People love to talk about “hitting” the superfecta, as if it’s some solvable math puzzle or a riddle you just haven’t guessed right yet. Let me save you the nonsense: nobody—and I mean nobody—can predict with any reasonable degree of confidence who’s running third or fourth in a horse race.

You can handicap pace, figures, class, intent… but you cannot handicap the moment a jockey realizes he can’t win and decides to wrap up and save horse and mount for another day. You can’t handicap when a horse gets shuffled, steadies, switches leads late or simply decides he’s had enough. Third and fourth place is where chaos lives. The deeper you go into a race, the more the intangibles pile up.

So, what do you do? You stop trying to be a magician and you start playing the pools the way they’re beatable.

This is where I’ve made money for decades.

The Play: Turn the Superfecta Into a One-Horse Exacta

Here’s how I approach the superfecta, and I will put this up against anyone trying the “pick four horses to box or key and hope” routine.

I take one horse I like on top—a horse I have a legitimate opinion on, not a guess. Usually, it’s a horse I like at a price, or one I think will beat the favorite.

Then I use two horses in the second slot—again, horses I want to be right about. If I’m beating the favorite in the win or the place slot, that’s where big money starts sprouting.

Now here’s the key:
For the third and fourth spots, I go ALL.

Why?
Because nobody can predict third or fourth.
Because the bombs, the pluggers, the grinders, the suck-up closers—they all live down there.
And occasionally, one of those horses I’d never land on just chugs up for a piece and detonates the pool.

You don’t get that with a “four horse box.” You don’t get that by trying to “pick” your third and fourth place horses. You get that by accepting that the bottom half of the superfecta is where the sport buries certainty.

So, the wager becomes something like this:

1st: A
2nd: B, C
3rd: ALL
4th: ALL

Please don’t confuse this with the ABC method, I don’t use or bet that way I am only illustrating my structure.

It’s not cheap in a 12-horse field, but in a 7-horse field it’s absolutely playable. And the reason it works is simple: You’re structuring the ticket around what you can know and protecting yourself from what you can’t.

Why It Works (And Yes, It Works)

The superfecta isn’t a handicapping test, it’s a ticket construction test.
People think the hardest part is picking horses. It’s not.
The hardest part is knowing how to bet and, just as importantly, knowing how not to bet.

And when you turn a superfecta into a glorified exacta—your one horse beating two horses—you simplify a bet that is typically the most overcomplicated and misunderstood wager in the game.

Here’s what this structure does:

1. It lets you cash with horses you’d never use

Some 38-1 plodder sneaks up for third?
The 51-1 donkey you tossed in the win pool?
You don’t care. You’re covered.

2. It boosts payouts when you beat the favorite

If the chalk doesn’t finish first or second, super pools explode.
If you’ve got a strong opinion against a favorite in the top two slots, this is your lane.

3. It gives you value for being right

If you nail your top horse and one of your two second horses, you’ve effectively won your bet—the bottom two holes just need bodies.

4. It protects you from race chaos

And superfecta chaos is real.
Traffic. Trouble. Trips. Ease-ups. Lost irons. Bad breaks. Riding decisions. Head scratchers.
You cannot predict these things, but you can insulate yourself against them.

Surviving the Game Requires Knowing the Game

If you want to beat this sport—honestly, if you just want to survive in it—you better learn that ticket construction is every bit as important as handicapping talent.

Too many players handicap well and bet poorly.
Too many players “like the right horse” and go home broke.
Too many players try to be cute in the superfecta, and that’s how they donate to the cause.

This method has worked for me because it’s honest about the nature of the bet. It respects the unpredictability of the lower rungs of the trifecta and super ladders. And it leverages the only thing you can actually trust: your opinion on who can win and who can run second.

Build the ticket around what you know, leave room for what you can’t possibly know, and cash when chaos works for you instead of against you.

That’s how you beat the superfecta.
That’s how you stay alive.
And that’s how you hit scores that straight handicapping could never touch.

Now, enough teaching how to fish, I will try and buy us all one. In the last race at Tampa Bay Downs on Saturday, assuming we stay on the grass I like Fluid Situation. Kevin Rice is great at spotting his horses and this guy likes turf, is in form, projects the right trip, and his best races out him right there. The price should be fair, and I’ll close out the Tampa Bay first Saturday on the 100^th season with Fluid Situation.