You're not a mug for having a multiple - there is nothing wrong with treating betting as fun

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Just a couple of hours after I'd filed last week's Betting World column I received an email from Trevor Pitman, a Members' Club subscriber, asking about my opinion on multiple bets, whether they were worth doing or simply for mugs, and whether I had any particular strategy myself.

It was strange timing as I nearly wrote about a multiple hard-luck story I'd had at York the previous week, but thought it might be a touch self-indulgent. Then again, It's my column, so you're going to get it now before I go into my opinions about multiples in general.

It was day one at York, which looked by far the most attractive punting card of the week, although I was tempted simply to repeat the Placepot perm I'd put in the paper rather than go for glory.

The long-held desire to go through the card (never have, never will) and get a life-changing win to small stakes (ditto) took over, though, so it was a Super Heinz with seven selections and a total of 120 bets.

You'd normally be cock-a-hoop with a decent return, but in the first six races I had four winners and two seconds beaten in photos before the last leg blew out completely (in my experience last legs only ever win when none of the others have) and I was gutted.

The difference between the neck by which Equilateral beat Alligator Alley and Forza Orta beat Aztec Empire translated to the difference between a fair four-figure pick-up and large five-figure return.

Equilateral (far side) gets up in an agonisingly tight finish to the opening race of York's Ebor festivalCredit: Edward Whitaker

I may be talking out of my pocket, but both Alligator Alley and Aztec Empire should have won as well. Alligator Alley was awkward at the start after his blindfold came off late, while Aztec Empire got himself caught in a pocket on the rail when travelling best of all and the winner, who caused at least some of the problems, got first run.

If that wasn't bad enough, two other things were particularly galling that afternoon.

The first is that if I'd have simply done my paper Placepot perm to a similar outlay I'd have won nearly ten times as much as it's the first time I can remember ever getting loads of lines up (12) in tandem with a good return (£497.80 to a £1 stake).

The second was that I spent the afternoon watching events unfold with our senior video producer Dave Lowe who, love him though I do, has the most irritating laugh on earth. And I felt the full force of that laugh twice – first when he backed Equilateral and second when he backed Forza Orta!

More seriously, I do enjoy the occasional multiple and probably don't do enough of them.

They are not for everyone and plenty of serious punters wouldn't go near them as they are incredibly speculative, and the more selections you have the more you dilute your own value.

For example, if you have a double in a pair of ten-runner races, each with a 125 per cent profit margin to the bookmaker, the margin increases to around 160 per cent. A treble and it's nearer 200 per cent, and so on.

Bookmakers love them, and plenty, in the past on the high street at least, used to try to tempt people in by offering triple the odds about one winner in a Lucky 15.

There is a reason for that – multiples are so profitable for bookmakers that they can afford to cough up for the occasional gigantic win with a smile and reap the PR they generate.

However, multiple bets are the only way a small-stakes punter is ever going to win a serious amount of money, no matter how unlikely, and we can all dream. There is nothing wrong with treating betting as fun on occasions, even if you're the type who treats it seriously most of the time.

As far as strategy is concerned, one thing I never do is stick a load of short ones together in win accumulators, although that's what many people do. They are the sort of ones the bookmakers love as an awful lot has to go right for the punter to win and their odds of reward are still not particularly high.

It is, of course, down to preference, but my tendency, at least when I'm not attempting to go through the card at a high-profile meeting, is to focus on races in which the bookmakers are offering extra places.

There's no hard and fast rule, but I tend to look for horses on offer at 5-1 or better who are likely to run their race in the conditions, even if I don't really expect them to win.

The place part of the bet is obviously considerably easier to get up, especially if you're getting one or two extra places.

The number of legs can vary, as over time I've done anything from picking two big-field races and having three selections in each for nine cross doubles, to having nine selections and going for fourfolds, fivefolds and sixfolds (126, 126 and 84 of each respectively, if you must know) if I'm feeling particularly ambitious.

There are drawbacks, of course, as many firms won't offer best odds guaranteed on races with extra places, while some firms have refused my bet unless I went for a full perm (covering all permutations from doubles upwards) at a lower individual stake than for, say, just fourfolds and fivefolds.

Whatever you do, though, there's no need to feel like you're a mug for having a multiple. Betting is a fun pastime for the majority of people and how you get your enjoyment out of it is entirely up to you.

There is, in any case, nothing quite like the feeling of having several hundred pounds running on when you've spent only buttons in the first place.

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