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Quote: from Flash on 5:40 pm on Mar. 29, 2007[br]Its like anything in life, where there’s money and people you will always get some kind of illegalities.
Generally I think racing is pretty straight to be fair and the authorities do a very good job in keeping it that way.
There will always be people claim racing is bent like there will always be people that claim they’ve been abducted by aliens.
Yes there’s bound to be the odd case but by and large I don’t think racing has a serious problem any more certainly compared to years gone by.<br>
I concur with Flash and Rob North on what a depressing thread it is from a so called bunch of racing enthusiasts. Find it hard to understand why all those who voted for option 4 would want to be involved in a sport so bent.
I don’t think that racing is anywhere near as bent as some people make it out to be. There are some trainers who fiddle things to try and land gambles ( let’s not forget that a lot of these gambles fail ) but they are in the minority . Also I’d imagine that most of us on here know who these trainers are and can see what they are up to.
On average, 90 % of horses unavoidably lose in a race.<br>On average, 10% win.<br>The forecastable favourite, however, wins on average about 30% of the time.<br>That is 3 times 10% and has been that way for decades.<br>If the figure for favourites were to drop significantly then that would indicate a more general integrity problem.
4, I think racing is rife with cheating in various forms, and I think it occurs on a daily basis at least
I voted for 4,
those who despair etc, please tell me why i am wrong to think the above?
(Edited by empty wallet at 9:39 pm on Mar. 29, 2007)
I love racing for the big events and because despite knowing that corruption is going on, I don’t know where and who is doing it. Therefore it doesn’t matter to me anyway. On the occasion when it is blatantly obvious then it can anger you but sometimes you are privy to a horse that is " trying today" and can end up with a small fortune. I didn’t at anytime say that I thought it was a terrible occurance I just said that it does happen.
I voted for 4,
those who despair etc, please tell me why i am wrong to think the above?
Empty
Why don’t you give us a list of today’s bent runners and races so we may analyse them. Or tomorrow’s.
You’ll have plenty to choose from as such skulduggery apparently occurs ‘on a daily basis at least’.
Mike
I voted for 4 myself, because we all know that races are run over the incorrect distances everyday.
Quote: from betlarge on 9:58 pm on Mar. 29, 2007[br]
I voted for 4,
those who despair etc, please tell me why i am wrong to think the above?
Empty
Why don’t you give us a list of today’s bent runners and races so we may analyse them. Or tomorrow’s.
You’ll have plenty to choose from as such skulduggery apparently occurs ‘on a daily basis at least’.
Mike<br>
Why don’t you give me answers to my question instead of replying with another question?
Certainly a problem remains. The taste in my mouth gets increasingly bitter every winner I see Robbie Fitzpatrick ride.
empty, I don’t think you are wrong to go along with option 4 as evryone has their own opinion but I can’t imagine that if you really believe that then why do you take an interest in the game?
If you manage to dig out a 33/1 winner of a race do you then think that all the others were cheating and that the fav in the race wasn’t trying? surely we can’t have it both ways if you see what I’m getting at.
If I myself thought option 4 to be correct I’d pack betting in tomorrow. However watching horse racing would carry on.
Quite frankly, those who believe racing does not need a ‘clean or scrub up’ are either part of the ‘game’ or are unaware of what goes on.<br>Not all of us are gamblers and grateful for it. We just enjoy racing.
Jim
<br>I can box clever and reduce the effect of 4 has on me, and this is why i stay in the game, if i couldn’t do this i would leave it well alone
<br>I can also box clever and find the bigger price ones too, they have not all been cheating, just some have been overlooked by the majority of the betting public due to poor draws, wrong ground, wrong distance and then when they get the right conditions, stuff the trying for it’s life jolly that say Timeform/RPR have 10lbs clear
(Edited by empty wallet at 10:52 pm on Mar. 29, 2007)<br>
(Edited by empty wallet at 10:55 pm on Mar. 29, 2007)
I’m pretty certain that no matter what your definition of ‘bent’ is, it’s probably got to be #4. And I’d suggest that a fairly good proportion of it is c). I can’t imagine b) happening all too often, seems a bit Dick Francis to me, and a) in certain circumstances can be done with the best of intentions.
In my limited experience, however, I find that the illegality in racing is mostly aimed at duping just one man: the handicapper. Horses will either run badly to get a low mark, or to return to one they can again win off of. I have a friend who is a permit holder and trains a few horses in the Borders, and every time I go racing with him I will without fail have him point to at least one horse on my race programme, and he’ll tell me "don’t back that one, not trying." And true to form, the horse will run like a monkey!
Remember this is just a two-bit permit holder; imagine the amount of false runners that big trainers & owners will be aware of at these meetings.
However, I’m not going 100% for the bleak outlook of this thread. A horse sitting at 9/4f will very, very seldom be a non-trier as the perception is that it’s got a bloody good chance of winning anyway. All I’m saying is that, from what I’ve seen (and many of you will have seen more), if a horse skooshes in at 25/1 having not shown any significant form in recent runnings, not everyone is necessarily as surprised as the punters.
Concur with Drone on this one.<br>Despite more proactivity from the authorities, serious problems remain in an industry beset by a culture of reliance on priviliged inside information.<br>Racing for peanuts prize money leaves many connections dependant on a bet.<br>Any race with a Curley runner distorting the market is rendered useless for betting purposes.<br>The motto "Always Trying" emblazoned on Mark Johnston’s horseboxes is a damning indictment of the business. Guess he can affors to take the morale high ground training for rich Arabs.<br>
Quote: from Jim JTS on 7:01 pm on Mar. 29, 2007[br]The reason that some horses on a daily basis don’t appear to run to their merits is that they are not machines and can have off days just like us, I reckon it’s almost impossible to tell if a horse isn’t trying unless ofcourse you’ve been given or heard info from connections of said animal that they will not be doing their best
Have to disagree there having compiled my own raw figures since the arrival of polytrack, i find it alarming when horses drift in the betting then run badly. i then get around to inserting the data to find a very poor figure sometimes on horses whose figures suggest they are a machine! I often smile when years later we hear of the latest shall we say suspicious series of rides and up pops the names of some of the horses with the discrepant speed figures!
A more interesting question maybe, would be is how bent is group, listed flat and top level jump racing is…
Without watching carefully all racing at all levels, i cannot really be sure which of the 4 questions is correct
Not as sure its as bad as some think though…
I am a fan of the AW but i only started my figures then and was using them as an example, not slagging the AW. i personally find the so called "top class racing" unfathomable, i remember Mac ranting about 19 consecutive losing G1 favourites :o .
Racings problem lies with the handicap system it rewards manipulation. I just hope one day someone in the clever ideas dept. will start to devise a system that rewards the horses that run to their merits week in week out.
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