“UFA” stands for Unsportsman’s Fair. It is a term used by horse racing book makers to describe those racing shops that do not have a license to trade. The first UFA was in 1969. Since then there has been a growing problem with book makers, allowing their customers to borrow money on their bet from other sports books. If a customer bet on two horses and wins then the book maker makes money. But if the customer bets on one horse and loses then the bookmaker doesn’t get paid.
UFA’s don’t like this because it ruins their business. Horse racing fans like to bet on their favorite race and if one of the horses wins the UFA demands that the bet is returned. Many horse racing book makers are very conservative and won’t put a lot of money on a win because they figure that if the customer comes back a couple of times then they will probably make money. The other problem is that the customer keeps betting and the book maker can’t collect the money or collect any money at all. That’s why they try to discourage the credit card person from using their website by calling the credit card company and threaten to charge the credit card for bets made on the website.
It is the book makers that take a loss and make money with their betting system and the customers that don’t make a loss that need to come to an understanding. UFA isn’t always bad. Some sports books have had trouble getting the approval of the Racing Commission of America (RCA). The main problem is that most of the betting and gaming rules in place today weren’t in place when the first UFA was started. That’s why most sports books try to stay out of the UFA arena as much as possible and that makes for good business.
The RCA introduced new rules in 2021 that made it harder for people to handicap races on sporting events. They also wanted to make it harder for the customers at sports books to beat the system by using their own resources to do the handicapping. That was supposed to happen and now there seems to be some peace at last. Most sports books are making nice money now and it’s mostly because of the Martingale system that has been perfected by one person, Harry Heilman.
Harry created a Martingale System that uses a very simple and easy to understand mathematical algorithm. It basically works by using a basic understanding of statistics and how to interpret that information. This is the exact system that is used at the University of Michigan and it is a well-respected system. That’s why the racing commission finally approved UFA.
As time goes on I am sure more changes will be made to UFA but for now you still need to remember that it’s not the end of the world if you’re a betting enthusiast. You just need to find another way to accomplish your goals and that is through good old-fashioned hard work. There are still many legitimate sports books out there but I think Harry’s Martingale system is the best one out there. I have enjoyed betting on UFA for a long time and hope that with the recent changes it will only get better.