This quaddie calculator turns the runners you are taking in each leg into a cost: it multiplies them into a combination count, divides your outlay over those combinations to get the flexi percentage, and shows what a dividend would collect. It covers the three leg counts a multi-race tote pool comes in: two for a running or daily double, four for a quaddie or an early quaddie, and six for the Big 6 bet.
A tote dividend is not known before the race, so the dividend box is optional: leave it blank and read the cost only.
How to use the quaddie calculator
| Input | What to type |
|---|---|
| Pool | Double (2 legs), Quaddie (4 legs) or Big 6 (6 legs) |
| Leg 1 to 6 runners | Runners you are taking in that race, 1 to 24 |
| Work it out from | Outlay, or Flexi % to name the share instead |
| Outlay or Flexi percentage | Whichever of those two you picked |
| Dividend per $1 (optional) | A declared or approximate dividend, stake included |
| Minimum flexi % (optional) | Your operator's own minimum, if it sets one |
Four tiles answer as you type: combinations, flexi share, outlay, and what the dividend collects. Under them, one row per leg shows what dropping a runner from that leg would do.
The tool refuses what it cannot price: a leg that is not a whole number from 1 to 24, an outlay outside $0.01 to $1,000,000 (including one worked back from a flexi, so 100% of a very wide Big 6 is refused), and a dividend over $10,000,000. It takes a dollar sign in the money boxes and a percent sign in the percentage boxes, and reads a decimal comma such as 2,50 as nothing rather than as $250.
The quaddie formula: combinations and flexi percentage
combinations = runners in leg 1 x runners in leg 2 x ... x runners in the last leg
flexi % = outlay / combinations x 100
Every combination is a separate bet, so one wide leg anywhere on the ticket multiplies every other leg.
The tote rules Western Australia adopted, as gazetted on 3 August 2010, define a flexi bet as one where the amount on each combination is a percentage of the unit of investment, and a winner is paid that percentage of the declared dividend:
collect = dividend x outlay / combinations
How a flexi bet is priced applies the same share to the single-race exotics.
A worked quaddie, from runners per leg to the collect
With illustrative numbers, take 3 runners in leg 1, 4 in leg 2, 2 in leg 3 and 5 in leg 4, for a $30 outlay.
combinations = 3 x 4 x 2 x 5 = 120
flexi % = 30 / 120 x 100 = 25%
Each combination carries 25c, so if all four winners are among your selections one of them collects a quarter of the dividend:
collect = 2,000 x 0.25 = $500, a profit of 500 - 30 = $470
Daily double and Big 6 costs, worked through
With illustrative selections and dividends:
| Pool | Runners per leg | Combinations | Outlay | Flexi | Collects |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Double | 2 x 5 | 10 | $4.00 | 40% | $23.12 on a $57.80 dividend |
| Quaddie | 3 x 4 x 2 x 5 | 120 | $30.00 | 25% | $500.00 on a $2,000 dividend |
| Big 6 | 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 | 64 | $10.00 | 15.63% | $7,812.50 on a $50,000 dividend |
The double row runs the tool backwards: 40% over 10 combinations is 10 x 0.40 = $4.00, and 40% of $57.80 is $23.12. A running double or daily double is priced the same way wherever your tote takes doubles at flexi, which the 2010 rules leave to the operator (rule 3.5(b)). The Big 6 row is the warning: two runners in every leg is already 64 combinations, and four a leg is 4,096, so a 5% ticket there costs $204.80.
The Collects tile works out what one winning combination collects, so type whichever dividend has been declared: the 2010 rules split the Big 6 pool, 90% to tickets with all six winners and 10% to tickets with the first five winners and a loser in the sixth (rule 15.1).
What leaving one runner out of a leg saves
Dropping one of r runners in a leg removes one r-th of your combinations, so at the same flexi share it saves one r-th of the outlay. On the $30 quaddie above:
| Drop one from | Combinations | Outlay | Saving |
|---|---|---|---|
| The 3-runner leg | 2 x 4 x 2 x 5 = 80 | $20.00 | $10.00 |
| The 4-runner leg | 3 x 3 x 2 x 5 = 90 | $22.50 | $7.50 |
| The 2-runner leg | 3 x 4 x 1 x 5 = 60 | $15.00 | $15.00 |
| The 5-runner leg | 3 x 4 x 2 x 4 = 96 | $24.00 | $6.00 |
The biggest saving sits in your shortest leg, because each runner there carries the most combinations: in a leg of two, one runner carries half the ticket. Which runner you can afford to lose is a form question, covered in quaddie staking and structure.
Risk: Betting involves risk. A narrower ticket saves money and loses more often, and there is no guarantee of profit. See responsible gambling for limits and support.
Scratchings, substitutes and the minimum flexi
A scratching does not change what a multi-race ticket cost. The 2010 tote rules Western Australia adopted refund a bet on a scratched runner in a single race (rule 9.1), but in a Double, a Quaddie or the Big 6 they move the money to a substitute (rule 9.2(a)). That substitute is the runner with the most money on it in the operator's win pool once betting on that race closes, or, in the Big 6, in that leg of the Big 6 pool (rule 9.3). A Feature Double is the exception, where the investment is forfeited (rule 9.2(b)).
Your outlay and your combination count both stay put, but if the substitute was already one of your runners in that leg, those combinations double up on it and the ticket covers fewer results, which exotic scratching rules works through. Cents-in-the-dollar deductions never reach a tote pool, which scratchings and deductions covers.
Note: under rule 3.5(a) a flexi bet needs at least 1c a combination, or the operator's own minimum where that is higher, and rule 3.5(c) rounds each combination's share down to the nearest ten-thousandth of a cent. Operators publish their own pool conditions, so read them where you are betting.
Rounding, and the mistakes that cost money
The tool rounds the flexi percentage for the screen and works the collect from the unrounded share. A $10 Big 6 over 64 combinations is a 15.625% share shown as 15.63%, and on an illustrative $50,000 dividend the exact share pays 50,000 x 10 / 64 = $7,812.50 where 15.63% pays $7,815.00. Under the Northern Territory's totalisator rules (the 2011 rules, as in force from 14 April 2020) a dividend is also rounded down to a multiple of 5c, with the operator keeping the difference.
| Mistake | What it costs | The fix |
|---|---|---|
| Reading the flexi as a discount | Expecting the whole $2,000 and collecting $500 | Treat the percentage as the size of your bet |
| Adding the legs instead of multiplying | 2 + 6 + 3 + 4 reads as 15 combinations, not 144: a $15 budget for a $144 ticket | Multiply the legs, then read the combinations tile |
| Assuming a minimum flexi | A ticket under it is refused, not scaled up | Type the minimum from the pool conditions in |
Reading the leg prices before you take the quaddie
A tote dividend stays unknown until it is declared, but each leg also has a fixed-odds win market that bookmakers have already priced. The B337 Terminal shows prices from 40+ bookmakers across racing and sports side by side, with Betfair back and lay, price history and closing lines, and a free account opens a limited view of the Terminal with live odds. Prices are read on a repeating cycle and shown as at the time displayed. Bookmaker names are trade marks of their owners. B337 is not affiliated with them.
Risk: Betting involves risk. Pool sizes and prices move, a quaddie that misses one leg collects nothing, and a wider ticket holds a smaller share of each dividend for the same outlay. There is no guarantee of profit. Betting on horse racing covers the groundwork, and responsible gambling has limits and support.