Isn't it odd Fig that so many people claim a horse will definitely stay 12f when he has stayed 10f etc. How many times does it come up to be just not as simple as that?

No any horse. So You Think, CDA, Dawn Approach in the Derby and Toronado today. Among many others. It seldom works out as straightforward as that.

*easier to predict

Maybe but he did beat DOW pretty well at Goodwood and Dawn Approach clearly never ran to form last time finishing alongside his pacemaker who was 12 lengths behind him in the Sussex.
Personally I think they jumped the gun because Olympic Glory ran so well against Moonlight Cloud. Today Toronado wouldn't have beaten Hillstar at a mile so it has to be discounted. I had hoped they would lay him out to take on Wise Dan but that's up in the air now. If I were them I would put him away now until next season. Olympic Glory has had an easy time of it and could win the QE11 and then the B Cup. Who knows.

I wonder how many horses cough unreported after winning?

Sandown

Overexertion can lead to serious noticeable physical problems, it can also lead to less noticeable problems which become apparent later, and lowering of resistance. Let's not pretend that racehorses aren't under tremendous physical stress when they race competitively. As it's been reported that as many as 70% of them suffer some bleeding in their respiratory system after a race I'd say that's pretty stressful. If you do not choose to believe there is a link that is up to you. I do believe it and also believe it can be factored into betting. Sure it'll lead to bum steers occasionally, but I know that on the whole it is more profitable to take it into account than ignore it.

Sandown

You keep going on about the 'hard race', I have already stated more than once that my reasons weren't only related to a hard race, the main reason was figure related and my own observations of form cycles. The observations are only a generalisation, that's all they can ever be, but it is a generalisation that has significance. If you follow the likes of Topspeed then you obviously won't see the correlation.

You got the right result but for the wrong reasons imo. It happens just as you can back a winner despite something else being unlucky not to win. Or, you can back a loser when it should have won

In this particular case that could be right, even I don't know, but, as you say, it is your opinion and you can't prove it any more than I can. As I said before, a one off race can never be proved one way or another, but I have the evidence of years of races and know for a fact that it has enough predictive accuracy for it to be factored into analysis before the race, instead of ignoring the issue, watching one perform poorly and waiting for trainer explanations.

Figgis



A half length improvement over DA from the Ascot run is hardly stunning progression.

I don't rely on TS or RPR's, as you know, especially for top races like G1's.But in this instance, I agree with those figures that Toronado achieved a PB at Goodwood. It's a bit odd for a time aficiando like yourself quoting a collateral term i.e. half a length , at me. The time for the Goodwood race was top class, and higher for me  than any of Toronado's or DA's previous races. Hughes had the horse back on the bridle at the line after showing a good turn of foot. It was hardly a flat out hard raced head to head fight over say 3f. So, for me the Hannon horse showed further progression.

Where I do agree with you is that achieving a personal best represents dangerous territory in that such an improvement can be followed by a lesser effort and in anticipating that you got it right. But, he might still have run a lesser rating ( I do not rate yesterday's race that highly - 111 for the moment) that Toronado might still have won. He ran well below form because he was suffering a bug. That could not be foreseen.The TV people, if they had been doing their job, should have picked up him sweating badly because that was the clue that all was not well.

Of course even if the horse had won it wouldn't prove the theory wrong that could only be proved wrong over thousands of results.

Although I must say on my figures Toronado did improve at Goodwood on final race time due to stronger pace there but looking at the sectionals at Ascot I felt the front 2 were more superior to the others than the margins gave them credit for. So I don't think he actually improved as such but the race was run in such a way for him to run to his best speed figure.

Stevie, I'm not claiming to know that Toronado would perform as poorly as he did, as I said I could've indeed just got lucky this time. Before understandably being eased off by Hughes he was only about 6 or 7 lengths behind the leaders, which would not be completely unusual for a below par effort. I do know that when a horse is more likely to run a below par effort and it does then it's amazing how often it also coincides with an excuse coming from connections later, that's not to say the excuse is made up, but there is a correlation.

yes you are correct Figgis, I see there Irish Derby figure is quite low and I think that is due to their standard on the 6f63y race being wrong. But even so yes the 129 also seems a few pounds too high for Toronado

In fact they have Toronado's sussex stakes 8lb better than Farhh's Lockinge. It's not really worth looking at them.

Toronado's alleged cough is very likely to be a total fabrication. Hard race at Goodwood (much harder than one who was stuffed 3 lengths and not involved in the finish) following another at Ascot, then regressed yesterday. Looks straightforward to me.

Before I started doing my own figures Figgis, because of topspeeds I used to think speed ratings were only useful for telling you if a race was truly run and how reliable the form figure was for the race. It wasn't until I did my own that I realised you can get an accurate assessment of how good a horse is.

Sankara

Toronado's alleged cough is very likely to be a total fabrication. Hard race at Goodwood (much harder than one who was stuffed 3 lengths and not involved in the finish) following another at Ascot, then regressed yesterday. Looks straightforward to me.


With all due respect you seem to be a conspiracy theory believer, possibly visually impaired,with an over-confident opinion in the face of the facts. Am I right?

Stevie G

For a free service the RP does a reasonable job with RPR's and TS judging on L/T results.Use them as a starting point as they influence SP's and look for the horses where your opinion is very different and you isolate possible value. My particular  concerns with TS are that they nearly always use one allowance, they may inflate the top rating on the day and I have more than a few disagreements with some race standards. That said, unless you can afford the time to rate every horse in every race at every meeting, you need someone to break the back of the work.

Frog Hollow would just about be my top rated. I'll have a look at queensbury now.

Like you, had Frog Hollow top, but Mont Ras joint top deducting the jockey allowance, which I often do depending on the jockey, didn't back any of them, though, much too difficult for me. Queensberry Rules ran a bit better than I expected.

At the risk of being accused of after-timing, the RPR's/TS can be very helpful and certainly influenced me to have something on Mont Ras at 30's, that and the fact that O'Meara clearly was having a go. I backed several in this, so the win was not all that you might think, but good enough. Funnily enough, my times did not come into this decision.

well ratings are just part of it, lots of other factors to consider when judging whether a horse is worth a bet at the price but the more accurate the rating is the better.