"Faster than they used to be"

JB,

>Now, my impression is that on that panel Beyer said they used claiming pars. I could be wrong-- I\'ll watch the DVD again when I get a chance. But even if the situation is what you described, that they use pars for only some tracks, that will act as a drag on your figures (to say nothing of creating an imbalance).<

1.   He and/or his partners are creating  projection figures for the major circuits. I can't give you a complete list.   I might be able get that information from a friend at the DRF who is in a position to know.  Whether casual glances at class pars are used in making marginal decisions about track speed I do not know, but if they are, it would have a small impact.  

2.   The very small tracks where he is using par times will only act as a drag if you are correct in your assumption that the horses are getting faster.  

3.   If we assume you are right (by any rate) those par time figures "would" act as a small drag. However, Beyer crosschecks figures by computer when horses change circuits.   If any circuit is found to be consistently out of line, they make adjustments – I would assume in favor of the track with the higher quality figures but I do not know.  I think this issue is a better case for saying that his small track figures are almost worthless than it is for saying all his figures are anchored by pars.  I think it\'s unlikely enough small track horses ship into the major circuits to screw up the projection quality figures on the major circuits.  

4.   Maybe his figures "are" getting a little faster, just not at the same rate.  When they first started publishing the Beyer figures I did a multi-year study of his par times in NY.  If I ever have a chance, I'll do it again but just at the graded stakes level to see if I notice anything.  It's very time consuming for me.
 
5.   I generally crosscheck the Beyer figures with another set of Beyer scale figures for NY made independently by a very competent guy using the projection method.  They are not equal on a day to day/race to race basis, but there has been no noticeable divergence. The figures haven\'t improved sharply. The maker provides me with pars from time to time.

I hope this helps.  (much of this information about process comes from my friend at the DRF. He is very sharp and knows.)



Post Edited (11-17-04 19:23)

[kev]

Should you be helping out your comp.?? By telling him their doing something wrong. Keep it on the down low, dude.

[kev]

Jerry, what about grass races?? are those races getting faster or slower and has the surface changed much??

[TGJB]

Kev, there was an exchange about 10-14 days ago about this. If you search using \"Frank\" as author you\'ll find it, and my response.

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

classhandicapper wrote:

> JB,
>
> >Now, my impression is that on that panel Beyer said they used
> claiming pars. I could be wrong-- I\'ll watch the DVD again when
> I get a chance. But even if the situation is what you
> described, that they use pars for only some tracks, that will
> act as a drag on your figures (to say nothing of creating an
> imbalance).<

I\'m probably too far out of the figure loop to thoroughly understand this \"break off\" from pars tenent. I always felt pars were subject to change and needed to be revised with current year times to be relevant. However, I think some correalation with a \"base\" is necessary to figure a days sample, especially when something like a single two turn race is involved. I keep \"rough pars\" in my head and then watch the results to try and ascertain variance from final times. One way to do this is project the final time for each race you watch and modify your \"projected time\" with each race result to arrive at a rough \"variant\" for whats going on and consequently an estimation of individual efforts. Honestly, I don\'t know how a figure can be reliable without some reference to a \"par\". I trust the figure makers and only do this to spot anomolies, which can occur for a number of reasons.

CtC