Favorites win only thirty-two or thirty-three races in a hundred, on an average. But still the distribution of money means something. It is the concrete opinion of the horse world on the chances of the several horses the com bined opinion of selectors, informed and uninformed pub lic, individual betting stables and individual heavy bettors. Nevertheless a player who follows the money instead of betting against it when his independent analysis of the chances permits is constantly losing to the take its ex aggerated share of the wagers on well-backed horses. A player who normally bets favorites puts himself in” the position of a man who matches quarters and agrees to ac cept 15c or 20c whenever he does match, and will pay over the full quarter when he fails. Well-backed horses are simply well-backed horses; a heavy proportion of all the money bet is on them. Selectors have chosen them to win; the public has followed the selectors, and the prices of such favored animals are odds-on, even money or a little more. To judge merely from the odds, the race is over before it is run. But favorites do not win 40% of their starts, only 32 or 33. Even odds-on favorites usually manage to lose at least half the time. In New York, for instance, in a recent year, 169 odds-on favorites went to post and only 82 managed to win. If a handicapper can get as many as 40% winners he must secure an average mutuel on them of $6 (which is 2/1) if he is to make the reasonable percentage profit of twenty on all amounts bet. A chronic backer of favorites, with an occasional short-priced second or third choice mixed in, probably will not get 40% winners (unless he is a first-class handicapper and picks his own horses without reliance on selectors). He cer tainly will not realize an average price on winners of 2/1. There is too much money with his on the type of horse specified. On top of that, his small natural winnings of what the lightly backed horses have lost will be cut down by the exaggerated mutuel take that develops from the legal rate on animals carrying a great deal of the money.