When it comes to horse racing, you need to look at the horse that you want to bet, his statistics and how well he has done over time, more particularly in the past few races. You need to look over the competition and see how they stack up. You need to examine the jockey riding your horse and what he has done. Is he the regular rider? Then you need to look over the weather conditions, the track conditions, wind, the odds the handicap and all that stuff and you need to look over all that data and decide how much of your hard earned money you are willing to risk on this horse coming across the finish line in the number one position.

Now poker, on the other hand, is more a people game. You have to be good at reading people and the gestures and movements and it also helps if you can keep a mental note of cards played and dealt so you can sort of figure out what the possibility is of you getting that Royal Flush or what ever hand you are trying to assemble at the moment.

Reading faces is relatively easy if you just take a few trial hands and watch how the people react. Unless you are facing a professional, everyone gives away little quirks when they get a good card or hand, or they bet a certain way based on what they hold and after a few hands you should be able to get a feel for what they may be holding by the way they gesture and or bet on the hand.

Counting the cards and keeping a thought as to what has also been played will also give you a bit of a mental outline of what is going on and what may be where and what you might expect to get in your next card.

But there is still a certain amount of luck involved in both and poker, but I think more of lady luck comes in to play with cards. Let's face it, on the ponies once you know what the horse is capable of and has done, there is a strong possibility that unless he goes lame of breaks a leg that he is going to perform similarly on the race that you are betting on. With cards, all things being equal and if you have a somewhat honest dealer, you are left to the luck of how the cards fall in the shuffle.

So, for my money, horses will give you a better return on the investment dollars that you have and you should be able walk away with a nice lining of green in your pockets from a little bit of work.