Daydreaming of college football

I backtested the first 3 weeks of last college football season. At $100 per parlay, if I have this figured correctly:

Wk 1: 8-7, -$120

Wk 2: 10-4, $800

Wk 3: 11-6, $560

That would be $200 bet per game, $9200 bet, $1240 won, 13.5% ROI. So far so good. I'll test more later.

I finished the NCAA season from last year. At $100 per parlay, if I have this figured correctly:

• wk 1: 8-7, -$120
• wk 2: 10-4, $800
• wk 3: 11-6, $560
• wk 4: 10-5, $600
• wk 5: 7-4, $320
• wk 6: 9-1, $1,240
• wk 7: 6-4, $160
• wk 8: 6-4, $160
• wk 9: 8-4, $480
• wk 10: 6-7, -$440
• wk 11: 7-5, $120
• wk 12: 10-5, $600
• wk 13: 9-6-1, $230.90 (the push would be -$9.10)
• wk 14: 9-5, $440

Total: 116-67-1 = $5150.90 profit / $36,800 bet = 14% ROI

I like these numbers. Going to have to backtest other seasons.

Use multiple books - one for the fave and over, the other book for dog and under.

One part of this that has bothered me was betting the two parlays. You know you will lose one and possibly both. So, I went back and ran the numbers for betting just one way or the other. The parlay betting on the Fave and over would have won $5910 while the dog and under lost $760. Adding these together gets you the total of $5150 that I had in post 6.

The interesting part about this is that you only bet 1/2 the amount as you would if you bet both parts since you are only doing one $100 parlay. $5910 won on $18,400 bet = 32% ROI.

Of course I'll have to check previous years to see if the fave and over angle holds up. If it varies from year to year vs dogs and under, you'd be better of hedging and betting both. Will post when I do more testing.

Just ran through the 2012 season.

Betting both:  $1720 (on $27,800 bet = 6% ROI)

Faves/Over: $3020 (on $13,900 bet = 21.7% ROI)

Dogs/Under: Lost $1300

Will check more years later.

2011 season:

Betting both: $1360

Faves/Over: $1760

Dogs/Under: Lost $400

2010 season:

Betting both: $4400

Faves/Over: $4900

Dogs/Under: Lost $500

4 year results:

Betting both: $12,630

Faves/Over: $15,590

Dogs/Under: Lost $2,960

Given that betting on the dogs and under lost money each of the last 4 years, if I played this system, I'd only bet the faves and over parlay.

I cannot handicap a football game, pro or college, if my life depended on it. I tend to stay away from betting on football exept when Gratefulbets produces hi college bowl picks.

That being said, I just did 5 years of backtesting on this system so it would almost be criminal not to put that to good use. What I'm going to do is start with $1000 and flat bet $25 per parlay (2.5%) on the fave and over as described above and adjust the amount for each week.

Joe, what book are you using? I will wait until much closer to actual kick-off to do any bets. The lines I see at Cantor are pretty close to what you show, except no line for Notre Dame yet.

Once all the books have their lines I will line shop each game. Most do not have totals yet.