Hi all,
I thought I would share my profits for Matched Betting Extra Place Horse Racing for Jan 21. January 2021 has turned into my best month of Matched Betting since I started way back in Summer 2018. This months profits are roughly £4,707. A life changing figure for many and a great figure seeing this is achievable on top of a full time job. Matched Betting is the only decent side hustle I have actually found, compared to doing hundreds of boring online surveys...yuck! (Unless you are a good business person / have 5 lodgers / lots of family money etc.) To see some of my other Matched Betting profits you visit my site: https://cashontheside.co.uk/
I will be investing some of my profits this month in ETF/Shares and putting into house improvements like a new drive way. In addition with Cheltenham horse festival coming up in March, I will be increasing my bank to cover liabilities.
The bulk of my profits came from Extra Place racing, large underlayed winners and BOG (best offer garuntee). Variance was certainly on my side this month and I must have had at least 10 large winners which won upwards of £1600 pounds per bet. As I underlay my bets I made more profit than If I had fully layed of the bets. About 5% of these profits came from low risk casino. After you have completed all welcome offers...in Matched Betting. Ep's become a gold mine...and I truly recommend them to anyone.
Some more of my bets this month illustrating underlayed bets and ep:
https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/02/winnings4.jpg
https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/02/winnings.jpg
https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/02/another-winner.jpg

Images of one of my bets illustrative of Best offer guarantee: https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/01/136707133_10159536662702922_8507610622687908137_o-1.jpg?w=544
For those who are starting out on their Match Betting journey in 2021 these sort of figures are achievable to you once you have experience….unfortunately this will not come overnight! I do put a lot of time into it..between 2-5 hours a day, 7 days a week sometimes. For the average person you could earn at least £500 a month.
To learn more about Match Betting please visit my article Boost Your Income with Matched Betting. Alternatively you can start an Odds Monkey free trial where they will teach you step by step and give you the calculators you need: odds monkey trial https://www.oddsmonkey.com/affiliates/affiliate.php?id=64754(affiliate) or www.oddsmonkey.com. (non affiliate)
To those with a little more experience who want to learn about Matched Betting Extra Places you can visit my guide here Extra Place Match Betting tips here or I have copied and pasted it all below.
For those with Matched Betting Experience - my guide and tips to Extra Places:
What is Extra Place Matched Betting?
Extra Places can be a very lucrative technique to learn. Extra Places are available for us to do pretty much every day, increasing the appeal. Extra Place Offers are available to all customers. This means that even if you get gubbed with a bookmaker, in most cases, you can still make money with them by Matched Betting on their Extra Place Offers.
Extra Places are considered an advanced reload offer, as they not risk-free. However once you have gained some experience on more basic horse racing offers, you can start to take advantage of the lucrative profits available. It may sound complicated but as soon as it ‘clicks’, it becomes simple. Essentially we are taking advantage of the bookies and exchanges paying out if the horse you have backed comes a certain ‘place’ in a race e.g. 4th.
Extra Places combined with additional offers such as BOG (Best Offer Guarantee) can mean additional profits. For example, you back a horse at odds of 15 and then the starting odds move up to 23. If that horse wins you win an extra x8 on your bet. You can see some real life scenarios I found of Extra Place combined with BOG below. Depending on the size of the underlay, profits below would range up to £3,000+

What is a ‘place’ in horse racing?

Quite simply a ‘place’ is the position the horse finishes a race in. For example if a horse wins a race it comes 1st, if a horse comes 2nd its 2nd. In some races with a large number of horses some bookies will pay out if a horse finishes the race in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th position. Horse Racing festivals such as Cheltenham or Ascot are particularly well known for this.

What is an ‘Extra Place’ in horse racing?

Now we’ve understood what a place is in horse racing you may have probably already guessed what an ‘extra place’ is going to be! An ‘extra place’ is where the bookies add one (or more) additional places to their standard place classification on a particular race. For example they may offer to ‘pay 7 places on a race’ instead of the standard 3 places. The ‘extra place’ in this instance cover 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th.
What are my Extra Place top tips?

Some of my biggest profits have come from big underlayed winners and BOG. I typically underlay most of my bets by about 20% sometimes more. If you are starting out I would underlay on the place only by about 10% to play it safe until you learn more.
Don’t bet on more places than a bookmaker is offering. E.g. If the bookmaker is offering 4 places don’t bet on more than that.
Whilst your learning, take horses on implied odds of at least 12 or more on a match of 80%+.
Look to keep qualifying losses down. E.g. for £100 profit, £5 ql.
Please note, the best odds are typically found between 10 minutes up and to race time. You have to be quick on your ‘toes’…learn to walk before you run etc. Start out on easy horse racing officers before doing extra places.
You will need a bank of at least £1000+ for your exchanges, ideally more. The more you have the more of the field you can cover. You can do EP with several hundred in your exchange but you won’t be able to make bigger profits.
Be consistent, don’t take risks, don’t chase your losses and learn from matched betting extra place forums.
Keep the Odds Monkey up throughout the day...and check for good matches.
Use Bookies Boosts to increase your odds and matches.
Do not give in to your fear of missing out on offers…Tomorrow is another day.
Have at least a dual monitoscreen setup. It is important to be able to see exchange, books and calcs.

How do I find Extra Places offers?
I use the the Odds Monkey Extra Place Matcher to find the best opportunities for profit. The Matcher is explained in the below video.
https://youtu.be/oOKAdiSJidg
I am also a regular visitor of the active Odds Monkey community forums. You can sign up for an Odds Monkey free trial today here today https://www.oddsmonkey.com/affiliates/affiliate.php?id=64754 www.oddsmonkey.com (non affiliate). Odds Monkey provide you with the all guides, calculators etc. I have been a member for over 2.4 years now.
Feel free to get in touch or ask below if any questions.

How to analyze virtual horse racing data and predict outcomes

Rock, Paper, Scissors: War Games

This is a rather long one and the last in this particular Universe for a while, enjoy!

Admiral Alexis was... Bored... When the usual suspects called for an emergency meeting he expected another war, some sort of political snafu or maybe a major discovery that would require his input.
Once he learned how little was at stake he stopped really listening, as far as he's was concerned it was just about someone cheating at video games...
****************************** The War Games had first been introduced as a way to create camaraderie between the races and to have hard data on the strategies and capabilities of the different races.
The Noradons had been the only ones who participated along side the Humans.
Targeting locks would count as hits for space combat, smoke would be artillery explosions, low level electric batons would be used to simulate blades and good old paint balls for live ammunition.
The result was an overwhelming win for the Humans, the Noradons' new Overseer, Talon, was far too direct in his approach, the only victories he achieve were when he had superior numbers and never in defense scenarios.
He didn't care for traps, small deployment of troops, scouts, listening to his officers on the ground or any type of subterfuge.
The second was a more balanced affair, the Noradons had now far more specialist units and Talon had learned from his mistakes.
It was also a lot more popular, it wasn't viewed as a barbaric display of power like the first one but as a more violent sporting event.
Thou the second game was better remembered for the arrival of the A/O during the closing of the games.
****************************** The ceremony was finished, everyone was picking up their things and preparing to leave.
Kin son of Krono, host of the ceremony at the Commonwealth's HQ had the classic bartender's look that screamed: you don't have to go home but you can't stay here...
That is until Lawless contacted him.
A massive ship, dreadnought class from the tonnage, had just entered the system, it would be here in mere minutes.
Seeing how The Pale Horse and the Queen's Fury, the only known dreadnoughts, were already there this was worrisome to say the least.
He urged everyone to remain, not that anyone was going to leave now, this was exactly what the War Games were ultimately about: being ready when the time came to fight.
By the time the unknown ship emerged, the Combined fleet, the Noradons swarm along side the dozen or so ships of the Imphlasms were ready for anything, the Va'sh had stayed home.
Historians still wonder to this day what would have happened had they been present.
The ship was an odd mix of science and gardening gone wrong, an icosahedron with a power signature better measured in stars covered in moss and vines.
Admiral Alexis: “Identify yourself and your intentions”
Unknown Ship: “We are us, we wish to learn all there is to know”
Admiral Alexis: Huh, doesn't sound too bad
Unknown Ship: “We wish to be the only sentient races alive!”
Alexis: Ah, this would be the other shoe dropping, “We can help you with that first part but do not think we will just allow ourselves to be killed without a fight”
The Unknown Ship powered what looked like weapons
The fleets above Commonwealth HQ were ready for combat and spread out in loose formations, combat was about to be joined.
Than came from Commonwealth's Law a message sent on all frequencies
3.14: “Very well and than what?”
Unknown Ship: “... We would be safe and no other sentient beings would add needless variables to the grand equation”
3.14: Grand equation? Have we finally run into civilized alien lifeforms!?, “I assume the grand equation is a single mathematical formula that explains and predicts all things in the Universe?”
Unknown Ship sounding happy and not monotone for the first time: “Yes!”
3.14: “So your plan is to remove all sentient beings to make it safe and easier to calculate”
Unknown Ship: “Yes, that would be optimal”
3.14: “And you would just exist like that until the heat death of the Universe?”
Unknown Ship: “The what?”
Admiral Alexis was growing impatient, the Krush ambassador and the Ship had been talking astrophysics for two hours now, the Unknown Ship powered down their weapons into the first few minutes of this discussion and it was looking like there would be no fighting after all.
Unknown Ship: “I see, so no matter what, eventually all things would end”
3.14: “It is inevitable”
Unknown Ship: “Perhaps, perhaps not, we will think on how to prevent this, it is a far more grievous threat than any alien species consuming us”
3.14: “Yes that would be a worthy endeavor to occupy a mind like... Wait, eat you!?”
The threat of conflict over, proper introductions took place, the Ship was composed of two species: the moss and vines was a single plant entity and the ship itself a massive AI, the first true and somehow naturally occurring AI the galaxy had ever known.
They had met by accident, the plant life form floated into the hull of the AI on a small meteor and grew there, the AI could easily predict how it behaved, it liked the little plant and they formed a bond.
In their travels they intercepted Commonwealth transmissions.
The Plant accessed the holo-net and saw that every sentient species ate plants in some capacity, the AI saw the chaos some species were capable off.
They decided to strike first but upon learning how all would one day end shifted focus to finding a may to prevent it.
They were giving a name: Alpha for being first of their kind and Omega for their shared goal to see that the end never happens, A/O for short.
They chose to stay in orbit around Commonwealth HQ, doing nothing of note.
Sometimes the AI would discuss theories with the scientifically inclined races on how to prevent heat death and the Plant would have philosophical debates on what constitutes life with the more spiritual races.
****************************** Alexis sighed
That was then, this is now
Alexis looked at Ambassador Paul trying and failing to convince the others of the gravity of the situation.
“This could prove a huge security risk, we must find out who is doing this!”
Alexis had had enough
“No offense but finding out who is messing with the War Game's holo settings isn't much of a threat”
Paul: “The most likely scenario is that someone is interfering with the Games in order to make a large profits from the bets taking place, we must find who is doing this”
3.14: “I'm pretty sure only Humans would do such a thing”
He looks at the Admiral
“No offence”
Admiral Alexis: “None taken, I mean, who else thinks it's Humans?”
Lady EliIi: “No doubt”
Warlord M'rm'n: “Of course!”
Ambassador Uv: “Makes sense”
Lawless, the AI of the Commonwealth Law sat at this meeting, she was the referee of the Games
“It's Humans, there's no question about that”
Paul: Et tu Lawless? “Anyway, I have put top men in charge of finding out the truth”
3.14: “Who?”
Paul: “Top. Men”
****************************** Lord Doros was having a bad day, the Combined ambassador had contacted Transit concerning supposed hacking of the War Games.
Normally this would be well beneath the 12 Blades but their “failure” with the Diszin incident had allowed the ambassador to call in a favor, so to speak.
Lord Doros: Pretty sure we got the job as punishment.
He thought back to the morning's meeting
Boss: “... And so we have to find who is messing with the Games and why”
Everyone looked confused, Lord Doros was fuming...
Scout K'r's lifted his paw
“Not that I mind but killing someone over rigging games feels like going overboard”
G00.106 nods
Boss sighed
“We are not to kill anyone,we simply report our finding to the officials and arrest the individuals if we can”
The specialists in the room said nothing, the shock was total, this mission was not only something they should never have to do but they would have to operate like common... Cops.
Lord Doros had had enough
“So what's next? Trade disputes? Traffic control!?”
Boss: “I understand how you feel but Transit gave us the mission and we must obey”
Lord Doros: That was 5 hours ago, now we are on the Commonwealth Law, looking for “leads”
Smith was a professional, he was given a task and would complete it, no matter how absurd.
He was meeting with Lord Doros, K'r's and G00.106 in the Commonwealth's Law cafeteria, there were dozen of groups of different races all over the place, while most individuals who participated in the Games did not travel to Commonwealth HQ, many coaches, reporters and VIPs did.
Which is why Commonwealth Law was used as a safe meeting for these individuals.
The media to try to snag any exclusives they could, the VIPs to follow the games along side fellow VIPs and the coaches for the timed honored tradition of getting in the referees face when they had a complaint.
Lord Doros was already sitting at the meeting table
“So anything?”
Smith sat at the opposite side of the table and G00.106 stayed standing her back to the two.
Smith: “No luck so far, I talked with a few coaches and the odd VIP but they let nothing slip”
Lord Doros nodded, he himself had not found anything and given the levels of security involved he doubted anyone would.
“G00.106?”
G00.106 shrugged
“Not a damn thing, I even tried asking a few males while wearing nothing but lingerie like some of the girls onboard suggested but all I got were screams and a fine for..”
She reads her datapad to get it right
“... Creepy indecent exposure”
Smith had a horrifying mental image and shuddered.
Lord Doros shuddered a second later
“Thanks for sharing specialist Smith”
Smith: “Sorry, the image just, wait a second wouldn't you have gotten the same from G00.106 anyway?”
Lord Doros shakes his head
“Noradons are now all psychically linked to the Overseer at some level, you can't read one without listening in on all of them so it comes out as static”
Smith: “Very well... So i guess we have no leads to follow”
G00.106 was slightly insulted by the conversation that had just taken place but decided to move on
“So anyway, I doubt it was Noradons, we don't really do the whole crime thing”
Lord Doros nodded
Smith: “Has anyone seen K'r's? It's not his style to be late”
Lord Doros opened his eyes wide and looked up
Smith and G00.106 followed his gaze.
K'r's was sitting above them on a lamp, his green coat and pants were torn in places, his beret was missing, chunks of fur looked to have been ripped off and he had a thousand yard stare that spoke of unimaginable horrors.
Smith: “What the Hell happened to you!”
K'r's grabbed a flask from inside his coat, unscrewed the lid and took a sip
“Ran into Captain Grace”
He than took a much, much larger drink, never making eye contact.
Smith bit his fist and looked away.
G00.106 separated her arms, jumped into the pole holding the lamp and grabbed the Va'sh, cradling him like a new born larva and looked at Lord Doros
“Permission to take specialist K'r's to the ship for medical care!”
Lord Doros nodded solemnly
“Granted”
Smith and Lord Doros watched her run to their shuttle
Smith looked concerned
“Poor bastard...”
Smith than shifted to looking as chipper as ever
“So anyway, I doubt the Noradons had anything to do with the hacking, I mean there's no such thing as Noradons' organized crime after all”
****************************** Late at night, in the middle of the workers district of the Commonwealth Capital, a G00 unit wearing a brown trench coat and a black hat was slowly making her way to a bar.
She approached carefully, looking into every shadow and jumping at every noise, she had what looked like an Xmas gift in her hand.
The box was small and by the looks of it had been wrapped by a child... Or a really drunk adult.
She eventually gathered her courage and knocked on the bar's door, two fast knocks followed by two slower ones.
The door opened a tiny fraction, the “gift” was quickly exchanged for a grey bag of unknown content.
The G00 unit left, practically running.
Inside the bar the bouncer, a soldier Noradon, wearing a tuxedo and sunglasses made his way to the back.
He walked calmly, the sentients drinking and smoking paid him no attention besides the occasional nod, which he politely returned.
He entered the VIP room, Big Vinny, the proprietor of the establishment: the Carlito's Way, was sitting on his leather couch.
He was wearing a white suit with a matching ascot, a gold chain and a massive silver ring on his dorsal right hand.
Big Vinny was an engineering drone, smaller than the average Noradon to more easily get to tight places and with three digits per arm instead of claws to use precision tools.
Not that Big Vinny was small, he was overweight which to a Noradon with a perfectly genetically built gastric system was no small feat.
The bouncer, Tony, handed him the gift, bowed and left the room.
Vinny waited for Tony to leave before opening the package, inside was a box of chocolates, sixteen total.
He smiled
Best way to get a message without risk of it getting intercepted? Code it using foodstuffs.
He put the chocolates in order, the shapes symbolized the events taking place in the following days, the filling who would win and the individual wrapping's color the optimal spread.
He committed the information to memory and ate the evidence.
Taste like... Profits!
******************************** The Games had being a huge success so far, the Humans were leading by a razor thin margin.
The sabotage event was a surprise steal by the Imphlasms following the sudden rain that made Va'sh guards miss their approach until it was too late.
They than lost the retrieve and salvage mission to the Human team who won on a technicality
The Human field engineer was quoted saying:
“The rules said we had to get the ship back faster than the other team, never said nothing about it not exploding or having it's crew making it out alive”
Which was true, thou the rules would certainly see changes for the next Games.
This year marked the first time the War Games would shift from live exercises to holo-space recreations.
As such many more species joined this time around, most were out of the running by this time however.
The Humans lead by a single event, the Noradons were in second place, the Va'sh in third and the Impshlasms in fourth.
Today was the last four scheduled events: base defense, VIP assassination, survival on a Deathworld and the three-legged race, no one was certain how that last one ended up there...
The Noradons had pulled an upset on the base defense by outsmarting the human attackers, they used the molted exoskeleton of their soldier caste to have their engineers hold the front gate while the soldiers burrowed beneath the entrance and slaughtered the attackers in the resulting pitfall trap.
The VIP assassination had been won by the Va'sh, the human guards had a hard time pulling the trigger when they attacked and the Noradons and Imphlasm simply weren't fast enough.
Thou the moment a Human sniper managed to get his laser sight on the Va'sh VIP, which resulted in his guards accidentally mauling him to death, was considered a Pyrrhic victory.
Smith had been watching the whole thing from his now usual cafeteria table, not much to do when he had already spoken to anyone who allow him to get close to them.
I hope the others had better luck...
Lord Doros approached him and sat down
“I have managed to find no leads”
Smith didn't look at him, to anyone else watching, the Aaen had just whispered to himself.
Is the kitten doing okay?
Lord Doros: “He'll be out of med-bay in a day or so”
Smith gave a barely perceptible nod
G00.106 arrived at the table, she looked in a hurry
“I have a lead! What do you know of the Carlito's Way?”
Lord Doros and Smith looked at each-other nonplus
Smith adventured an answer
“... I don't like the ending I guess?”
G00.106 looked at him like he was an idiot
“What? No I'm talking about a bar in the Commonwealth Capital, Solenia”
She explained how one of her sisters from her hive back home contacted her, to let her know if she wanted in on a gambling scheme she was part of.
“I've made 4 times my initial bet so far!”
Was what she had told her.
G00.106: “My guess is that they're somehow behind the hacking, like the rain that costed the Va'sh the sabotage mission or the Humans weapon misfire when the Va'sh attacked their VIP”
Smith: “I don't think the weapons mis... Anyway, should we contact Lawless and check this bar out?”
Lord Doros: “Yes, this seems like a solid lead”
****************************** Smith, Lord Doros, G00.106 and Lawless made their way to the Carlito's Way.
Lawless insisted on joining the team, citing how as the referee of the Games it was her duty to see those who would defile it brought to justice, thou Smith thought the AI was probably just looking to get away from the incessant complaining from the coaches...
They found the bar with no issues, it had all the proper permits and all taxes were payed.
Lord Doros: “G00.106, you take point”
G00.106 hesitated
“Shouldn't Smith do it?”
Smith: “Normally yes, but you have an actual “in” with the crowd we are trying to infiltrate, I will enter with you as a friend looking to make some money, than”
He points at Lord Doros and Lawless
“They come in later as a couple looking for an out of the way place to have a quiet drink”
Lord Doros: “Anything goes wrong, we back you up”
Smith trying to be reassuring
“See, nothing to be worried about”
G00.106: “Right. Got it!”
She than kicks the door open and while holding her shortened carbine yells
“Nobody move! We know you're conducting illegal operations, you're all under arrest!!!”
Smith and Lord Doros thought at the same time
If we survive I'm killing her myself
Lawless grins, produces a kukri from under he coat and stands in front of G00.106.
The people at the bar barely seem to notice and quickly return to their drinks and talks.
Smith and Lord Doros reluctantly drew their pulse pistols, enter the bar and stood by their colleague.
Smith: “When we get back, if we get back, we need to talk about your infiltration skills”
G00.106: “Why?”
Before smith or Lord Doros could answer, or shoot her, the door in the back opens.
Big Vinny, with Tony in tow, appear.
Smith: What the Hell, a Noradon... Don!?
He seems very calm and he speaks softly as if to an old friend's kid he's trying to explain a complicated notion to.
“What, if may ask, is the reason for this loud and quite frankly disrespectful scene in this, my humble establishment?”
G00.106: “We know what you're doing and you're going to prison, if we don't kill you right now that is!”
Vinny undisturbed
“I find such a thing rather difficult without any evidence and for any threat against my person”
Vinny snaps his fingers
Half the bar draws weapons and Tony gets in front of his boss, the infiltration team is now outnumbered five to one
Vinny: “You will find it a... Difficult task”
Smith was curious, if he was going to die today he just had to ask
“Okay, what's with the outfit?”
Vinny, positively beaming
“You like it? I modelled it after Tony Montanas's suit in Scarface”
Smith, now less curious and more confused
“The movie?”
Vinny: “Yes, we like your “mafia”, quite a novel idea”
Lawless: “Yeah well, organize crime is nothing new and even if you get rid of us more will come”
Vinny: “Crime? What crime?”
G00.106: “You rigged the War Games and make bets on them, my sisters called me and told me all about it!”
Vinny got in front of Tony, he was frowning
“Did she tell you we were actually fixing the events?”
G00.106 seemed a lot less confident all of a sudden
“Well not in so many words, no”
The rest of the team looked at her and than at each-other
Vinny: “We have a group of ex-military professionals analyze the strategies of the teams and a Krush run the odds, than we place bets on events where the margin of error matches the betting spread”
Smith: “So you aren't the ones hacking the Games?”
Vinny genuinely surprised
“The Games are getting hacked!? Well, we have nothing to do with that, we're just honest mafiosy”
Smith still concerned and very aware of the multitude of guns pointed in their direction.
“You do know they're the bad guys right?”
Vinny: “Of course but that's because they break the law”
G00.106: “Ha! Like you don't”
Smith came to a horrible realization
“Lawless could you run a quick background check on the people here for outstanding warrants”
Lawless closed her eyes for a second, smiled awkwardly and sheathed her kukri.
“No criminal records, not even a ticket and they have permits for those guns”
Lord Doros: “It seems we made a mistake”
Vinny: “Quite so but don't worry, this was exhilarating! Rocco Two Hands had been itching for a reason to draw his guns”
Vinny waved at Rocco, who was standing behind Smith
Smith looked back expecting a Noradon with only two arms but what he saw was a Noradon drone with all of his arms and a backpack with another set of four mechanical ones allowing him to hold eight guns total, all aimed at his head.
Smith: “Rocco TWO hands?”
Vinny: “It's short for Two Sets of Hands, alright fellows put the hardware away, you're scaring the tourists”
At this the entire bar sat down and no one even looked at the four who now awkwardly sheathed and holstered weapons before leaving.
Vinny as he waves them good bye
“Arividerchi!”
The four walked in silence for a while until Lawless spoke
“This never happened, agreed?”
No one said anything, there was no need.
On the way back to Commonwealth Law Lord Doros got a message on his datapad
“We have a new mission”
****************************** Lawless was spectating the survival event of the games in the cafeteria.
We didn't find the culprits, we didn't even find how they did it... Thou given how they could have done much worse than add random shit I guess we should consider ourselves lucky.
A/O had joined the other VIPs, they were curious about how things would turn out.
He approached in his holographic avatar, a small crystal cube with a single leaf inside it.
“Greetings Lawless, are you enjoying the Games?”
Lawless: “Yes, kinda”
A/O: “Is there something not to your liking? I could modify the templates further”
Lawless stopped looking at the screen and turned to the floating cube
“I'm sorry, modify the templates further?”
The cube floated up and down, trying to imitate a nod
“Yes, we found the games too easy to predict, so we added semi-random events to make sure the Games remained interesting”
Lawless, was at a loss for words an entity that wanted to boil down all the universe to a single equation had somehow hacked into the Games to “spice things up”
She mulled over a few words, a couple of ideas and just... Gave up, they hadn't hurt anyone and at least they showed an interest. She resumed watching the screen.
“Just out of curiosity, are there any modifications to the current event?”
A/O: “Yes, in the next 12 seconds the tectonic plates where the teams are situated will begin to move”
Lawless: “An earthquake?”
A/O: “Correct”
Lawless: “... During the cooking portion of the event?”
A/O: “Is that a problem?”
Screaming and some really ingenious curses can be heard from the screen as holo projections of the teams catch fire, fall face first into their food or right into their makeshift cauldrons.
Lawless shrugs
“I guess not”
****************************** Captain Grace was on a mission, she was stalking a beautiful Va'sh, a white angora kitten wearing a butlers' outfit!
She applied some more scent blockers, checked her ceramic second skin under armor, activated noise cancellers on her boots and a camo-suit to become virtually undetectable.
The kitten took a turn into a cargo hold, she followed slowly and when she felt the Va'sh couldn't possibly dodge her, she jumped!
The hologram disappeared and the door locked behind her.
Before she could look behind, someone had put a bracelet on her right hand and in the time it took her to look at it an identical one was put on her left hand.
Grace: “What is the meaning of this!”
Smith and Lord Doros simply pointed up, to a viewing window
Grace looked up and paled, Admiral Alexis, Warlord M'r'm, Alisia Black, Lady EliIi, 3.14, Ambassador Paul and the Uv Ambassador were looking down at her.
Alexis: “Grace you have gone too far, consider this an intervention”
He pushed a button and the holographic butler kitten re-appeared.
Alexis: “This is a hard light construct of a real Va'sh, you have only one thing to do, pet the kitty”
Grace was scared but she acquiesced, not that she had a lot of choice...
All those watching winced
Lord Doros and Smith made it in time to catch the “petting”
Lord Doros: I heard the Human expression “there is more than one way to skin a cat”, I guess one of them is to let Captain Grace pet it...
After a couple of minutes Captain Grace stopped
“It's not the saMEEEEEE!”
An electric shock shot out from one bracelet to the other
Grace: “What the Hell was that!”
Admiral Alexis: “That was a mild shock, you will get hit by one every time you pet the Va'sh too hard”
Grace: “Mild shock!? Are you kidding me?”
Alexis, now looking quite angry
“No, this is no joke, now Pet. The. Kitty!”
A few hours and several thousand volts later
Captain Grace looked rough, her ponytail had come undone, actually quite a bit of her hair had curled and some of it was smoking.
She had a weird twitch on her left eye and as far as Admiral Alexis could tell she stopped blinking a while ago...
Alexis: “See, that wasn't so bad?”
Captain Grace in a monotone voice
“Yes, not so bad”
Warlord M'rm'n felt generous and removed his tricorne hat and offered his head to the Captain.
“Here”
Captain Grace hesitated but ultimately pet the Va'sh head, very gently
M'rm'n: “That was nice”
Captain Grace than began twitching uncontrollably and fell to the ground, hugging her knees
“pet the kitty, pet the kitty, pet the kitty...”
Everyone stared
Eventually Lady EliIi felt the need to say out loud what everyone was thinking
“We might have gone too far”
Warlord M'rm'n shrugged
“She got her hands on the Emperor nephew last week, the video of today's intervention should be enough for him to call the hit off”
Admiral Alexis looked at the Va'sh with a mixture of shock and anger
“You're kidding right?”
The Va'sh grinned and Admiral Alexis chose to assume it was a joke, Alisia Black knew better however...
Captain Grace spent a few days in the infirmary of her own ship and is now famous, rather than infamous, with Va'shs throughout known space!
The way she gives the softest pets and how she goes completely catatonic after has made her quite popular...

HRP Trip Report: The Pyrenees on steroids

PROLOGUE(TLDR): I’m one of the many PCT 2020 NOGOs. My naivety and hubris made me embark on a beautiful but testing journey that took me 816km(507mi) from the sandy shores of the Atlantic Ocean through the heart of the Pyrenees crossing France, Spain and Andorra to finally arrive at the warm waters of the Mediterranean Sea. The hardest 23 days I’ve ever done didn’t so much test my body but shake my mind. After the report follows an extensive gear section including a cottage gear jacket which is the first of its kind. But first some facts and stats to put it all in perspective.
What: The Haute Route Pyrenees (Pocket Guide Versio n)
When: 1st - 24th of September 2020
Total Time: 22 days and 22 hours (includes one zero)
Distance: total: 816km(507mi) / daily average: 35,6km(22,2mi) / daily max: 45,78km(28,45mi)
Vertical Gain: total: 49336m(161864ft) / daily average: 2153m(7063ft) / daily max: 2880m(9449ft)
Route: Map with waypoints of the HRP
Photos: 77 Pictures
Gear: Spoiler: 10.75lbs including a mirrorless zoom lens camera setup
Instagram: I’m posting photos with additional info on how climate change is affecting the Pyrenees. Surprise…it's quite severe. Follow along to find out more.
Strava: My daily itinerary including some clutch camp spots
Conditions: Daily highs at the start were around 23°C(73,5°F). Daily lows towards the end were around 6°C(43°F). Coldest nights were around 2°C(35,5°F). Very mild overall. Mostly sunny. Some days completely foggy, especially at altitude. A few outliers that brought in heavy winds coupled with rain. It hailed for a few minutes once. Luckily missed all the snow which started falling a couple days after I passed certain sections at the end of my trip.
Additional information: The HRP is an unofficial route which crosses the Pyrenees and can be hiked either West- or Eastbound. The trailheads are Hendaye, France (Atlantic Ocean) and Banyuls, France (Mediterranean Sea). The HRP has some sections in common with the GR10, GR11 and GR12. There is a Cicerone guide available. I chose to follow the Pocket Guide rout e by Paul „Whiteburn“ Atkinson. His guide keeps higher and crosses more Cols (passes). For every difficult section and Col Paul usually has an alternate which is easier and passes through more valleys for additional resupplies that should be considered in bad weather. At this point I have to thank Paul, who put an incredible amount of time and knowledge into his guide and provides it to us completely free of charge. Thanks Paul! If you are ever in Hamburg I’ll buy you a beer. I chose to do the whole route without any alternates and stay high. On his website you can find GPX files for all sections and PDFs for both directions with detailed route descriptions and resupply options.
For navigation I only used GAIA Premium with all French and Spanish IGN maps downloaded. This would eventually bite me in the ass. But more on that in Chapter 3 of my report.
The trip report will not be structured by days but by sections between resupplies.
Feel free to skip any part. I know this trip report is way too long and I guess it’s more for me to remember. But maybe you’ll find my journey interesting enough or use it as a reference for your own future Pyrenees hike.
If you have any comments or questions, ask away.
TRIP REPORT
Chapter 0: Hamburg - Hendaye
Wait, doesn’t the HRP start in Hendaye? Yeah well, bear with me for a minute. The adventure started before I even arrived at the trailhead. I wanted to reduce my carbon footprint a bit and chose to take the train down to Hendaye from Hamburg, Germany. The whole journey should have taken 14,5 hours instead of 5 hours by plane and a quick bus ride. Well, the German and French train companies had other plans and decided it would take me 30,5 hours instead.
I had been waiting inside my train in Hamburg for 30 minutes before the conductor announced that the train had some defect and would not be taking me down to Paris. Good start… I quickly rebooked my journey to Paris but had to rebook my train from Paris to Hendaye directly in Paris.
F*ck it. Let’s give it a shot. Little did I know that the train down to Hendaye had already been cancelled by the French.
The next train thankfully took me to Paris. While trying to find the metro station some guy on his bike abruptly stopped and started talking to me in french and pointing at my back. Once it was clear that I was oblivious to what he was saying he thankfully switched to English. He asked me if I was an ultralight backpacker and showed me his X-Pac pack on his back that a friend of his had made. I was carrying an X-Pac pack I made as well. So we got to talking and I told him that I was going to be stranded in Paris for the night and didn’t have a place to stay yet. He generously offered for me to stay with him and his mom who he was visiting. We exchanged numbers and decided to meet up later as I had to rebook my ticket for the next morning.
The three of us spent a lovely evening having dinner and talking about all things life. Thanks Ulysse for approaching a stranger on the street. I appreciate your friendship very much and I hope we get to hike together soon! Hiking and ultralight has yet again proven how well it connects people.
The rest of the “approach“ went smoothly and I arrived the next day at 12:30pm in Hendaye.

Chapter 1: Hendaye - Lescun - Day 1-5
Before starting I obviously had to take a dip in the Atlantic Ocean. The water was lukewarm. Would the water be as pleasant on the Mediterranean Sea three weeks later? I wasn’t sure if I’d find out… After being quite excited for the trip something shifted two days prior to leaving Hamburg. A tight feeling in my chest settled in. I lost all excitement. I didn’t want to go anymore. This feeling would not go away for the first couple of days out on trail. I never had that problem before on any of my other multi-week trips…
My pack was way too heavy. Last year my kit was hovering around the 7lbs mark but after adding a few luxuries and finally settling on a proper camera it was more around 10lbs. Doesn’t make a big difference to me. But I really screwed myself on the food I took for the first few days. Unfortunately, I’m really lazy when it comes to planning my food for trips so I went no-cook. I went to the grocery store an hour before it closed the night before leaving for Hendaye. I just grabbed some stuff I thought I’d like not looking at the g/Kcal food lists I actually had from past trips. I grabbed two heavy-ass glass jars containing PB and Hummus. What was I thinking!?! Glass jars…
I thought the food I bought would last me 3 days… It lasted 6.
Okay, let’s start walking!
Starting at 2pm, I left Hendaye behind me pretty quickly. The vert didn’t wait to introduce itself. Right away you do some steep ascents on forest roads and then out of nowhere you are bushwhacking through some thick brush. The vegetation is very lush and green in the Basque Country. Water was scarce though and my 2 litre capacity was depleting rather quickly in the heat. The first time I managed to find water was around 7pm from a kettle pond. I threw in two of my Micropur tablets and continued the ascent up to Larrun. For the first time I was close to 1.000m(3.300ft) above sea level. After the descent south of Larrun I found a nice meadow. I imposed one restriction on myself for this hike. No night hiking like I usually ended up doing. I just didn’t want to miss anything.
The night was mild and clear. I decided to cowboy camp. A decision I regretted due to all the horses with bells around their necks grazing around me. Whenever I heard a bell come closer I’d jump up and look around me. I was scared shitless of being trampled to death. That would not be the only night I was accompanied by that fear but the last I cowboy camped…
The next two days were more of the same, occasionally passing through a little village of ancient stone-walled houses. I met a dutch hiker, Gun, who was carrying a ÜLA Catalyst. He was a bit skeptical regarding the ultralight approach. I shared my troubles getting into the hike and not being in the right mindset. He knew the feeling and said I should give it a couple more days and hopefully find my groove. I was skeptical but what was the alternative? The logistics of getting back home were more complicated than continuing on. But I think the main reason I went on at that stage was because I had shared my plans of hiking the HRP with so many friends and family… I couldn’t admit defeat, especially since I was in good shape, doing 40km(25mi)+ days right from the get-go.
Lost in conversation, we made some navigational errors but eventually arrived at a decent flat spot to pitch our mids (he was carrying a Duomid). I was happy for the company and I think the main reason I had trouble getting into the hike was the thought of being out there for three weeks… alone. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve done more hikes solo than with friends but at that point in time I wanted to share the beautiful, fun and hard times with somebody, and I knew the hike I had planned would have a minimum of that. That night was only one of two in which I camped with someone else…
The next morning Gun and I said our farewells and I grinded on. Yes, it was a grind these first couple of days.
I passed more bells than I cared to hear. I kept thinking this must be the soundtrack of the Basque Country. Ha, how wrong I was. It was the soundtrack of the Pyrenees! I’m not sure if I saw more shepherds or hikers during my trip.
Despite my mental state during the day I was a very happy camper when I decided on my camp spot for the night. Five stars! I sat there, watching the sunset, overlooking the peaks of the Basque Country… smiling. Is this what I needed to turn it all around?
I was actually kind of looking forward to Day 4. Lots of vert and climbing my first minor peak at 2000m(6560ft) above sea level. But Pic d’Orhy would not come easy. First I had to tackle a pretty steep climb and scramble up some ridges. I was exhausted and during a tough scramble looking down a cliff I encountered a german couple who were day hiking and had just come from Pic d’Orhy. It was quite funny how I just started blabbing on without pause as soon as I had people to talk to. They were lovely and after sharing my hiking plans they gave me all the food they had left. I appreciated the fresh apple the most. Thanks Kati and Michi!
Day 5 was the day everything finally came together and I started to feel the trail. After descending down to Refugio Belagua I had a quick Tortilla (the first thing I bought after starting in Hendaye).
The following section will always stay with me. The sun was breaking through the leaves of a magical forest that opened up to a pine tree splattered granite landscape. It was one of the most beautiful sights I got to experience up to this point in my life. My enormous grin just wouldn’t leave my face. No chance. Arriving on the top of Col d’Anaye and looking over my shoulder I knew I didn’t want to be anywhere else in that moment. Crazy how nature’s beauty can totally change your perspective.
On the descent to Lescun I used my 6th and final Micropur tablet of the trip. It seems my confidence went up in every department in these hike defining hours.
After a quick road walk I arrived in Lescun.

Chapter 2: Lescun - Gavernie - Day 5-9
Lescun is a cute little village with a small super market that has a pretty limited selection. I quickly stocked up for the next stretch to Gavernie and got in another one and a half hours of hiking. I was never really sure where I would camp the following night. My itinerary usually evolved during the day depending on the terrain and the miles I managed. I got to a Cabane (unstaffed shelter) which was being used by a shepherdess I scared to death when I looked inside. I apologized and asked her if she’d mind me camping on the meadow next to the Cabane. She didn’t and I was glad when another shepherd arrived a few minutes later to hopefully rid her of any fear that was left about some weirdo arriving unusually late to camp right next to her.
I left early in the morning and embarked on a day that was dominated by clouds and fog. I managed to get above the fog for ten minutes which opened up the view to mountain peaks piercing through a plush white blanket of clouds. It didn’t feel like something real at all.
At Ibon de Estanés I passed a fellow ultralighter with a simple hola. I think he was wearing a KS Liteskin pack. Still kicking myself for not introducing myself.
Down in Candanchu I had my first proper town food. A very average Pizza. I’m only mentioning Candanchu as it’s one of the many deserted ski resort villages which look extremely off-putting and depressing during the summer. Funny to think that these sterile artificial places only come to life a couple of months a year. And seeing how climate change doesn’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon, will surely suffer in the years to come and maybe turn into permanent ghost towns.
While eating I requested the weather forecast from my dad, a hobby meteorologist. Since he was tracking me online through my Spot he always provided me with very accurate predictions for the next few days. I was always in the know and trusted his expertise. Who needs an InReach if you have your own personal weatherman?
After some road walking I once more climbed into the familiar fog. Due to the lack of views I started to jog down the occasional descents. No point to linger. Trying to fall asleep I just thought to myself how many beautiful landscapes I probably missed due to the fog. But you win some you lose some.
I was completing one week on trail the following day.
I’ve been cruising up to this point and getting a bit cocky. I was already calculating that if I keep up my current pace I will probably finish in 18 days instead of my roughly projected 21 days.
Little did I know that the “real“ Pyrenees were just about to start.
And I was definitely not prepared for what the HRP had in store for me that day.
Heading up to Col d’Arrious I had one of a few conversations with a shepherd. They are quite interesting people and come from all walks of life. Arriving on top of the pass the wind hit me hard. I quickly put on my wind shirt and headed down to Refuge d’Arrémoulit where I had a serrano sandwich with an omelette. While I was enjoying the view of the neighbouring lake a Bonelli eagle passed 15m(50ft) over my head. A rare sight. Could life get much better? I’m not sure, but it could definitely get much worse...
After my break I started to gain elevation again and headed over Col du Palas only to be greeted by a huge boulder field. Keep in mind, there is no trail at all at this point. Occasionally there were a few Cairns scattered around which didn’t really help to define a clear path. After scrambling down for a bit I had to head up those boulders to Port du Lavedan. This is where I made my first major mistake of the trip. I was kind of eyeballing the direction and not really checking GAIA. Well, due to my navigational error I missed the pass by a good 10m(33ft) and climbed up a small ridge I thought was the pass. Once on top I looked over to the other side I had to descend.
“WHAT THE F*CK!?! What the hell is this Whiteburn guy thinking to send people over this crap without advising them to bring some climbing equipment. No, don’t blame him, what where YOU thinking following some made up route from a guy on the internet. JESUS CHRIST. This is f * cked!“
I looked back - yeah no chance I was going back down the way I came. Not much better than what lay before me. Whiteburn mentioned that this section had three major Cols increasing in technical difficulty. This wasn’t one of the three but I thought it was the first and the thought scared me shitless. How was I going to survive the other two IF I made it down this one alive!?! Adrenaline rushed through my body. Focused like I’ve never been before I slowly moved my hands towards some slightly protruding rock to find any grip. Then looking for a decent foot hold. It took me a good five minutes of intense sweat to go down the worst part. I wasn’t going to do something like that again anytime soon, I thought to myself.
Well, I totally would. Kids, triple check your navigation before deciding to climb some stupidly steep ridge.
Not long after the worst part I saw the pass I was supposed to take a couple meters to my right. I was alleviated and angry for making a mistake that could have ended quite badly.
Those five minutes had depleted my energy to zero. I was shaking. That day I had my second shortest hiking day of the whole trip.
After a good nights sleep I was ready to tackle the three technical Cols of that section: Col de Cambales, Col d’Arratille and Hourquette d’Oussoue.
The experience from the day prior boosted my confidence substantially which made those cols a breeze to do and made me enjoy the wide mountain landscapes a lot more. I took my usual hour brake in the early afternoon and washed my shirt and socks. After the last col I tried to get as close to Gavernie, my next resupply. I ended up staying in my first Cabane of the trip which was just a simple rectangle stone hut. Nothing inside. I wanted to get up as early as possible and break down camp quickly so I could arrive early in Gavernie and not lose too much time in town. I managed to arrive around 10am the next day.

Chapter 3: Gavernie - Bernasque - Day 9-12
Gavernie is a little mountain town that is the hub for a lot of hiking loops in the area. It has a small outdoor shop you could definitely get a pack or shoes if you have trouble with your equipment.
I headed straight to a restaurant. I needed to charge my power bank to 100% and that would probably take 3 hours. With a quick 30min charge during my pizza break in Candanchu it had survived 8 days without charging.
I got to talking with two hikers that were sitting at the table next to me. They had started the Cicerone version of the HRP 33 days prior from the Mediterranean Sea. From what I could gather the Cicerone version is more in line with the alternates Whiteburn suggests for the Pocket Guide version.
After writing some post cards and stocking up on food at the small super market I had a big steak with fries and a fried egg.
I left Gavernie at 2pm with renewed energy. After the steep descent down Hourquette d’Alans the valley is accompanied by a nice stream that leads into the Lac de Gloriettes dam. Many of the turquoise lakes in the Pyrenees are actually reservoirs or hydroelectric power generators. It takes a bit away from the magic sometimes.
Right around Gloriettes a drizzle started to build. The fog from the days prior was back. And you know when you miss that moment when you should have put on your rain jacket but instead hope that it stops to rain? Yeah, that was me.
Completely soaked I looked at my map to make out potential campsites for the night. I made out a Cabane I should reach right around sunset.
Too bad it was being renovated and bolted shut. Luckily I saw Cabane des Aires a half hour up ahead on my route. I picked up the pace and moved on. I would regret my decision on many levels in the hours to come. I should’ve just set up my tent…
I was hiking a bit above 2000m(6550ft) and the fog was getting thicker to the point that I could only see what was 5m(17ft) around me. Combine that with mostly grassy trails and you have a navigational nightmare on your hands. I was looking at GAIA non-stop and still getting off-course. It was getting pretty cold. I managed to arrive just in time before it got dark.
Exhausted I put on my headlamp to check out the little stone hut. Something moved in my peripheral vision. I moved my head back to where I thought I saw something.
“OH COME ON! REALLY!?“
A freaking mouse. I really didn’t want to deal with these little pests right now. I shooed the thing outside. As the huts’ steel door wouldn’t close I built a barrier out of wood pallets and a nose from a snowboard (how the hell did that get there?). The sleeping area was in the back of the room and thankfully half a meter elevated from the floor. I set up for the night, put my food right next to me and left the rest of my gear on the table. After climbing into my quilt I scanned the hut for unwanted critters again. F*CK! The mouse had brought a friend along… I conceded right then and there. There was no way I was keeping them outside and the night was about to get worse.
When I went to charge my phone nothing happened. I unplugged and plugged my phone back into the power bank a couple of times. Nothing. I was using a micro USB cable with a Lightning adapter. After testing the cable on my headlamp the culprit was obvious. I never trusted 3rd party accessories for the iPhone before. Why did I take this little piece of shit anyway?
My phone was at 7% battery and I had no way to charge it. How was I going to navigate out of this thick fog? I only had one choice: wake up early and head back down the mountain to an Auberge 6km(3,7mi) away and hope that someone was willing to sell me their cable. For that to happen I needed a phone for navigation or clear skies. I knew the general direction but there were so many turns and lakes separating me from my destination that I would likely get lost pretty quickly, especially without any visual orientation. I guess physical maps weren’t such a bad idea right now.
The night was obviously terrible. I was on edge hoping for my phone to survive until the next morning and the two mice were having a serious domestic fight all night long. I kept following them around the hut with my headlamp. I spent most of my headlamp battery during the trip looking for mice. Thankfully they stayed away from my food.
After barely sleeping I woke up the next morning to unchanged weather conditions. F*ck. Too afraid to check my battery during the night I unlocked my phone. 4%. Yes! I can make that work. I just need 40 minutes to get to the road that will take me to the Auberge. I packed up as quickly as I could and headed out praying for no further navigational f *ck ups on my end and more importantly a kind soul willing to part with their charging cable.
I lost the trail a couple of times but eventually managed to get to the road with 1% left.
Arriving at the parking lot of the Auberge I saw a young couple getting ready to head out for a day hike. I told them of my dilemma and hiking plans. I probably looked quite pathetic. But thankfully they had a spare cable. They weren’t willing to take my money though. Damn was I relieved. I hiked up the way I came and I started blabbing the same way I always did on this trip as soon as I had company.
This iPhone adapter debacle could have cost me a day or two. It scared me enough that I will probably always take separate brand name cables for the rest of my life.
Even though the new cable had given me some much needed mental energy the next climb up Col de la Sede took the energy right out of my legs. This was probably the most exhausting climb of the whole trip for me. No trail, just 60-70% degree slopes of grass for 400m of elevation gain.
Looking back, this was probably the hardest day physically for me. On top of the pass I had to cross some steep scree that made me slide down with every step and sharp rock just waiting to cut up my ankles. After that it got a bit less technical for a few kilometers, but the ascents didn’t stop.
At Lacs de Barroude I had a decision to make. Take the alternate down to Parzán for some easy hiking on the GR11 or head east another 10km (6.2mi) with 900m(3000ft)/-1050m(-3450ft) of vert for some technical ridge walking. I was completely depleted and it was already 4pm. At the same time I wanted to complete the prettiest and hardest route possible. Three snickers later I started climbing up the ridge anyway. Sometimes I’m just too stubborn for my own good. For the first time that day I wasn’t walking in complete fog. The clouds still gave me pause. I didn’t want to be caught in a lightning storm as there was no easy or quick way off the ridge. Half way through I started hearing thunder. I couldn’t place it though and didn’t see any lightning. I picked up my pace as much as you can while scrambling up and down a ridge I guess. For the night I was betting on a green spot on my map that looked rather flat looking at the elevation lines. I just had to get there. The ridge walking got more technical as I progressed, but the clouds stayed tame. I moved north off the ridge and got to my planned camping spot.
My bet had paid off. Five stars! My favourite camp spot of the trail overlooking the heart of the Pyrenees. It was the first and only night that was completely silent as well. No bells, no mice, no nothing. I slept like a baby.
But not even good sleep could restore my energy after Day 10’s events and very steep and technical off-trail hiking. And Day 11 had more of that in store for me.
Climbing up Port d’Ourdissétou on one of the rare maintained trails of the day I noticed that I couldn’t keep this up for much longer. I needed a proper break. I decided to take a zero at my next resupply in Bernasque. That was still one and a half days away though. Luckily the second half of the day was a bit easier until a late climb up Port d’Aygues Tortes and the descent down to Cabane Prat Caseneuve. After my last, rather unpleasant, Cabane experience I actually wanted to avoid all further ones. But Prat Caseneuve was a very nice one with a second storey and proper mattresses. My fear of bedbugs made me sleep on the floor, to the great bewilderment of the Frenchman I was sharing the Cabane with. I was realizing that the Gavernie-Bernasque section was probably the hardest of the whole HRP.
The next morning we got up at 6am and I headed out at first light. Sleeping inside to get up early was the right choice as I had a very hard day ahead of me. I was going to tackle two of the highest and most technical cols of the HRP: Col des Gourgs Blancs and Col Inférieur de Litérole. Both just under 3000m(9850ft). I had heard horror stories about Litérole from other hikers on trail and in online forums. Especially descending the east side, which I was going to do. I didn’t buy it though. The crap I had already done to this point was hard to top, in my opinion.
It was a very pretty day and after passing another storage reservoir I headed up Col des Gourgs Blancs. Navigating through huge boulders, following scattered cairns and scrambling up scree had become second nature. I was cruising through one of the hardest hiking the Pyrenees has to offer. Heading down I could see Lac du Portillon, another reservoir. I took a 45 minute lunch break at Refúge du Portillon and talked with some locals about barefoot ultramarathon training and dream races. The sun was warming up my cheeks. On to Col Inférieur de Litérole!
The climb up was steep and I made one bad choice in circumventing the snowfields by climbing further up some steep scree. Every step I took I triggered a rock slip. I tried heading down as quickly as possible. That was not fun at all. I continued on the edge of the snowfield. The last climb up Litérole was easy enough. Looking down the other side though I understood what everyone had been talking about. Daaaamn that was steep. It didn’t manage to faze me anymore though. The HRP had made me quite confident. I found my way down with a quick glissade into a scree field. What followed was the longest boulder hopping adventure of my life. Pure fun. I headed down the Remuñe valley. That’s where I took my favorite picture of the whole trail. After a long descent I hit the road that would take me to Bernasque. I asked two Spaniards from Barcelona for a ride. With our masks on and disinfected hands we headed down into the valley.

Interlude: Zero in Bernasque - Day 13
Bernasque is a picturesque village in the heart of the Spanish Pyrenees. Its village centre consists of beautiful stone buildings and a wide selection of hotels and restaurants. Two outdoor shops which offer everything you’d desire makes Bernasque a fully featured mountain hub for tourists.
After saying goodbye to my ride I headed to a one star hotel. Mid September is the end of the summer season for most Pyrenees tourism. That was my hotels last day and so they organized another hotel a few minutes away for my second night. I had to buy groceries for the next stretch to Arinsal as my zero was going to be on a Sunday and I wanted to head out early on Monday.
I checked the news for the first time on my trip. Crazy how things can change in such a short time. When I went down to Hendaye the Covid numbers had been consistently low for a few months now. But France and Spain’s numbers were exploding again. Over 10k new infections a day in France alone. I found the French and Spanish much more responsible than the Germans though. Everyone was wearing a mask in public. In Germany people were demonstrating in masses against the Covid measures of the government. Without masks and social distancing…
I had a big dinner and went to sleep. I was looking forward to my zero. No hiking would surely do me good. A day before arriving in Bernasque I started having a bit of pain in my right outer knee as I was going down technical terrain for a prolonged period of time. It was knee pain I hadn’t experienced before, so I had trouble placing the cause. I used the day to stretch myself a bit more and applying KT tape. During the first half of my trip I consistently rolled out my feet and did the Viranasa pose which I think was a big factor for staying mostly pain free.
Besides my knee flaring up I had to take care of my trail runners (Topo Ultraventure). After 200km(125mi) I first looked at my sole and saw that the Vibram lug on the right heel had unglued half way. Now, after 400km(350mi), the lug was only hanging by a rubber thread and the left heel lug was half way unglued as well. At a souvenir shop I found shoe glue and glued the two lugs back onto the sole. The tread in general was already very smooth and two holes were opening up where my big toes meet the balls of my feet. In hindsight I should have just chosen a new pair of trail runners from the huge selection on offer at the two outdoor stores.
The rest of the day consisted of eating, laying in the sun, eating, sleeping, eating, you get the idea…
The last bus of the season headed up the mountain that Sunday. As I wanted to leave at 6:30am the next morning and didn’t want to wait around for a hitch I had to book a 25€ shuttle back to trail.
Chapter 4: Bernasque - Arinsal - Day 14-17
The next morning I arrived back on trail a bit before 7am. Civil sunrise had not arrived yet. I guessed I would have to do a few minutes of night hiking after all. 6km(3.7mi) in, I arrived at the half way point of the HRP.
The day went by smoothly heading over one of the highest cols of the route, Col de Mulleres. The rest of the day had a lot of vert and turquoise lakes in store. Around 4pm though I started to feel my right knee again. The light pain soon turned into severe one. F*CK… I was happy to be hiking again, grooving through the trail, enjoying the views and now this?!
I wasn’t surprised though. Of course there was some issue to rise up when I was doing anything between 4000-6000m(13123-19685ft) of accumulated vert every day.
The pain didn’t subside. Maybe I had applied the KT tape with too much stretch? I removed it. It got minimally better. Could just as well been placebo.
I went up my last climb of the day, very nervous that my knee would end my hike. Half way up I met a German hiker named Andreas. A fit and experienced hiker. He had started the HRP (Cicerone Version) but after a few days switched to the GR11 as he started to feel uncomfortable with the terrain and passes that he had to hike through. I understood him completely. We exchanged a bit of food and camped together. That was the second and last time I would camp with another person. Before sleep I devoted a bit more time than usual to stretching.
The pain was gone in the morning. But all the little niggles I had had on this trip had gone away after a good night’s sleep. I didn’t trust my pain free knee yet.
After half an hour the pain came back in full force.
Panic hit me full force. The pain and my fear of not being able to go on consumed me. And I had no idea what the hell was wrong with my knee.
Going down into Salardu, I called my dad. I vented my frustrations and asked him to look up my symptoms for me as I wasn’t getting an internet connection. He started reading out a diagnosis of what seemed to be the cause of my pain. IT Band issues. I had only heard about it. Alright dad, how do I fix it? I can’t quit now. No way.
He tried to explain to me some google images and a youtube video he was watching. I guess I was being crewed over the phone. After cheering me up a bit I got my usual weather fix. Thanks dad!
In Salardu I sat down in the shade and started to brutally roll out my outer thigh with my trekking pole. I kept that up for five minutes. Afterwards I got up and carefully took some steps.
Magic! The pain had subsided significantly. Okay, let’s see how long this lasts.
I picked up my pace again and did 1000m(3280ft) of vert in a span of two hours over 10km(6,2mi). My knee was doing fine. Not good, but fine. I set up camp beside a lake just before sunset. Not a minute later it started to rain. The first drops hitting my tent in the Pyrenees. After 15 days.
With my new phone-taught skills I kept my knee pain in check so it wasn’t bothering me any longer. Occasionally I had to stop on a long downhill section and do some extra work with my trekking pole though. Day 16 I passed my biggest waterfall on the trail. Quite the sight.
I’m still annoyed with myself for passing on a camp spot that day which would have been in the Top 3. I took a gamble thinking the next lake would have an even better spot. It didn’t. Still beautiful though.
Checking GAIA before sleep, I knew I had to do some negative vert in the morning. Not something I ever look forward to. Especially not with my knee issues in the mix.
I only had one objective for Day 17. Get to Arinsal in time to resupply and call my grandmother in brazil for her birthday.
The day was marked by a lot of vert and constantly thinking about food. Hiker hunger had set in after a week on trail and daydreaming about grocery shopping had become my main pastime.
Around 5pm and some decent views later I got to Arinsal in Andorra.

continued in comments

GTA Online Casino Inside Track Horse Racing glitch SOLO works for PC (maybe XBOX AND PS4 as well?)

Electioneering 2016 & 2020: No one is ready for 10 million white voters

Figures

Table 1 - Raw Votes & Voters 1980 - 2016
Table 2 - Exit Poll Percentages 1980 - 2016
Table 3 - Calculated Exit Poll Results in votes 1980 - 2016
Figure 1-A - Votes by Margin in Popular Vote 2012
Figure 1-B - Votes by Margin in Popular Vote 2016
Figure 2 - Charts By Gender Breakdown
Figure 3 - Charts by Demographic Breakdown
Figure 3-7 - Demographic Breakdown by Calculated Vote Totals 1980 - 2016
Figure 4 - 538 Swing-o-Matic Default Results
Figure 5 - 538 Swing-o-Matic Actual % Results for 2016
Figure 6 - MSNBC Swing The Election - Data
Figure 7 - MSNBC Swing The Election - Chart
Figure 8 - 538 Swing-o-Matic 2020 potential

So, having talked about it for about two years (or more), here is my Electioneering post, on why the Democrats have misunderstood their own understanding of the demographic breakdown of their own voters, and how their own statistics are fooling themselves, particularly in regards to white voters.
I've put the history of how I decided to look into this back in 2016 in the comments, along with why Trump's win in 2016 validated the Electoral College

Studying 2016

After discovering that the Democratic narrative about Trump's win in 2016 was wrong by the evidence of margins of votes, I decided to take a look at how the exit polls could tell me what happened.
In 2016, 538 released an app called the Swing-O-Matic which allowed you to play with the turnout and partisan lean for 5 demographics: Black, Asian/Other, Hispanic, White College Educated, White Non-College Educated. You can see from Fig 4 just how far off the Default results were using the 2012 data. I decided that I would try to play with the Swing-O-Matic's sliders until I got to the actual results of 2016. For each demographic, even for the collapse in black turnout which the pollsters said was hugely significant to the outcome, the result really didn't change. Hillary should have still won by a significant margin. Only a one or two states flipped. However, when I adjusted the sliders on the White Non-College Educated demographic, over half-a-dozen states flipped blue to red.
Suddenly, it was wildly clear, by Fig 5, what the hell happened. White non-college educated voters were absolutely decisive to winning Trump's election. All this crap about white women not voting Democrat, black voters not turning out, and Jill Stien was just horse shit. That didn't matter. Even if Trump won 50% of the Black vote in 2016, he still would have lost the election. White. Votes. Matter.
So... how the hell couldn't the Democrats have seen this?
I listened to some astonishing things in 2016. I listened to NPR announcers be audibly shocked that white men were the only demographic to have a decreasing life expectancy, as if they'd never considered that a possibility before. I listened as, over the past 2 years, I had heard that white people were not just making up fewer and fewer Americans, but that the actual percentage of the population seemed to be wildly changing. Supposedly the white population was decreasing, this was somehow a good thing, and that states that were too "old and white" like mine weren't going to matter in elections going forward. Again, NPR. I even heard claims that the whites in America made up as low as 53% of the population.
But that's wrong. They make up 73% of the population. The Leftists are sniffing their own farts about race.
So, I decided to tear apart all the results I could of the exit polls. I needed to see the raw vote totals instead of just what one percentage or another was each year. I decided that I could calculate something akin to the original raw vote totals from each demographic by party, through taking the total number of raw votes, finding the corresponding vote numbers for each demographic according to the exit polls, and then find each party's raw votes in each demographic by the split of each of those votes. I could do this all the way back to 1980, which was when I first found demographic exit poll breakdown. You can see these calculations in Tables 1, 2, and 3 above.
Something jumped out at me immediately. White votes absolutely fucking dwarf every other demographic. Not by a little either, but by everything. Donald Trump, damn near won the whole election on white votes alone, and that re-enforced my original point. But more than that, the Democrats basically haven't been able to reliably break 36 million white votes. And there's 98 million white voters out there. They need damn near 70 million votes to win anything!
Looking at Fig 3-7, you can see the serious problem that Democrats have with white voters. They need vast amounts of non-white voters to make up the lack of white votes. They need as many as they can get. Black votes are especially dire. They need significant & absolute majorities of every non-white demographic, and damn near the entirety of all Black turnout. All of it. Whites only made up 55% of all Democratic votes in 2016. Let me repeat that. They only managed half of 73% of the country. That is a fucking disaster. The Democrats are rabid race-baiters... because it's all they can do to win at all.
Looking at Fig 3, the historical breakdown is fairly stark. Please note the collapse in white voters for Republicans in 1992. We'll be talking about Ross Perot very soon. But 2 things to note in the historical demographic break down are: a) Donald Trump had some of the largest numbers of non-white votes in Republican party history (not-racist confirmed), b) the change in 2016 in demographic numbers is very significant. Hillary lost nearly a million black voters. That is a bad loss that would have been a serious set back in every election. But this time, the fact that Trump gained 1.3 million white voters on top of that Democratic loss is the thing that blows everything else out of the water. The scattershot placement of those white voters is a ton of different states is what gave him the win.

Understanding 2020

Knowing what we know now, all I can say is that the Democratic situation is even more absolutely dire. Trump is absolutely have significant gains in Black, Asian, and Hispanic votes without question. Hispanic Catholics and Anti-Socialists will be turning out. Disaffected blacks, pro-masculine blacks, and blacks that have benefited from stronger immigration controls are going to push Trump probably past 15% of the Black vote. Asians who have been explicitly targeted by Democratic racial laws, are anti-China, and have seen the US improve relations with South Korea, India, and Japan are all going to be happy to support Trump. On top of that, Cop Kamalla and Crime Bill Biden will probably collapse black support even further for the Democrats. But none of that actually matters.
Take a look back at Table 3. Remember Ross Perot? Look at the split in 1992 in total white votes compared to both Dem & Rep white vote totals. That's a lot of white voters voting for an eccentric billionaire, running against a corporate establishment, and focuses heavily on fixing NAFTA. Gee, fucking remind you of anyone? Well, that's not the only thing. Due to their sheer size, white voters can swing by millions at a time. Even small percentage changes lead to many millions moving about. But white voters swung by 5 million votes or more 5/10 times since 1980. No other demographic even comes close to that. The depth in numbers that white voters will wing is pretty substantial too. Look at 2000-2008. 5 million gain. 8 million gain. 3 million gain. Whites can seemingly pour out of the woodwork.
Several groups have claimed that they expect over 150 million voters this year. That basically guarantees that there will be more than 100 million white voters for the first time in American history. A lot more than 100 million. Look at Table 3 again. 150 million voters would be an increase of 12 million voters from 2016. Do you really expect that to come from almost entirely blacks and hispanics? I don't think so. I think the number of hispanic voters might fall given the fact that immigration control has improved, and during times of economic hardship, the US undergoes an outflow of migrants. For blacks, you have a lot of Black National Socialists calling for revolution regardless of who wins. It is far more likely in my mind that blacks will have smaller turnout than in 2016, and so will hispanics. I'm willing to bet that we're looking at significant white turnout. Especially given the anti-white Black National Socialist rhetoric in their schools, jobs, and entertainment. Let's not forget that the Left has apparently abandoned the midwest, working class whites.
I think that we are looking at 8 to 12 million white voters... and I'm not sure that the Democrats are even get a third of that. They might even lose white votes. Let's split the difference between 8-12 and call it 10 million more white voters.... Literally no one is ready for 10 million more white voters.
Hey.
Hey.
Wanna see a whitelash?
That Swing-O-Matic from 538 has a decedent. MSNBC calls it the Swing-The-Vote, but it's basically the same thing. If we adjust for the 12 million more white voters that I expect, and 15 million total black and hispanic voters (which would be steady for hispanics and a loss for blacks), and we swing non-college educated white voters to the right a bit. We get percentages that look like Fig 6, note that even a swing of 12 million white voters, still shows only whites with 73% of the total vote, which would be very deceptive to anyone looking at only the relative measurements because it would be a 1-point increase in the vote share. But, like 2016, the effects are dramatic. For the map, see Fig 7 Minnesota is apparently in play if the Biden campaign's actions are anything to go on... but no one has said shit about the others. Virginia is supposed to be confirmed for Biden. Nevada is still supposed to be confirmed for Biden. Maine isn't up for discussion, nor is New Mexico. The Democrats are pretending that Ohio and Texas are in play... they've entirely lost the plot. They simply do not seem to recognize the disaster that is befalling them. Florida stays, Ohio stays, Pennsylvania stays, Michigan stays, Wisconson stays, Texas stays. And then states they aren't even prepared for are up for grabs.
Unfortunately, MSNBC doesn't give us any information on how close the individual states are. The 538 Swing-O-Matic can do that for us. The demographic information is out of date, so it's prediction off of my results are more in favor of Trump but it does tell us the states that are absolutely neck and neck... and it's all bad. Really bad. Washington, Oregon, New Jersey, Maine, Connecticut, Delaware, even Illinois.
The point to take away here is that Minnesota is a swing state, not Ohio. Not Texas. The battleground states are places the Democrats aren't even looking at. And the states that could surprise people, are ones they aren't even imagining are in danger. Oregon, Virginia, New Hampshire, Maine, Washington, New Jersey... Illinois? It's similar to the same fatal mistake that Clinton made. They were sure Ohio was the swing state. But it was Wisconsin, it was Pennsylvania. And now it's going to be even worse, because these demographic calculators don't tell you anything about how the people on the ground are effected by the riots. If Oregon flips, the political shock-wave will be devastating.
Get your fucking popcorn boys.
Electoral Majority of >350, and an indisputable popular vote win.

Questions

But Gizortnik, how will we know if "it's happening"?

Watch New Hampshire. Trump lost New Hampshire by a smaller vote margin than your local school levy. He lost by 2,736 votes. If the white vote swings hard for Trump, New Hampshire should be a solid win.

But Gizortnik, every good hypothesis should be falsifiable. What would make yours wrong?

I'd have to be completely wrong about white people. It would have to be massive minority voter turn in a scale that would be enormous. Bigger black turnout for Obama in 2008, bigger hispanic turnout than for Bush in 2000. That, and white people would have to just be dissolutioned with Trump, and a whole bunch would be going for Biden. ... I'd have to be fundamentally wrong about literally everything I just said.
But I don't see how that's possible. It must be my lying fucking eyes again. I live in a "swing state" according to the Democrats. But I also live in a red county with a majority white population. On Saturday and Sunday, when the building is closed, the Board of Elections parking lot is filled with people hand delivering early votes to a secure box. Do you know how long the early voting line was 2 weeks ago on a Wednesday? A half hour. A Trump convoy passed by my house for a second time today.
If I'm wrong, it is because I'm living in a bubble the size of my fucking county.
And Historically Speaking, platform to platform, Trump-Biden looks a lot like what happened with Nixon-McGovern and Reagan-Mondale.

Top Betting Mistakes

1) Failure to Use Betting Banks
Most gamblers fail to understand that the best method of achieving a healthy and sustained long term profit from racing is to set aside a sum of money away from your main finances, solely for the betting of horses. Whatever method or system you are using, whoever you are following or subscribing to or however your own bets are calculated, you are better off with a "Betting Bank" that has built -in advantages that can help you. It needs to be independent from your own personal finances and needs to be protected from factors that can threaten it. This can take a lot of emotion out of the decision making process. Emotion is a factor that threatens all punters. The size of your betting bank will of course be dependent upon your own individual circumstances and free capital available.
An analogy to the world of shares perhaps may be that no financial advisor worth his salt would advise you throw all your capital into the stock market alone. The vast majority of punters fail to use any form of set aside bank. They bet randomly with what ever money they have in their pocket at the end of the week or go in too deep with stakes far in excess of their personal safety levels. A punter with a professional attitude will set aside what he can comfortably afford to invest and then determine the best use he can make of that fixed sum of capital. With a fixed sum of capital available you now move on to the next reason for failure.
2) Failure to Stake Correctly
It is vital that you consider your betting bank as capped in amount. You do not have an endless pool of resources to dip into. Betting by its nature carries inherent risks. These risks include periods of low strike rates and long losing runs. Your betting bank and staking should be adapted for the method you use. You must in advance, prepare yourself for the possibility of a worse than average sequence of losers through adoption of a sufficient number of units in your betting bank. Correct methodical staking in addition to the mathematical advantage, can also help overcome the risk of emotional reaction to a sequence of unusually positive or negative results. Take the Pricewise column in the racing post as an example.
Long term if you could get on at the advised prices, it would have returned a decent profit overall. During this time however followers would have to have endured runs of up to 40 losers in a row! Despite the overall long term profit I suspect the vast majority of Pricewise followers would have been terminated either by a failure to set aside a sufficient amount of points or through failure to cope with the emotion of the losing run. We have long since established here a strike rate of about 35% on our Best Bet selections and at an average S.P. of over 5/2 for each winning bet.
We feel able to protect clients banks as long losing runs haven't happened and the strike rate and odds have been more than enough to ensure long steady and safe growth for your betting profits. That is in essence the key to winning money. Manage your accounts in a way that protects them as far as possible from the element of risk that the game presents you.
3) Chasing Losses
Chasing losses at first sight may appear to be an easy way to guarantee an eventual profit but the true story is it is a game for fools and statistically will not work unless you generate an overall level stakes profit. Chasing losses is a game for the ill informed who do not want to make the effort to seek value in their bets. Bookmakers have to price up every race. Punters don't have to play in every race, they can pick the races they want to bet in,and that is the main edge that people fail to understand.
If you have had a losing day, by attempting to chasing your losses you give up that advantage and bet in the races that you should not be betting in. You are therefore betting the way bookmakers want you to and not in the way to win. Many punters will alter their stakes in the last race either to "chase" losses or "play up" winnings. Its no coincidence that the bookmakers have ensured that the last race on each day is often a handicap or one of the hardest races that day. There will be more racing the next day and the day after that.
The secret is waiting for opportunities and only betting when you know you have circumstances which favour you and not the bookmakers. You must never change your approach, or deviate from sensible staking as there is no such things as "The Last Race".
4) Lack of Value Appreciation
Appreciation of "value" in a bet is core to long term success. To profit over a long series of bets you must be betting at odds greater than the true chance of winning your selection have. To do this however over the long term, you need to concentrate on each race individually and seek the value bet in that race. There is value to be had in every race. The key to it is understanding where that value is. Many times a punter will screw up a losing betting slip and say "At least I had some value".
There is absolutely NO relationship between value and prices. A 33/1 chance may be diabolical value yet a very short priced favorite may be supreme value. It does not follow that the bigger the price you take the better "value" you have. The value is sometimes clear but more often well hidden and it takes a trained eye to see that. Everyone has this "Foresight" on occasions, it is a game about opinions after all and nobody is always right or wrong. Value can be the most expensive word in racing if you can't bet winner. The old cliche is that value is about betting a horse whose true chance is better than its price reflects.
That's only a small part of it. You also have to make sure that you bet in the right way and in the right races as that is the only way you can keep strike rates high and protect a betting bank. You should continually strive to increase value in your bets. Once you have a selection you feel is value do not just take the first acceptable price that comes along. Seek to improve it by shopping around the various bookmakers or try and top the best bookmakers price by looking to the betting exchanges. Marginal improvements on odds on each bet you make can have a dramatic effect on long term profits.
5) Greed For Instant Wealth
Many punters seek the thrill of a life changing bet that will produce huge gains of instant wealth for a small outlay. Bookmakers play on your natural desire and go out of their way to encourage you to bet exotic multiple selection bets that can in one hit, turn a small stake into a large sum. Professionals however rarely bet in multiples. Most professionals bet singles and steer away from the multiple bets. Bookmakers relentlessly promote a host of multiple bets with exotic names such as Yankee, Lucky 15, and Goliath.
The reason they are heavily touted is the profit margin in the bookmaker's favour increases the more selections you add to your multiple bet. Say you select any random 5/1 selection. If you bet this as a single the bookmaker may have a theoretical edge in his favor of 15%. Taking two such selections however and betting them in a win double, the bookmakers profit margin rises to about 30% ! Yes your win double can produce a much bigger win from the same stake however over the long term the bookmaker is eating away at your capital at a much faster rate.
It is a waste of time debating which type of multiple bet is 'best'. Unless your prediction skills are supernatural or you are incredibly lucky, then betting in singles is more often the best option. You may say that many "Pros," do bet in multiples in bets like The Scoop 6 or the Jackpot, but that's only because they know there is plenty of "Dead" money in any given Pool and they are betting against people who don't understand the dynamics of those types of bet. There are times you should bet in multiples but in truth they are few and far between.
You can't approach this as a "Get Rich Quick " scheme. It is a long slow process of serious and sustained profit and not a game for Get Rich Quick schemers. If you go Into any Betting shop, have a look at all the posters on the wall offering "special offers", "enhanced terms " and "bonus offers". You will see they are all multiple bets. Bookmakers want you betting in multiples and it is easy to see why. They carve most profit from them. You never see a Bookmakers promotion offering extra's on a win or each way single. Ask yourself why.

The Genius: Simulation Breaker (Round 2)

Ultimate Gambling Guide for GTA Online - odds, probabilities, and optimal strategies

Since the Diamond Casino update, I have seen a large number of 12-year-olds posting Blackjack memes on this sub. As a parent, this has me very worried.
On top of that, I have seen some of the most trustworthy GTA Youtubers giving flawed gambling advice, which can have damaging impact on their gullible audiences.
So that's why I decided to write this up, to educate everyone on the subject, so there will be no more misunderstandings.
(2020 Update down at the bottom.)
If you're one of those Youtubers that wants to use this information in a video, feel free to do so. The more people (especially kids) that become educated about gambling, the better.
But then also please go back and review your own work, and delete or edit the videos that are giving out the wrong advice, like where you're saying you have "a good strategy for making money with roulette", or some other nonsense that I've heard this week. Delete that please.
Before I get into the individual games, I need to discuss a few concepts first, that will make understanding the rest a lot easier.

Expected return and variance
A game like Roulette or Slots has a fixed expected return on your bets. This is a percentage that you have no way of influencing. Say you are flipping a coin against a friend, and you both put up $1. The winner gets the pot. Since the odds are even at 50%, in the long run, you will expect to break even. Your expected return is 100% of your bet.
But imagine if you would play this coin flipping game in a casino against the house. On the "house rules" listed at the table they would probably say that you would only get 95 cents back for every win, while you are forfeiting a dollar on every loss. Would you still play?
Sounds stupid to do so, but still, everybody does it. Every bet they place on Roulette, every coin they put into a Slot machine, is based on the same concept.
Those few cents they take on every bet are their profit margin, and has paid for all the Vegas lights, the Mirage volcanoes, and the Bellagio fountains. Make no mistake - casino gambling games are not designed to make you lose, because sure, you can get lucky on a single night, but they are designed to make them win. That's the beauty of it. They can both exist at the same time.
Too many people that don't see how this works, are just destined for disaster. Just because you went on a lucky streak and won 8 games out of 10, does not mean that flipping coins is a profitable game, or that choosing tails is a winning strategy. Always be aware of the house edge, your true chances of winning, and just realize that you got lucky. There is no such thing as a strategy in flipping a coin that will give you a higher expected return, so it's just pure gambling, just like Slots and Roulette.
Most casino games are made in such a way, that your expected return is a little under 100%. This means that from every dollar bet at the tables, the casino expects to keep a few cents. For individual players, results may vary. Some will win, most will lose. But for the house, it doesn't matter. They take millions of bets each day, so for them, the expected average works out a lot sooner. In short: the house always wins.
When looking at the house edge, we're talking about the expected long-term result, based on the game's house rules. But for a player, it can take literally tens of thousands of hands or spins before you also reach this average number. Until that time, you can experience huge upswings and downswings, that are the result of nothing but short-term luck, which is called variance.
Some games and some bets have a much higher variance than others, which means your actual results will differ enormously from what you're expected to be at.
Take for example betting on red/black at the Roulette table. This is a low-variance proposition, because it has a high percentage chance of occurring, and a low payout.
Contrast this with betting single numbers in Roulette, which only win once every 38 spins on average. This bet has a much higher variance, meaning you can easily hit a dry spell, and not hit anything for 200 bets in a row, or you can see a single number hit three times in five consecutive spins. This is not a freak occurrence in high-variance bets.
Even though the expected return in both these bets is exactly the same, there's a huge difference in variance, causing massive differences in short-term results, which can go both ways. You need to be aware of this, before you decide what types of bets you are comfortable with placing.

Gamblers' Fallacy
Another thing to realize, is that each individual game, hand, or spin, is completely independent from the one(s) before it, and after it.
Gamblers tend to believe, that the chance of a certain outcome is increased, based on previous results.
The most famous example comes from the Casino de Monte Carlo, where the Roulette wheel managed to land on black 26 times in a row. Gamblers lost many millions during that streak, all frantically betting on red, believing that the odds were in favor of the wheel coming out on red, after producing so many blacks. This is not true. Each round is completely independent, and the odds are exactly the same.
You will hear people say things like a Blackjack table being "hot" or "cold", which is completely superstitious, and should be ignored. The exception was when Blackjack was being dealt from a shoe. It made card counting possible. But with the introduction of shuffle machines, and continuous shuffling like is being used in GTA, this no longer exists.
This is also why "chasing your losses" is a very bad idea. After being on a losing streak for some time, many gamblers believe that now it's their turn to start winning. So they will often increase their bet size, believing that when their predicted winning streak comes around, they will win back their losses, and more.
The reality of it, more often than not, is that people will indeed start playing higher and higher limits, until they are completely broke. Nobody is ever "due for a win". There is never a guarantee that you're about to start winning. In fact, the opposite is more likely to be true. You are, after all, in a casino.

Betting systems
Some people like to think that they have a fool-proof betting system, like the Martingale system. Simply increase or even double your bet when you lose, and keep doing that until you win. In theory, this system will always win. So that's why table limits were introduced, and where the system fails.
If you start at the Roulette table, playing red/black, with a small 750 chip wager, and just double your bet every time you lose, you only have to lose 6 times in a row, before you will be betting the table limit of 48,000, just to get that 750 chip profit.
Sure, you can go on all evening without this happening, winning 750 chips each time, but this losing streak only has to happen once, and you're bust. Any betting system like this is ill-advised, because you are hugely increasing your so-called "risk of ruin", and that's what we were trying to avoid.
And even if your starting bet is only 100 chips, after only nine straight losses, and nine doubled bets, you are betting the table limit at 50,000 chips. If you lose that bet, you're 100,000 chips in the hole, with no way to recover that with your 100 chip base wager.
So don't believe anyone that says this is the perfect system to always win in the casino. Sooner or later they will understand why they were wrong, when they're asking you for a loan.

Set your limits BEFORE you start playing
One final point before we get into the games, a general tip for people that head out to play: money management.
Just like in real life, before you go to the casino, decide on a maximum amount that you are WILLING TO LOSE.
Bet small enough, so that amount can last you through the entire evening, and you will not be tempted to run to the ATM to continue playing.
Considering GTA money, some people will be comfortable losing 1% of their GTA bank balance, some people will be comfortable with gambling away 5% of their total GTA savings. It's up to you what you can handle. Decide for yourself where it will start to hurt, and don't cross that line.
But whatever number you decide on, as soon as you lost that amount, get up and walk away. Don't chase your losses, stick to your limits, and accept that this has not been your day. There is always another game tomorrow. Always agree with yourself on a simple stop-loss rule, how much you would want to lose at most, and simply stop playing when you get there.
Same goes for winning. You can decide on a number, how much profit you would like to take away from the casino. You can go on a hot streak and be up half a million in a short period of time, but if you would continue to play longer, looking for more, chances are that you're going to lose it all back.
Most people are happy with doubling their daily casino budget, for example. Others are looking for 10 bets profit in Blackjack. Whatever you choose, when you hit that number, you can stop playing and bank your profits, or you can continue playing if you're still enjoying the games, but then only just play minimum bet sizes. Then you're just playing for fun, not for money. You've already made your profit, so simply keep it in your pocket, and don't risk losing it again.
Either way, decide on what your money management strategy will be, and STICK TO IT.

Casino games in GTA Online
Now, I'm going to dive into the games that you can find at the Diamond casino, ordered from worst to best.

6) Slots
Generally the rule is this: the less strategy a game has, the worse it is for the player. And with slots, this is definitely the case.
The only influence you have, is choosing what type of machine you're going to play. Basically, there are two types of slot machines:
-high frequency, low payout slots
-low frequency, high payout slots
In the first type, there is no huge (progressive) jackpot on offer, just your average selection of prizes that don't go up to crazy amounts.
This will result in a player having many more spins resulting in a win. The amounts that you win on the bigger prizes, will be smaller, but they do come around more often. This type of slot machine has a lower variance, which means that your money should last you longer, winning many smaller prizes along the way to keep you going.
The second type of slot machine lures you in with the temptation of a huge jackpot prize. Even though the long-term expected return on these machines is the same as the previous type, the prize distribution is hugely different. The large jackpot prize weighs heavily on the scale of expected return, but the chance of it hitting is extremely small. This results in a much higher variance on this type of machine. Usually your money will go down very fast, because the smaller prizes are less rewarding than on the other type of machine.
At the Diamond, the info screen says the player return at slots is set at 98.7%. This means that, on average, for every maximum bet of 2,500 chips, you expect to lose 32.5 chips.
This might not seem like a lot, but the danger of slots is that the game is extremely fast. You can spin about once every 6 seconds, which would result in an expected LOSS of about 20,000 chips per hour of playing.
But again, in this long-term expected number, the large jackpot awards are also factored in, and as long as you don't hit those big prizes, you'll see your money go down a lot faster.
In any case, thank heavens the max bet is only set at 2,500, or else we would see more players go bankrupt at alarming rates.
Optimal strategy for slots:
There is none. Because after betting, you have no more influence over the outcome. The only choices you have, is what type of machine you want to play at, and how much money you are going to risk. And those are all personal preference. As long as you stick to your loss limits, as discussed above, there's no harm in having a go every once in a while, hoping to get a lucky hit. Just realize that you don't have a high chance of scoring a big win, so as soon as you do, get up and walk away.

5) Roulette
Roulette is also a game where you have no influence over the outcome. There is zero skill involved. You place your bet, and that's it.
In traditional French roulette, a table has only the single-zero, but of course, for American casinos that wasn't enough of a house edge, so they simply doubled their profits by adding a second zero. The house edge was increased from 1/37 to 1/19, which is huge.
This makes playing on a double-zero roulette table by definition a sucker's play.
The payouts scale evenly, which means that a bet on a single number, and a bet on half of the numbers, and everything in between, yields the same expected return. The only difference, again, being the variance that you are willing to subject yourself to.
The player return for double-zero Roulette for all bets is 94.74%.
Except for the 5-number bet, which can only be made by placing a bet on the two top rows that contain 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3. The expected return on this bet is lower: 92.1%. This is because it only pays out 6-1. Why? Well, the number 36 isn't divisible by 5, so the greedy people that came up with double-zero Roulette had to round it off someway, and as expected, it wasn't going to be in the players' favor.Just remember that that 5-number bet is the worst bet at the table, and should be avoided. All other possible bets have the same expected return.
So it really doesn't matter how you spread your bets, if you bet only one chip, or if you litter the entire table with a bucketload of chips. Each chip you put out there, has the same expected return, so there is no strategy that will improve your long-term results.
Assuming that you're betting the maximum table amount of 50,000 chips, you will be looking at an expected loss of about 2,630 chips per spin. Considering that a round takes about 45 seconds to complete, your expected LOSS at the GTA Roulette tables will be around 200,000 chips per hour of playing.
Optimal strategy for double-zero roulette:
Stay away. Stay far away.

4) Three Card Poker
With Three Card Poker, we come across the first game where there is actually some strategy involved. You get to look at your cards, and then decide if you want to fold, and surrender your ante, or double your bet.
Additionally, you can choose to place a side bet on "Pair Plus", which offers progressive payouts.
There are some websites out there that ran all the numbers with computer simulations, and even though I would like to quote the source here, these websites are understandably littered to the max with online casino ads, so that's why I have decided against doing that.
Optimal strategy for Three Card Poker:
For this game you only have to remember one strategy rule: Always bet on any high card queen-six-four or better, and fold any high card queen-six-three or lower. That's it. Just don't forget to double check if you're not folding a straight or a flush, and you'll be fine.
This strategy will result in an expected return of 96.63%.
The Pair Plus sidebet, with the payout table that is used at the Diamond casino, gives you an expected return of 97.68%, which is actually a bit better than the main ante bet.
So by playing both wagers, you're reducing your expected losses per bet, but since you're betting more, you're also increasing your expected loss per hour.
My advice would obviously be to not play this game at all, but if you do, put as much of your bet as possible on the Pair Plus, while making our Ante bet as small as you can.
To be able to compare it to the other games at the Diamond, let's stay on that 50,000 maximum wager, meaning making your ante bet 35,000, and your pair plus bet 15,000, if the table would allow it.
This results in an expected loss of about 1,525 chips per hand, and with a round taking about 45 seconds, this adds up to an expected LOSS of around 120,000 chips per hour of playing. In comparison, if you would only play the ante bet for 50,000 per hand, you expect to lose 1,685 chips per hand, which means an expected LOSS of about 135,000 chips per hour. So the more out of that 50,000 wager you can put on the "Pair Plus" sidebet, the better.
Even though it may be fun to try out this game for a bit, since there's only one simple strategy rule to follow, you'll soon find yourself robotically grinding down your bankroll until it has vaporized. You're not missing out on anything if you skip these tables, there is no real challenge.
Just like with Roulette and Slots, if you want to try it out nonetheless, you can just bet the minimum amounts and only play for fun, so it won't matter if you win or lose.

3) Blackjack
Blackjack is the most complicated game by far. Simply because the player has to make a series of decisions, which will largely decide the outcome. Luckily, there is such a thing as an optimal strategy, which will be outlined below.
However, the strategy is also dependent on the house rules. These not only affect your expected return, but in some places also your decisions.
Here are the house rules at the Diamond casino:
-The game uses 4 standard decks, and a continuous shuffle.
-Blackjack pays 3 to 2, dealer checks for early blackjack.
-No insurance offered, no surrender.
-Dealer stands on soft 17.
-Double down on any two cards.
-Player can split only once, but doubling after split is allowed.
-Seven-Card Charlie.
Under these rules, and following the "basic strategy" chart, your expected return at Blackjack is a shade under 99.6%, which is extremely good for a casino game, that's why Blackjack should be your table game of choice.
But it comes at a price: you are going to have to memorize the relatively complicated strategy chart, or at least stick it to your monitor until you have it in your head. But in case you ever stumble into a real-life casino, you won't regret having this table memorized, so I would definitely advise you to work on that.
The strategy chart might look complicated at first, but you will be able to notice certain patterns. Your decisions are mainly based on the dealer's upcard, which is basically divided into a weak card (2 to 6), and a strong card (7 to ace).
When a dealer shows a strong card, you will be hitting more often with the risk of going bust, but when a dealer shows a weak card, you're not taking that risk, and you will be standing more, but also doubling and splitting more. You want to increase your bets when the odds are in your favor, and get out cheap when they're not.
But it also helps to take some time to think about why a certain advice is given. For example, why does it say that you always have to split two eights, even against an ace. Well, that's because two eights equals 16, which is the worst total you can have. It's better to split them up, and give yourself a chance of finding a 17, 18 or 19 with the next card. Once you see the logic in that, you'll have one less thing to memorize.
The playing advice in the basic strategy chart is a result of computer simulations that ran all possible outcomes against each other, and produced the most profitable decision for each situation. So you can't go wrong following it.
Optimal strategy for Blackjack with Seven-Card Charlie
The added house rule of Seven-Card Charlie, adds a small advantage for the player, and it does influence a few strategy decisions. For example, you might have a 14 with 6 cards, against the dealer's 5 upcard.
Normally this would be an automatic stand, but if you're only one card away from the Seven-Card Charlie, meaning an instant win for the player, regardless of the dealer's hand, it turns it into a hit.
Here's the most optimal strategy chart to follow for the Diamond Casino house rules: https://prnt.sc/olct6g
You'll see that two fives are missing from the chart, and that's because you never split them. You treat them as a regular 10. You also never split tens. Just stand on 20.
If you follow this strategy religiously, even with a maximum wager of 50,000 chips, you only expect to lose about 215 chips per hand, and with rounds taking about 30 seconds, that amounts to an expected LOSS of 26,000 chips per hour, which is only half a bet. A small price to pay for an hour of entertainment.
But since the expected return is so extremely close to 100%, you will see more positive short-term results than with other games. But obviously it can also swing the other way. Again, this is supposed to be the game where your money lasts you the longest, but always set your loss and win limits before you sit down. That rule simply always applies.

Still, even with optimal strategies applied, all these games are expected to lose you money in the long run. So betting any kind of large amounts is not advised. If you simply want to enjoy playing these games, there's nothing wrong with betting a minimal amount. Playing these games for a longer period of time will already cost you money anyway, since your daily property fees will still be charged while you're playing in the GTA casino. As long as you can play for fun, there's nothing wrong, but when you see yourself betting insane chunks of your entire bank balance to try to recoup some unfortunate losses, you're doing it wrong.
As the commercials in Britain all correctly say: when the fun stops, stop.

2) Virtual Horse Racing
Now onto the good stuff. I ran some numbers, and I believe Rockstar has made a mistake with the horse racing game. Because as it stands, and if I read the numbers correctly, this game is actually profitable for the player. You can actually make money with this, at least, until Rockstar figures out their mistake and patches it.
If anyone wants to jump into the math and double check this to make sure, please do so. I will add any corrections to this post. This is one of those "to good to be true" things, so I keep thinking that I might have overlooked something. So please verify it if you can.
The setup is this. There is a pool of 100 horses, each with their own attached payout. These are divided into 3 groups, ranked by their odds. From each group, 2 horses are randomly selected to provide a pool of six runners for you to bet on.
Now it's not an actual race you're looking at. You are looking at a raffle. This is important to realize.
Each horse gets awarded a certain number of raffle tickets. The favorites get awarded more tickets than the underdogs, and therefore, have a higher chance of winning.
If this distribution works like it does in the real-life casinos, then the raffle tickets are awarded according to the betting odds.
Example 1: imagine a race with 3 runners, all have 2/1 odds, representing a 33.3% chance of winning. (Because 2/1 means 2 AGAINST 1, so 3 total.) In this case, each horse gets one third of the raffle tickets, giving them an equal chance to win.
Example 2: imagine a race with 3 runners, one has 1/1 odds (or EVENS), representing a 50% chance of winning, and the other two horses are marked up as 3/1, with a 25% chance of winning. The favorite gets half the tickets, the other two get a quarter of the tickets each.
A ticket is drawn, and you'll have a winner.
It doesn't matter in this game which horse you bet on, because the expected return is always the same: 100% or break-even, for the above examples.
Now, what happens if the percentages don't exactly add up to 100%?
They must add up to 100%, because there will always be a winner. And only one winner.
So when this is the case, the actual winning chances of the horses are adjusted to meet the 100% requirement, using their payout odds to determine the scale.
So, if the represented percentages add up to more than 100%, the actual winning chances of the runners will be DECREASED, resulting in all bets becoming losing propositions for the players.
Example: In a 6-horse race, all runners are listed at 4/1, representing a 20% chance. Only with six runners that amounts to 120%. So all chances are scaled down by 1/6th, to end up at 100%.
This means your horse's chances are reduced from 20% to 16.67%, turning it into a losing bet: 5 times you will lose your bet, and 1 time you will win, but only get 4 bets back in this instance, instead of 5. A losing bet in the long run.
This is the type of odds that you find in regular casinos, with fields as large as 15 runners to bet on, where the assumed winning chances always add up to more than 100%, therefore are decreased for all runners, resulting in a house edge.

But in GTA Online's Inside Track, there are other scenarios, because of the small field, and the way that they are put together.
In some cases, the represented percentages when added up, are LESS than 100%, meaning that the actual winning chances of all runners, are INCREASED.
This creates profitable bets for the players, because in the long run, you're expecting to win more money than you lose. This is a gambler's dream, pure and simple.
So, according to the in-game information, the three groups of horses are divided as follows:
-Favorites: EVENS to 5-1
-Outsiders: 6-1 to 15-1
-Underdogs: 16-1 to 30-1

Let's take the two most extreme examples to show what's happening.
The worst possible field to bet on: two runners at EVENS, two runners at 6-1, and two runners at 16-1.
EVENS represents a 50% chance, 6-1 is 14.29%, and 16-1 is 5.88%. Add those up and you land on a total of 140.34%.
This means that the actual winning chances of the horses are decreased by 28.75% (to get that 140% down to 100%), which makes betting on this field extremely unwise.
A horse at EVENS will only come in as a winner 35.63% of the time, instead of 50%,
a horse at 6-1 will only win 10.18% of the time,
and an underdog at 16-1 will only win 4.19% of the time.

The expected return on a bet on any of the horses in this field is only 71.26%, so a maximum bet of 10,000 chips on any of these horses holds an expected LOSS of 2,875 chips.
These returns are the same, because the winning chances are scaled equally, according to the payout numbers. So it really doesn't matter which horse you bet on, in the long run, you expect the same results.
But as explained before, it does influence variance, and therefore your short-term result, which can swing both ways.

But now, the best possible field to bet on: two runners at 5-1, two runners at 15-1, and two runners at 30-1.
Odds at 5-1 represents a winning chance of 16.67%, 15-1 odds means 6.25% chance, and 30-1 odds means a 3.23% chance of winning. Add these six horses together, and you only get 52.285%.
This means that, to get from 52% to 100%, the actual winning chances of these horses will be almost doubled! Multiplied by 1.91 to be exact.
So the 5-1 favorites will now win 31.88% of the time, instead of 16.67%,
the 15-1 runners will win 11.95% of the time,
and the underdogs at 30-1 odds will still win 6.17% of the time.
When betting on this field, the expected return on your bet is 191.25%!
This means that a max bet of 10,000 chips will result in an expected PROFIT of 9,125 chips.
This is printing money, if there ever was such a thing.
Optimal strategy for Virtual Horse racing
So all you have to do, is only bet high on the games where you have an expected positive return, and bet the absolute minimum on the games where your expected return is negative. Or back out of the racing game to refresh the field.
If you don't have a way to quickly add up all the percentages, and until somebody shows up here with a neatly formatted table, just use a few general rules of thumb:
-Always bet the maximum on a race with favorites at 2/1 and 3/1 or higher in it.
-Simply skip all races with two favorites at EVENS in it, and at EVENS and 2/1. Or bet the minimum, if you can't skip or refresh the field.
-To decide if you should play races with other favorite combinations EVENS and 3/1, EVENS and 4/1, EVENS and 5/1, or two favorites at 2/1, the payouts on the other four runners determine whether or not it's profitable to play them. The results of betting on these fields vary from an expected 1,330 chip loss (worst-case) to an expected 1,680 chip win (best-case), with a max bet of 10,000 chips.
But if you're not looking for another strategy chart, you might just want to skip these borderline cases, and just cherry pick the best ones, which are easy to recognize, and with which you can never go wrong.
It's difficult to put a number on an expected win-rate, because it all depends on which fields you get presented with, but it's not unreasonable to state that you can maintain a steady win-rate of around 200,000 chips per hour, with about 50 seconds per race.
Remember, you're not trying to win every race. You're trying to win the most money per hour. So don't sweat it when you bet on a 4/1 favorite, and lose a couple of races in a row. It will still be more profitable in the long run. You have the math on your side.
To reduce negative variance, always bet on the favorite, when betting on profitable fields. We're not gambling anymore, we're grinding out a steady profit. We want to keep the swings to a minimum.
I contacted Rockstar support to verify if this is indeed how it works, but the only reply I got after 6 weeks is that they were "looking into it".
User u/Garsant made a useful Excel-worksheet, available for you to download, where you can quickly type in the payouts on the horses, to see if it produces a profitable bet or not. You can find it in his post here: https://www.reddit.com/gtaonline/comments/ekp8na/gta_online_inside_track_odd_calculato

1) Wheel of Fortune
The number one profitable casino game in GTA Online is obviously the Wheel of Fortune, because it costs you nothing to play.
Unfortunately, you only get one free spin per day, but it holds great value, so make sure you do it.
With a chance to win a super car, vehicle discounts, expensive mystery prizes (which also can be vehicles), and a lot of cash and chips, the expected return on a single spin is around $100,000 in value.
So don't forget your daily spin, it's definitely worth your time.

2020 Update:
As of the Diamond Casino Heist update, the Inside Track horse racing is confirmed to still be as profitable as outlined above.The only thing that seems to be changed, is that you can't refresh the field anymore by backing out of the screen. This does affect your hourly rate in a negative way, but does not change the fact that this game has a huge positive expected return, and should be your go-to when you're trying to take money from the house, without having Lester's nagging voice in your ear. That should also be worth something.

And with that, I conclude my 5,000 word essay on gambling in GTA. Questions, comments, feel free to add your input to this guide.

Cliffs:
-Gambling games should only be played for fun, not for big money. You should expect to lose in the long run. The house always wins.
-A casino game doesn't have a memory, and betting systems don't work.
-Set your limits before you start, how much you are willing to lose or win, and then walk away when you get there.
-Don't play slots, roulette, or three card poker.
-Only play blackjack following a basic strategy chart (https://prnt.sc/olct6g).
-Inside Track betting can be played profitably, if you only bet on fields WITHOUT a heavy favorite.
-Wheel of Fortune is always your best bet, because it's a free bet.

A short Guide to making £500 through Match betting (Update for current circumstances)

Inside track - Lets talk strategy

UPDATE 2: I've done a long term test now for about 1200 races and my predictions using this method are pretty much spot on.
Regarding which horse to bet on. As this post states all horses have the same expected value, meaning that the expected long term profit is the same. But here are some differences worth noting:

Horses with lower odds (ie horse 1) will win small amounts more frequently.
Horses with higher odds (ie horse 6) will win larger amounts less frequently.
The profit from horses with lower odds are more "stable" and not affected as much by differences in wins.
The profit from horses with higher odds are more affected by differences in wins. Meaning that if you're lucky and win a bit more than expected the profit will be a lot higher if you bet on horse 6. But at the same time the profit will be a lot lower if you're unlucky and win less than expected.

UPDATE: So I founds this post: https://gtaforums.com/topic/933094-testing-different-inside-track-horse-racing-betting-strategies/page/2/?tab=comments#comment-1070850773
Using the data from those 100 races I tested this strategy and here are the results: https://i.imgur.com/Jh6pWL5.png
Even though 100 entries isn't optimal for calculating probability in the long run, I would say it does make this strategy look promising.

Inside track - Lets talk strategy
I've been seeing a lot of post about the inside track statistics and how to bet to maximize your profit. So I thought I would try to clear some things out.

Most of the post talk about win percentages, for example horse #1 wins most often so you should always bet on horse #1. Even though this is true (horse #1 wins most often) only looking at win percentage isn't optimal for maximizing your profit in the long run, it could even result in losing money. What you should look at is expected return and expected value for each race. Doing so you will maximize your profit in the long run and it doesn't matter which horse you're betting on.

Before we get started I would like to give credit to this post: https://www.reddit.com/gtaonline/comments/ciuz70/ultimate_gambling_guide_for_gta_online_odds/
I would suggest reading the inside track section in that post but I will try to sum it up and expand on it here.

The horse race can be compared to a lottery with 100 tickets where each horse has x number of tickets.
How many tickets each horse gets corresponds to the horses return:

Tickets: x_tickets = 100 / (1 + return)

Example:
A horse with a return of 1 (Evens) will have 50 tickets.
A horse with a return of 3 will have 25 tickets.
A horse with a return of 4 will have 20 tickets.

The reason the inside track is profitable is because for some races the sum of all the tickets for each horse is less than 100 and since there has to be a winner each horse gets extra tickets to fill up the empty slots.

Example:
Lets say there is only the three horses from the previous example in the race:
Horse 1: Evens - 50 tickets
Horse 2: 3/1 - 25 tickets
Horse 3: 4/1 - 20 tickets

The sum of all tickets is only 95 (50 + 25 + 20) resulting in 5 empty tickets. This is where the expected return comes in:
Expected return: ER = total_tickets / sum(x_tickets)
In our example we get ER= 100 / (50 + 25 + 20 ) = 100 / 95 = 105.26...%

(The percentage has more digits, but for simplicity I just use "..." rather than type out all digits. This will continue for all examples)

To compensate for the empty tickets each horse gets extra tickets using:
Actual Tickets: T = x_tickets * ER
In our example we get:
Horse 1: T = 50 * 105.26...% = 50 * 1.0526... = 52.6... tickets
Horse 2: T= 25 * 105.26...% = 26 * 1.0526... = 26.3... tickets
Horse 3: T= 20 * 105.26...% = 20 * 1.0526... = 21.1... tickets

As we can see each horse got extra tickets and because of this have a higher percent change to win than "intended", this brings us to the next part, expected value.
The expected value tells us the expected profit for each bet:
Expected value: EV= (Probability to win * profit) - (Probability to lose * loss)
where
Probability to win = T / total_tickets
Probability to lose = 1 - Probability to win
Profit = return * bet
Loss = bet

Example:
So for our example we have the following:
Using 10000 Credits as bet
Horse 1 (Evens):
Probability to win = 52.6... / 100 = 0.526...
Probability to lose = 1 - 0.526 = 0.474...
Profit = 1 * 10000 = 10000 Credits
Loss = 10000 Credits
EV = (0.526 * 10000) - (0.474 * 10000) = 526.3... Credits

Horse 2 (3/1):
Probability to win = 26.3... / 100 = 0.263...
Probability to lose = 1 - 0.263... = 0.737...
Profit = 3 * 10000 = 30000 Credits
Loss = 10000 Credits
EV = (0.263... * 30000) - (0.737... * 10000) = 526.3... Credits

Horse 3 (4/1):
Probability to win = 21.1... / 100 = 0.211...
Probability to lose = 1 - 0.211... = 0.789...
Profit = 4 * 10000 = 40000 Credits
Loss = 10000 Credits
EV = (0.211... * 40000) - (0.789... * 10000) = 526.3... Credits

As we can see all horses have a expected value of ~526 Credits. This means that in the long run we expect to make 526 Credits each time we play. We can also see that all horses have the same expected value, meaning that it doesn't matter which horse you bet on. Betting on horse 1 will result in a higher frequency of smaller wins and betting on horse 3 will result in lower frequency of larger wins, but the total profit, in the long run, is still the same.
So if we had this exact example and bet on it 1000 time (regardless on what horse we bet on), we would make a expected profit of 526 000 (526 * 1000) Credits.

Since the expected value is the same for each horse, a simpler way to calculate it is by just using the expected return:

Expected value: EV = (E100 - 1) * bet

So in our example we get:
EV = (105.2... / 100 - 1) * 10000 = (1.052... - 1) * 10000 = 526.3... Credits

Simulations
I've done tests and simulations on this. This is the results on betting max (10000 Credits) on 5000 races where:
- I was betting on a random horse each race
- Only bet on races with a expected return over 140%.

Runs: 5000
Average expected return: 154%
Wins: 827 (17%)
Expected profit: 27 002 298 Credits
Profit: 28 370 000 Credits
Diff: 1 367 702 Credits (105.07%)

(I've done simulations for betting on only horse 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 as well and the differences are insignificant)

So how do we use this?

Only bet on races with a expected return over 100%
It doesn't matter which horse you are betting on, as long as you follow step 1
Never bet if both horse 1 and horse 2 are Evens or 2/1, see charts below

If you don't want to calculate the expected return and just go on the rate of Horse 1 and Horse 2 you can follow this chart below:

EDIT: The charts doesn't seem to load so I upload it here instead: https://i.imgur.com/T9gEYDD.png

This is assuming the worst case scenario for the rest of the horses (Horse 3: 6/1, Horse 4: 6/1, Horse 5: 16/1, Horse 6: 16/1). Green means expected return over 100%, red means expected return below or equal to 100%.
The same chart but for the best case scenario (Horse 3: 15/1, Horse 4: 15/1, Horse 5: 30/1, Horse 6: 30/1) is below:

EDIT: The charts doesn't seem to load so I upload it here instead: https://i.imgur.com/j8cPPCY.png

Good luck on the track!

Note: The calculations and simulations in this post are only theoretical and might not represent the actual game. I have played the in game track for about 12 hours using this strategy and from what I can see it does in fact represent the actual game.
I currently have the "This feature is not available at this moment. Please come back later"-bug so I can't play. Once this is sorted i will do a long term test to verify that this is correct. I'll post the results when available.
Please let me know if any calculations are wrong or if anything needs to be edited.

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