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Analyzing my SAR results
I've been a horseplayer about as long as I've been on this board. One consistent piece of advice is to keep records. I've played Saratoga pretty aggressively this meet, and broke down my 300 wagers over 18 race days thus far, several of which are small part wheels counted as one wager.
Total credits are 3% lower than total debits. I topped out at 154% ROI before falling to -29%, mostly on the weak cards last Thursday and Friday—bet size went up and hit rate went down. Curious what you think of the results breakdown.
By race type, I was profitable in higher quality races: allowance (34%), optional claim (22%), and stakes (19%). Stakes account for a third of my handle. I fared poorly with maidens, especially claimers. This is kind of intuitive, although I felt more confident about MCL than my results show. Also aligns with my recent slide on those poor cards.
The most surprising result is that I have a 23% return with fillies & mares, but -24% on males. I didn't expect a substantial difference by sex. Is there a logical explanation, or just a consequence of small sample size?
By age, I was profitable with all 3 year olds at 39% and F&M 3+ at 59%. Maybe 3 year olds hit a sweet spot of limited but not scant information to project forward for improvement.
Another curious result is 63% return on the inner turf, but -37% on the firm main turf track (although I got a small profit on the brief run of "good" main turf bringing the total to -31%). I nearly broke even on a fast main track. In the mud, I went broke with dirt runners but only lost half my money on off-the-turf runners.
Distance is tough to assess. I'm 21% on routes, but mostly from the inner turf, which doesn't host sprints. I also scored 34% on the 9f dirt routes. I tanked at 8.5f, on both turf courses, -58%. Probably just an anomaly?
For dirt sprints, I did O.K. short at 5.5f and 6f, but poorly longer at 6.5f and 7f. I bet a lot of 5.5f main turf races, losing at a 20% clip. Oddly, I did well with claiming sprints on the main turf, as well as MSW dirt sprints and the cursed 8.5f on main turf, categories in which I otherwise fared poorly.
I mainly wager win, place, and exacta, with the rare trifecta. A classic would be 2x win (occasionally dutching two runners), 4x place, and a few 1x exactas. My exactas almost always include runners with complementary styles. I'll play savers with or without favorites, swings against the favorite, and chalk enhancers when I have opinions underneath. I limit the spread to six combos, usually less, and equalize the probable payouts. But those exactas are killing me at -36%. My place wagers prevail with 27% ROI, and win eked out 2%. I must be catching prices to place that aren't running with their exacta companions on top. The win dutches may be deflating the ROI vs. place.
My place and exacta handle is about the same, about a third more on win. I'm emphasizing win/place because I'm getting an ADW promotion that gives rebates equivalent to 10% takeout, so my net is a bit higher. That's good, because my inclination is to play exactas and trifectas, which apparently I don't do well at. Not sure I'd do better if I focused more on exotics rather than using them to enhance win/place. The latter seems the "correct" approach.
Just wanted to see if anyone had any insight about my results, especially how I might interpret my success with fillies and mares, the inner turf, place bets, and my failures with the main turf, long sprints (vs. short) on the dirt, and exactas. Or is it all just too small a sample to be meaningful? Also let me know if there's anything in particular I should cross tabulate.
Sorry for the long post, hard to make it short.
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