Exacta Bets: Hit the Right Order & Cash

There’s a lot more to betting on horse racing than just trying to pick the winner of a race and hoping for the best.

The best online sports betting sites these days offer as many as 10-12 different markets on any given race. These include backing a horse each-way, to finish in the Top 3, for horse X to beat horse Y, betting without the favourite and reverse forecast betting.

Another option is to go for an exacta bet. But what’s an exacta bet, how do exacta bets work in terms of what you need to happen, what are the advantages of playing them and what are some tips to win on an exacta bet? 

What is an Exacta Bet? 

An Exacta bet is the same thing as a straight forecast bet. 

When placing an Exacta bet, you’re trying to predict which horse will finish first and which will finish second, in that particular order. 

This is in contrast to a reverse forecast bet where it doesn’t matter in which order the two horses finish in, as long as they finish first and second. 

How Exacta Bets Work?

The first step is to decide which two horses you want in your Exacta bet. Let’s say you want Italian Stallion and Spanish Siesta. 

The next step is to decide which horse you think will win and which one you think will finish second. The third is to decide on your stake. 

Exacta bets can either be placed at fixed odds bookies or in pools betting. The difference between the two is that with the former you know the odds of the two horses to win and therefore the odds of your exacta bet at the time you strike it. 

With pools betting there aren’t any odds because the system works differently and is dependent on the popularity of a selection, so you don’t know any odds or potential payouts at the time you place the bet, though the expected dividend gives you a good idea. 

The odds of the Exacta bet are dependent on the odds of the two horses you selected in it and the order in which you think they will finish. 

If you put the two favourites in your exacta bet, the odds would be far shorter than if you had two outsiders. And if you put the favourite to win and the second favourite to finish second, the odds on that would be shorter than if you had the second favourite to win and the favourite to come second.

After that, it’s very simple. Either your two horses finish first and second in the order you thought (winning bet), or they don’t (losing bet). 

Image Credit: Unsplash

Benefits of Exacta Bets

There are two main ones.  

The first one is that picking a winning exacta bet is much harder to do than just picking the straight winner or even a reverse forecast where the 1-2 finishing order doesn’t matter. So, assuming you’re not always backing the two favourites in it, the odds will generally be pretty high, meaning big payouts.

So, in this regard, placing exacta bets caters for all budgets. The big-hitters can have their big bets as usual, while those who want to bet much smaller amounts can do so in the knowledge that even small stakes can lead to some decent payouts. 

The Exacta bet just discussed is the simplest and most common type of exacta bet and is also known as a straight exacta bet. But there are two more to be aware of. 

• Exacta Box- This is just a case of covering both outcomes once you’ve picked your two horses. So, to use the example above, in an Exacta Box you’d have Italian Stallion finishing first with Spanish Siesta second and Spanish Siesta finishing first with Italian Stallion second, costing you twice the stake. 

• Exacta Wheel- If you’re relatively confident you know who the winner might be but are less confident about the runner-up, then an Exacta Wheel might be for you. 

Here you’d decide that Spanish Siesta is going to be the winner and then in addition to having Italian Stallion as the runner-up, you’d also have other horses as runner-up, always with Spanish Siesta winning. Each combination will obviously be a new bet and therefore need a new stake.