White Mercedes wins two... again! (yawn)

I\'ll address your points separately.

1. It was my view that Texcess had indeed improved recently, but it was not reflected in his final time speed figures. It\'s obviously a moot point because he ran so horribly there is no evidence one way or the other if I was right. Had he run right back to his recent speed figures, it would have been some strong evidence I was wrong. Running as badly as he did demonstrates that something else was at work other than his recent speed figures or my opinion that he had been improving in a more hidden way.  

2. The \"california horses\" thing is strictly a quality issue. Given 2 horses with similar figures and all else being equal, I\'d bet the horse earning his figures against better quality all day long. Qaulity is not measured strictly by the title of the race or the speed figures earned.

3. The plenty of speed issue is obviously related to whether or not you think competitive paces in fast fractions impact the results. For me, it\'s an absolute no brainer that they do. You many not agree, but that\'s why we all go to the windows. :-) The key issue is whether you can use that insight to profit by predicting pace scenarios better than the general public. \"I\" think the answer to that is that it\'s very difficult. So much so, it\'s probably overrated. However, \"YES\" at times. I always try to evaluate the probabilities of various pace scenarios. If I think it\'s likely a horse is going to get a good/bad pace trip it changes my perception of \"fair value\" by a bit one way or the other. It never puts me on or off horse though.    

In this case, I couldn\'t see any way this was going to be anything less than an honest pace. There were plenty of speed/pressers. The blinkers being removed from Texcess was an indication to me that they might try to rate off SC - which I thought would be the right move. Dueling would certainly be idiotic. Texcess had also shown some rateabilty. Feeling comfortable that you can get a good trip is certainly a plus when deciding when and if to pull the trigger. Had he not shown that ability, I would have been much less likely to bet him at the same price I got. I would have needed more.  

4. When I say a horse is better than he looks, that generally means I think his form is better that the \"general public\" would think based on a casual glance of his PPs. So I expect his odds to be longer than they would be if everyone knew what I knew.

Some of that kind of thing is captured by TG because of wide trips (buried) and other notes. Sometimes (rarely) my opinion is related to a bias I believe worked for/against the horse and subsequent evidence from that day. Most often it\'s a pace/visual thing where I think a horse was either negatively or positively impacted by the pace of his recent races or had more in reserve than he showed.

I always have a mental list of horses that I think are better or worse than they look for \"whatever\" reason and I try to focus on them when looking for bets because I think they are a prime source for overlays.



Post Edited (03-28-05 13:07)

[richiebee]

HP:

  Thanks for the suggestion. Even though I had a profitable week (2 racing days) at AQ last week (no TGs), I am going to order a set for Wednesday\'s AQ card online as soon as I make 2 statements:

  1) HP, great job in the Lane\'s End

  2) As much profit potential as there is   in various methodologies, including TGs, I think its mostly the \"extraneous stuff\" that has most of us hooked on this game.

[HP]

Richiebee,

You are absolutely right on point 2, and I have a story that might better illustrate the point I\'m trying to make.

Years ago I did a few seminars for TG with another guy and his wife.  The gentleman in question and I were both horse racing fans and brought a lot of \"extraneous\" stuff to bear on our handicapping, but in my observation (and I watched him play), he was more likely to let the \"extraneous\" stuff talk him out of good TG plays than I was.  All this trainer and jockey stuff and he would boot quite a few good straight TG plays.  Not that he wasn\'t a good handicapper, but he brought in the extra stuff and I don\'t think it helped.

His wife on the other hand knew nothing about horse racing before using TG, used TG EXCLUSIVELY, and got some incredible results.  I saw her hit two triples at Penn National the night before we did the seminar in Atlantic City for the Thunder Gulch Derby.    

In my experience, this is not a unique phenomenon.  The LESS people know about other forms of handicapping, the BETTER they do with TG.  TG users who are \"old horse racing fans\" are generally locked in some \"battle of faith\" with other forms of handicapping they have used before.  You see it on this board all the time.

My wife knows nothing about horse racing and on big days, as I have detailed on this board, she regularly embarasses me, the resident expert, by flipping through the sheets in ten seconds and landing on say...War Emblem.  No pace, no class, no nothing.  

The IDEAL user of this data would know NOTHING about horse racing and TG would be the FIRST handicapping product they ever saw.  The rest of us are fighting the \"battle of faith\" with our old crap.

HP

[spa]

Chin up....We had a great weekend of racing and most of us had a serious chanch to hit the big one!!!!!! Remember me, I picked the slowest horse in North America, before the race, and was roundly scoffed at. Wild Desert, in almost everyones opinion was tooo slooow. OOOOOps!!! If Mayan King runs any kind of race, I would win enough to buy a couple of small states. Some days you get the bear and some days the bear gets you.

[richiebee]

HP:

  We\'ve all been where the husband was: \"paralysis due to overanalysis\" of the numerous sources of available information. Those husband/ wife at the races stories never work out well for the husband, do they?

  Thank god my wife has no interest...

  The \"extraneous stuff\" is a bit of a vast wasteland. I prefer to be more swayed by the \"subjective stuff\".. opinions and beliefs I have formed over the years.

  Last Wednesday at AQ, I bet a winner based on the following subjective belief: The animal had been claimed by a trainer who IMO was both competent and underrated, taken from a trainer who IMO is one of the worst on the circuit. I would have bet this animal solely on the trainer change even if you  told me the TGs or Beyers afforded him only a slight chance to win.

  The nice thing about all this is that neither trainers\' winning percentage was exemplary, and that anyone in the grandstand that day could have said there was no real difference between the two-- that they were both mediocre trainers at best. But in MY mind, based on MY observation over the years-the two trainers were worlds apart in terms of talent.

  I would say that my subjective beliefs, as gratifying and profitable as they sometimes are, lead me astray at least 80% of the time. Anyone know a shylock with a bad heart?



Post Edited (03-28-05 14:06)

[HP]

Class,

I can\'t really disagree with your general point, which is that pace has SOME impact on the race, but I\'m not getting anything specific on this horse or what you saw that made you believe in him.  What was \"better than they looked\" about his races?  They look like 5\'s to me.  

I\'m willing to look at pace stuff (I looked at pacefigures.com quite a few times) so I really would like to know what you\'re talking about.  

HP

[TGJB]

Richie-- \"Amsterdam\" was good, especially for those who watch \"The Wire\" on HBO. Same idea was used there by a cop who established a free zone for drug dealers to keep crime down in other areas. But I\'m definitely against doing that in our game-- it would make this even more of a guessing game than it is now.

[Bally Ache]

HP

Mark me down with Class Handicapper & Richiebee.  This is not simply a numbers game and it never will be.  It is much more an art than a science.

[HP]

Bally,

Consider yourself marked down.  Whenever you\'re ready to spell out whatever you consider to be the \"art\", I\'m ready to read all about it.  Otherwise I\'ll just mark you down...  HP

[TGJB]

It\'s also worth noting that HP isn\'t simply talking about betting the fastest horse(s)-- his 3 horse box in the Lane\'s End included horses who were NOT fast, relatively.

[jbelfior]

Perhaps you had WILD DESERT simply picking up the pieces during a slow final eight.

I still would not use him if they ran the race today. Congratulations to anyone who caught the 5-3 number. As for me, I\'m still looking to choke Norberto \"Poolstick\" Arroyo.


Good Luck,
Joe B.

[Bally Ache]

HP

okay, let\'s use the race at hand as an example (even though it works against me).

I had Wild Desert & Mr. Sword.  I did not have Flower Alley.  My third horse was Mayan King.  The irony there is that one of the cornerstones of my betting is recent, frequent & fast workouts.  Preferably over today\'s track & more than 3 furlongs.  Despite his good works I let Flower Alley go.

Mayan King was my third choice despite recognizing that G. Contessa was getting into unfamiliar waters here.  Why?  Well, they both only had two starts and I preferred a horse sired by Stephen Got Even to Distorted Humor at 1 1/8 miles.  I overlooked the off track and the obvious discrepancy between Pletcher & Contessa, particularly in a race of this type.

Why?  Well, a friend of mine used to say you always have to leave yourself a way to lose.  I think of that every time I do something stupid.

My best pick of the day was Daddy Joe in the previous race.  It would have given me the pick 3($1750 or so).  But I got nothing for it because some implausible (to me) bomb came and got him.  Check the chart of that race and see how far back it was to the 3rd horse.

I came out slightly ahead for the day but I could have had a much better day.  Lay all the horseplayers end to end who could make that statement on any given day and you\'d have a very long line.

This post has gotten too long but, in a nutshell, the game is in interpreting the info - and that\'s an art.

[richiebee]

Joe B:

    Good luck at the Gulf this weekend. I expect a full report on Bandini\'s manners when you return.

     If you think YOU are mad at Norberto, think about his agent. On the day of the Gotham, he got DQd in the first race, got a tummy ache, and took off his remaining mounts. One of these mounts was Dixie Talking, the upset winner of the 109k Cicada.

HP,

My thoughts on Tex are in the first post of the \"Lane End\" thread. It was all pace related in this case.



Post Edited (03-28-05 19:13)

HP and TGJB,

For the record, I think HP did a great job on the race and I agree that you should be looking for improving horses etc...

As everyone knows, I supplement the figures with subjective views on performace that sometimes cause me to come to different conclusions about where a horse has actually been and therefore where he is going next.