What is a Yankee in Betting

Most of the best sports betting sites offer you the chance to place Yankee bets, but what is a Yankee?

The name came from an American bettor who placed this specific kind of (very lucrative) bet whilst in England. He won his bet and it was known as the Yankee from then on.

We’re going to find out all about what bets are in a Yankee, as well as go over a Yankee bet example, and even what a Super Yankee is. Ready? Let’s get to it!

The first thing to understand is how many bets are in a Yankee. There are 11 in total, six doubles, four trebles, and a fourfold bet. 

In order to get any return from your Yankee bet, you’ll need to win at least four parts of it.

So now that you know how many bets are in a Yankee, you just need to know how it’s all worked out. You only need to pick four individual bets, that are then combined eleven times in the following way:

• Doubles: Six of the eleven bets are doubles. They’re made up of every possible combination of the four choices - AB, AC, AD, BC, BD, CD. 
• Trebles: Four of the eleven bets are trebles. You need to select the three of the four possible trebles that you think are most likely to win. Your options are - ABC, ABD, ACD or BCD. 
• Accumulator: The final bet is the accumulator, in which all four selections must win. The only option here is ABCD. 

Sometimes it's easiest to understand what is a Yankee by seeing an example worked out for you.

We’re going to use horse racing as an example, as that’s where you’ll most commonly see people betting Yankee.

Selections

Let’s use the 2024 Randox Grand National Day as our example. Your selections are as follows:

• A: I Am Maximus (to win the Grand National)
• B: Found a Fifty (to win the Maghull Novices' Chase)
• C: Brighterdaysahead (to win the Mersey Novices' Hurdle)
• D: Strong Leader (to win the Liverpool Hurdle)

Doubles

You have to include every one of your selections in all of the doubles, so you have the following bets in your yankee:

1. I Am Maximus & Found a Fifty (AB)
2. I Am Maximus & Brighterdaysahead (AC)
3. I Am Maximus & Strong Leader (AD)
4. Found a Fifty & Brighterdaysahead (BC)
5. Found a Fifty & Strong Leader (BD)
6. Strong Leader & Brighterdaysahead (DC)

Trebles

You need to choose three out of the four possible doubles for your bet. You choose:

1. I Am Maximus, Found a Fifty, and Brighterdaysahead (ABC)
2. I Am Maximus, Found a Fifty, and Strong Leader (ABD)
3. I Am Maximus, Brighterdaysahead, and Strong Leader (ACD)

Accumulator

The final part of your bet is just a single accumulator, this includes all of your options in one bet:

1. I Am Maximus, Found a Fifty, Brighterdaysahead, and Strong Leader (ABCD)

Odds & Winnings

If you’d picked those horses then you’d have got very lucky on the day. Each of them won! To work out your winnings, you need to look at the odds of each of the horses first. The starting prices were:

• I Am Maximus: 7/1
• Found a Fifty: 11/8
• Brighterdaysahead: 6/5
• Strong Leader: 8/1

Convert to Decimal Odds

Let’s imagine you had a $2 stake on each bet, for a total of $22. To make it easier to calculate your winnings, lets convert these to decimal odds: (A) 8, (B) 2.38, (C) 2.2, and (D) 9.

The correct doubles bets would each make:

1. A & B is $2 x 8 x 2.38 = $38.08
2. A & C is $2 x 8 x 2.2 = $35.02
3. A & D is $2 x 8 x 9 = $144
4. B & C is $2 x 2.38 x 2.2 = $10.47
5. B & D is $2 x 2.38 x 9 = $42.48
6. C & D is $2 x 2.2 x 9 = $39.60

You got all of these doubles correct for a total of $309.65. Next you need to work out your trebles:

1. A & B & C is $2 x 8 x 2.38 x 2.2 = $83.78
2. A & B & D is $2 x 8 x 2.38 x 9 = $342.72
3. A & C & D is $2 x 8 x 2.2 x 9 = $316.80

You also got all of the trebles correct, this nets you a total of $743.30. The final stage is to work out the profits from your winning accumulator:

1. A & B & C & D is $2 x 8 x 2.38 x 2.2 x 9 = $753.98

Your Total Winnings

Because you won all of the legs of the yankee bet, you just add together all of the totals to find out your overall winnings.

$309.65 + $743.30 + $753.98 = $1806.93

So, from your $22 wager, you won $1806.93. It’s probably easier to see why Yankee betting is so popular now, there can be big returns from relatively small wagers.

Photo by Emilio Garcia via Unsplash

There are no hard and fast rules to which sports you can place Yankee bets on, but you tend to find that the following three are the most common.

• Horse Racing - in this sport you can place each way bets in your Yankee to cover yourself if a horse doesn’t win, but does place. This doubles your stake.
• Greyhound Racing - you can make the same choice in this sport too, covering more bases for double your stake.
• Football - most bettors usually bet on the winning team, but you can increasingly find exotic football bets that you can use as part of Yankees.