ClassAdvantage.com

[Vegas711]

First I will admit that I am a pace handicapper but I am willing to learn new ideas concerning Class handicapping . This is your opportunity to bring up your ideas concerning how to measure class other than using pace and speed figures.

I would like to see someone discuss track class. As an example how many class levels seperate Churchill from fairgrounds as an example etc. etc......

How do horses ship when they go from one track to another.....

This is just a start , feel free to add new ideas..

[GaryG]

The BRIS class ratings are far from perfect, but are a very useful guide to comparing the relative class from track to track and also at the same track. At small and medium sized tracks often a horse going from a medium priced claimer into a conditioned allowance is dropping sharply in class. Also, starters allowances can vary greatly in strength. I make my own class ratings by using the par times as a starting point and then adjusting for the strength of a particular field. This is fertile ground for overlays as players become more and more dependent on speed and pace. As Mark Cramer put it, class handicapping used to be mainstream, now it is on the fringes.

[john spencer]

On a different note Vegas711, i dont exactly know how they do it but at racehorsedata.com the guys their seem to make an assessment of class based on the variables of both age, starts and the preferred method of 'rating'. I have found this a great tool for use on the exchanges in helping me develop a staking method on how much to risk. Derived from a method that bookmakers once used in britain in determining 'class' from a lay perspective, this is an angle i had never previously considered . Good thread Vegas. Happy punting.


John

[DrugSalvastore]

Originally Posted by GaryG

As Mark Cramer put it, class handicapping used to be mainstream, now it is on the fringes.

I think handicappers would be better off to banish the word from their mind all together.

The quality of opponet a horse faces and beats is obviously very important, and that is really what "class" should mean. It should also be a word used to describe the individual quality of a race. I'll use the Breeders Cup Card for example.

Lost in the Fog for example, was a Grade 1 winner who brought a perfect 10-for-10 record into the Breeders Cup Sprint. And despite that, he had some serious class issues for a horse with his giant reputation. He had simply never beaten a high quality sprinter. And, his lone Grade 1 win in the King's Bishop was absolutely hideious on the clock. He only went 3/5ths faster than two years olds in the Hopeful, and a 2yo MSW winner ran a marginally faster adjusted final time than him earlier on in the card.

So, with that said, you would think I would have been excited to bet against Lost in the Fog in the Sprint---but obviously I wasn't. I even picked him to finish 2nd---simply because eight of his opponets in the 2005 Breeders Cup Sprint had very limited talent by Grade 1 sprint standards, and the two who once had big talent (Wildcat Heir and Lifestyle) are both NOTORIOUSLY unsound horses.

The eventual winner of the race, 3yo Silver Train, seemed headed for claiming races in March of this year after two terrible losses at Gulfstream in N1X allowance company. Luckily for him, he was sent off to the Rick Dutrow Jr. machine after a 13.5 length ALW loss and a 52 Beyer.

Silver Train won two of four for Dutrow, including a visaully dynamite N1X allowance score in the supersonic final time of 1:07.67 (just 0.01 seconds off the BEL track record) and a front running score over Florida Derby winner High Fly at a mile.

Silver Train's fast allowance win was tainted some when 2nd place finisher Ingot came back to get beat as the favorite in his next two starts.

Silver Train was lucky to just beat Taste of Paradice. To give you an idea of how unspectacular Tof P is, by top sprinter standerds, going into the Breeders Cup, this 6yo making his 28th start had NEVER run back-to-back triple digit beyer figures in the same season!

So, the Breeders Cup Sprint, in my opinion, would be an example of a pretty phony Grade 1 race.

Unarguably, the Breeders Cup Juvenile was by far the best race on the Breeders Cup card from a classification standpoint. It was one of the all-time deepest and most talented Juvie fields. It has to earn the highest marks of any Breeders Cup race from a class standpoint.

That gives you an idea of how I think the word class should be applied in the handicapping process.

The so called "Class players"---who make idiotic comments like "Artie Schiller shouldn't be bet in the Mile because he never won a Grade 1 race before" are exactly the type of people who make me hate the word class....and make me cringe when I hear people identify themselves as "class players."

If I was smart though (and I'm not) I would do cartwheels when I hear comments like that---because players with that mentality have been the one's who have inflated my mutuals enough...so that I still don't need to work a job, and I can afford to keep this ridiculious occupation for a living.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by DrugSalvastore

I think handicappers would be better off to banish the word from their mind all together.

You made so many terrific comments about classing horses properly, but the above comment doesn't fit with them.

The reality is that most people don't class horses properly because they look at the labels of the races and not the quality of the horses that are actually in the race.

Once you classify horses properly by looking at the quality, depth and competiveness of a field, you can then determine how well a horse ran within that field given his trip relative to others. That little piece of information can not be packaged neatly into a number that's available for sale, yet it will get you to a lot of winners that speed and pace figures alone will not.

All you have to do is look at multipe sets of figures and you will see loads of discrepancies between one figure maker and another. No figure maker is perfect and no set of numbers can incoporate all the possible pace and trip scenarios and their impact into a comprehensive number. The numbers are an essential and terrific way of estimating ability, but class handicapping when applied properly can take the numbers further and vice versa.

Class handicapping gets a bad name because so few people know how to class horses properly and no one has written a very good book on the subject. Quinn has come close, but even he is lacking in some areas.

[Vegas711]

I agree with you on Lost in the Fog.

I am starting to believe that the class of the competition will have an effect on any figures that other runners may get. If a horse faces an inferior group it is likely that he will run better figures in the same manner as a lone speed getting brave on the lead. I know that my best golf games come when I am playing with poor players.

I see every year horses comming from tracks like hawthorne to canterbury who are beaten 15 - 20 lenghts. They dramatically improve here and win first time out.

Track Class must have some effect on shippers.Sartin used to have a track class chart it must haved served some purpose.

Does the Purse value excluding state breed bonuses have the potential to measure the level of the class of the race. I assume that trainers with better horses will run in races with higher purses. A race for non state breeds that has a $25,000 purse most of the time will have better horses, How much better are they?

[john spencer]

DrugSalvastore, i think you might right. I think maybe this is in part is what the guys at www.racehorsedata.com were inferring to when they developed a means to help identify the level of exposure or risk one should take when laying a horse to lose. Effectively they encourage us to look outside the square and assess class using methods that those that have historically made consistent money on the sport ( ie bookmakers ) have used. Happy punting .


John

[witchdoctor]

http://www.horsestreet.com/ubb/Forum7/HTML/000042.html

[twindouble]

DrugSalvastore;


"I think handicappers would be better off to banish the word from their mind all together."

I agree and also agree with your example but I thought LIF would at least hit the board, even a 4th would have made a good day for me.




"If I was smart though (and I'm not) I would do cartwheels when I hear comments like that---because players with that mentality have been the one's who have inflated my mutuals enough...so that I still don't need to work a job, and I can afford to keep this ridiculious occupation for a living."

In my many years of gambling on the horses, I have met very few people that made a living on the horses, one I'm sure of others just existed but that's it. Those that didn't work for a living had other things going on that subpplemented their gambling, mainly bookmaking or other things that wern't on the side of the law. Not infering anything when it comes to you. That's just been my experience. I've read like we all have about some that can and have done well as professional horse players. I have never sat next to one to pick his brain to find out what he does to seperate himself from the majority of players. I would venture to say that first and formost he had a substantial bankroll to start with or got lucky enough to build one. I have incountered many people that got off to a good start or somewhere along the way but couldn't sustain themselves over the long haul.

Good luck,

T.D.

[toetoe]

DrugS,

I have just minor quibbles. ToP had shown class in an injury-plagued career, but Beyer #'s were not the proof. LT had won a prestigious Gr. 1 at 8f, beating real beasts, but I was wrong to key him so strongly. He's not a real Gr. 1 horse.

What you say about the Sprint, I say almost every year.

[PaceAdvantage]

Ok, how many dopes like me actually typed classadvantage.com into their browser just to see where it goes??? LOL

If you don't like pop-ups, beware.....

[Hosshead]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

...If you don't like pop-ups, beware.....

Thanks for the warning, also, anybody getting tired of the "Ads" for race-horse-data- dot- com?

[Rook]

Originally Posted by Hosshead

Thanks for the warning, also, anybody getting tired of the "Ads" for race-horse-data- dot- com?

Yes, I wouldn't mind seeing these bogus posters banned.

[Geekyguy]

Originally Posted by DrugSalvastore

Lost in the Fog for example, was a Grade 1 winner who brought a perfect 10-for-10 record into the Breeders Cup Sprint. And despite that, he had some serious class issues for a horse with his giant reputation. He had simply never beaten a high quality sprinter.

He beat Egg Head, who is as good as any other sprinter I've seen this year (if you can get over that he's from Delaware). I think Lost In The Fog's problem was that he had never faced a field as deep as the BC Sprint, which had six horses who could run 110 or more as a figure.

I love how Vegas711 said that he's "beginning" to believe that horses run better figures against lower company, when even Beyer himself said in his books from decades ago that this was the case.

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by Hosshead

Thanks for the warning, also, anybody getting tired of the "Ads" for race-horse-data- dot- com?

Not sure I follow here....can you be more specific....I might be extra dumb tonight and not even know it!