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Jay Trotter
04-30-2011, 03:38 PM
Getting ready for the start of a new live meet at my home track and was wondering what methods players use to monitor the "track bias".

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. :ThmbUp:

Dan Montilion
04-30-2011, 04:13 PM
Here is my take on track bias. I cut and pasted it from my web site. Site is still up but business never took off, so no attempt to sell anything.

To properly identify a track bias a superior trip handicapper needs to have the card properly handicapped. If you don't know what is supposed to happen how can you make a judgment on what actually happened? If a lone pace scenario on a majority of the races is expected and the pace sets up as expected yet none of the lone pace horses survive yes, there is likely a track bias. Or if all of the strong pace types have drawn inside of weaker pace types in a race full of weak closers and the inside horses get the best of the pace and go onto win. Many handicappers might suggest an inside advantaged bias. We would label the above scenario non -biased, as what was supposed to happen happened. Of course the above are just examples. It is usually much more subjective to properly identify a track bias. Our opinion about track bias has always been that most handicappers are too quick and easy to label a track biased. This approach is okay if a player attempts to take advantage of a possible bias for one days play. If the player is wrong it's just one losing day. However, if the same quick and easy approach is used to incorrectly label a track bias then all of the horses that ran on that day will be improperly evaluated in subsequent starts. We are conservative in our approach. We believe that a true track bias should affect a majority of the field. Here is an example. Seven 10 horse fields on the main track and all of them go wire to wire; all win by less that one length with a nice mixture of short priced horses and longshots. Many fans would be quick to call this a speed favoring surface. What if I told you all of the second place horses that were beaten by less than a length came from last. Different opinion? You bet. We will be conservative in labeling tracks biased. We also hold the opinion that a bias should affect all distances the same way. But we do realize that at times, for reasons not understood by us a bias is present for routes vs. sprints and visa versa. We will on occasion even admit we are a bit confused as to if a track is biased and we will mention it in the track bias section. We are not embarrassed if we are occasionally stumped. We need to know it and so does the subscriber. You will know when a track bias exists; we will write it out as opposed to an esoteric code that some handicappers use.

Edward DeVere
04-30-2011, 09:30 PM
Visually.

After years and years and years, you can look at a few races - sometimes just one race - and know one of three things:

1) There is a bias.
2) There is not a bias.
3) You're unsure. RUN AWAY FROM THESE DAYS. RUN AWAY, RUN AWAY, RUN AWAY. They will kill you, both on the day and in the future, from horses you've entered into stable mail.

Tom
04-30-2011, 09:45 PM
My SOP is there is no bias unless it is unmistakeably there and influencing racing. If I have any doubt at all, there is no bias.

Robert Goren
04-30-2011, 11:38 PM
When something big hits the first race I get suspicious, by the third race I generally have it figure out. Then the tractors come out and every thing changes. :confused: All kidding aside, fast track bias generally stick around until there is a rain or there is the weekly break. Drying tracks bias can end before card is over. The other other thing is it very hard to predict a drying track bias ahead of time. My favorite is the rare frozen solid mud track.

Rapid Grey
05-01-2011, 11:05 PM
Track bias doesn't have to be for a full race card. Some tracks will make adjustments once a trend seems to develop and you'll get caught in the switches. Aqueduct in particular on their inner dirt track wasn't nearly as biased this past winter as it normally is. Tracks like Oaklawn seem to watch and adjust quickly as well. I've seen Churchill change over the course of a race day as well.

One thing I've found is to watch for bias on turf courses more so than dirt or synthetic. Anyone ever see them cut the grass between races? Belmont and Saratoga have two turf courses with varying degrees of rail settings. Gulfstream used two different turf courses on their recently completed meet. Keep a daily diary of biases on these courses with accurate notes, there are oppurtunities for those who do their homework.

I would suggest the DRF Simulcast Weekly for anyone seriously wanting to monitor track bias.

Robert Goren
05-01-2011, 11:19 PM
A few years ago I saw the one hole 14 of 15 races in two days at Louisiana Downs including a bunch of $20 horses and my last $100 winner. The worse they looked in the form the more they won by. The smaller the track the less likely they are to try to change things. The same is true in the last few days of a meet.

Tom
05-01-2011, 11:44 PM
Track bias doesn't have to be for a full race card. Some tracks will make adjustments once a trend seems to develop and you'll get caught in the switches.

Tell me about it.
I always detect a bias once race after they track super does. :mad::D

Valuist
05-02-2011, 12:03 AM
Saturday at Churchill: that was a dead rail and speed was lousy. Yeah Borel defied it for one race but that was it.

Dave Schwartz
05-02-2011, 12:49 AM
For my two cents worth, I will offer a quote from Howard Sartin, who once said, "Most biases are perceived rather than real."


Personally, I would amend that to say, "Most changes in the bias are perceived rather than real."

thaskalos
05-02-2011, 11:29 AM
The problem with "track bias" is that some people are confused about the definition of the term...

On a day when illogical horses repeatedly win in wire-to-wire fashion, horseplayers are quick to detect a track bias; but let even ONE subsequent stretch runner win - and all of a sudden...they announce that the "bias" has suddenly disappeared.

Not true!

When a roulette player says that a roulette wheel is biased, it is not meant to imply that certain numbers NEVER come up...they just don't come up as often as they should.

Fastracehorse
05-02-2011, 01:55 PM
....that is a track bias.

Even if the second place horses rally from last to be second. Here's my explanation: If a horse is trying to get by a horse taking advantage of the bias it will falter (exertion against the bias). Spinning it's wheels so-to-speak. Allowing fresher horses running late to get up.

fffastt

cnollfan
05-02-2011, 04:29 PM
The races are not run independently of each other, either. On days when there is an apparent speed bias, sooner or later a couple of the jockeys on speed horses will engage in a suicidal speed duel and the race will be won by a horse coming from the clouds.

Fastracehorse
05-02-2011, 06:26 PM
The races are not run independently of each other, either. On days when there is an apparent speed bias, sooner or later a couple of the jockeys on speed horses will engage in a suicidal speed duel and the race will be won by a horse coming from the clouds.

.........they have to burn some chalk don't they

fffastt

Stillriledup
05-02-2011, 09:23 PM
People try and simplify bias by just looking at the winners and not the losers. If there are a few wire to wire winners on a card, the bias pundits start trumpteing the B word.

The way i like to try and identify bias is to see if horses who have a certain running style or are in a certain path are either underachieveing or overachieveing. For example, if i think that a deep closer has been super sharp and fits on every other angle and he sits way back of a vicious speed duel and it takes him forever to get up into contention at the wire, i'd view that surface different from a surface where that same closer is sweeping past the leaders at the top of the stretch.

I agree with dan in post 2, you need to know the horses really well to make bias determinations that are accurate.