Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnGalt1
I used to ignore European turf shippers because of no posted workouts like those that show up for Breeder's Cup races figuring that the 5f workouts for American horses showed they were fit and Eros were an unknown.
I read in many handicapping books and articles that we should assume all horses in stakes races are fit. So all Euro shippers should also be assumed to be racing fit.
This I now do.
Class of horse and race can sometimes overcome this.
My example above on the did show a much classier horse, and even if I did not bet it to win, could and maybe should've used in horizontals. And if I thought it could've beat my two win bets, maybe passing would be the prudent choice, even if my lower class horses that had recent races would've won.
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I do hate to make assumptions but on a practical level that one makes a LOT of sense. It would be difficult to imagine someone dull enough to spend the money shipping an unfit horse to the US to run in a Stakes Race.
From another thread someone added a thought to this from the other end of the spectrum and that is Low Claiming races where it could be that the horse could perform poorly by being overworked.
Its a tough puzzle to be sure. On one level it is basically a box to check to prevent betting heavily on questionable horses. I am hoping to get to a point that I can start to use some methods to pick apart borderline contenders from non-contenders. A borderline OK horse with really good fitness pattern may be a good price. A horse that just barely makes the contender list and ALSO shows a poor fitness pattern. maybe just drop him off the contender list completely.
I like to do horizontal bets and like to find that horse that just fits into the contender list but does have a realistic chance of winning.