Pace Handicappers: Do You Use Energy Distribution?
 

How did you vote Dave that’s what I want to know lol

"I do not select pacelines."

This, despite being a pace handicapper.

Frankly, I never got it to work for me, but am revisiting it as I get closer to the release of my new software.

The Pace Module - nicknamed TBrain, - is looking to be pretty fantastic.

I consider %Median to be very important, but I would have no idea of how to use that in pace line selection.

The Sartin guys used to say that the horses had to fit the model.

IOW, they'd use it in their HANDICAPPING.

Dave,
I use energy to detect races that had more of a front-end skew than others by examining the 1st and 2nd calls. I promote horses who pressed the pace in races where the %E is above average in either call, especially those that remained competitive to the end. I demote closers who fail to exploit these set-ups.

I've found a number of high early energy races where the pace figures didn't point to an abnormal front end pressure but where the leaders came back strong when the pace figured to be less energy intensive.

I don't have time to maintain a model, so I use the horses in the race to simulate a model. I then see which horses are frequently outside the %M "model".

But I am still not understanding what the relationship to pace line selection would be.

% EE starts off with Pace Line selection....

HSH has 13 ways of selecting each Factor...

In this case First Fraction is used ...Fr1....so which will work out of the13?

I like what Ranch suggested if he's taking about the average of the horses whole PP's...

The only consistent part of the race is how the horses break ...everything else depends how the race sets up

The median, not the average. I take the median of all %M's, then establish a range and determine which races fall outside the range.

I still don't see that as a valid way to establish a pace line.

To me, ideally, a pace line should be a competitive race under conditions similar to today.

I don't believe we are deciding a pace line here ....we are looking for a winning pace scenario that the horse fits

Heres a screen shot of HTR VELOCITY

This Gulfstream Winner paid $21 on Sunday....

Look at his EE% in his "decent" Races?

Any similarities?

Not according to the poll -- Question for those of you who do paceline selection. Do you use energy percentages?

Nothing to do with paceline selection, other than you have to select a paceline to know what the energy% are.

I guess I didn't understand the question. lol

I also use the median %M to establish how the field wants to go. If it is a late field, then there's still got to be some early horses in the race. Those early horses aren't going to handle going early and will likely back up. Otherwise, I assume the race will be normal and I just evaluate the individual horses.

Sorry if I confused people.

I was saying that the poll was for people who select pacelines.

If you don't select pacelines, how would you even have energy pcts to model?

This turning into the ..."chicken or the egg"...

need one for the other

I don't just figure the energy for the pace line. I also calculate %M for all races for both the horse and the field. That's why I found the original question so confusing.

This thread doesn't make sense for someone that doesn't use pacelines

You need a pace line to determine %EE

i know this will probably go in the trash!!

The poll question wasn't that confusing, but apparently people have their own agendas.

I tried to explain it to former jockey and trainer Larry Spraker once, he lost his mind.

It was very confusing because energy distribution can be computed on any race. Thus, the original question could be construed to be asking about energy distribution as related to pace line selection.

The real question has nothing to do with pace line selection. The real question is...

If you use pace handicapping ala Sartin, Brohammer, et. al., do you use energy distribution and, if so, how?

I suspect this is an extremely good response, but it is really a bit deep to just completely grasp immediately as far as actual implementation. But I am going to go over it and give it some thought. Thanks!

Too many try to out think the room.

Not knowing the requirements leads to garbage.

I'm not speaking for Dave, but the requirements seemed simple. I will try rewording the poll question.

"When handicapping a race do you select your own paceline(s)? If yes, select one of the choices from the given poll responses."

One could argue that the last response is not needed based on the first requirement, but nowhere does Dave ask how people use %EE. I'm sure he is smart enough to start a thread that asks that question if he wanted to know how. And maybe he will.

What Fingal wrote.

You mean the guy who can't spell George, right? :pound:

That would logically be next because - until a few minutes ago - I thought modeling it was the only way.

Ranchwest presented an idea (not in this thread) that is really quite good.

Perhaps he'll expand on it here.

I like Ranch's approach, and just happened to be looking for it on your forum.

George, GR1 used to do this in HTR for turf races.
He slected multiple pace lines - might have been mode 4? - and then used the average ratings instead of a single line.

It's too much of a struggle on here. See the other forum for my explanation.

tells of FORM CYCLE or when a horse stretches out (particularly during the road to the Triple Crown you can tell which colts have it in them to stretch out to longer distances. THOSE who cannot, their % median rises as the distances increase)

I understand what %Median tells. I didn't understand the initial question, which I interpreted to mean using %M to select a pace line. That's what I didn't get.

I havent done it for a while since I stopped subscribing to the software that enabled me to do it, but let me try and find something that will illustrate it.

That will lead to sample error

Thanks, that would interest me.

I always felt like "energy distribution" combined with "track profiles" should be the Holy Grail, but I never came across an energy distribution formula I felt worked as well pace figures where a number is assigned to each pace call or where you just look at running styles and watch races.

There's probably a magic bullet buried in energy distribution somewhere, but the reality is very difficult to capture in a formula. It probably already exists for humans. I have to think the most elite minds in physics and biology focused on track and field have created formulas for maximizing final time at various distances under different conditions for human runners and understand how variations impact things (at least better than we do for horses).

I believe energy distribution and track profiles are much better for eliminations than selections.

Agree 100%

Most horses in most races would fall within the profile range for energy distribution. Narrow the range and it doesn't work.

I understand what you are saying. You are trying to find horses that match the demands of the track and conditions of the race. But there must also be a way to use the internals to evaluate performances better. The formulas I've seen seem to miss the mark. Not that I have one that I've tested that will work better. I just always felt something that could be created.

The Sartin Methodology has 7 basic factors that can be used to rank horses. The composite of those rankings is a generally good measure and many winners come from the top 5.

But I find that the best evaluation is the pace setup and determining whether the winner will run from the front end or the rear and which ability will prevail in the late stages of the race. It's not something that can be ascertained by looking at the individual numbers of a single horse or even by simple mechanical comparisons of a few numbers. It is the interaction among the horses that has to be evaluated.