Hedging involves getting in a position were the Lay odds of the selection are lower than the Back odds. If we find this position we can make a guaranteed profit on the event. One thing to be aware of is you are using an In Running markets for this style of betting and it could be a little volatile so just tread a little cautiously to start with. The technique is well worth mastering as it will generate nice profits for you. As with all the techniques we recommend you testing the setups in the Learning Mode before risking any of your betting bank. When you feel comfortable with the settings and how they work then look to place small amounts into the market to just learn the basics that way any mistakes are made to minimum amounts. Remember it should be your no.1 priority to “PROTECT YOUR BETTING BANK” at all times.

So at this point lets speak a little regarding suitable races to Hedge, well the obvious starting point are competitive races that are not suitable to Dutch. Races were the data for the spread % is low and there are a lot of orange boxes highlighted this is the ideal races for Hedging. Another word of advice is unless you are fully familiar with the settings and method of Hedging it may pay to avoid sprint races at first. Now this is not an absolute set in stone rule if you feel comfortable then by all means go ahead, its just that with sprint races the market moves very quickly and the last furlong of the race the shape can change completely so unless you are confident it may be wise to just hang fire on using these races until you are more confident with the technique.

So lets start by explaining a very basic principle that most people don’t observe until they try Hedging. Select a horse or two in an In Running market and watch the odds on the selected horses as the horse is running well notice the odds will reflect this and shorten but also if the horse is not racing as well as you would like or is positioned badly the odds will drift. This is not an exact science and is merely other Betfair users interpretation of what is happening in the race. Even the eventual winner will drift and shorten in odds throughout the race. So with Hedging we are simply aiming to capture the movement of the odds as the In Running market develops.

So we can now start to look at a Hedge bet from the afternoons cards I look at the 2.20 Lingfield and look to Hedge Brontes Hope. This horses form was a prominent racing type, likes to be up at the front however it had to give 12lb in weight to a live danger in Comrade Cotton and coupled with the rise in its weight for winning last time out and todays apprentice rider I decide to Lay and then Back as I don't think the horse will have things his own way today up at the front, and the apprentice is not very experienced. As you can see I have a Maximum Liability of £50 entered and I am aiming for quite a low spread of 35% this will create a profit of £2.73 if entered at this point.

So Bet-IE now needs to be told what she needs to do, simply select your runner and start the market refreshing, then select the Hedge function. Open the Stoploss table by clicking the button in the function area, choose a direction that you think the odds will move in this case I am Laying and will then Back. Bet-IE indicates that I will place a Lay bet for £12.50 at odds of 5, and then she will automatically enter a Back bet at £9.77 at odds of 6.4. The stoploss table now reflects your live market position once the opening side of the trade is fixed into place on the table.

So in the above image you can see the stoploss variables and the Lay odds are fixed in place if I don;t think that the odds are going to drift out to 6.6 I can jump in and click the Stoploss odds to bail out at that position. Or I can leave the two sides of the Hedge in place and if my form assessment is correct I can make a profit.

Here we can see that Bet-IE enters the two sides of the bet automatically for us, if I want to cancel the Back bet and use the stoploss I just place a tick in the box next to the horses name and click Modify / Submit the unmatched bet is cancelled and then i can place a stoploss by clicking on the Back odds column, should I need to.

As we can see I never had much to worry about the young jockey missed the break slightly and was always struggling to get in a good position.

Hedging is a very clever method of using the In Play markets, however as you may appreciate the In Play markets can be extremly volatile always aim to protect your betting bank. If you feel uncomfortable about the horses positioning in the race use the stoploss to remove your position in the market. In this case above I would only lose money if the horse wins the race, and I would have reduced the potential loss from £50 to £14.34 if I fired a stoploss at 4.8.