An email came in yesterday from John Harrison of Streetwise trying to tempt me into buying a “brand new system” called “Lay Bet Genius“.

There is obviously some kind of affiliate arrangement as the domain name ends with “sw”, indicating Streetwise’s involvement no doubt.

This tactic seemed familiar as it was used by several companies to promote the The Lazy Lay Quick Profits System by Bill Stratford back in late 2007.

At that time each different company (i.e. each different joint venture partner) was provided with a specific URL to use to promote the system.

For example, if the company was called “X Promotional Masterminds” then they would use a URL such as lazylayxpm.co.uk (not a valid website or company name, I’m just using it to show an example) – where the xpm was added for tracking purposes.

In any case, the Lazy Lay system was pretty expensive for what it was – £197 for a short PDF file outlining the simple system.

Sadly it didn’t work very well either. As you can see if you go to the link above, I tested it extensively and found it lacking in its basic premise – it didn’t make any money.

This Lay Bet Genius system is also surprisingly expensive at £297, which is another reason why I think it might be from the same people as the Lazy Lay system.

I’ve also discovered that both the Lazy Lay and the Lay Bet Genius domains have been registered by the same company, “ProMax Data”.

So by adding up all of the little clues, my guess is that the same people are behind both systems.

Of course, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the Lay Bet Genius system won’t work but there is the track record (pun intended)…

(Just as a side note, if you are thinking of buying this then please thoroughly read through the guarantee conditions. If I remember correctly there were some rumblings about problems with the money back guarantee when the Lazy Lay system went wrong).

My morning routine usually consists of a quick check through my bank account and then a trip over to the Racing Post website to see if there are any selections for the day.

Now until today this was an easy task – I would simply log onto the site, choose the course and then click “view all races on one page”.

The site would then give me all the runners for the day and the betting forecast for each race so I could scan through them all and quickly pick out any races that matched the criteria I am looking for.

Unfortunately they’ve thrown away that useful site and sometime over the last 24 hours have published a new “good looking” site which isn’t easy to navigate.

First of all, during the day I use my work’s proxy for connection to the internet. And I also use the Opera web browser. Together, these made navigating the RP website pretty much impossible.

The new site is much more resource intensive it seems – and my poor net connection and incompatible browser were causing timeouts.

No problems, I thought, I’ll switch to Internet Explorer and see if that helps.

No luck – the RP website informs me that I need to use IE7 to access their site. I guess they are happy to block a huge proportion of internet users who are still using IE6 and below.

So, I can’t get the site to work all morning and miss three races.

Disappointing.

Now you may be saying – “quit complaining Ben, the site’s free to use”

Fair enough, I shouldn’t expect bells and whistles for nothing but I do contribute in my own way.

For example, if I am signing up for a new bookmaker, I will try and go through the Racing Post’s links so they get some commission. It’s the least I can do to say thanks for such a great source of racing info.

However, I feel I’m going to get tire very quickly of seeing the following ‘loading’ image each day:

Edit: Perhaps I was a little premature with my criticism. I’ve just logged on and I see that my “view all races on one page” selection is available again:

Fancy a free flutter? Sign up for Betfair and use the code CVEHKGCGF when filling out the registration form under ‘Refer and Earn’ and you’ll receive a free £20 bet.

(NB: Terms and Conditions apply, please see http://www.Betfair.com for details)

A popular topic for discussion last year was the Lazy Lay System from “Bill Stratford”.

I’ve yet to be convinced that Stratford exists but that’s not really important.

What is important is: does the Lazy Lay System work?

From November 2007 to June 2008 I tested the system and found that, despite some very annoying drawdowns, the system did turn a profit over 233 days.

In fact, I managed to turn £200 into £206.03 after laying the favourites in 151 races – a profit of 3.02%.

Not very exciting and certainly not worth the time or effort.

However, I haven’t given up and the new season has started again from the 1st of September so I am now publishing my results as I did last year.

Please see the following webpage for the latest on my progress with this system:

The Lazy Lay System – Results for 2008-2009

Last year this blog attracted a number of comments about the system and so please do feel free to post your thoughts and experience of the Lazy Lay System below. I have now closed the comments on the previous blog post.

Back on the 8th of November 2007 I set out to test the Lazy Lay system – a horse racing laying system which claimed to allow anyone to make a fortune, tax free.

On Saturday I placed the last bet of the season and will now have to wait until September for the start of the new season.

As it happens, the system did return a profit for me over 151 races.

The strike rate, however, was not as good as it should’ve been. 97 profitable races out of 151 gives a 64.2% winning rate. I believe that it should have been around 70%.

Disappointing as the strike rate may be, the fact remains that I am in profit to the tune of £6.03 on an initial bank of £200.

So, over 8 months I managed to get a tax free return of 3.02%.

You can see my full results, including running commentary here:

The Lazy Lay Quick Profits System by Bill Stratford

I’m looking forward to the 1st September to get going again so watch this space!

I’ve been testing the Lazy Lay system now for a few weeks and have seen some strange behaviour on the Betfair betting exchange. Horses that are odds-on favourite on the Racing Post’s website at, say, 2/1 (3.0) are then quoted to lay at huge prices.

Today I am trying to lay one particular horse which is favourite in the betting forecast at 2/1 (3.0) but on Betfair, just 30 minutes before the race, the best price I can get is 12.5!

That’s between 11/1 and 12/1 – way out of line from what I saw on the RP’s site.

Oh well, if the price doesn’t change sharpish then that particular race is ignored but I do find it strange that Betfair is so far out.

Or is it the Racing Post that is wrong?

Or, most likely, has general opinion changed and created a new favourite?

Whilst on the subject of Betfair, if you do not already have an account and were thinking about joining, use the following code to get a free £20 bet. Simply enter it when filling out the registration form under ‘Refer and Earn’.

Betfair Free Bet Code is:

CVEHKGCGF

(NB: Terms and Conditions apply, please see Betfair.com for details)