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Garston, a decent sample size would be around 500 races. I wouldn’t group the data into percentiles either, it’s not really going to help you if you think about it.
Ranks work fine if you limit the lowest number of runners in race, to say 10 and then just concentrate on the top 6 ranks and have your lowest analyis rank set as 7+.
Plot each rank onto a graph and then make your assessment that way.
You will also need to know if the market gives you an edge, ie. is this data included in the prices being offered.
Things like weight and SP LTO are positive regarding strike rate, but dont give you an edge. So in practice they are interesting but worthless.
Good luck with the analysis.
Crock,
A couple of questions if I may? First are you saying the ability rating doesn’t work, or isn’t up to the job because it doesn’t take weight into account? Also looking at Garstonf’s figures he appears to be using the bare rating. As you know when looking at the examples the selection is often well down the ability rankings, so how do G’s figures prove anything?
As you also know I don’t use/look at weight at any time, however I would be more than happy to put my ratings against any of the weight based rating you mention. Unfortunately I can’t give you stats as I inadvertently included a formula into my analysis sheets (also the sheets I used as a record of past races) so the figures have automatically updated, at times making a nonsense of past races.
Be Lucky
Mtoto,
I’m merely trying to point out that trying to use the ability rating as a stand-alone rating will not lead to success ‘How can one wheel in the cog be expected to work in isolation’. It’s combination of elements as demonstrated by the point you make about so many winners being well down the ranking.
I’m not really sure where your own ratings fit into this, as the discussion is about VDW’s ability rating. Generally (IMO) ratings that take into account a combination of elements (class, current form. weight, speed etc) will prove a better guide than those relying on a single element.
VDW said we can use his class rating as a base factor and when all elements line up…. He never said it could be used as a stand-alone rating and trying to do that will only lead to frustration & failure.
I’m not really sure where your own ratings fit into this, as the discussion is about VDW’s ability rating.
Crock,
My apologises, I thought the discussion was about why VDW’s ability didn’t work, and that was down to the fact it didn’t incude weight.
I notice you have mentioned ability ratings and class ratings as if they are one and the same. How can this be? To qualify for an ability rating a horse must have won races, this doesn’t appear to work with class ratings, VDW himself said Prominent King didn’t have a WINNING class rating.
Be Lucky
Mtoto
VDW showed that he used class and ability as synonyms (3rd last and penultimate paras. of his contribution of 28/2/81 – item 36 in "The Golden Years").
VDW showed that he used class and ability as synonyms (3rd last and penultimate paras. of his contribution of 28/2/81 – item 36 in "The Golden Years").
Hensman,
I agree in many articles he did use those words as synonyms, but that can’t be said of the article when he said PK DIDN’T have a winning class rating. If you think I’m mistaken can you explain the wording? After all he did bracket PK with a horse that had never won a race.
Be Lucky
Hensman
I’m not sure what VDW meant but various possibilities occur, of which two strike me as the most likely:
1) neither horse had a win in its last three runs (the runs which, by now, VDW will have assumed his readers were using to establish form);
2) neither horse had a win at the level of the races in which they were his selections.
I certainly doubt that that late letter should be assumed to un-write, as it were, all the previous "Golden Years" etc material.
I certainly doubt that that late letter should be assumed to un-write, as it were, all the previous "Golden Years" etc material.
Hensman,
I don’t think he was trying to "un-write" previous material, more to explain how the assumptions based on the early material were missing the point.
The first of which is the ability rating was used to solve the examples before it was introduced. I have gone through this many times before and have decided to keep quite as I do feel I’m becoming a bit of a bore on the subject. However this in no way means I have changed my mind, or read anything put forward that makes me doubt I’m wrong.
To reply to your points.
1) neither horse had a win in its last three runs (the runs which, by now, VDW will have assumed his readers were using to establish form);
I agree VDW may have assumed readers were indeed using the last three runs to estabish form. However for me the last three runs are to confirm only one thing, that the horse is CONSISTENT.
2) neither horse had a win at the level of the races in which they were his selections.
Again I can’t argue with that fact, but why use PK as an example many of his other selections also fit that criteria? Of course it may just be me but I think VDW was showing the answer to a question that had been bothering many from the Erin. I also think this is what he felt many had missed from the example in Systematic Betting.
Be Lucky
My apologises, I thought the discussion was about why VDW’s ability didn’t work, and that was down to the fact it didn’t incude weight.
Mtoto,
At the risk of repeating myself, I’m NOT saying VDW’s ability ratings don’t work. I AM saying they won’t work as a stand-alone rating. They were never intended to be used as such as class/ability is only one element in the equation. It’s my opinion that weight can be used to negate class.Hensman
There is a third possibility as to what VDW meant when he said PK did not have a winning class rating and that is, he used the Sporting Chronicle and genuinely did not know the horse had won a race previously. Apparently, the Sporting Chronicle did not show a horses’ win record and total win prize money as in the Life. If this is so, it would also prove he did not use ability ratings in that race.
Garston
As I said, there are various possibilities and that VDW failed to realise that PK was not a maiden is one. Improbable in the extreme, in my view, though, for several reasons, not least that there is good evidence that VDW used the Life as his main racing paper (as of course did anyone with at least half a brain in those days).
Hensman
By those with half a brain I take it you mean the high street bookmakers who put both papers on the boards for the punters in the 70’s. It would help if you could present some of your evidence that the Life was his main racing paper.
It doesn’t really matter what vdw said or did not say surely. The question is surely one of facts and analysis today.
Hensman
By those with half a brain I take it you mean the high street bookmakers who put both papers on the boards for the punters in the 70’s. It would help if you could present some of your evidence that the Life was his main racing paper.
There is overwhelming evidence in the articles that VDW took The Sporting Life.
You have his April 1985 article (Wing and a Prayer etc) in which he uses the Life ratings instead of his own. If you study the examples there are also a few slight discrepancies in the ability ratings of horses when compiled from the form books. These are entirely consistent with information published in the Sporting Life though.
Nobody is saying he took the Life exclusively, he may well have taken the Chronicle as well, I guess most ‘serious’ racing people would have taken both in those days. There is plenty of evidence he took the Life though.
Thank you Crock
There is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that VDW would have used the Life in 1985. The last edition of the Sporting Chronicle was printed in July, 1983.
Garston,
There is actually evidence he took both papers in his letter of May 1978 (Letter 13 TGYO – Numbers Game To Form a Picture).
Again it is interesting that Strombolus did not feature in the first 6 in my daily, or in a well known sporting daily. To the credit of The Sporting Chronicle it did feature.
I can’t think of another well known ‘sporting daily’ to which VDW would have been referring to other than the Life.
Garston
Most (not all) of the betting forecasts VDW quotes are from the Life including, for example, the four from the famous March 1981 article. Crock has given the other main reference I’d have posted, plus of course VDW quotes Life ratings in some examples.
Finally, there is the question of whether the Erin was in the Chronicle. From memory, not, but I’d need to check that before stating it as a fact.
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