Monday Morning Message with Jason Beem for July 7, 2025

A good Monday morning to you all! Hope your holiday weekend went well. Ready to get back to work here in Virginia as we get set for week 1 at Colonial Downs. The cards are remarkably good and competitive, and each day has an average field size of 10 or more per race and that’s not including also-eligible runners. I’ll write more about Colonial in Thursday’s column.  

On Saturday, my pal Alan from the Auxiliary Gate Podcast made a comment about how “there’s no free squares in horse racing.” While it was just a simple point he brought up after two big favorites had been beaten (Kopion at Los Alamitos and Nitrogen at Saratoga) I think it’s a good discussion point that is always evergreen. 

The concept of a “free square” or “free space” generally is a topic when discussing big favorites in horizontal wagers. A big majority of the public will see a horse like that and single them and try to build around it in the other legs to construct a winning ticket. The problem is that so many people leverage on these types of “free space” horses that you really have to get some big prices in the other legs to see some value. When you have these "free space" types in the first leg of a Pick 5 and they win, it’s interesting how often the Pick 4 starting in the next leg will end up paying more than the Pick 5. I think that’s in part because Pick 5 players often have bigger bankrolls to go after their sequences, but also because once those bigger rolled players are live in the Pick 5, they have less reason to even play the Pick 4 pool.

I think a lot of players, especially smaller bankrolled players, breathe a sigh of relief when they see a "free space" horse in a sequence. They feel like they can keep their ticket more affordable and have a better chance of hitting. And of course, these types of horses often do win and you absolutely can hit a nice ticket even with a big logical chalk win. But those times you don’t, and those times will happen like on Saturday, you just have to move on. 

The general rule for these types of horses when it comes to Pick 4s or 5s is to either single or play completely against. If a horse that is 2-5 or less loses, and you think they should lose, you certainly don’t want to not have the horse that beats it. The other obvious hard part of a Pick 5, for example, is even if you are right and beat the 2-5 shot in one race, you have to be right four other times. And if you went four or five deep to beat the big free space horse, you’ve used up a fair bit of your bankroll to get there. 

It’s a tough game, but it’s supposed to be tough. I think a lot of players get focused on hitting each ticket and add a lot of extra and unnecessary horses to tickets in order to get through a leg or hit the ticket. You’re going to be wrong so often in this game, you have to get comfortable with being wrong a fair bit more than you’re right. Just try and make what you think are good, solid decisions and be aggressive with those opinions, and I’m sure your game will improve. But remember, there are no free spaces! 

Have a good week everyone!