Wow, there's none so blind.......etc

As a racing fan and impartial observer, Brig, with no axe to grind either way, I think what you're failing to grasp is that Figgis isn't slagging off any horse. He is merely applying the methods you have used to downgrade recent performances to some performances of the past. The lesson being that no race fully stands up to the closest scrutiny under those terms and a case can be made that any performance was less than it appeared.

Has brigust defined what he means by "greatest Arc winner"? Best horse to win an Arc or the best performance in the race? Or is he leaving it ambiguous to muddy the waters? Either way it's probably Ribot.

Dancing Brave was a great horse and his Arc win tremendous but if you believe it was one of the all-time great throughbred performances you have to think that Shardari, Tryptych, etc are amongst the best ever at 12f. They patently weren't. If the race has been run this decade DB would probably only have been rated mid 130s.

And we in the UK are only 30 years behind the use of sectional timing

Having spent the best part of 30 years working with sectional timing in this country, I can assure you that whilst it does provide another dimension to handicapping it is NOT by itself the road to a fortune, and for the work involved, the  time might be better spent elsewhere.

IMO there is no foolproof method for measuring the merit of a performance given all the variables that come into play, to the degree of accuracy really needed for reliably differentiating between horses. What you can do is arrive at a method which you trust and whose limitations you understand and that enables you to make some sense of it all.

All imo of course.

*what I've seen of the U.S. methods.

Hi figgis,
          What did you rate Harbinger after the Hardwicke?

I don't rate on the 140 scale, metro john. I use a lower scale and it's not exactly comparing like with like, as I believe these 140 scales generally exaggerate differences in ability. All I can say is I thought it was a figure that was good enough to take most of the King George's in my time.

the issue with a horse like Harbinger is that ridden to challenge and to make it's effort at about the 2 furlong pole it is only ever going to build up a winning lead of a certain distance  - regardless of the opposition - and a lot will depend on haow hard tthe jockey pushes the horse out. it's a very inexact science.

http://youtu.be/FXC4sgGDYQY

The remarkable thing about what we do is how well we measure horses' abilities given the margins involved.

When talking about the effect of 1 lb we overlook the fact that an average mature thoroughbred can weigh 1100-1200  lbs plus weight carried so in reality the scale is not 0-140 it is 0-1250 or thereabouts.

In time terms, 1/5 th of a second is really on a scale of 0-500 over a mile (100 secs roughly to run x 5 fifths to a second) and 1/1000 fifths over 2 miles.

Its no wonder that we don't always agree. What is truly remarkable is how often we can agree within a margin of error that is quite small say 7lb or 2-3 fifths of a second.

Figgis did a pretty good job on the inadequacy of taking selected beaten horses into account when assessing races with his post on Dancing Brave but just to add another swipe at the brigust1 "selective race " school of form assessment, myself.

The Premiership is only 3 matches old and this may have been done elsewhere in the past, but it's worth using the example from football again.  Collateral form can lead to very silly conclusions. Take this set of results from the current Premiership.

Stoke City win at Man City 1-0.

Man City beat Liverpool 3-1 at home.

Liverpool beat Spurs away 3-0.

Spurs beat West Ham 1-0 away.

Brigust1 conclusions:1. Stoke City must be the best team out of these so far. 2. Stoke City will finish above the other 4 teams.

I've just had a little bet, only £100, in true Brig style, on Stoke to win the prem at 1000/1. They win. Form is rock solid whatever way you dish the variables.

Metro john

I'm not really knocking brigust1 more the methodology, which to be fair can lead to the same conclusions arrived at using other methods. Its just that he insists that "all the clues are there" which ignores the part that chance plays. Stoke were 20/1 to win at Man C. and  man c 2/11. It's the randomness that makes for uncertainty. All the clues are not there and never will be.

I think even people who don't like the methodology would be more accepting of someone else using it if that person just offered it as their own viewpoint, instead of trying to state it as the truth and the light, 'the clues are all there but not everyone else can see them' nonsense. Whenever somebody puts up a high opinion of a horse, he doesn't just say he disagrees, the opinion is belittled by saying things such as 'some people are easily pleased', 'people are being led by the nose by Timeform', and other patronising remarks. Then starts squawking when that methodology is challenged.

What Sandown has said has to be right. We have both had discussions and disagreements on here about pricing horses up and determining value. His method is to always price every runner and look for anything significantly bigger than his tissue price, therefore often leading to backing a few in a race. Whereas my method is actually closer to the brigust way of looking for a horse with a reasonably high chance of winning. I will often only price up what I consider to be the main contenders against a 'rest of the field' price. There is no doubt that his is the more thorough method and mine couldn't possibly work for him, or a bookmaker. However, I think both methods have their advantages and disadvantages and ultimately it's always best to work to suit yourself.

Many successful punters won't price up a race in the strict sense but surely what can't be disputed is that every winning punter must have an idea of the horse's chance and  be able to put it into odds before they place a bet, they have to know what price is acceptable to take and what isn't. To simply say I believe this horse will win and I will back it at the best price available, whatever that may be, makes no betting sense.

I think sometimes when people talk of making their own prices they do not accept that some of us struggle with this,I used to try but to be honest how do you price up something you believe can't win?(),I have yet to witness a decent ratings to prices conversion? and to be honest once you leave your ratings out of the equation,because you believe some of those not valid,or possibly improvement to come,,how can you price up such an obscure view? I am willing to learn if one of you would like to post your method of pricing up a race(please help)

MJ

There are many advantages to pricing up a race and it doesn't have to be difficult. I have a simple method which I started with which may help you but first the advantages of doing so.

1. It forces you to think about every horse instead of just locking in on one or two. Remember, if it runs, it can win.

2.It opens up alternative betting strategies apart from backing the "most likely" winner to win. eg EW, dutching,laying, making a book (especially useful with AP or big races), reverse forecasts, place betting, because it highlights where the value lies.

3. It helps you to adjust the driving/key factors that influence the race e.g when it comes up heavy, ability to act on the ground goes straight to the top, draw at certain tracks like Chester, Sandown 5f course

Word of advice- don't start with percentages - it's too complicated to keep adjusting. So, here's my method.

You will have a rough order of likelihood of winning for most horses in a race even if further down you have to put them in a group. You can do this with ratings using a conversion chart eventually(in fact its a good place to start) you can look at forecast prices (I'm not bothered by being influenced) and you can take other factors into account broadly such as improver, jockey/trainer, class.

Start with the horse you think most likely to win. Award it 10 points.

Take the next in the list and compare it with your first. How would you rate it against the first?. Close, say on a head to head 4/5, 5/4? OK award it 8 pts. Or maybe 1/2, 2/1 then give it 5 pts. Very little chance? Say 1/5, 5/1 . OK award it 2 pts.

As you work down your list you will give each a lower score. Eventually you will be giving 1 pt. Tip: Even apparent no-hopers deserve something say 1/2 pt.

Add up the points and divide the total by the number of points awarded. Say you have 30 pts then the favourite is 3.0 or 2/1. And so on.


Its fast, can be adjusted easily later say when more information comes in, including market strength. Eventually you will be able to do it in your head.

Hope that helps.

When I was younger I did try to incorporate realistic prices that were available in the offices,so i would want to make a 115%  book, I found that if you try a 100% book,your prices are out to the prices available? I always found problems with method!


Thank You for the advice sandown ,figgis,grendel,but what % would you work too?

Each of us has to find their own path. There is no right or wrong method, right or wrong price. It's whatever you feel comfortable with, whatever works for you, whatever gives you a profit (or minimises a loss), whatever adds to your enjoyment.

Article by Simon Rowlands for those interested in this quite complex subject.   https://betting.betfair.com/horse-racing/bloggers/simon-rowlands/post-222-040810.html


any articles you can post on the subject would be of interest to myself and newbies to the game

The trouble with having a strong opinion about a horse that varies a lot from the market is not everyone is looking at the race from your perspective and you can wonder why its price is so big when its chance is obvious and speculate and worry about factors you've missed. These are the situations where you have to trust your opinion and back accordingly and not worry about unknown factors to yourself as these factors will over time average out and not be as significant as the discrepancies suggest.  For example if you fancy a horse strongly on ratings but it has a historical poor draw, it's more than likely that the horse will have enough in hand to overcome the poor draw enough times that it will still be profitable to back such selections long term and nothing is more draining on your confidence than missing a winner.