Bet Settlements Explained The Dead

Heat Golf Betting

Dead heats in golf

One of the most confusing aspects about Golf Betting is the Dead Heat Ruling on the Outright result.

As we have previously said, you generally cannot have a dead heat for the actual winner of a tournament,
as extra holes are played to decide the overall winner. This is not the case for the placed golfers. Most
weeks will produce a Dead Heat of some description in a golf event. Lets look at a couple of scenarios:

Dead heat involving two players

Example: You have staked 2 each way on Padraig Harrington to win the US Open at 16/1. Paddy Power
are paying five places at each way terms of 1/4 of the odds. The leaderboard looks like this at the end of
the tournament:
Position Golfer Score
1 Tiger Woods -8
2 Phil Mickelson -6
3 Lee Westwood -5
4 Jim Furyk -4
5 DH Sergio Garcia -2
Padraig
5 DH -2
Harrington

The top four places are undisputed; however there are two players level on fifth place. So what now?

Dead heat rules state that your stake should be divided by the number of competitors involved in the
dead heat and then settled at the normal odds. This means that the example bet above would be settled
as follows:

An each way bet is essentially two bets, a bet on the selection to win and a bet on the selection to place.
The 1 win part of your bet is a loser, as Harrington didnt win. The each way part of your bet is 2. In a
dead heat situation, your stake is divided by the number of competitors involved in the dead heat (in this
case theres two; Garcia and Harrington). 1 divided by 2 is 50c. So were working out 50c at 16/1 with
each way terms of 1/4 of the odds. The calculation will look like this:
Place terms 16/1 Divided by 4 = 4/1
Dead heat 2 players divided by 1 place = 0.50
1.00 becomes 50c.
Your reduced stake is 0.50 x 2 = 1.00

Total returns
Reduced Stake x place terms + reduced stake = Total return. = 2.50

Dead heat involving more than two players

Following on from the above example, a different situation occurs if the leaderboard had finished like this:

Position Golfer Score

1 Tiger Woods -8
2 DH Phil Mickelson -6
2 DH Lee Westwood -6
2 DH Jim Furyk -6
2 DH Sergio Garcia -6
Padraig
2 DH -6
Harrington
2 DH Kenny Perry -6

In this situation, six players are tied for second however, Paddy Power are paying five places and there
are seven players filling these places. Settling this market is a little more complex.

All bets on Woods are winners and are not affected by any dead heat. This leaves four further places for
us to pay out on six competitors. This means that the dead heat terms are 4 divided by 6.

Example: As an example, well use 2 each way on Harrington to win at 16/1. The calculation is similar to
before (its easier to explain if we work out the dead heat terms first, in this instance)

Place terms: 16/1 Divided by 4 = 4/1

Dead heat: 6 players divided by 4 place = 0.67
1.00 stake becomes 0.67c
Your reduced stake is 0.67 x 2 = 1.34

Total returns
Reduced Stake x place terms + reduced stake = Total return. = 6.68