Like it or NOT, GPS timing coming to more and more tracks

[Jeff P]

Originally Posted by Tom

I would say that each track has all the time in the world to time every race using video as CJ does. No excuses. Not double check, use the video as the official timer. Not unreasonable. Hire a guy. Pay him $30K a year. Buy his the best equipment. When he is not timing races, can wash silks, mop floors. Any track that says they cannot afford to do it or doesn't have the time to do it, is lying.

This is a billion+ $$ a year industry that is run like a Mon & Pop Grocery store in may cases. Time to suck it up and act like a real world industry.

Agreed.

And FYI --

Imo, the mom and pop grocery stores in my neck of the woods seem to do a better job when it comes to accuracy of the price tags on their merchandise than a lot of tracks do when it comes to accuracy of timing their races.


Just saying.


-jp

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[mountainman]

Huge problems with system at Mahoning,..margins behind at points of call often skewered to point of impossible running lines...... 4th by 3.. 6th by 14..3rd by 3..finish 2nd by 1...replays an absolute must for true picture of margins and position..unreliable splits, as well..and those errors center on certain points of call at certain distances....

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by The_Turf_Monster

Either way, the timing of a race can be overcome through a thorough understanding of class, which admittedly has become difficult in recent years with the advent of 'or' in the condition book (I'm looking at you, Laurel Park)

I obviously agree with you about the merits of class and analyzing the quality of individual fields, but some situations get very tricky without the time of the races also.

These are some of them.

1. Maiden races with a lot of first time starters and lightly racehorses that sometimes contain up and coming stakes horses and other times contain total dregs even though the class designation is the same.

2. NW1 allowance races that sometimes contain up and coming stakes horses and other times weaker groups.

3. Races where one or two horses totally dominate a race and it isn't perfectly clear how much of that had to do with them being much superior to the class and how much had to do with the rest of the field being weak (or a combination of both)

4. Races at tracks where you aren't familiar with the entire pecking order or quality of the horses and where they fit locally.

There are others.

There are ways of trying to make "educated guesses" in these situations, but sometimes the speed figures scream the answer without that struggle.

I think the best approach is to look at all the evidence.

[Jeff P]

To my way of thinking --

Class (no matter how you go about analyzing/quantifying it) represents an area of the game where the player is working with strength of competition faced.

Ability from Speed Figures (no matter how you go about analyzing/quantifying it) represents an area of the game where the player is working with innate ability of the horse based on actual performance in races.

Done well - both can be significant.

Class and Ability from Speed Figures are two separate areas of the game. (This, despite the fact that the lines between the two are sometimes blurred.)

In no way shape or form should the idea that Class is significant be taken by the industry as a built in excuse that continued mistiming of races on a regular basis is somehow ok.

Because it's not.



-jp

.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by Jeff P

To my way of thinking --

Class (no matter how you go about analyzing/quantifying it) represents an area of the game where the player is working with strength of competition faced.

Ability from Speed Figures (no matter how you go about analyzing/quantifying it) represents an area of the game where the player is working with innate ability of the horse based on actual performance in races.

Done well - both can be significant.

Class and Ability from Speed Figures are two separate areas of the game. (This, despite the fact that the lines between the two are sometimes blurred.)

In no way shape or form should the idea that Class is significant be taken by the industry as a built in excuse that continued mistiming of races on a regular basis is somehow ok.

Because it's not.



-jp

.

I agree with everything you saying.

This is how I view it from my perspective.

I think most pure "class handicappers" are attempting to bypass the speed figure aspect of it by saying if "A" is beating higher class horses than "B", he's better than "B" (which also translates into faster).

The idea here being that since there are so many timing and subjective errors in the speed figures, who is beating who by how much (with what trip) can sometimes be more accurate than who is running faster (with what trip) according to speed figures.

My feeling is that in some situations speed figures are more likely to be accurate, in some situations who is beating who is likely to be more accurate, but if you choose the speed figure route, the quality of the competition (or class of competition) still matters to some degree because the higher the quality of race, the tougher the trips and other aspects of the race will tend to be and in subtle ways that are not always so easy to see.

[Tom]

My two cents.
I think the best way to handle class is to combine the general method Quinn wrote about in his "conditions" books and the pars for the various class levels. Doing it that way, I don't need all that much precision in the figs - Just having a framework to judge performances against, and knowing some races will be "off races, as he grows and develops both ability and confidence.

[tcasolo]

From the DRF story......."and Penn National and Mahoning Valley in Pennsylvania."

Pretty nice when DRF doesn't know which state a track is in. Maybe their GPS can help?

[Tom]

D'oh!

[ubercapper]

Originally Posted by mountainman

Huge problems with system at Mahoning,..margins behind at points of call often skewered to point of impossible running lines...... 4th by 3.. 6th by 14..3rd by 3..finish 2nd by 1...replays an absolute must for true picture of margins and position..unreliable splits, as well..and those errors center on certain points of call at certain distances....

If you have example with track/date/race number, please send me a PM. As CJ can attest if there are issues we will address them.