slow pace #'s

[thomas]

when a Slow Pace notation is indicated are those figs adjusted  or are they \'hard\' numbers and it\'s up to us to interpret if the pace might have caused a lower then expected #?

[TGJB]

It means the pace was so slow that the final time was compromised. I treat those races as if I didn\'t have final time, just using the horses. Interpretation may be called for in some cases, such as when a horse is restrained far behind a slow pace, and gets a bad figure.

[Mall]

It\'s just one man\'s opinion of course, but it seems that in turf races over 9 furlongs, there is often a slow pace designation when the fractions do not seem particularly slow for a marathon( 48 3/4, 49, 49 1/4,etc). How do you decide & what are the criteria for the slow pace designation? On a related subject, many seem to assume that a faster pace will necessarily favor closers, while it seems to moi that there are quite a few turf horses which only exhibit a closing kick in races where the pace is \"slow.\"

[TGJB]

When the final time for a race (almost always on the grass) comes up abnormally slow, I look to see how the fractions came up versus the other races. It is highly unlikely I have (or would) give out a pace designation to a fraction faster than 49 on a race longer than 1-1/8M.

[dpatent1]

Jerry, you may be saying this implicitly when you say that you \'look to see how the fractions came up versus the other races\' but I would think that you should look to how fast the field came home relative to the early fractions in the race.  For example, if the fractions of a race are:

24.3 49.3 114.0 137.2 149.0 it would seem more reasonable to consider a pace adjustment than if the race went:

24.3 49.3 114.0 138.2 149.4

The second race is slower but seems more likely due to a slow surface as opposed to a slow early pace.

Thoughts?

[thomas]

Maybe you need a specific example to answer this but I\'ll give it a whirl anyway. If your final calculation for a race is within \"range\" whatever that might be of your projected # do you still adjust it even if the pace of the race in question is out of whack with the rest of the card?

[TGJB]

If so, it would reflect in the final times of the other grass races.

[TGJB]

The answer is no, but I also want to address what seems to be a common misconception. We don\'t have a projected # for a race. We look at ALL the horses who ran in the race, comparing what they have been running with the figures they would be assigned now. An everyday occurance has one horse exploding, most running about what they run, and the rest running X\'s. If we used a projected figure for the RACE, the winner would get that, and the rest would recieve bad numbers.

So I use all the horses\' histories to make figures. Fortunately, most extreme slow paces come on turf, making it easy to know when to subtract for pace. I would add that Time-Form does this far more often due to the frequent slow paces in Europe. They create two figures for each race--time figures (based purely on time), and the ones you see in DRF, which are equivalent to what we do.

[Alydar in California]

   JB wrote: \"Fortunately, most extreme slow paces come on turf, making it easy to know when to subtract for pace.\"

    Subtract what? You aren\'t subtracting here, are you? This discussion is very misleading.

[TGJB]

Cranky as ever. Welcome back. Yes, I am subtracting. If raw time (or the variant of other grass races) would give the winner a 10 and I want to give him a 5, I have to subtract 5 points.

[Alydar in California]

Thank you. If your hangover \"remedy\" worked, I wouldn\'t be cranky. No. You\'re not subtracting. If the pace is slow, you detach the race from the other turf races run that day. Then you make the figures based on the previous numbers of the horses in the slow-pace race. Subtraction doesn\'t enter into it. In your example, the horses would get a number five points faster than raw time would dictate. But you haven\'t gotten there by subtracting. You have gotten there by detaching. By talking about subtraction, you are giving people the impression that you knock, say, two points off the figures if the pace is a second slow. You don\'t do this.

[Alydar in California]

One more thing:

You wrote: \"It means the pace was so slow that the final time was compromised. I treat those races as if I didn\'t have final time, just using the horses.\"

     In these cases, you don\'t use the final time. Again, subtract from what?

[Alydar in California]

David wrote: \"24.3 49.3 114.0 137.2 149.0 it would seem more reasonable to consider a pace adjustment than if the race went:

24.3 49.3 114.0 138.2 149.4

The second race is slower but seems more likely due to a slow surface as opposed to a slow early pace.\"

  Why did you muddy the waters by making the final eighth faster in your second example? Were these races won wire to wire? How far behind were the closers at each call?

[dpatent]

Alydar,

The final time for race two should have been typed as 150.4, not 149.4.

My point was that final time of the race is perhaps less important than the relative speed of the final fractions, particularly if we have a situation with only 1 or 2 turf races that day.  I would be much more confident that slow pace was the cause of a slow figure if the internal fractions look out of whack than if the final time appears slow.  I\'m still awaiting Jerry\'s take on that.

[Alydar in California]

David wrote: \"The final time for race two should have been typed as 150.4, not 149.4.\"

A second here, a second there, and pretty soon we\'re talking about serious time.

\"My point was that final time of the race is perhaps less important than the relative speed of the final fractions, particularly if we have a situation with only 1 or 2 turf races that day. I would be much more confident that slow pace was the cause of a slow figure if the internal fractions look out of whack than if the final time appears slow. I\'m still awaiting Jerry\'s take on that.\"

Asked and answered. If there is only one turf race that day, the issue is moot.