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If you are planning to bet on the Breeders' Cup on Oct. 27 (and if you aren't, why the heck not?), and you have a reasonably deep bankroll, then you should probably be taking a look at the two Pick Fours that will be offered. The Pick Four is always an intriguing bet because it is reasonably winnable, quite affordable to play, and the risk-to-reward ratio is often excellent. On Breeders' Cup day, though, the bet holds an extra special appeal. Both bets have a guaranteed pool of $2 million. That means that there will be a pile of money directed towards the bets, and much of it won't be particularly intelligent money. That, in turn, means that high payoffs are very possible. Who wouldn't want a piece of that?

The payoffs can, as I said, be huge. Last year, one $2 ticket paid off a ridiculous $96,907 on the late Pick Four. In 2004, the late ticket paid $46,270. Six of the last eight Pick Four tickets have paid at least $13,000. Even the lowest payout, $3,130 on the early Pick Four in 2004, represents a significant return on investment for an intelligently purchased ticket. Do I have your attention yet?

First, the basics. If you haven't figured it out, the object of the Pick Four is to pick the winners of four consecutive races. You can obviously pick more than one horse in each race (as long as you are willing to pay for the privilege), but you must have the winner in all four races in order to cash in. The cost of a ticket can get very high if you have several horses in each race. You must pay for every single possible combination you choose. The way to calculate the cost of your ticket is relatively simple - you just multiply the number of horses you have in each race together, and multiply that by the $2 cost per ticket. If you chose three horses per race, for example, then the cost of your ticket would be 3x3x3x3x$2=$162. If that's too steep you can always bet the $1 minimum per combination, but that obviously means that your payout will be half the size of the listed payouts. The investment is half as much, though, so your ROI will be the same either way.

If you aren't careful, the cost of a ticket can get way out of control on a day when most of the races will have 14 horses in them. Buying every combination would cost more than $76,000, so you have to limit yourself. To do that you need a strategy and some self restraint. Here are three tips to keep in mind as you are putting together your winning tickets:

1. You can't pick every horse - If you try hard enough you can make a case for every horse in a race. That's true any day, but especially so at the Breeders' Cup when the worst horse in any race would be the best horse at most of the smaller tracks in the country. In your handicapping you have to focus not on every horse that stands a possible chance, but on every horse that you think stands a good chance of winning. You aren't looking to bet every possibility, but rather to spend the minimum amount to give yourself the maximum chance of success. Look at it this way - any horse can win a given race, but over the course of time the favorite will win a third of all races, and the top handful of horses will win the large majority of the races. You need to reject the horses that stand little hope of winning, and concentrate on those that are, in your mind, likely.

2. Think about winning, not the payoff - Sure, you could make tens of thousands of dollars if you picked the longest shot in each race and they all came in, but that just isn't going to happen. You want to buy a ticket that gives you the best chance of cashing in regardless of the price. On Breeders' Cup day even the worst Pick Four payoff is going to ensure you have a very, very good day (and night). Don't be tempted to throw in longshots with little hope of success because all it does is drive up your ticket cost and drive down your return on investment.

3. Not all horses are created equal - Your handicapping will tell you that all horses don't have the same chance of winning, so why would you bet them as if they do. Instead of picking all of the horses that could win and just boxing them to get your ticket, you could reduce your cost and increase your chances of a solid payoff by grading the chances of the horses and betting accordingly. This doesn't have to be as complicated as it sounds. Say you have two horses in each race that you think stand a very good chance of winning, and two more that are the likely winners only if the top two falter. If you were to box the four horses in each race on a $2 ticket it would cost you $512. That's not a terrible investment if you stand a chance at a five figure payout, but you could do better.

Instead, you could buy a $3 ticket on your two top choices in each race for $48, a $1 ticket on your top two horses coming in during one race and your bottom two coming in during the other three races for $64, and every remaining possible combination of your horses at $1 each for $176. That would make your total ticket cost just $288. You would still win in every case that you would with the much more expensive ticket, and you would make more if any of your two top picks were to come in during each race. You've cut your costs, maintained your number of possible winning outcomes, and leveraged your investment towards your most favored outcomes. That's just one example of how you could be creative and craft a ticket that does the best possible job of maximizing your investment.