3 Leg Parlay 4,0/5 7183 reviews

To explain parlay formula betting, we use an example of a 3-leg parlay involving three horse races. Parlay formula bets are only available for horse racing bets in Australia. The bettor has selected a formula of two for the parlay bet, this means, that two out of the three legs must be successful for the bet to win.

  • Consider a bettor who makes a 3-leg parlay containing the Team X moneyline at -175 odds, the Team Y moneyline at +140 odds, and the Team Z spread at -6 with -110 odds. A $1 bet on this parlay would result in a profit of $6.20 (for a.
  • If the bettor chooses to make three-team parlays they will have 56 different parlay tickets. The ticket will cost the amount chosen for each parlay. If the bettor only has $300 they might choose to Round Robin the teams by two, so they have 28 different parlays for $10 each.

A parlay, accumulator (or acca), combo bet or multi is a single bet that links together two or more individual wagers and is dependent on all of those wagers winning together. The benefit of the parlay is that there are much higher payoffs than placing each individual bet separately, since the difficulty of hitting all of them is much higher. If any of the bets in the parlay lose, the entire parlay loses. If any of the plays in the parlay ties, or 'pushes', the parlay reverts to a lower number of teams with the odds reducing accordingly.

Odds and payout[edit]

Parlay bets are paid out at odds higher than the typical single game bet, but still below the 'true' odds. For instance, a common 2-team NFL parlay based entirely on the spread generally has a payout of 2.6:1.[citation needed] In reality however, if one assumes that each single game bet is 50/50, the true payout should instead be 3:1 (10% expected value for the house). A house may average 20-30% profit on spread parlays compared to perhaps 4.5% profit on individual sports mix parlay bets.

Aside from 'spread' parlays, another way to parlay is to bet on two or more teams simply winning straight up. In order to calculate the payout of this parlay, one must multiply out the payout for all games. For example, if 3 teams are -385 favorites, a successful parlay on all 3 teams winning would pay out at a ratio of approximately 1/1. This is because (385/485)^3 is approximately 50%.

Examples[edit]

Parlay

Parlay Example

Typical payouts for up to 10 team parlay bet[edit]

The following is an example of a traditional Las Vegas Parlay Card at William Hill Sports Book, which shows the typical payouts for an up to 10 team parlay bet based on -1.10 prices (amount won is assuming $100 is bet)[citation needed]:

NumberOddsAmount wonPayout
2 Team Parlay2.6 to 1$260$360
3 Team Parlay6 to 1$600$700
4 Team Parlay11 to 1$1,100$1,200
5 Team Parlay22 to 1$2,200$2,300
6 Team Parlay45 to 1$4,500$4,600
7 Team Parlay90 to 1$9,000$9,100
8 Team Parlay180 to 1$18,000$18,100
9 Team Parlay360 to 1$36,000$36,100
10 Team Parlay720 to 1$72,000$72,100
Parlay3 leg parlay

Profitability of parlays in sports betting[edit]

Many gamblers have mixed feelings as to whether or not parlays are a wise play. The best way to analyze if they are profitable in the long term is by calculating the expected value. The formula for expected value is: E[X] = x1p1 + x2p2 + x3p3…xkpk . Since the probability of all possible events will add up to 1 this can also be looked at as the weighted average of the event. The table below represents odds.[citation needed]

Gambling Parlay

Column 1 = number of individual bets in the parlay

Column 2 = correct odds of winning with 50% chance of winning each individual bet

Parlay

3 Leg Parlay Meaning

Column 3 = odds payout of parlay at the sportsbook

How

Column 4 = correct odds of winning parlay with 55% chance of winning each individual bet

Number of individual betsCorrect odds at 50%Odds payout at sportsbookCorrect odds of winning parlay at 55%
23 to 12.6 to 12.3 to 1
37 to 16 to 15.0 to 1
415 to 112 to 19.9 to 1
531 to 124 to 118.9 to 1
663 to 148 to 135.1 to 1
7127 to 192 to 164.7 to 1
8255 to 1176 to 1118.4 to 1
9511 to 1337 to 1216.1 to 1
101,023 to 1645 to 1393.8 to 1
112,047 to 11,233 to 1716.8 to 1

The table illustrates that if a 55% chance of winning each individual bet were achievable, parlays would be profitable in the long term. Compare the expected value you receive on an individual bet at a typical price of -110 with a 55% chance of winning: ((100/110+1)*.55)-1 = .05 (exactly 5 cents won for every dollar bet on average), multiplied by 11 = .55, to the expected return on the 11 game parlay ((1234/717.8)-1) = .719 (72 cents won for every dollar bet on average). In this case a parlay has a much higher expected value than individual bets with greatly increased variance in outcomes.

See also[edit]

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