Golf Review 2023
I am pleased to share my 2023 Golf Review in the knowledge our profit currently sits at a respectable 18% ROI from over 1500 bets
I say respectable because it is only the second time in six years that it has fallen below 20%.
Firstly, let’s look at the turbulent peaks and troughs we endured in 2023, they are the most violent ones since we began. The first two months we grinded along at a small loss then by the end of March we had finally found some big-priced winners and then from March until September Golf ran at 40% profit as below.
Since September we have hit a poor run of form which has seen a loss of 20% as below
To add further context, in review and investigate further, it was found that I ended 2022 in similar fashion as below
That is the most illuminating aspect of any reviews I have ever done previously and when I went back further, 2021 showed the same trend.
Experience dictated my approach
I have been betting golf for a second income for nearly 30 years and my mindset starting a tipping service was that historically, my best betting months were always the starting 3 months and the final 4 months of the year. My first two years as a service followed that path and was phenomenal and I am sure long-term followers remember Brendan Todd going back-to-back in the fall of 2019 at 100s+.
In fact, I used to believe the major season (April-August) was my least profitable. Well, that must change going forward.
Initial Plans for 2024
My plans for 2024 are slightly different and we will increase stakes slightly from March through August. Instead of reducing stakes in the other periods we will reduce volume which will have an effect. Further investigation found that with exception of Rama the place model struggled to find the bigger priced winners outside of those peak months.
As you can see, we bet 55 points each year after September, and I intend to bring that down to approx. 40 next year.
There are other reasons pulling against profit in 2023 and possibly the main one is the lower average price of outright winners.
My style has always been to optimize the biggest price ranges for profit. Since time began in golf betting there is more than one way of making profit if you follow all the regular tropes. Jeremy Chapman who was the doyen with Keith Elliott nowadays takes the easy view of playing the top of the market. That style will likely have yielded his best recent year in 2023.
We must acknowledge that there have been more winners from the head of the market since Covid-19 in 2020 and that tilted further to the head of the market in 2023.
2023 PGA Tour – 45 events
7 winners – 100/1+
9 winners – 50/1 to 99/1
12 winners – sub 19/1 downwards
17 winners – between 20/1 and 49/1
Effectively 30% of PGA events have been won by players of 50/1+ and that reduces further at 100/1 to 15%.
To add context in 2019 there was 17 winners of above 100/1 let alone 50/1.
2023 European Tour – 37 events
11 winners – 100/1+
8 winners – 50/1 to 99/1 (Hisatsune and Hiller settled at 90/1 but both were 100s in places)
5 winners – 19/1 and below
13 winners – between 20/1 and 49/1
The European Tour was our best and the number of winners of 50/1+ accounted for just over 50% of events in comparison to 30% on the PGA Tour. This is more in keeping with my style of betting.
Further plans for 2024
We will continue to attack the European Tour more with the big-priced winners more apparent there. That will be reflected in our staking plans a little bit more.
As always with betting, it is a constantly moving landscape and doing reviews has always been as good for me as subscribers. The golf one has unearthed some nice edges to be aware of and use in 2024 but as always, we need to be sensitive to change.
