Is the # on Bargain Belle right?

I agree with you class.  Meets should be speacialized.  One in the east, south, midwest and west.  You don\'t have to close tracks, just not run them all at the same time.  Why does DEL, PHA, MTH, LRL run at the same time.  Run a meet every 2 wks at each track and rotate.  You can run more races, will have more horses and can run enough turf racing to keep everything excited.  You can have a $10 million pick all on a 14 race card and that may bring out the lottery players.  NYRA, and SCAL can do the same, NCAL should only run in the summer or from April-DEcember.  HOpefully this will happen but don\'t hold your breath.

DG:
This is an ok letter in my opinion but you fail to state the crux of the problem in racing, the high cost of the game.  Takeout averages 20% whereas sports betting is only 4.5%.  The house advantage in blackjack is only 1% for the good players.  The bottom line is this game will continue to lose customers until greedy horsemen, track owners and other management start paying attention to the people that pay their way, the bettors.  Some owners feel we should pay for their private parties, these people should move to Dubai.  Every study out there have shown that a decrease in takeout will increase handle and what do horsemen do, they want to increase the takeout so they can take their short term profit and to the hell with the rest of us.  Why is it that CA bettors can\'t get a rebate that is offered on YOubet, because of the greedy bastards at the TOC. Why did KY stop testing for milkshakes?  They couldn\'t publish the results. They should just build slot machines at these places and just let us bet on Hong Kong races.  They bottom line is this, you have greedy track owners(Magna, CD, NYRA, Del Mar all included), greedy horse owners(always complaining that they lose money, then get the fuck out of the game if you\'re losing money), greedy politicinas, dirty trainers and an aging fan base.  This does not bode well for the future(but Stronach spent over half billion so far!!!).  There will always be horse racing but we will probably end up with something like SCAL for part of the year(the racing is really bad) and NCAL for the rest of the year with only SAR being the meet.  Well enough rambling.

Has anyone else seen his article on the Bloodhorse site?  He states that betting revenues will be down for the first time in 5 years(no shit, when you cutting off rebate shops what do you expect).  He states tracks don\'t have the know how to reward their customer.  Well maybe they should quickly find that know how before they lose all their customers!! Who the hell wants to go to the track, pay $20 to get their, have to fight for an outlet for your computer and deal with rude employees.  This guy and the tracks don\'t get it, it\'s call customer service.  If tracks want customers, give a frequent reward card and rebates, then people will be flocking to the tracks, otherwise the trend will continue all the way to the bottom.

The problem with racing is super trainers and short fields, period.

Sharmadal, there was another horse at Ascot that won on Tuesday and Sat.  I agree that certain trainers kill horses in the AM, especially out in CA. I think if you look at all the horses who were going for the TC, only Silver Charm and maybe Real Quiet was a great horse.  The other were good.  Smarty is a question mark.  I think Afleet will be considered a great hoss but the bastard couldn\'t win the Derby when I had in the pk 4 and he had a perfect pace set-up so how great can you be!!!!

Actually, the should reverse what he recomends, I think the Belmont used to be the first Saturday of June and that\'s what they should do.  Only healthy horses can go from the Derby, Preakness onto the Belmont.  With only 2 wks from Preakness, no horse from the Preakenss undercard(Sarava) would try Belmont unless they are really good.  Also, Zito, Frankel would be less inclined to bring their Derby horses on such \"quick \" rest.  This nonsense about rest is ridiculous, horses can run and win on 1 week\'s rest in GR 1 races all over the world, without the benefit of LASIX and all the other drugs that are used today(Maykbe Diva is a prime example).

\"Alex is the best horse in training now and is the fan\'s choice for HOY\".  May I point out that you should take a look at the Met Mile!!!

I think the Derby has more to do with Pace than Drugs but drugs are an important part.  If it\'s all drugs, how do you explain the great performance of Arguement and Buzzard BAy(who may end up with the best #).  For once, I was hoping that they were using since my group were sitting on a $2 pk4 live to AA, BR, Wilko, Sun King and High Limit, how this ticket loses is mind boggling, but that\'s horse racing.  If they are doing super testing for the Preakness, I guess Giacomo is still in play along with AA.

JB:
You stated only 6% top and 23% pair, what % are off and X\'s.  Also, these have to taken with a grain of salt.  Some of these horses has no chance of topping and pair at 1 1/4(Spanish Chestnut, Going Wild, etc).  I don\'t know if this was taken into consideration. I think the most pertinent question here is horses that have run the top in their last race, what % top/pair and what % off/X.  For instance, for B. Road, I give him about 1% to top, 10% to pair, 40% off and 49% x.  However, this gives him about a 45% chance to run a -2 or better which makes him the most likely winner.

Some story of this great mare, winning G1 on consecutive weekends in Australia.  Story at Equidaily.com

Well, partly.  CH, I\'ve also been using something similar to what you are talking about for the last 1 1/2 year with much success.  HOWEVER, Jerry is right when he says there are really no to qualtify this \"effort\" and he just gives you accurate # and you can adjust them as  you see.  Also, just becuase a horse dueled inside means he should have earned a better figure.  There could have been a rail bias that carried him along( I think this was present at FG on LA Derby day).  So you have to make a qualitative adjustment not a quantitative adjustment.  Also, if there was no rail bias, then the fig. is actually much better than give n but this horse may bounce next time, so as in all races you have to play the odds.

In regards to comments such as horse won easily, was all out, tank empty- in my experience this is all NONSENSE.  I would just depend on the pattern of the horses and not these old time comments.  I know a handicappper in SCAL who publishes these things and they are invariably wrong!!

Just adding gas to the fire!!!

It just goes to show that no one is really interested in catching cheaters.  The state will lose handle money since people bet less, the Tracks don\'t want to have a bad name, the owners don\'t want to lose their purse money.  So exactly who will benefit from catching cheaters?  The bettors and of course we dont\' have any voide except to vote with our feet and not bet.
The same goes for professional sports.

Yesterday, wa an anomaly for FG track, usu this is a stone closer track and speed was holding up yesterday.  Too bad FG decided to soup up the track for it\'s big day.

Unfortunately, Magna is not really about horseracing but about gimmicks surrounding horseracing.  There is the horse wizard, slot machines, beauty contests, malls, hotels, etc.  Xpressbet is a complete failure in my opinion.  Where do you get HRTV and after April it\'s not good anyway unless you want to watch LoneStar.  
Slots is not the cure for horseracing, period.  We need to get new fans involved in racing, not in activities around racing like rock concerts, slot machines, horse wizards, etc.  One way is to have more TV, more tournaments(a la the World Poker Tour) and less 5-10,000 mc/ claming races.