DeltaLover Question about Class
 

A few months ago I copied a file that you were kind enough to provide us with that had class ratings for the various tracks around the country. The numbers are quite ranging and I wondered how they were to be used. That is , are they just for reference or do they have a time relationship ?
Thank you

I do not remember which file exactly you are talking about. Can you please re-post it?

Here is the file:

that looks like a list of the average allowance race purses at each track.

I think a better indicator would be the lowest race purse at each track. The majority of races are claiming races, most bottom level claiming.

OK. Later when I will have some free time I will add some data to the file and provide some ways of how this info can be use

I've been racking my head over this for years. IMO, purse is not a reliable indicator for a few reasons, but one is that costs also vary. If the purse at one track is 50k and it costs $90 a day to train a horse on that circuit, how does that compare to a race at another location where the purse is 25k but daily training costs are only $45 a day. Maybe they are a lot closer than the purse indicates. I even tried to research training costs at as many tracks/circuits as I could, but there's not much info out there.

Ok Delta,thanks for your help .
TD

I have seen training rates vary from 35 to 95 a day at the same track, depending on the trainer. And the higher one may not be the better trainer.

Posted class listing
 

Without getting my book, that class rating looks very close to Quirin's class list in his books. And several of the tracks on there have been closed a couple of years. The rating of Laurel being the same class as Penn seems to be off, no matter what year it's from. Most of the major and minor eastern tracks look to be fairly rated. As to Laurel, I've often considered their horses having a class advantage when shipping to Parx as well.

Many years ago when talking about NY vs Cal racing Laz Barrera said the best horses go where the money is.
To me that means higher purses = better horses.

I use purse value exclusively...just seems to be more "honest" a yardstick than trying to sort out conditions, track ratings, etc. Sometimes surprising results happen when judging by purse values only--and the majority of handicappers are looking at claiming and allowance levels.

As in every facet of everything in life.....money does talk.

Right, that's the theory, but it gets called into question when you include costs that vary from track to track.

Let's say I have a horse that can run competitively in races at track A with a purse of 50K and it will cost me $90 a day to train there.

Let's say another option is running at track B where I can run competitively in races with a purse of only 35k.

The purses say I am better off running at track A. But if the training costs at track B are only $45 a day, I can actually net more money at track B under some circumstances because I'm saving a lot on costs.

If enough people realize there is potentially more money to be made at track B than track A despite the lower purse, the better horses may actually be running at track B.

I have no solution to that problem. So sometimes I use purse as a rough guideline..

The best solution is probably to monitor all the shippers into the track you play. After awhile, you'll accumulate enough of them to get a good feel for how the other tracks fit with the ones you play. That's a lot of work unless you have a database.

How do you find out what the costs are?. Doesn't each trainer charge different rates? Unless you know for sure it could be very hard to figure costs.

It's hard to stick to that when you have slots vs. non-slots tracks. I went 100% away from purse value a few years ago.

That is the 2012 DRF Purse Value Index for North American tracks.
It's an allowance race average.