Some advice on my handicapping

[Versajoe]

I'm new to harness handicapping. I read Ainslie's Complete Guide to Harness Racing. It's a pretty old book, but the theories still apply. There also don't seem to be any recent books that are easily available.

A couple of observations/questions about Ainslie's pace rating formula:
1) He seems to give a lot of weight to good drivers. That's fine, but the way he does it seems to be too abrupt. If a driver has a win percentage of more than 15%, you give that horse 10 extra points. (This is a lot, since most contenders are only separated by 10 of fewer points prior to adding these "driver" points in.) Therefore, a driver with a win percentage of 14.8% gets no points. Is a driver with a win percentage that's only 0.3% higher really worth all of those extra points? Seems to me that I should figure out a sliding scale. To give you an idea of how many points this is, the difference between post 1 and post 8 on a half-mile track is only worth 4 points.
2) He only uses the most recent past performance - unless that performance doesn't tell you much. (e,g,: The horse was stuck in traffic.) His theory is that standardbreads are all about conditioning now - and races that are more than two weeks old are not relevant at all at telling you what their current condition is like. (Do they have aches and pains, etc? He posits that this changes from race to race.) Again, this seems kind of abrupt, but it does make things easier since there is less to deal with.
3) He gives no consideration to the trainer. This does not enter the rating at all. Shouldn't it?
4) It's amazing how many races are NOT good races to bet under his system. I suppose this is a good thing, no? The idea is that you want a clear contender. It definitely is not always the favorite, which is good. Anybody can just bet the favorite - and lose money. I should point out that he only stresses betting to win, with the occasional exacta.

The toughest part of his system is identifying which horses are contenders. His examples aren't entirely clear - and seem somewhat arbitrary. Once you identify the contenders, you run the numbers. I suppose I'll just have to work on that.

I can say that his system, while far from perfect, has helped me. It provides an easy way to focus on speed, class, etc - whereas I used to get hung up on what order the horse finished in without putting it into context. I just think that I need to tweak it some.

Frankly, I'm not looking to make money at this. I'm looking to have fun when I go to the track. Having fun means at least having a chance when I bet. If I had a fun day, and lost a few bucks, I'm fine with that. I just want to know enough about what I'm doing to at least make my chances better than random.

[Ray2000]

Sly Fox posted this link back in June in reply to a thread started by Tom

http://www.kimstarr.org/corner/archives.html

Good articles for someone new to the game.

[Big Fella]

I do not agree with the driver's rating system in handicapping. Let's not forget that good horses make good drivers. Take for example at Mohawk/Woodbine where the regular catch drivers all seem to be comparable, I for one, never even look at who's driving. If I like a horse I simply bet on his chances. I give more importance to the post position especially on smaller tracks.

[JustRalph]

Try the T-Breds

[botster]

[QUOTE=Versajoe]I'm new to harness handicapping. I read Ainslie's Complete Guide to Harness Racing. It's a pretty old book, but the theories still apply. There also don't seem to be any recent books that are easily available.

Versajoe before "you jump ship" give it a try by betting small and just watching for a few months.Try to zone in on only one or two tracks, i would suggest the Meadowlands, and mabey Mohawk/Woodbine.

Try not to get suckered in by betting the "rinkydink" tracks with small pools they are a quick pathway to aggravation and an empty wallet.

Try to form your own opinions on drivers/trainers at these meets and get to know the horses racing there.If you need more learning on the basics of the game i would suggest reading articles written by Bob (pandy) Pandolfo, he has best grasp IMO on the basic insights of the game.I had mentioned before in prior posts that I still use his progressive betting system to this day.It's a great form of discipline for those who have trouble on how to bet.

[Stick]

Botster
Can you explain Pandy's progressive betting system?

[Horseball]

I have also read Ainslie. Don't look too much to the precise weighting that he gives each factor. This book can only help you if you have no idea what to look at in the program -- it can give you a few ideas.

That book was written 35 years ago -- so much of what it says doesn't apply. Look at the drivers who win more than 15% -- there are only two of those at Yonkers (Bartlett and Bouchard), and only one at the Meadowlands (Sears). In the days that Ainslie was writing, catch driving was far from the almost completely universal practice that is today. Now the regular drivers at Meadowlands drive 8-10 races a night, and almost nobody else does at all. Like mutual funds that get too big, once you capture the entire market, it is harder to beat the market and consequently harder to fall behind the market. If there were nine horses in every race, and nine of the same drivers competing in every race, the bogey is about 11% (1/9). You'll see that the regular Meadowlands drivers (with the exception of Sears) are pretty closely clustered around that number.
Furthermore, the whole concept of handicapping presented in the book is flawed. The entire focus is on picking winners -- whereas handicapping is about finding value. You should not be trying to pick winners then hope that the odds are favorable -- you should be trying to find attractive betting propositions. Any horse can be an attractive betting proposition, given the right odds, not just the "contenders". Remember that you are not betting that a horse will win, but rather you have a difference of opinion with your fellow bettors about the horse's chances to win. You've got to look at the tote board, and Ainslie doesn't tell you anything about that.

[Postime]

I have also read Ainslie. Don't look too much to the precise weighting that he gives each factor. This book can only help you if you have no idea what to look at in the program -- it can give you a few ideas.

That book was written 35 years ago -- so much of what it says doesn't apply. Look at the drivers who win more than 15% -- there are only two of those at Yonkers (Bartlett and Bouchard), and only one at the Meadowlands (Sears). In the days that Ainslie was writing, catch driving was far from the almost completely universal practice that is today. Now the regular drivers at Meadowlands drive 8-10 races a night, and almost nobody else does at all. Like mutual funds that get too big, once you capture the entire market, it is harder to beat the market and consequently harder to fall behind the market. If there were nine horses in every race, and nine of the same drivers competing in every race, the bogey is about 11% (1/9). You'll see that the regular Meadowlands drivers (with the exception of Sears) are pretty closely clustered around that number.
Furthermore, the whole concept of handicapping presented in the book is flawed. The entire focus is on picking winners -- whereas handicapping is about finding value. You should not be trying to pick winners then hope that the odds are favorable -- you should be trying to find attractive betting propositions. Any horse can be an attractive betting proposition, given the right odds, not just the "contenders". Remember that you are not betting that a horse will win, but rather you have a difference of opinion with your fellow bettors about the horse's chances to win. You've got to look at the tote board, and Ainslie doesn't tell you anything about that.

I read Ainslie book in the early 80's, still have my copy somewhere, Harness racing has changed a whole bunch since that book was written.(the racing bike is much differant) I respectfully disagree with the statement "Handicapping is finding value" Handicapping is finding winner's.

[Horseball]

Postime, I agree with you that the Ainslie book is outdated in many ways, but I have to disagree with you. Handicapping is not about picking winners -- take the Meadowlands Pace from this year. If you were picking winners, there is no way that you would choose any horse other than SBSW -- but at 1-9 the odds were terrible. Art Official paid $26.00 or whatever as the second choice. The week before SBSW beat Art Official by open lengths. Nothing in the program would have told you to bet on Art Official -- but the tote board could have steered you in that direction by offering very nice odds.

Furthermore, if you are betting exotics, that is quite literally not about picking winners. I think that there was a Pandy article on this where he said that he was in a trifecta slump due to his consideration only of contenders -- you have to also think about horses that are capable of finishing third.

Another point missing from Ainslie is trying to understand why others have differing opinions about horses. Maybe you see a horse that has a few strong outings then is scratched as sick, if prices are short, bettors believe that the horse will return to form -- if prices are long that it won't. Me and everyone else has seen either happen, and it is probably more likely that the horse will not immediately return to form. Nevertheless, if the odds are long enough, it may be worth betting -- even though (unless you're the veterinarian) you really don't know anything about the horse's condition or even what it was sick with.

The important thing is to try to see why a particular horse is being bet or not bet. Do you think you know? How much confidence do you have in the judgement of the other bettors? Each bettor is taking into account certain factors - do you feel they are overemphasizing anything? Such as the last race -- whether the results were good or bad?

Often the most important handicapping consideration is what information you choose to exclude or discount, but just because you're not considering that factor doesn't mean that such factors should not be part of your analysis. For example some people never consider the driver, although most people do (including me). So, a player who doesn't consider drivers might conclude that any horse driven by, say, Jason Bartlett at Yonkers this year would be an underlay, because at least some people are more likely to bet on the horse on that basis. The horse might be an overlay for other reasons, but you have to ferret those out.

[botster]

This is beginning to be the "old age question".

I am watching closely Pandy's Grand Adventure on the U.S.T.A site and see that he has made a profit over 44 weeks. A very small profit, but still warrants much praise under the conditions in that he is restricted in his selecting process.

Pandy believes, for the most part, to get the winners and the value will follow.It works for him, but doesn't for me.I cannot pick enough shorter priced winners and exotics to keep me afloat. This being said, I still think it is extremely hard for most players to go this route and show a profit... but mabey I am wrong.

To be successful in value hunting one needs to be extremely disciplined and sharp.Not to sound boastfull, but I believe this takes much more time and effort to be successfull.

[Stick]

Some good stuff guys. I think that people who prefer to find the winners still have a guideline as to what odds they will take. But instead of looking at the race from a value perspective, they choose a horse because they believe it has some type of advantage in the race (lone speed, others will battle, class, sudden change of form, etc.) that they hope the public will not fully take advantage of. If the odds on this horse are not there, they pass the race instead of seeking value somewhere else in the race. So a capper can handicap the race and assign MAO on each horse or can identify horses in races that they think have an advantage and then look to play these horses if the odds are acceptable. Both can be done to beat this game in the long run.

[Tom]

The "light" that came on for me was how to recognize a horse sucked along. It was a hard thing to throw out a horse with a running line like:

2 2-1 2-1 3-1 3-2

Once I grasped the idea that the horse needed to show some signs of shape and that trips were everything, the rest started to make more sense.

Harness is different than T-Breds in some major ways. You have to change your mindset.