%…
• And achieved a strike rate of 85% (691 bets won out of 811).

So pretty strong results there, although it is still early days.

To find the selections Mel looks at Betfair between around 11 and 12 in the morning UK time and then posts the lay bets on Telegram with a screenshot of the lays placed on Betfair. 

Not all of the selections will be matched and Mel’s advice is not to go chasing the prices – if a selection isn’t matched at the advised price, he says to just leave it. 

All prices are between 3.0 and 6.0 so there is no risk of one unsuccessful lay wiping out your whole bank at huge odds as is the case with some laying services.

It is a “set and forget” strategy so once you have entered the lay bet on Betfair that is it – there is nothing further to do like trading or monitoring the market, your work for the day is done. 

So a very novel approach here and it will be interesting to see how this one fares under a live trial. It would be good to have a profitable laying service as they have been few and far between over the years.  

We will kick things off today then and will report back here soon on how it’s all going.

In the meantime you can check out Second Class Racing for yourself here.