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Old 09-07-2017, 12:41 AM   #1
VigorsTheGrey
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On the DRF's Speed Rating-Track Variant

When the Daily Racing Form shows the speed figure-track variant numbers, for examples 89-08, 93-05, 102-01...

I get that the left figure is the speed rating; and the right figure is the track variant.

Am I correct that the higher the track variant the SLOWER the racing oval was that race...?

My question is: Does it make any sense to subtract the track variant from the speed figure, yes, of course....But what does that tell us...?

Also, what exactly is a 00 track variant...? Is 00 a super-fast surface or just a normally fast surface...?

I see that there are no minus (-04, example) track variants used to indicate a faster than normal surface...

The track variant must be tied to an optimum moisture content value for a 00 rating and yet no figure is used when the dirt is dried back, beyond that optimum rating...and therefore, faster than normal...

Last edited by VigorsTheGrey; 09-07-2017 at 12:42 AM.
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Old 09-07-2017, 12:57 AM   #2
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Also, does a high speed rating combined with a high track variant indicate that the horse is a mudlark or runs well on soft to yielding turf...? For example, 90-25 for Md Sp Wt 40k, 5 Furlongs turf race for 2 year old filly..?
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Old 09-07-2017, 04:51 AM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey View Post
My question is: Does it make any sense to subtract the track variant from the speed figure, yes, of course....But what does that tell us...?
The speed figure on a slow track will be lower than a fast track and the variant will be higher. Therefore, subtracting the large variant from the speed figure will add insult to injury. You should add the variant to get a "normalized" speed figure. The problem with both speed figures and variants is that they are based on lengths or fifths of a second which arguably which need adjusting themselves. Now let the arguably begin.
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Old 09-07-2017, 01:16 PM   #4
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These figures have been known to be deeply flawed for decades. The larger figure on the left represents the number of fifths of a second the horse ran in contrast to the track record. The track records are sometimes created by freakishly fast conditions & on such days you may have two new records set on the same day by ordinary horses. The track record for a mile at a track may have been set by a Grade One winner shipping in to get a check. At the same track the record for a mile and a sixteenth may have been set by a $5000 claimer having a good day. So a horse that runs a second slower at each distance will get a 95. All things being equal the horse that ran the 95 mile ran faster.
All thing are not equal, which brings us to the daily variant figure to the right. This is an average of the number of 5ths in relation to the track record on a given day. This tends to say more about the quality of the horses running that day then the actual daily variant. On a Saturday, typically better horses run & will run faster the horses carded for Monday even if the track conditions are the same. Using this method the Saturday horses figures are downgraded & the Monday horses are upgraded.
Needless to say these figures are not comparable from track to track.

The sane thing to do is ignore these antiquated figures & use the bold faced Beyer on your left.
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Old 09-07-2017, 01:59 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by betovernetcapper View Post
These figures have been known to be deeply flawed for decades. The larger figure on the left represents the number of fifths of a second the horse ran in contrast to the track record. The track records are sometimes created by freakishly fast conditions & on such days you may have two new records set on the same day by ordinary horses. The track record for a mile at a track may have been set by a Grade One winner shipping in to get a check. At the same track the record for a mile and a sixteenth may have been set by a $5000 claimer having a good day. So a horse that runs a second slower at each distance will get a 95. All things being equal the horse that ran the 95 mile ran faster.
All thing are not equal, which brings us to the daily variant figure to the right. This is an average of the number of 5ths in relation to the track record on a given day. This tends to say more about the quality of the horses running that day then the actual daily variant. On a Saturday, typically better horses run & will run faster the horses carded for Monday even if the track conditions are the same. Using this method the Saturday horses figures are downgraded & the Monday horses are upgraded.
Needless to say these figures are not comparable from track to track.

The sane thing to do is ignore these antiquated figures & use the bold faced Beyer on your left.
Good description although I do not think that the speed rating is using the track record for its calculation but the faster time during the last 3 years.

http://www1.drf.com/help/help_speedrate.html

Surely the DRF track variant and speed rating metrics are very antiquated and contain significant flows but I would not recommend Beyers as a better alternative as they are also inaccurate (especially when it comes to longer distances and turf Beyers are terrible).
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Old 09-07-2017, 02:14 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by betovernetcapper View Post
These figures have been known to be deeply flawed for decades. The larger figure on the left represents the number of fifths of a second the horse ran in contrast to the track record. The track records are sometimes created by freakishly fast conditions & on such days you may have two new records set on the same day by ordinary horses. The track record for a mile at a track may have been set by a Grade One winner shipping in to get a check. At the same track the record for a mile and a sixteenth may have been set by a $5000 claimer having a good day. So a horse that runs a second slower at each distance will get a 95. All things being equal the horse that ran the 95 mile ran faster.
All thing are not equal, which brings us to the daily variant figure to the right. This is an average of the number of 5ths in relation to the track record on a given day. This tends to say more about the quality of the horses running that day then the actual daily variant. On a Saturday, typically better horses run & will run faster the horses carded for Monday even if the track conditions are the same. Using this method the Saturday horses figures are downgraded & the Monday horses are upgraded.
Needless to say these figures are not comparable from track to track.

The sane thing to do is ignore these antiquated figures & use the bold faced Beyer on your left.
So in the case of the filly above that got a 90-25, this means that her time was 2 seconds slower than the track record run in a race where the surface was estimated to be 2.5 seconds slower than in the race where the record was set....? Do I have that correct...?
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Old 09-07-2017, 02:18 PM   #7
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You are right sir. They did update to use the best of the last 3 years.

I disagree with you about the Beyer figs however. Everyone who makes figures thinks there's are the best, but Beyer has stood the test of time. Re turf races,
final time is not really all your looking for in grass races. Many grass races end in a blanket finish with all the horses getting similar numbers. As Beyer has said in grass racing the final fraction is more important then the final time.
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Old 09-07-2017, 02:31 PM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey View Post
So in the case of the filly above that got a 90-25, this means that her time was 2 seconds slower than the track record run in a race where the surface was estimated to be 2.5 seconds slower than in the race where the record was set....? Do I have that correct...?
As has been pointed out the 90 would be 2 seconds off the best of the last 3 years & with the 25 variant deducted, her adjusted figure would be 70 (90 minus 25). Compared with the Beyer, Cramer or TimeformUS, that 70 is a very weak figure to bet your money on.
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Old 09-07-2017, 02:39 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by betovernetcapper View Post
As has been pointed out the 90 would be 2 seconds off the best of the last 3 years & with the 25 variant deducted, her adjusted figure would be 70 (90 minus 25). Compared with the Beyer, Cramer or TimeformUS, that 70 is a very weak figure to bet your money on.
90 minus 25 would be 65...So you are deducting the variant while Augenj said that the variant ought to be ADDED so it is still unclear which way is the correct way....
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Old 09-07-2017, 02:47 PM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by VigorsTheGrey View Post
So in the case of the filly above that got a 90-25, this means that her time was 2 seconds slower than the track record run in a race where the surface was estimated to be 2.5 seconds slower than in the race where the record was set....? Do I have that correct...?
Correction, 90-25, surface was 5 seconds slower than track variant high marker for that fillys last race....25=5 seconds...
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Old 09-07-2017, 03:14 PM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by betovernetcapper View Post
You are right sir. They did update to use the best of the last 3 years.

I disagree with you about the Beyer figs however. Everyone who makes figures thinks there's are the best, but Beyer has stood the test of time. Re turf races,
final time is not really all your looking for in grass races. Many grass races end in a blanket finish with all the horses getting similar numbers. As Beyer has said in grass racing the final fraction is more important then the final time.
Since you disagree, I would like to know your answer to the following questions in regards to Beyer Speed figure creation ( I can ask many more questions but for now let's start from these)..

(1) What are the parallel time curves that are used?

Obviously what he states in his books are not only completely out of date but also do not cover difficult cases. The examples he provides refer to very soft cases, like for example six to seven furlongs on dirt but there is not a word about how to treat real world cases where we have very few races for a specific surface / distance.

(2) How cross - track adjustments are estimated?

He writes on "Beyer On Speed":

Quote:
Originally Posted by "Beyer On Speed" (p.23)
"I analyzed southern and northern California and saw that the average shipper was running two points higher than north...."
Does this mean that all southern Cal tracks are averaging to the same figure?
Does the same apply for northern? How shippers from other tracks are to be considered? How you handle shippers from a track who has very few or no shippers at all?

(3) Although Bayer claims that "class" represents a fictitious quality, he still uses it as the starting point for his figure creation, taking a specific classification as the base for his scale (He assigns the arbitrary number of 80 to the average 10K claimer). Is not this a contradiction to the "speed" approach?

(4) The value of a length in the Beyer methodology reflects the percentage worth of a fifth (moved by two decimal places) in comparison to the base (parallel) time of the race in fifths (converted to fifths, or in other words the figure is given by the following algorithm:

value_of_point = 1000. / (base_time * 5)
time_delta_in_fifths = base_time - time
points_delta = time_delta_in_fifths * value_of_point
figure = int(round(80. + points_delta))

How does he arrive in this formula and more precisely why he needs to use the full time of the race instead of a fraction of it (for example the last half of the race or something similar)? What is the impact of this approach as the distance becomes larger?

Let me make it clear that at no point I have the intention of downgrade the greatness of Beyer's work whom I consider the most influential handicapper ever and the patriarch of the American handicappers. I am just tring to make the case that his figures (that probably worked fine before they became part of the DRF) are antiquated and there is a lot of room for improvement for those who have the required knowledge and time to work on them.
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Old 09-07-2017, 03:20 PM   #12
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Here is the thing, if people would stop talking about these ridiculous ratings and they went the way of the dinosaur, there would be more room for things like...wait for it...purse values!!!
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Old 09-07-2017, 03:22 PM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by betovernetcapper View Post
As Beyer has said in grass racing the final fraction is more important then the final time.
I thought I'd read everything he ever wrote but I don't remember that. Do you remember where he wrote it?
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Old 09-07-2017, 03:27 PM   #14
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As Beyer has said in grass racing the final fraction is more important then the final time.
If Beyer has said that...then I've missed it. I've seen him use the final fraction and the Beyer figure in combination...but I haven't seen him comment on the importance of the final fraction alone. In fact, in his latest book, he suggested that the last HALF-MILE might be a better alternative.
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Old 09-07-2017, 04:36 PM   #15
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Sensitive, running today at KD's 6th in twenty minutes, ran a 105-01 on 2july17 and won....does this mean she bested the top speed marker by 1 second on a day when the turf played only 1 length slow...?

If so, I'm going to bet her today with Flo up WP at 3-1...
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