There are, however, more worthwhile systems, put together by gamblers with a deep understanding of their subject matter.

Definitely from the latter camp, speedmasteronline.com is an excellent resource for people who love to bet on horses. For over a decade, punters have used it successfully, and InsideEdge staffers got a taste of what it can do in the last month.

Speedmasteronline.com has its roots back in 1992, when John Hooton, a photographer, electronics troubleshooter, and son of a racehorse trainer, John K Hooton, began programming betting utilities for Psion Organisers.

In 1993, he introduced the first ever suite of horse racing betting utilities for Windows, under the banner of Betting Manager. For the first time ever, punters could now easily calculate the returns on multiple bets, using the 'betting slips' in the program. The program also contained an integrated bank, automatically linked to the betting slips and a fairly simplistic rating tool that required a daily paper and manual input of data.

'I had left the ratings until last,' recalls Hooton. 'The problem of predicting the outcome of horse races was one I had tackled many years ago while working on the farm and riding out in the early mornings on the Sussex Downs.

'With the right information (the Racing Calendar and Ladbrokes Chaseform as it was) and hours of work, it was possible to pinpoint winners. However, I realised that the life of a successful gambler would require about a 14-hour day, every day, even if the action only involved, on average, one bet every two weeks. About 98% of the time was spent weeding out what you didn't want.'

This was before computers were as widespread as they are now, but those lessons learned in long, evening hours studying future entries, were about to be dragged into a new world, where science could analyse nature.

Hooton had written 'Betting Manager' for himself, but out of curiosity, decided to advertise it, to see if any other racing fans and computer users would be interested. The response was immediately positive and would set the seal on many thousands more hours, spent trying to make life easier for the dedicated punter.

In 1995, independent, course-conscious speed analysis had been added to the ratings, and Speedmaster was launched. This new program combined form ratings and speed ratings to give a better overall picture of past performances.

Two weeks after the launch, nine punters backed a 33/1, top-speed winner at Epsom, and a punter in Scotland scooped £35,625 using Speedmaster in a seven-horse super Heinz. The punter later became the part owner of three racehorses, stepping into the winner's enclosure no fewer than 16 times.

In 1995/96, the SMARTsig computer challenge was held. Horse race betting system software vendors were invited to prove the worth of their products. Speedmaster won. Aside from many good-priced single winners in John Hooton's entries, his selections also contained the Tricast of the 1996 Grand National and a Placepot at the Cheltenham festival! This provided a 73% return over six months, winning the competition outright and proving that Speedmaster could deliver impressive returns.

The parameters of the original form and speed ratings have remained unchanged and have been proven over many years by countless winners and predictions. However, the program ultimately still required a certain amount of selectivity on the part of the user, and discipline - two qualities that are sadly lacking in many of us.

Enter Speedmasteronline
In 2004, Glyn Timberlake, a dedicated Speedmaster enthusiast, introduced Hooton to master programmer Steve Milligan. Very soon, Milligan set to work, and, using the combined power of structured queries over a specially constructed Speedmaster database, the output was quite astonishing, creating a far more sophisticated analytical tool for punters.

By inserting filters that could specify certain conditions, including those unique to Speedmaster, it became possible to produce immediate profit/loss accounts based on the filters.

This meant that, with a little practice, punters could begin identifying likely patterns, future selections, and profitability, with illustrative graphs taken from results and historical data.

'With speedmasteronline.com, the original concept of Betting Manager has been fulfilled after 11 years,' says Hooton.

'We have found that it can make very accurate predictions from financial modelling, resulting in confident, stress-free betting.'

INSIDE EDGE ESSENTIAL GUIDE
InsideEdge tested speedmasteronline.com for a month. In that time, we developed a filter that produced six winners from 11 runners, a strike rate of 54.5%.

Most of the winners went in at evens to 2/1, although the system picked out Hartshead at 10/1 at the evening meeting at Carlisle on 3 July. During the month, a bank of £1,000 rose in value to £1,410

For more information, go to www.speedmasteronline.com