The quinella might be one of the most overlooked wagers in horse racing, especially when it’s matched up in the same race with an exacta.

Since the exacta calls for a handicapper to pick the first two finishers in exact order and the quinella has more flexibility, requiring just the first two finishers in either order, the exacta will inherently pay better.

But that doesn’t mean there are not times when the quinella can offer some wagering value.

The key element here is that if you settle on two horses and they finish 1-2 in the quinella there are more winning tickets than when you box those horses in the exacta.

Much of this depends on which horse you favor and how your bets will be tilted. Will it be a $5 box, with $5 exactas on each combo? Or do you favor one horse over another and plan to wager that same $10 with a $6 exacta one way and a $4 exacta the other way?

Once you have that answer you can compare the exacta and quinella payoffs to see which one favors you.

One rule of thumb is that if the horse you like is higher than the other by about four points (2-1 vs. 6-1) you’ll always be better off playing exactas.

But if you like the favorite narrowly, and plan to bet the $6 and $4 exactas, the quinella might offer better value.

For example, in the second race at Saratoga on Aug. 29, the winner was the 8-5 favorite and a 7-1 shot was second. The exacta paid $27.60 and the quinella $16.80.

If you made the $6/$4 exacta wager, the return was $82.80. The $10 quinella paid $84.

Granted, that’s not a huge difference, but if you instead gave a narrow edge to the favorite but opted for a $5 boxed exacta, the exacta return would have only been $69.

Keep in mind, too, at major tracks such as Saratoga, the pools are scrutinized far more thoroughly by handicappers than at smaller tracks where holes in wagering pools pop up more often.

So again, just because an exacta will pay more than a quinella, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take a minute or two to monitor both willpays before putting your wagering strategy in place.

It could put a few extra dollars in your pocket, which is always a good thing during a day at the races.