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Old 09-26-2014, 01:36 AM   #1
Billnewman
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The advantages of making you own numbers

I don't know who said it about a month ago! I think it was Capper Al when he was on about his ultimate truth. But what he said was even the best figure makers CJ beyer rag ozone the sheets sartin lovers logic dictates bris and so on. They are using numbers that are flawed to some degree. No one can truly explain what the actual reality was for nine races at the track when race 1 was .8 fast race 2 was 1.3 seconds slow race 3 had a very slow pace and all 3 leaders stop and the plodders fool on by. When speed held the before and after race 3.or why a winner comes back out of breath the whole time you hot walk him but he ran a slow-slow race. I have my own reasons why these things happen. Some I would be embarrassed to share. Back to my point the advantages of making your own numbers. When your numbers differ mainstream numbers and you are right. That's huge. And if you bet correctly you are rewarded. When CJ or beyer are right everyone has the information. But only you have your own figs. It doesn't happen but maybe 1 out of 25 races for me. But my FL numbers picked a 18/1 and 6/1 as they should have been 2/1 and 7/2. They finished 1st and second and the exacta paid $133. When CJs numbers say the same thing that horse doesn't stay 18/1 cause he sells them to, I could end even guess how many people. Also when you make your own variants you learn a lot about pace, and how it actually affects the running and times. And when you compile enough data you can go back and check your work. And correct your errors. And make pars for obscure distances. The more times you try to make the best variant you can and have the knowledge to split them or even more difficult when they change throughout the day because of wind, rain, sun, water truck guy, trainers complaining to the track maintenance crew about conditions. And the larger stables have more pull and they will change the track for them in the middle of the day at FL. I compare the track variant to someones Texas hold down cards. You don't know what they are but you can make a pretty good guess by their bet and tells. If you try to guess everyone's holdings you get pretty good at it.
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Old 09-26-2014, 02:00 AM   #2
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I agree with your analysis, but I also think that the disadvantages of using others' figures (even if you don't know exactly how they were derived, or no matter how publicly available they are) can be overcome to a large extent by:

1) giving the figures their proper proportionate weight in the overall handicapping picture, rather than viewing them as the be-all/end-all determinant of which horse to bet on;

2) using the figures as part of a process of assigning a fair winning probability to each horse in the race, rather than concentrating solely on narrowing a field down to the one most likely winner through a process of elimination; and

3) betting based on pari-mutuel value rather than on winning probability alone.

In light of those considerations, I think that it boils down to a question of whether you consider the effort required to make your own figures justified by a comparison of the value of your time and the number of races you can handicap, versus the incremental benefit in hit rates and higher mutuels from the use of your own figures (even if you believe or can show that they are more accurate/precise than those from other sources).

Last edited by Overlay; 09-26-2014 at 02:03 AM.
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Old 09-26-2014, 02:38 AM   #3
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Of course making your own figures can be a big advantage over using other, commercially available figures...but your own figures have to be BETTER than the commercially available figures; just "different" won't cut it. This is a marathon, not a sprint...and the value of a set of figures is not determined by the occasional longshot that it might pick. Even the most popular figures will point to the occasional 18/1 winner...
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Old 09-26-2014, 06:21 AM   #4
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but the up side is you know how they were made. the problem with buying numbers is that your win cycle will match theirs. The reason they sell numbers is because a lot of players don't know how or do not want to make their own. After all, it requires work and work is a four letter word. It is also another revenue source.

For 4 easy payments of just $29.99 I will sell you mine!
[ sorry....couldn't resist]

Ever notice that every horse in every race has money on it? Somebody's system wins and the rest fail. For all of the hype, I seriously doubt the strike rates of 50% and up that is offered up in sales pitches is real. Why in the hell would anyone sell a system that could do that?

Come to think of it, where would they find the time between betting and going to the bank?

JMHO
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Old 09-26-2014, 07:33 AM   #5
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What is more important than making your own numbers, has to do with how you are processing them.
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Old 09-26-2014, 11:02 AM   #6
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You hit the nail on the head there.
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Old 09-26-2014, 11:25 AM   #7
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When you roll your own, you are doing a good bit of handicapping ahead of time in many cases.
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Old 09-26-2014, 11:32 AM   #8
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Originally Posted by Tom
When you roll your own, you are doing a good bit of handicapping ahead of time in many cases.
I have made my own Quirin-style figures for about 25 years. I am limited to one track/circuit, but I know what went into them and can adjust after the fact when appropriate. Someone smarter than me once said something like "I don't intend to lose my money on someone else's typo."
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Old 09-26-2014, 11:48 AM   #9
Robert Goren
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The main advantage to using your own numbers is you know which days the variant was all over the place and the SR is probably not very reflective of the race the horse ran. The main advantage of using somebody else's numbers is they do all tracks and you get a number for a shipper from a track you don't figure. Besides you don't have to do all the work. Believe me, making even a decent SR for just one circuit is a lot of work. Pay CJ the money, his numbers are worth it if SRs are a major part of your method. Even Beyer's numbers are probably better than anything you can come with on your own.
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Old 09-26-2014, 11:57 AM   #10
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i think the TimeformUS is a damn good product for the money they charge. the numbers themself are as good as any that you could pay for. it really depends what you want to use them for. i use a different set of numbers to enter horses and give rider instructions. i don't use any numbers to make betting decisions with though. i look for various things that you don't find in any number. what i am looking for is the horse that never is on the pace that will be on the pace today.

if i had information on what horses get treated for in between races would also help. today if you know what a traveling veterinarians schedule is, you could make a fortune.
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Old 09-26-2014, 01:54 PM   #11
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Originally Posted by thaskalos
Of course making your own figures can be a big advantage over using other, commercially available figures...but your own figures have to be BETTER than the commercially available figures; just "different" won't cut it.
Different gets you higher prices, so they don't need to be "better" on other measures (accuracy, whatever), they just need to be decent. i.e. "different" is part of being better, as long as you keep them to yourself.

But what makes a speed figure better? I'm interested because I just invented some in the last month or so -- I had some radical notions I wanted to try out. Speed figures are fantasy numbers: it is actually impossible as far as I can see to objectively measure their "accuracy" or some such since they are just made-up numbers (the real numbers are the real race times). We can only use proxies like "how good are they at ranking horses if we use last race fig for each" and stuff like that. All of those metrics are problematic because they all need to use something other than the actual race the speed figure is assigned to in order to decide whether it is a good figure or not. (There is no objective ideal/standard we can compare it to.) There is no way to tell if a speed figure is "right", and so we can only evaluate how good a tool it is for us.
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Old 09-26-2014, 02:12 PM   #12
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Originally Posted by GameTheory
Different gets you higher prices, so they don't need to be "better" on other measures (accuracy, whatever), they just need to be decent. i.e. "different" is part of being better, as long as you keep them to yourself.

But what makes a speed figure better? I'm interested because I just invented some in the last month or so -- I had some radical notions I wanted to try out. Speed figures are fantasy numbers: it is actually impossible as far as I can see to objectively measure their "accuracy" or some such since they are just made-up numbers (the real numbers are the real race times). We can only use proxies like "how good are they at ranking horses if we use last race fig for each" and stuff like that. All of those metrics are problematic because they all need to use something other than the actual race the speed figure is assigned to in order to decide whether it is a good figure or not. (There is no objective ideal/standard we can compare it to.) There is no way to tell if a speed figure is "right", and so we can only evaluate how good a tool it is for us.
I too have some radical notions...and I have invented some new figures myself these last couple of months. I cannot be convinced that speed figures alone can accomplish what they set out to do...regardless of how precise or "sophisticated" they are. The speed figures are missing an important element, IMO...and that's something that the individual horseplayer has to discover for himself.

But more damaging than the "imprecision" of the speed figures is the faulty thinking that pervades when most handicappers start USING them. Even Andy Beyer -- the CREATOR of the Beyer figures -- is unaware of the best way to use his own creation. To him, the top-figure horse is simply the one with the highest-rated, most recent representative race.

If "value" is what we are after...then we are going to have to dig a little deeper.
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Old 09-26-2014, 02:19 PM   #13
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Anyway you are going to see it, Beyer style speed figures is a thing of the past, based in antiquated technology and even methodology. Figures like CJ's are of course much better and comprehensive, since they evolve the original approaches of Beyer, Brown etc.

In my opinion though, what is more important is not the creation of the a figures but the methodology to compare different approaches and conclude which one is best.
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Old 09-26-2014, 02:23 PM   #14
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In my opinion though, what is more important is not the creation of the a figures but the methodology to compare different approaches and conclude which one is best.
Do you have an opinion on an appropriate methodology to do that? Although we can probably find ways to throw out the truly awful, I don't think you can ever crown one "the best" -- only the best at passing your test. Often tweaking the numbers to do better on such tests will actually make them less useful because the analytical test and the real-world test are never the same...
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Old 09-26-2014, 02:23 PM   #15
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Originally Posted by DeltaLover
Anyway you are going to see it, Beyer style speed figures is a thing of the past, based in antiquated technology and even methodology. Figures like CJ's are of course much better and comprehensive, since they evolve the original approaches of Beyer, Brown etc.

In my opinion though, what is more important is not the creation of the a figures but the methodology to compare different approaches and conclude which one is best.
Before you can determine which set of figures is "best"...you must first discover which is the best way to TEST them. Horses run different figures at different times. How do YOU decide which horse is best according to the figures you use?
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