Ultra-Pix Harness Program

[beaucap1]

Has anyone bought Bud Smith's Ultra-Pix Harness Program? You can add weight factors for speed,driver,parked out,class,post and finish position. It's sounds like an ok program. It's $90.00 and shipping is free.

[LottaKash]

Has anyone bought Bud Smith's Ultra-Pix Harness Program? You can add weight factors for speed,driver,parked out,class,post and finish position. It's sounds like an ok program. It's $90.00 and shipping is free.

Hey Beaucap, being a fairly competent harness handicapper, and without ever seeing or using this software, and based on the parameters and premise's of the program, I would offhand say that It is just another, "Find the Morning Line Favorite"- picker......All the general factors that make the sizing up of contenders are already there for all to see, and some people do need to have some order of the content presented in a more organized and straightforward way......

Although this software allows you to change the weights of the basic handicapping factors, it doesn't really address the significance of Trainer and Drivers, and their relationships to each other...... A Trainer's intentions on race-day carries a great deal of weight with me....Also a horse's running style and his post position relevancy in todays contest vs. the competition is a major issue as well......Also, a myriad of angles that loom large, are not addressed and this is also a concern for me.....

Still, a program that will allow a different weighting for the major tangibles is a plus, especially for the novices and newbies, as when their handicapping skills and awareness grows, they might experiment with the different weights and learn something in the process......

For me tho, a program that accomdates BOTH the t-bred & S-bred genre's, presents certain dilemmas for me, as speed & pace and performance lines as well as win%;s and earnings are analgous to both sports, but I think that is where it ends, for the most part..

In the end, if I were a newbie or intermediate player, I might give this a go, for a hundred clams, it will probably improve your bottom line enough to compensate for the purchase.....as most likely, if you need this software ,than you are giving away more than that anyway.....

humbly,

[pktruckdriver]

Hey LK


as most likely, if you need this software ,than you are giving away more than that anyway:lol: :lol:



You are so smooth, but also correct

[LottaKash]

Hey LK


:lol: :lol:



You are so smooth, but also correct



Hey Patrick, how goes it?...How is life on the Big-Roads...??

Hey Pat, everyone who has ever looked at or played the horses, has to have been in a certain state of success at any given point, everyone......Given that, smoothness has nothing to do with the probable truth......When I needed software, to tell me what I may know now without it, I probably was giving away a lottkash as well...haha...

I didn't mean to be demeaning in any way, heck I too am curioius and interested in how this software may perform, but not to the tune of 99 smackers.........Just don't need it need now.....

best,

[Tom Barrister]

The trainer is the key force in harness race handicapping. It's a long ways to the next most important factor. Unfortunately, trainer intention is something that's very hard for humans to figure out in harness racing, let alone having software do it..

[Maxspa]

Lotta Kash,
Did Clint Galbraith and Niatross have anything to do with the name you've chosen here? The farm that Clint was associated with, bred and developed a lot of horses with Kash names! I was at Saratoga when Niatross went over the hub rail at odds on but thankfully he was not injured!
Just Curious,
Maxspa

[jeebus1083]

What about doing the Quirin Speed Point method for the trots? I think one could get solid overlay prices doing that.

[LottaKash]

Lotta Kash,
Did Clint Galbraith and Niatross have anything to do with the name you've chosen here? The farm that Clint was associated with, bred and developed a lot of horses with Kash names! I was at Saratoga when Niatross went over the hub rail at odds on but thankfully he was not injured!
Just Curious,
Maxspa

Hey Max, I never thought anyone would guess that.....YOu are correct, I adopted that name for my own many moons ago, as I made a lottakash on Lottakash.......

Niatross one of the best ever........Bret Hanover remains my all time favorite, tho.....as I believe if he were alive today, he would run as fast as a t-bred, he was such a handy horse and he could go from dead-last or wire to wire and win....Of course that is subjective and we will never know for sure.........

best,

[Tom Barrister]

What about doing the Quirin Speed Point method for the trots? I think one could get solid overlay prices doing that.

Early Speed isn't as big an advantage in harness racing as it is in thoroughbreds.

[LottaKash]

Early Speed isn't as big an advantage in harness racing as it is in thoroughbreds.

Hey Tom, being a harness guy, I would say that early position is more important than early speed, and is the key in harness racing.....But the enigma begins when one considers that, to get and keep a good early position, is early speed required, yes?....no?....or maybe?.....

best,

[big frank]

Early Speed isn't as big an advantage in harness racing as it is in thoroughbreds. What ??? Except for 1 mile tracks , speed is far more dangerous and important than ANY thoroughbred track ... At 1/2 mile tracks inside posts @ early speed dominate.. Just check the numbers and see how post positions 7 @ 8 do on half mile tracks. If you dont have early speed to leave the gate , you have little shot to win from coming from 7th or 8th..

[Tom Barrister]

What ??? Except for 1 mile tracks , speed is far more dangerous and important than ANY thoroughbred track ... At 1/2 mile tracks inside posts @ early speed dominate.. Just check the numbers and see how post positions 7 @ 8 do on half mile tracks. If you dont have early speed to leave the gate , you have little shot to win from coming from 7th or 8th..

I didn't say early position wasn't important in the race itself. I said early speed itself wasn't that important of a handicapping factor in harness racing. They're two different things.

Early position is mostly a function of post position and trainer intention.

Without poring over programs, I'd estimate that 90% of all standardbreds who win on half-mile tracks have the ability to brush a fast first quarter and get on or near the early lead if the circumstances are favorable. Those who aren't able to either rarely win or end up going to 5/8's or mile tracks, where they have longer stretches to accelerate.

A standardbred who repeatedly fires first quarters a second faster than the norm for that track and class level isn't going to do very well unless it can also finish strongly.

If 90% of successful half-mile-track standardbreds have the ability to get on or near the lead, it makes it pointless (at least to me) to key on early speed, per first-quarter time or early running positions in the past performance.

[LottaKash]

[QUOTE=Tom Barrister]I
Early position is mostly a function of post position and trainer intention.

Without poring over programs, I'd estimate that 90% of all standardbreds who win on half-mile tracks have the ability to brush a fast first quarter and get on or near the early lead if the circumstances are favorable. Those who aren't able to either rarely win or end up going to 5/8's or mile tracks, where they have longer stretches to accelerate.
QUOTE]

Hey Tom, here is a silly thing, Yonkers is a 1/2-miler, and the stretch is 660ft, and Chester is a 5/8ths miler and the stretch is 440 ft.....haha...

best,

[RichieP]

I am not familiar with the program.

If it is a reflection of the man behind it most probably rocks. I have known Bud for years through email and phone calls. He runs a super successful consulting firm in Texas. He has a heart as big as one can possess. He and his wife Donna have gone out of their way to make my Mom feel special during these last years and her bout with Alzheimer's.

I can't speak highly enough about the man behind the software.

[headhawg]

I don't know anything about the program either but it sure looks like it was written by Joe Zambuto. He probably wrote the code based on weighting factors given to him by Bud Smith.

FWIW, most people here were not big fans of Joe Z's t-bred program. It did give the user the ability to "tune" the weights automatically (uh...backfit), but it does not appear that Ultra-pix gives the user that option. You can manually adjust the weights, which is fine. But to me, that seems to defeat the purpose of a computer program. If I already knew how to "weight" the factors, I probably wouldn't need software to show me the picks for the race.

Just my .02.

[Tom Barrister]

I don't know anything about the program either but it sure looks like it was written by Joe Zambuto. He probably wrote the code based on weighting factors given to him by Bud Smith.

FWIW, most people here were not big fans of Joe Z's t-bred program. It did give the user the ability to "tune" the weights automatically (uh...backfit), but it does not appear that Ultra-pix gives the user that option. You can manually adjust the weights, which is fine. But to me, that seems to defeat the purpose of a computer program. If I already knew how to "weight" the factors, I probably wouldn't need software to show me the picks for the race.

Just my .02.

I'm curious how you came to that conclusion, if you don't know anything about it. A lot of authors have the equivalent of "weighting factors" and "tuning" (backfitting), Mike Groves (QuickDog/QuickHorse) being one of the better-known ones (mainly for QuickDog, which I've used for years).

[headhawg]

Which conclusion? I went to Trackmaster, clicked on Partner's Products, then Third Party Software, click the link that read "Click here for complete details..." for the Ultra-Pix program, read the description and looked at the picture. I owned the Joe Z t-bred program and there is no mistaking the interface design.

I just wanted to point out things that I noticed in case it was important to potential buyers. I also didn't give an opinion about the goodness or the badness of the program as I never used it. Any more questions?

[Tom Barrister]

Which conclusion? I went to Trackmaster, clicked on Partner's Products, then Third Party Software, click the link that read "Click here for complete details..." for the Ultra-Pix program, read the description and looked at the picture. I owned the Joe Z t-bred program and there is no mistaking the interface design.

I just wanted to point out things that I noticed in case it was important to potential buyers. I also didn't give an opinion about the goodness or the badness of the program as I never used it. Any more questions?

Ahh, it's on Trackmaster, which would make sense, since they have past performance data files for harness racing.

It does look like Zambuto's work. Zambuto wrote a lot of software for others, and this looks like some programs I've seen.

Smith also has one called "Duo-Pix" for an extra $10, which does both Thoroughbreds and Harness; it uses "class, speed, current form, hidden form".

Ultra Pix claims that:


The factors of speed, class, driver, finish position, post position and parked calls pretty much covers all the important aspects of a horse’s ability and readiness.


Apparently, trainer ability and intent, effort level, trouble-lines, predicted early position, track size and bias, and effective level of competition don't mean anything in harness racing anymore.