We extend the empirical analysis of hot hands in sports to horse racing, using the winning streaks of a sample of jockeys riding in Australia. Grouping jockeys by strike rate (win percentage), we find evidence of hot hands across almost all strike rates. But considering jockeys individually, only a minority exhibit hot hands. A wagering strategy based on hot hands yields a negative return overall and for most hot hand jockeys, although some do yield a positive return. We conclude that hot hands are present but not ubiquitous and that this is generally recognised in the betting market. JEL Classification: C53, D81, D84
Chezum and Wimmer (2000) show the impact of asymmetric information in the American thoroughbred industry by demonstrating that homebreds (horses retained and raced by their breeders), on average, have lower betting odds than otherwise similar nonhomebreds. In this paper we test their hypothesis in the Australian thoroughbred industry. While we find no relationship between lower betting odds and homebreds when we use their model, we are still able to support their conclusion when we use a logistic model to measure the relationship between homebred and horse performance.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.