The Final Furlong is a horse racing tipster service which is being offered through the Punthub stable of tipsters. It appears to be a great value service at a glance.
Introduction to The Final Furlong
As a tipster stable, Punthub continue to grow their market share and they have put out some pretty reasonable offerings over the last… well, however long I’ve been reviewing their services. The Final Furlong is a particularly interesting offering for a number of reasons that I want to explore over the course of this article.
Key to this however is that Punthub has put together a service that may well offer some of the best possible value that I have seen from a tipster service for a very long time.
Especially when you start to factor in the features that come with the service, things that honestly, I would expect from a much more premium service. So, with all of this in mind, is The Final Furlong something that you should seriously be considering? Let’s have a look and see.
What Does The Final Furlong Offer?
As far as tipster services go, The Final Furlong doesn’t really break any new ground. This does not necessarily seem to be a bad thing here though. Logistically, you are looking at a very typical service from Punthub, albeit a bit of a selective one.
Whilst there are selections advised most days, there are periods where no bets are provided. Honestly though, this isn’t a bad thing with some tipster services seeming to advise bad selections for the sake of sending something out, rather than nothing.
When The Final Furlong does have bets available, these are emailed directly to subscribers. The quality of these emails is very high, as I will explore shortly.
In terms of the bets themselves, there is a combination of win and each way bets available, as well as the occasional smaller accumulator. It is worth noting however that Punthub’s proofing demonstrates that there is not a massive range of odds here.
There are a number of bets that are advised at less than evens, generally not getting into double figures. It is worth noting the fact that whilst The Final Furlong isn’t a service that advises of bets every day, this doesn’t mean that it is necessarily a low volume service. The fact is that some days can have quite a substantial number of bets, sometimes backing multiple horses in the same day.
Punthub do have a staking plan in place for The Final Furlong and it is a very straight forward level staking affair. All bets are advised to be backed to 1 point to win or 0.5 points each way. On the occasions where there are accumulators, these are also backed to just 1 point. This makes for a very straight service which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It is worth noting that whilst Punthub don’t provide advice on a betting bank for The Final Furlong, I would expect that 100 points should be enough due to the nature of the service.
Finally, I want to talk about the strike rate for The Final Furlong. This is another area in which Punthub don’t give out much in the way of information. I have taken the liberty however of calculating a figure from the proofing. Of some 627 bets placed, 250 of them have been designated losers whilst 121 have been unplaced. This makes for a strike rate of around 40.2% which isn’t a bad figure at all. As I will cover though, because of the odds, it still makes for a somewhat precarious service.
How Does The Final Furlong Work?
As always with services from Punthub, there is unfortunately very little in the way of information on what the selection process actually entails. Fortunately, this isn’t really a problem as The Final Furlong has the distinction of being a tipster service in which the tipster behind the service provides a full and detailed explanation on the reasoning for the selections. This is something that is typically the reserve of more expensive tipster services and is a strong positive for the service.
Building on the fact that you receive a write up on why a horse has been selected, one thing that is particularly positive to note about The Final Furlong is that there is a relatively consistent approach to these.
This suggests to me that whilst you won’t ever get a full luck at the bigger picture behind the tipster’s approach to The Final Furlong, you know that this isn’t somebody clutching at straws. As a final note, it is also worth keeping in mind that Punthub do provide full proofing for the service as well, so you can always get an idea of what to expect before you actually make a purchase.
What is the Initial Investment?
There are just two options if you want to sign up for The Final Furlong. The first of these is a monthly subscription which is priced at just £9.99 per month. Alternatively, you can sign up on a quarterly basis which represents a reasonable saving at just £25 for 3 months. It is worth keeping in mind that payment for both of these options is handled directly through Paypal, and with no mention of any money back guarantee, it seems all payments are final.
What is the Rate of Return?
The Final Furlong has been operational since November of 2017 and since then, it has amassed a profit of 88.26 points according to Punthub’s proofing, at the time of writing.
Given that you are looking at more than 18 months of results, that doesn’t necessarily look great, however that is not necessarily the full picture. At the start of January 2019, The Final Furlong stood at just 35.92 points which means that this year, there has effectively been a 53 point increase in profit which is a not inconsiderable amount.
I feel it is also worth mentioning that over the full duration of its proofing, The Final Furlong has maintained an ROI of 10.81% which isn’t a terrible number.
Conclusion on The Final Furlong
Objectively, The Final Furlong is a bit of a mixed bag, however I will say that I am quite enamoured with it.
First of all, I want to address the criticisms that I have as there are definitely some things that need to be mentioned and considered. Mostly, and perhaps not all that surprisingly, these are based around the profitability for the service. The uplift in results for 2019 are a benefit, but it is difficult to ignore the fat that looking at the big picture, The Final Furlong hasn’t exactly set the world alight.
With that having been said, there are a number of positives that I want to discuss. One of the main things is value for money. Now, in the case of The Final Furlong, I see this as being about more than just the cost. Don’t get me wrong, what Punthub are asking to receive selections is not a lot at all.
In fact, I can quite comfortably say that this is one of the cheapest tipster services that I have looked at for a long time. £100 for a year (using the quarterly subscription) represents the potential for phenomenal value for money.
Now another less straight forward element of value lies in the detailed reasoning behind selections. I am always a fan of this as I believe that it also adds something of an educational value to a service as well. Once again, paying £25 per quarter isn’t a substantial amount of money for that.
Admittedly, this isn’t necessarily going to make you a better bettor overnight, buy I do think it helps to foster an understanding of what to look for. Again, you aren’t paying a lot for this at all. In fact, most services I have seen in a similar vein to The Final Furlong are quite a bit more expensive.
So, would I recommend The Final Furlong? To a certain type of person, definitely. For others, not so much. Here’s how I see it. If you are looking for a first time horse racing tipster service and you are new to serious betting, this should be ideal.
The fact that you are receiving insight really helps you to look into the mind of a tipster, and if you are starting out, that is worth a lot. There is some profit to be had and realistically, I think that £5 bets would return a very modest amount, but it would also cover your subscription costs.
If you are a more serious bettor and you are all about the bottom line, then The Final Furlong probably isn’t for you. I think there are some quite clear limitations in terms of profitability and honestly, you could do much better than 53 points in 5 months.
Yes you might pay more than Punthub want here for that increased profit, but if you are looking solely for profit, that shouldn’t really be a problem.
