Why has technology left handicapping in the dust?

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

Wait...you're going to judge all this based on chatGPT or whatever other chat AI is out there?

A few of you sound like the guys on the trading floor back in the late 90s muttering to themselves that "no computer can ever outtrade me!"

Now there is no trading floor anymore...LMAO

Speaking of disappearing trading floors due to computers, this documentary of the Chicago floor was very good...made in 2009....a bunch of these traders are real characters, not unlike what you might meet at the track back in the day.

The full movie is freely available on YouTube:

YouTube

A lot of these guys were nothing but BIG GAMBLERS

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

I'm not looking for that. I'm looking for something that will help me create my own program, so to speak.

I'm not aware of any commercially available black boxes that are documented winners, so it sounds like they don't exist?

But again, this thread was never about creating or selling a black box.

Look into Betmix. I haven't tried it myself...but someone tried explaining it to me a while back. And it sounded somewhat like what you are looking for.

[romankoz]

Originally Posted by classhandicapper

IMO, a fertile area for profits these days is the “exceptions” to the rules.

Whether it’s pace/time, flow, bias, ground loss, trainer, class, etc… , within each factor there are little applications where the axioms are either wrong or misunderstood and you can find horses that you can upgrade/downgrade that other people are taking at face value and others where almost everyone else is upgrading/downgrading them and shouldn’t be.

Having read all the postings this quote/s by "class handicapper" is by far the truest truism of all the comments. There will ALWAYS be gaps in form analysis the crowd will be unable to unravel consistently enough and it will indeed be the bettor/s who think deeper than the crowd who will be able to take advantage.

[o_crunk]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

Wait...you're going to judge all this based on chatGPT or whatever other chat AI is out there?

A few of you sound like the guys on the trading floor back in the late 90s muttering to themselves that "no computer can ever outtrade me!"

Now there is no trading floor anymore...LMAO

Yes, I will judge chatGPT, especially after some of the nonsense that's been said in this thread. It's not ready for prime time and yet, it's a great tool for certain things and will make my life a lot easier.

But to the original question....why aren't there good tools for the retail horse player? Between the data costs, the state of that raw data, knowing the best practices of cleaning it and then hooking up the disparate data sources so they work together. It's quite a bit just to get started and you will need sharp domain knowledge. Then you actually need an idea of doing novel stuff after that to find value.

ADW's aren't incentivized to provide this, though I think they are probably the only players in the industry who could provide these type of tools.

So what happens is the few people who want it have the few people who can build it, do it for them.

[JustRalph]

Originally Posted by romankoz

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Having read all the postings this quote/s by "class handicapper" is by far the truest truism of all the comments. There will ALWAYS be gaps in form analysis the crowd will be unable to unravel consistently enough and it will indeed be the bettor/s who think deeper than the crowd who will be able to take advantage.

How do you come to this conclusion now that favorites are winning more than ever?

Field sizes crumbling to 4-6 horse races all over the country have ruined the game. Prices falling, less variables in every race. There might be gaps, but they are much fewer and far between when you only have to analyze 5 horses a race

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

Is there really no room left for creativity in the interpretation of these "commonplace" figures? I don't believe that for a second...and the same can be said about the other handicapping factors like "form", and "class".

I agree with you. I also think that’s how you combat computers. Computers are good at finding things with large samples. They aren’t as good at finding subtle subjective or interpretative exceptions.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

I'm not looking for that. I'm looking for something that will help me create my own program, so to speak.

I'm not aware of any commercially available black boxes that are documented winners, so it sounds like they don't exist?

But again, this thread was never about creating or selling a black box.

I would guess that if the very best CAW programs were tweaked to only accept odds that were profitable, they could beat the game without rebates. They don’t do it because they are sharp enough to make odds lines that accept small losses, still profit from the rebate, and maximize their profit.

What you seem to be looking for is something that will help you create your own CAW model. I don’t think that exists.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by JustRalph

How do you come to this conclusion now that favorites are winning more than ever?

Field sizes crumbling to 4-6 horse races all over the country have ruined the game. Prices falling, less variables in every race. There might be gaps, but they are much fewer and far between when you only have to analyze 5 horses a race

I agree with everything you are saying.

It’s getting harder and harder to find beatable races, especially for me because most of my action is in higher quality races. I used to be very NYRA focused. That would never work for me now given how I play. I had to adjust. Now I’m looking for biases, extreme race flows, watching head on replays, taking notes etc.. at multiple tracks and focusing my energy on the types of races I’m most likely to bet or find a bet out of. I don’t waste time with some races. You can still find large fields at FG, OP and some other tracks.

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by classhandicapper

What you seem to be looking for is something that will help you create your own CAW model. I don’t think that exists.

No, not really. Why would I even want that? I can't compete with them...I don't have the bankroll they have.

All I'm asking for, BASICALLY, is to be TRANSPORTED INTO 2023 WHEN IT COMES TO HANDICAPPING SOFTWARE.

That's all...

[wiretowire68]

I did not read the entire thread but some of the comments and I could not agree more whole heartedly. I believe Valuecapper 2.0 and Mike Pizzolla was a person who at least created a system whereby you pick the portfolio or the types of races that you want to bet on. His software gives the options, however, they are based on his studies and his basic algorithms that stand the test of time in terms odds play. His software spits out bang on who is the favorite or bet down but he is a pure bankroll player and he hammers 3-4 races to me or basically buys the race out hoping for the price.

Action junkies can have as much software as you want...and I agree, You can not even get techies from Fiver or Freelance to take a shot at coding a drf past performance so it can be downloaded into a spreadsheet. Raybo created an Excel spreadsheet like so many using using past handicapping methods to break down the data. I am not sure there is a right answer for this question because, the bottom line is you have this living creatures who decide when they want to run and then you have these living creatures who feed them, work them out, clock them, (sometimes manipulate them) and then decide to put them into these conditions called races. Then you have these little tiny people who ride them and they try so hard and then sometimes they do not. Thus, the randomness and beauty of the gambling/handicapping world.

The game keeps going but North American particularly the U.S. i.e. (DRF, Brisnet, Equibase) they are the ones who are holding the computer handicappers and the invention of any new algorithm advances to go forward.
All Past Performance Data is controlled by them and if you are a developer or asking a developer to create something, you have to convince people that the software is good enough and to use it and you have to throw the costs back at the public. Pizzolla has to buy his data from Equibase, just JCapper or Dave Schwartz etc.

If you check on the amount of guys who either try to stay in business or whose sites have gone done trying to sell their versions. Just go on Cynthia.Net Publishing and see how many outdated or sites that are gone. I have ideas but you need a large amount of investment to constantly upgrade and maintain. I agree, if you purchase data, even if it is one card, it should be user friendly enough to be able to fit pdf right into what your doing. I am not a coder but I like to handicap. I am trying to build a fast enough spreadsheet whereby I can do 12 races of pre picks but it takes hours. Then there are the sites that spit it out but that is no fun. So for me,, where is the line between using your own skills and the guys that have created sucessful versions. ?????????????????????????

[Dave Schwartz]

Originally Posted by JustRalph

How do you come to this conclusion now that favorites are winning more than ever?

Field sizes crumbling to 4-6 horse races all over the country have ruined the game. Prices falling, less variables in every race. There might be gaps, but they are much fewer and far between when you only have to analyze 5 horses a race

I did a quick comparison of 2012 vs 2022 in 8-horse fields.
(No races with entries were included.)

First, Ralph, you are actually more than correct.

The results were surprising to me.

The hit rate on favorites as actually GONE DOWN by 2.26%!

That's because the races are more competitive.
(Less horses available to compete cause that.)

But the challenging part is the red highlights.

See how the $nets are flattened?

Efficiency in the market is the result of the Whale Era.

THIS is what makes the game so much tougher today.

[AskinHaskin]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

Why has technology seemingly passed the handicapper by?

The so-called handicapper is akin to the person still paying $25 for a copy of (the last-ever printed issue of) Playboy.

He is still waiting around for Swank, Gallery, Oui, Hustler and Perfect Ten to return to print editions.


Meanwhile, porn is essentially free for everyone else, on the internet.


The answer to the question above closely parallels why those mentioned titles won't ever bother returning to print. (because the four consumers who keep wishing for them would have to foot the entire cost of the printed media, where in bygone days that cost was split between hundreds of thousands, or millions of consumers)

Meanwhile, you can still purchase the most expensive daily paper on earth for $10 or $12 a copy.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by Dave Schwartz

I did a quick comparison of 2012 vs 2022 in 8-horse fields.
(No races with entries were included.)

First, Ralph, you are actually more than correct.

The results were surprising to me.

The hit rate on favorites as actually GONE DOWN by 2.26%!

That's because the races are more competitive.
(Less horses available to compete cause that.)

But the challenging part is the red highlights.

See how the $nets are flattened?

Efficiency in the market is the result of the Whale Era.

THIS is what makes the game so much tougher today.

Is that just dirt or dirt and turf combined?

I say that because I think we run more turf races now than we used to as a percentage of all races and it's sometimes tougher to separate contenders on turf. So adding more turf races to the sample might make the win% for favorites overall to drop a little.

[Dave Schwartz]

Originally Posted by classhandicapper

Is that just dirt or dirt and turf combined?

I say that because I think we run more turf races now than we used to as a percentage of all races and it's sometimes tougher to separate contenders on turf. So adding more turf races to the sample might make the win% for favorites overall to drop a little.

You might have missed the point but it was all dirt.

[Dave Schwartz]

Sample size is a bit small, less reliable.

Favs 2012-Turf 8 horses
1-rPubChWIN BETS
Field1 Field2  Starts   Pays    Pct   $Net     IV    PIV     DV     BV  AvPay AvOdds AvPubC
1st             1,055    348   33.0  $1.64   2.64   1.01   1.06   2.56  $4.97   1.50   1.00
2nd             1,051    240   22.8  $1.80   1.83   1.11   1.16   1.61  $7.88   2.96   2.00
3rd             1,030    153   14.9  $1.57   1.19   0.97   1.01   1.21 $10.56   4.29   3.00
FH              2,071    197    9.5  $1.63   0.76   0.98   1.05   0.77 $17.13   7.35   4.50
RH              3,113    104    3.3  $1.21   0.27   0.84   0.78   0.31 $36.10  19.42   7.00

Total           8,320  1,042   12.5  $1.49   1.00   0.98

Favs 2022-Turf 8 horses
1-rPubChWIN BETS
Field1 Field2  Starts   Pays    Pct   $Net     IV    PIV     DV     BV  AvPay AvOdds AvPubC
1st             1,000    351   35.1  $1.75   2.81   1.07   1.13   2.58  $4.97   1.48   1.00
2nd               979    199   20.3  $1.63   1.63   0.99   1.05   1.60  $8.04   2.98   2.00
3rd               965    165   17.1  $1.81   1.37   1.14   1.17   1.18 $10.57   4.43   3.00
FH              1,953    156    8.0  $1.31   0.64   0.83   0.85   0.76 $16.40   7.44   4.50
RH              2,918    109    3.7  $1.39   0.30   0.93   0.90   0.32 $37.22  19.17   7.00

Total           7,815    980   12.5  $1.50   1.00   0.98