Pinza

I have followed on from my late Father who was often reading "The Handicap Book" and working out speed figures
Around that time I was avidly following football and the racing results annoucements were a nuisance as they
preceded the football results.

The change came when I was 10 years old and my Mother asked me for a tip.
The "tanner" (6 old pence) went on Mexicali Rose which won at 10/1 and that was the start of my addiction to horse racing.

It wasn't long before I was borrowing my Dads form books and even opened up my own postal racing account with Shermans Bookmakers.

Mu first racecourse bet was when I was 15 at York races, on holiday with my Dad. Joe Sime won the Ebor at 16/1.

When starting work at Shipping Agents Office in Liverpool I would buy a daily newspaper to read on the train.
I become quite an authority on various newspaper horse racing coverage.
Daily Sketch, Herald, Mirror, Mail, Express, Guardian were initial studies but have settled with Mirror and Express as my main racing papers.I also have a high regard for the Mail which I also used in the early years but it's too expensive running three papers.

The early noticeable thing about the Mirror was the number of 2yo Maiden winners over 8 furlongs for John Dunlop when the SF (strongly fancied) was present on the racecard.

My job was to deliver shipping note invoices to the various Shipping Line Offices in Liverpool City. There was often time during the afternoon delivery to pop into the betting offices.

Marraige and children took out a period of time where horse racing was restricited, but my first wife would argue that Form book study was still a priority in those days.

1982 was the start for the basis of keeping data in written format and 1994 started the computerised version.
I now have accumulated a massive amount of racing data under Flat racing trainers and numerous Excel databases.

The information overload is problematic (especially with number of Saturday meetings) to evaluate sometimes and probably too much to keep on top of. That's where the winter months come in handy as less racing on AW allows time for data input. and evaluation.