BRISNET or DRF ?

[PressThePace]

Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey

High and low figures are bright bobbing floats,
rising and falling on racing's vast ocean swell...

Tethered to crab pots below, we
need to find, hook and still, haul...

'Tis work, the pots heavy,
often, there's no crab at all...

Still, without these figures, these tell-tails
how could we ever taste that prized
and elusive crustacean....?

Mind blown...

[NY BRED]

So, with all the discussions until this point are there any opinions
on the Sheets ie; Ragizon/Thoro-Graph?

[VigorsTheGrey]

Rumor has it that Agents of Jockeys use the Rags to book their lads and ladies on steeds now rounding into form...

There is more to form cycles than we give credit to...usually we look at the last race and expect improvement when if fact the best may lay behind until another cycle rolls around...is this what the Rags are addressing...?

[RonTiller]

Just got around to reading this thread.

I remember seeing one from years ago but I don't remember the results. The toughest thing I think is defining the criteria. What do you use? Last race only, last race on surface, last race on surface at similar distance? Do you average figures?

The other problem is having access to the figures. Who is going to pay to buy PPs for all the data providers just to study the figures? You couldn't just buy a few weeks and have a real sample. I think you'd need at least a year, maybe more.

This was done in the mid 1990-s by Sports Stats ( Jim Bayle) and it was going to be repeated around 2000 but it wasn't as (I believe) Jim was too busy gambling on sports full time.

Ellis is partly correct - Jim Bayle initiated and oversaw a speed ratings study in 1999 (or 2000?). HDW was a part of the study, supplying Jim Cramer's speed figures to Jim Bayle every single day for 6 months. This was not a trivial task for any of the party's involved in the study. The files with the data were timestamped and it was up to each participant to post the data before the first race of the day. Likewise, it was up to Jim Bayle to retrieve the data before the first race of the day, to prevent all possibility of past posting data.

Also part of the study were Beyer, Thorograph, Ragozin Sheets and I believe the DRF style 3yb speed ratings (though there are inconsistencies in how THAT rating was made). BRIS chose not to be involved. I don't remember if Michael Pizzola was a part of the test but he may have been.

There were various metrics, like last race, best of last 3, best at surface (and other things like that) plus each vendor was allowed to supply a customized metric that could be programmed by Bayle and applied to all the different numbers. I only know that Jim Cramer did not provide any custom metric to test; I do not know what the other vendors did or did not do.

The motivation for Jim Cramer and HDW was to actually have an independent test to get the real facts. I cannot speak for the others but especially with respect to the Sheets versus Thorograph, there was certainly a rivalry (at times bitter) at play and both sides surely wanted to best the other. There were certainly bragging rights at play for everybody.

When the data study period was over (involving lots of work for 6 months for everybody involved), Jim Bayle stopped responding to calls and messages. It seemed he disappeared from the face of the earth and we were worried something might have happened to him. Several months later, a mutual acquaintance reported that Jim Bayle was alive and well in Las Vegas and had started a betting syndicate, specializing in long shots.

Jim Cramer was finally able to contact Jim Bayle and Bayle said he still had all the data but he was evasive about the elephant in the room - what the heck happened to the study and the data analysis he was going to perform and then publish? He said he was willing to provide the data to us or a third party (I don't remember which) but nothing ever came of that. It was just plain bizarre behavior, extremely disappointing and more than a little aggravating.

Jim Cramer contacted Len Ragozin to see if he would be amenable to hiring an independent third party to do the data analysis on the data Bayle had collected and Ragozin was agreeable to the idea. I still remember that conversation because Ragozin, being the good communist that he was, said it was only fair that he pay a bigger share of whatever the cost might be because he probably had more money ("From each according to their ability...").

We discussed having Barry Meadow take charge as the neutral third party and I believe I recall he was amenable to that, since Barry had published a very small speed ratings study several years earlier in his Meadow's Monthly Newsletter. However, we were never able to get access to the data so it did not matter.

The end result was no study was published by the person who set up and oversaw the study. I do not know if 1) he did the study privately and in the course of that found a longshot system from which he built a syndicate, or 2) he lost interest in the study immediately after a 6 month period of collecting the data and didn't feel the slightest obligation to contact the participants, or 3) he accidentally deleted all the data and was too embarrassed to admit it, or 4) something else.

So ended the great speed ratings shoot out.

Sigh...

Ron Tiller
HDW

[pandy]

Wow, interesting story Ron, thanks for sharing.

[ubercapper]

Ron,

Thanks for filling in the blanks from my recollection.

I do recall there was one study that was completed (which HDW may or may not have been involved in), or perhaps it wasn't fully completed but there was preliminary data made available to the participants, and another study (the one you refer to) that was never completed and maybe never even started as you state.

When I speak with Dave (Siegel) I will ask him to confirm there is some data around from the first study as I believe he still has a printed copy of the first study or the preliminary data.

[Tom]

I found my study - from Sport STat, 1994.
Looks like I paid $45 for it!

March -June 1994, 199 races from HOL and 685 from other tracks (AP,BEL,CRC)

They showed the results of a few test for many different sources of figs - DRF SR+TV, Beyer, BRIS, Henry Kuck, speed and pace, Pugliese speed and pace, Ragozin, Thorograph, TrackMaster Power, Master Win Ratings, RPM Power Ratings, TIS speed and Pace.
Not any real data to analyze. Random results.

[VigorsTheGrey]

DRF SR+TV, Beyer, BRIS, Henry Kuck, speed and pace, Pugliese speed and pace, Ragozin, Thorograph, TrackMaster Power, Master Win Ratings, RPM Power Ratings, TIS speed and Pace...and also HTR.

In the days of the San Francisco Gold Rush, merchants made fortunes selling durable goods to the miners and prospectors.

I just wonder if the real gold is in selling the various "sheets, ratings and softwares"...?

One would expect the authors of the celebrated options to all be millionaires by now from betting alone....how are they all doing in that Department?

Are Andy Beyer and the rest of them wealthy now as a result of their betting or mainly from selling their inventions...?

[cj]

Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey

DRF SR+TV, Beyer, BRIS, Henry Kuck, speed and pace, Pugliese speed and pace, Ragozin, Thorograph, TrackMaster Power, Master Win Ratings, RPM Power Ratings, TIS speed and Pace...and also HTR.

In the days of the San Francisco Gold Rush, merchants made fortunes selling durable goods to the miners and prospectors.

I just wonder if the real gold is in selling the various "sheets, ratings and softwares"...?

One would expect the authors of the celebrated options to all be millionaires by now from betting alone....how are they all doing in that Department?

Are Andy Beyer and the rest of them wealthy now as a result of their betting or mainly from selling their inventions...?

For a guy that acts like he doesn't know anything about racing, you sure seem to have been following the game a long time.

[VigorsTheGrey]

Originally Posted by cj

For a guy that acts like he doesn't know anything about racing, you sure seem to have been following the game a long time.

It is an honest and decent question with no innuendo or malice intended..

...if the systems and methods are excellent and work well, then one would think their authors would have over the years capitalized on wagering and for the most part, all be wealthy men, I mean that is the whole point of all these methods, isn't it, to win a lot of money...

...I'm not trying to be funny, cynical or intrusive here...I'm just wondering if the authors themselves were able to make good from betting on their own wares...?

[Dahoss9698]

Originally Posted by cj

For a guy that acts like he doesn't know anything about racing, you sure seem to have been following the game a long time.

Indeed. Also kind of odd a guy without an ADW is suddenly very interested in betting.

[VigorsTheGrey]

Originally Posted by cj

For a guy that acts like he doesn't know anything about racing, you sure seem to have been following the game a long time.

I was at Santa Anita when Vigors-the White Tornado-won the 1978 Santa Anita Handicap...

https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/s...3&action=click

[Speed Figure]

Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey

I was at Santa Anita when Vigors-the White Tornado-won the 1978 Santa Anita Handicap...

https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/s...3&action=click

You were at Santa Anita in 1978, but you don't know anything about the DRF speed rating & TV?

[cj]

Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey

It is an honest and decent question with no innuendo or malice intended..

...if the systems and methods are excellent and work well, then one would think their authors would have over the years capitalized on wagering and for the most part, all be wealthy men, I mean that is the whole point of all these methods, isn't it, to win a lot of money...

...I'm not trying to be funny, cynical or intrusive here...I'm just wondering if the authors themselves were able to make good from betting on their own wares...?

My reply had nothing to do with that question in particular, but more you flooding the board lately with stuff that seems like you just fell of the turnip truck and landed in an OTB.

[VigorsTheGrey]

Originally Posted by Speed Figure

You were at Santa Anita in 1978, but you don't know anything about the DRF speed rating & TV?

I'm a slow starter but like Vigors I finish really well...