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[sparkywowo]

I wouldn't read any more books for the time being, but would suggest you pick a track and follow it.

1) Pick a track you have some interest in.
2) Learn how to use your preferred set of past performances.
3) Save the daily charts from that track and learn how to analyze them to make your own speed and pace figures.
4) Pick at least one day a week you will handicap and watch the races, make it the same day of the week each week. Pay attention to all the horse as best you can in the paddock, post parade, and race itself.**
5) Learn something about how the track plays with regards to speed horses and closers. Learn for your track which speed horses can win and which can't, and which closers can win and which can't. Learn how a fast track and sloppy track affect peformance for your track.
6) Learn which trainers and jockeys are competent and which aren't. Which trainers run a horse forever at the wrong class level? Which jockeys are punctual and bring home the chalk, which are impatient and move too wide or too soon? Which never win on closers?
7) Learn where the good shippers come from and where the weak shippers come from.
8) Learn to make a simple odds line and determine what kind of wager offers the best value and suits your temperment and bankroll in any given situation: is it one horse to win, a 2 horse exacta box, a pick 3 with two wide open legs...? Be able to read the tote board quickly and make a decision on how to play the race. Get a feeling for when a 5-2 shot at ten minutes to post is going to wind up 7-5 or 3-1.

Try to go one step at a time on the list, and use the books you already have as references. As you start to get some experience working with entire race cards, you will see which races you understand and which you don't. But, it will take some time. Once you start to see the same horses again and again you will pick up on how well a particular horse actually runs. One of the biggest problems people have is overemphasizing a horse's finish position in its last race. If the horse won it should win again, no? If the horse finished 5th how can it possibly win today? etc...

**Probably the first skill you should learn, and this is mentioned in Davidowitz's book, is how to assess the race as the horses exit the turn. Once you can see for yourself that the leader is about to cave in or draw off you will have taken a big first step.