Pick 4 Budgets
 

Been struggling with setting budget for pick4's lately.

Personally, I have very limited and sporatic success with playing the pick 4 on $50+- budget. This may be attributable to limited ability on my part...

Seems like it makes sense to play the pick 4 with a strategy similar to pick 6. Using $2 tickets (or more) on top combinations and $1 tickets to cover. Just feel like ticket cost can get very high $200+.

Anyone here have opinions on pick4 budgets?

Maybe try the grand salami instead for $5 play.

Your best bet is the BBB ticket of 1x1x1x2

1X1X1X2 X $150... I could retire by X-mas.

I don't think assigning a budget to your P4 plays is a good way to go about it. I think you should let the sequence dictate what you spend. There are some sequences (like big NYRA stakes days) where you'd be foolish to spend more than $24 if you don't think more than one favorite can be beat. Then there are days that you realistically need $200 to give yourself a shot and it would be foolish to waste $24 on a limited ticket.

I definitely think the ABC method is the way to go though the majority of the time.

Definitely agree that a budget should not be set in stone. Some time it is a very narrow ticket, sometimes an altogether pass.

It's the other say 75% of the time I am concerned with. Do you play a set of A,B,C tickets or just limit size and take your lumps when you miss.

Guess the answer is whatever make you $$$...

just do what bbb does..

Definitely don't do that. . . $200 seems a little high to me for the pk4 on most days. . .

to me best success would be when you sense 1-2 vulnerable favorites at least and then play every horse that has a prayer hoping that at least 2 of the races leave you with 2-3 horses and the other 2 races as many as you need. this is normally a rather hefty bet, but thats how you hit the 4-5 digit payoffs. unless you are one of those geniuses who only need the 1x1x1x2

I think the key to the pick 4 wager is to have at least one strong opinion on a race. Forcing a single is not a good thing and I've learned that the hard way. Another thing is to not exclude horses because of cost restraints.
Passing on the wager when you have uncertainty about two legs or more is probably the wisest thing to do. I