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Pru
using your setional time analysis,can you summerise how the majority of races at Ling were run on the 08/12/04 ie:slow/moderate/fast sectionals
Pru,
I purposely avoid rating the lower grade races, because I believe the form in these races, or more correctly, the horses’ ability to reproduce that form, is less certain than in higher grades. Also, from a practical angle, it reduces the races you need to look at by about 70%.
However, there have been plenty of occasions, when I’ve rated these races for interest purposes and found that there’s probably not as much in it as I first thought. Horses do generally run to form in these lower grade races. The main difference, in my experience, seems to be that when you find a horse that looks very well treated in one of these small races, they can for no apparent reason, completely fail to give their running, which saps confidence. The cumulative effect of these confidence-draining betting experiences can give you a negative feeling about low grade races. I’m sure the same thing happens in better class racing, but less often and with less spectacular(or better explained) failures. It’s probably psychological, but hard to get away from.
Quote: from Artemis on 9:06 am on Dec. 9, 2004[br]
I purposely avoid rating the lower grade races, because I believe the form in these races, or more correctly, the horses’ ability to reproduce that form, is less certain than in higher grades. ÂÂÂ
Artemis,
I think your second perception that "there’s probably not as much in it as I first thought … horses do generally run to form in these lower grade races" is the correct one.
The figures below show the strike rate of horses with the best "last time out" speed figure in all-aged h’caps on the all-weather and you can see that there’s little in it between the various grades –
Class Wins Runs Win %<br><65 112 542 20.7%<br>65-70 168 875 19.2%<br>75-80 111 548 20.3%<br>85-90 60 272 22.1%<br>95+ 27 129 20.9%<br>
(Edited by ACR1 at 9:54 am on Dec. 9, 2004)
I think the inconsistency issue at a low grade exists but is much overstated. Often it’s not the horse that is inconsistent but its trainer if you know what I mean :biggrin: .
There was also no small difficulty in getting a handle on the form of horses going into this grade having, say, been beaten comfortably in maidens previously when banded racing was first introduced. Now that it has bedded in that’s not such a big issue.
EW, <br>sectionals for leaders at 2f pole expressed as % of overall race times:<br>8f Mad 74.76+ 25.24 (24.28 optimum)<br>7f Savernake Brave 70.98+29.02 (27.94 optimum)<br>7f Averami 71.03+28.97<br>8f Grezie 75.01+24.99<br>8f Miss Porcia 75.78+24.22
In other words, oddly for Lingfield, in the first 4 of those races the runners judged on the leader spent less time in the first part of the race and more in the second than ideal: i.e. they went too quickly. In Miss Porcia’s race the leader 2f out (which was also the winner) went an almost ideal pace.
Of course, each individual horse runs the race differently: sometimes drastically so. The front runner in Grezie’s race went a daft pace (it was already coming back to the field at the sectional) but Grezie itself wasn’t far off ideal with a final sectional of 24.42%. Miss Porcia wasn’t flattered as such by her performance, but the horses who came from off the pace in that race are better than the result (and probably better than she was).
I think anyone who can read a race would come to a similar conclusion, but it is good to have it confirmed independently and it is possible, with enough data, to quantify the degree to which this was an issue too. ÂÂÂ
(Edited by Prufrock at 10:27 am on Dec. 9, 2004)
Pru
interesting stuff
Speedfigure position
11.50 4th from top<br>12.20 2nd<br>12.50 2nd<br>1.20 2nd<br>1.50 3rd<br>2.25 bottom (miss porcia)<br>3.00 4th<br>3.30 4th
Pru, watching Miss Potia’s race yesterday, I think anyone playing in running would have taken the front two against the field at half way, because it seemed obvious they werent goint that fast in front.
But do you think having sectional timing at all racecourses will make reading a race much less profitable?
I sometimes watch some 20 odd runner handicaps back many times to look for horses running better than their finishing position suggests, mostly against a pace bias.
The amount of times during the season, in a big field handicap, using pace, draw, track bias I thought id found a value bet, that very horse is strongly backed through the morning.
Does this show that more and more people are using the same methods and sectional timing would just highlight that more?
Sorry, in short what I mean is, with punters demanding more and more information – sectional times, wind ops, horses weight beforehand – eventually actually being able to read races wont be that important.
(Edited by Twinkle Twinkle at 11:05 am on Dec. 9, 2004)
TDK, it reminds me of the form versus trends argument, in that an awful lot of people favour the latter approach not because it is "better" (though they may kid themselves as much) but because it is "easier".
If you have only an hour or so a day to look at racing then there’s not a whole lot of point in going into great depth in handicapping races, coming up with speed figures, analysing races sectionally and then pricing each horse up individually. Your time will have been "up" long before you come to any conclusion.
But if you do have the time then you should do it I reckon. Those who can put in the extra graft or show the extra flair and intuition reap the rewards in this game.
Once you have established standard sectional times for a track then gathering the data and putting it onto a spreadsheet takes little time. Perhaps half an hour a meeting. Why deny yourself this aspect if it is available to you?
Like you, I do "pretty well" out of betting on the all-weather. This winter, partly because I have been busy with other things, that has been as much as anything down to sectional timing analysis. It is, in fact, tempting at times to drop any wider appraisal of matters and simply side with horses who have done well in the context of the race or against horses who have figured prominently only because of it, in the belief that the public will get it "wrong". But that’s getting back into the trends territory, whereas I am a great believer in a multi-dimensional approach rather than a one-dimensional one. Time allowing, of course.
Twinkle Twinkle, do most people who watched Miss Porcia’s race know whether the winner was flattered or grossly flattered or the degree to which the horses immediately behind her were unlucky?
At the moment even highly experienced race readers are regularly managing to misinterpret the run of a race, and the consequence is that their whole assessment of a race can be wrong. How can someone with their naked eyes tell the difference between a horse running a mile in 100 secs and 101 secs? I know I can’t for sure, and yet that is a big difference.
If some people get all the innovations they want then some of the mystery will go out of racing analysis, but only some I reckon. The one thing that technology will definitely struggle to cope with is excatly the one thing that a human racereader can have an input on: not where the horse was and when, but how well the horse is going and how clear a run it is getting etc.
I think obvious pace handicapping is in danger of being overbet, but there is a vast amount of less obvious stuff going on out there day in and day out and very few people seem to realise it.
Maybe the time boys can tell us, but again over the extended nine furlongs last night, four of the first five, were described as being either held up or in midfield in the early stages. Red Spell finishing third having raced prominantly. Even though they went no gallop for the first 2 furlongs. It may be rubbish but the results seem to speak for themselves.
Twinkle Twinkle, I’ve only just seen this.
I’m afraid I’m not quite sure what point you are trying to make.
The point I would make is that in any individual race it may be relatively easy or relatively difficult for horses to win from the front or come from behind. But that doesn’t mean that a horse can’t win "against the bias". One additional thing is that it can certainly be argued that a horse which wins a slowly-run race is showing that it has what it takes to win a slowly-run race—a turn of foot basically—at least as much as that it is significantly better than the result. Often, I reckon, it is a bit of both.
Results may, or may not, show that relatively few horses win from the front at Wolverhampton. There will be an explanation for this, but that explanation won’t be the equivalent of some sort of a curse having been placed on front-runners. More to the point, in a given circumstance the fact that relatively few horses win from the front at a course may be totally irrelevant to the race under consideration.
Mistaking general information for specific information, or applying the former when the latter is appropriate, is far too prevalent in the field of form analysis by certain so-called experts already.
Yep, you’re right Pru, and as always make perfect sense.<br>Having had a decent run on the AW lately I think youre post has just made me realise that becomming over confident due to current success is a quick way to end your winning run.
Instead of thinking I know exactly what types will win at WH, I should carry on evaluating each race as it comes.
Having had a decent run on the AW lately
Glad to hear it.:biggrin:
Even gladder to be able to say something similar myself.:biggrin: :biggrin:
1m 141yds/ 1m 1f 103yds for wolves upto 11/12/04
made all         1<br>held up          28<br>held up in touch   4<br>always prominent  6<br>always in touch    2<br>chased leader’s    8<br>mid division       5
(Edited by empty wallet at 7:27 pm on Dec. 13, 2004)
As I’ve said before, EW, it is in fact very difficult to make all. You not only have to exit the stalls quickly enough to get to the front immediately, but you need to stay there for the entire race, against several rivals (usually closely matched on all-weather), without going too fast and while being in sufficiently good form and sufficiently suited to the conditions to give of your best.
It is only one way of running a race, and a pretty extreme way of running a race in some respects. There are numerous other ways of getting from a to b without being in front the whole way.
There was another example of a made all today in Buscador (9.47f, Wolverhampton). According to my sectionals he actually went a bit on the fast side, but the upshot was that he was a few lengths clear of most of his rivals 2f out and only one of them got close to closing him down.
I’d be interested in any studies for other tracks, but they would need to be in standardised races, with say 12 to 14 runners only. The phrases "held up" and "chased leaders" etc are rather too subjective and individual for my liking. In fields of 12 or 13 runners (which are the norm at Wolverhampton) you would expect the majority of winners to come from off the pace to a degree, unless the jockeys were consistently misjudging the pace.
I will run the above query tommorrow,what age?, hdcp’s only?etc
Wolves,Southwell will only have a small sample compared to Lingfeild,would a sample say from 1/10/04 be sufficient
It is up to the individual to interpret the race reader’s comment’s,when analysing any data
(Edited by empty wallet at 8:34 pm on Dec. 13, 2004)
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