Formula 1 Racing – Best Sportsbooks are Listed
In Formula 1 auto racing, only a small number of drivers win races each year. While it narrows down the field and makes it easier to pick outright winners, it also means that the favoured driver rarely provides value. To find the best bets, stats and trends need to be followed, and winning F1 bettors do the math. When you dig into the stats, some interesting and very surprising numbers pop out at you. We’ll discuss some of those stats later in this article.
A key element to becoming profitable in F1 betting is the ability to compare odds and get the best prices available. This means that serious F1 punters need to have funded accounts at several sportsbooks on the net. At SBL.com, F1 is one of our favourite sports to bet on, and below are the best sites for F1 betting.
.
1/ Sports Interaction: Focuses solely on the Canadian market. Sports Interaction has a huge selection of betting options across every sport, as such, F1 Grand Prix betting options are wide. For every F1 race, Sports Interaction offers wagering for individual race winners. Podium and Speed Row bets are offered for most races as well. Punters can find futures bets for the World Drivers Championship (WDC) and World Constructors Championship (WCC) well before the season begins, and deep into it as well. Sports Interaction has an excellent reputation, accepts all of the most popular deposit options, and offers 24/7 customer support via toll free phone, email, and live chat. A full-featured online casino and poker room are also available. 18+, T&Cs apply, and Gamble Responsibly (BeGambleAware).
Sports Interaction also offers live F1 betting and mobile F1 betting from iPhone, Blackberry, Android and Windows based phones.
How to Bet on F1 Auto Racing
The most popular way to bet on F1 auto racing is on outright winners. Punters can also bet on the World Drivers Championship, the World Constructors Championship, driver matchups, Speed Rows, and Podium finishes.
F1 Outright Winner Bets
Betting on outright winners always adds an element of excitement to a race, but a lot of casual punters fail to do the research before placing their bets. At times when a single driver is heavily favoured to win, the odds on him are very poor. For example, when a driver wins two races in a row, the odds on him for the third race are generally in the 1/2 – 2/9 range. There are two major problems with betting on this driver.
1/ There are always 3-5 competitive drivers in a race with a legitimate shot at winning. 1/2 – 2/9 odds don’t reflect that.
2/ 13 of the last 14 back-to-back winners have not gone on to win the third race. While it’s a small sample size, this shows us how difficult it is for a single driver to hold off the rest of the field three races in a row.
F1 is not just about a drivers skill, it’s also about getting cars dialed in, perfect pit-stops, track conditions, suitability to the car, and a number of other elements. This is a team sport where everything has to go right in order to win. To win three times in a row against the best teams in world is a very difficult task. So, where is the value in the favourite at 2/5 odds?
Instead, look to bet on drivers who’ve fared well in previous races and offers better odds.
Matchup Bets
Many sportsbooks offer matchups bets, wagers that pit drivers against each other. Most often these bets are between two drivers, but some bookmakers offer matchups of 5-6 drivers. The punters job is to determine which driver will have the highest finish in a race.
In matchup bets that pit the top 5-6 drivers, these are bad bets to make. The reason is because the winner of the race will likely come out of this pool anyway, and punters can get much better Formula 1 odds on an outright winner bet.
Matchup bets should only be made on pools of drivers that do not include the driver who you think will win the race.
Propositions (Props)
Prop bets are wagers that do not fall into any of the standard betting categories listed above. An example of an F1 prop bet would be picking the driver you think will lead the most laps in a race. These types of bets are more for entertainment purposes and it’s not often you’ll find value betting on props.
F1 World Constructors Championship Bets (WCC)
Another popular wager is betting on what team or constructor you think is going to do the best in a given race. Most teams consist of two drivers and in order to win the bet your drivers need to finish better than the other teams in the wager.
F1 World Drivers Championship (WDC)
You can bet on F1 future bets as well, which are bets that last the entire racing season. You can wager on what driver you think is going to win the Drivers World Championship or who will win the Constructors World Championship. Your money may be locked up for the season, but if you find good value in the bet then you need to think of it as an investment.
Useful Tips to Help You Win
Don’t bet on back-to-back winners. Since 2007 there have been 12 instances of back to back winners that did not win the third race. Only one time since 2007 has there been a driver to win more than 2 races in a row, when Jenson Button won four straight races, and 6 of the first 7 for the season. This is a huge suckers bet because back to back winners generally come in as heavy favorites, but they rarely pull off the three-peat. This bet would’ve been lost 12 out of 13 times, and the one win likely wouldn’t have matched that single wager.
This is different from how it used to be. From 2000 – 2006, there were 24 back to back winners that did not win the third race, but there were a total of 10 drivers who won 3 or more races in a row.
F1 European Grand Prix racing is the type of sport that draws passionate fans. If you’re a casual punter looking to have some fun, keep your bets reasonable in size and we wish you luck. However, serious handicappers need to be able to separate their heart from their wallets.