When do you handicap and how long does it take you?

[dirty moose]

Originally Posted by GatetoWire

Great thread just shows that every person approaches the pre race work in a different way and guess what....there is no correct way!!!

Lots of computer players and others spend minimal time coming up with contenders....lots of people spend hours pouring over the races.

One of the best Handicapping books you will ever read is not about handicapping at all. the book is Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman.

Goes into great detail on decision making and is a great read.

I started to read this book, then stopped for some reason. Maybe I should pick it back up.

[badcompany]

The amount of time I spend handicapping usually depends on what I had for dinner the night before.

[Clocker]

Originally Posted by Laminarman

I posted the original question, now I'll follow up with really dumb ones: why not pay more attention to "professional" handicappers?

The pros have to handicap every race, usually in advance without knowledge of scratches, conditions, or odds. Folks here have the luxury of being able to pass on unplayable races or races in which they can find no value.

The value of the professionals, at least for me, is not their picks, but their insights, their commentary when they can actually analyze some horses beyond just listing numbers. They will occasionally point out something I missed in my analysis that will break a tie in my mind or cause me to pass on a race.

If I cannot be at the track, I especially value the comments of a few people I trust concerning the physicality of the horses, which look fit and which do not. Of the usual suspects at TVG, the only one I would listen to is Simon Bray when they take time out from touting exotics and he actually has a chance to talk about the appearance of the horses in the post parade.

At the risk of being sexist, the top people here are women. Dawn Lupul at Woodbine and Christina Bossinakis at Monmouth are tops if you can catch them on cable or on the track feed.

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by badcompany

The amount of time I spend handicapping usually depends on what I had for dinner the night before.

I am the exact opposite. What I have for dinner usually depends on how much time I spend handicapping.

[traynor]

Originally Posted by DeltaLover

Definitions usually help to clarify this kind of confusion.

Not quite. That presumes that all (without exception) words, terms, descriptions, and whatever else have the same (identical) meaning to the reader as they have to the writer. That is rarely the case.

[Clocker]

Originally Posted by traynor

Not quite. That presumes that all (without exception) words, terms, descriptions, and whatever else have the same (identical) meaning to the reader as they have to the writer. That is rarely the case.

To paraphrase Churchill, a widely diverse community separated by a common language.

[traynor]

Originally Posted by Clocker

To paraphrase Churchill, a widely diverse community separated by a common language.

A common language makes it even worse, because one tends to get sloppy and presumes to understand what the other means. Chomsky did well with his explanations. So did Korzybski. The latter emphasized the basic human "need" to affix labels to things so they don't have to think about them further--they can then respond to the label as if it were the thing labeled. The whole "map is not the territory" concept. Science and Sanity is an interesting read.

I shudder at the prospect of a world filled with Sticky Notes that label everything as thus and so, to "preserve precious cognitive resources."

[MJC922]

Originally Posted by traynor

Opinions are opinions. What you do and call "trip handicapping" may be quite different from what I (and others) do and call "trip handicapping." Labels conceal more than they define.

Fair enough. If those labels are concealing to anyone, that probably isn't some one who can be 'helped'. The point is a theoretical rematch under neutral conditions. Whether you think the race put the winner over the top in form cycle or moved some other horse forward as it was a good prep, or some jock wasn't doing things as expected, that's all (at least in my world anyway) part of the upcoming and theoretical 'neutral' rematch. (IMO)

[Capper Al]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

The "professional handicappers" are paid to do a job...and that job isn't to release profitable selections. Their main objective is to stimulate the betting action on the day's card...that's why you'll hardly ever see them recommend passing a race because it is unsuited for wagering purposes. If you want to turn a profit in this game...then you have to do the heavy lifting yourself.

Heavy lifting, for me, comes in two spots. The first is in coding and is an investment of my time so that when it's handicapping time it takes me less than 10 minutes a race. Most of this 10 minutes is just looking over all the various outputted data hunting for anything abnormal.

The second heavy lifting for me occurs at wagering time. How am I going to put my tickets together? I go by some general rules here, but haven't found a way to automate this.

[ReplayRandall]

Originally Posted by Capper Al

Heavy lifting, for me, comes in two spots. The first is in coding and is an investment of my time so that when it's handicapping time it takes me less than 10 minutes a race. Most of this 10 minutes is just looking over all the various outputted data hunting for anything abnormal.

The second heavy lifting for me occurs at wagering time. How am I going to put my tickets together? I go by some general rules here, but haven't found a way to automate this.

If you keep trying to automate the whole process, your mind will atrophy, and by the looks of your posts lately, it appears it already has.....

[DeltaLover]

Originally Posted by Capper Al

Heavy lifting, for me, comes in two spots. The first is in coding and is an investment of my time so that when it's handicapping time it takes me less than 10 minutes a race. Most of this 10 minutes is just looking over all the various outputted data hunting for anything abnormal.

The second heavy lifting for me occurs at wagering time. How am I going to put my tickets together? I go by some general rules here, but haven't found a way to automate this.

As far as the second part of wagering, I think that the simplest approach is also the best.

Usually your best approach is going to be to simply bet your horse to win or if you have strong opinion in two consecutive race to bet the double.

There are also some other cases where you might bet on exactas as well, usually trying to limit their number to the smallest number possible (one or two in most cases, unless you are betting a huge longshot that allows for a couple of more combinations...

[traynor]

Originally Posted by MJC922

Fair enough. If those labels are concealing to anyone, that probably isn't some one who can be 'helped'. The point is a theoretical rematch under neutral conditions. Whether you think the race put the winner over the top in form cycle or moved some other horse forward as it was a good prep, or some jock wasn't doing things as expected, that's all (at least in my world anyway) part of the upcoming and theoretical 'neutral' rematch. (IMO)

I think much more is involved than re-ordering the finish. If that conceptual framework works well for you, great. It seems (to me) to be an (overly) simplistic reduction to create the illusion of control. Similar to defining speed in the form of Beyer numbers, or whatever one's preferred methodology might be.

[Dave Schwartz]

The second heavy lifting for me occurs at wagering time. How am I going to put my tickets together? I go by some general rules here, but haven't found a way to automate this.

From a coding standpoint this is not as difficult as it seems. Just build a rule-based system - where you create the rules.

It works much like building a Paceline Selection System.

There are three distinct types of rules for paceline selection:

1. The pacelines I will consider today. (i.e. distance, surface, races back, etc.)
Load them into a sortable queue or file.

2. A rule for sorting the pacelines being considered. (i.e. highest FT, 2nd highest, fastest pace, etc. or some kind of weighting)

3. A rule for deciding how many pacelines to select.


Doing it for a wagering system is much the same thing:

1. The horses I will consider today. (i.e. probability rank, projected $net, marked as a contender, odds range, etc.)

Load them into a sortable queue or file.

2. A rule for sorting the horses being considered. (i.e. minimum or maximum hit rate, min/max $Net, min/max Opt%, etc.)

3. A rule for deciding how many horses to bet. (i.e. 1, 2 or some other number, bet until a certain amount of money or pool pct is wagered, etc.)

4. A rule for deciding How Much and How to bet. (This could be more of a check box affair.)

Exotic wagers are a little more difficult because you might have a different set of rules for the #1 slot vs. #2. Trifectas more difficult still.


You guys who are programmers... once you get into to this it really isn't that difficult. Think of a spreadsheet for each type of rule, with each row being a rule and each column being fields to consider.

I'd bet that a spreadsheet wizard who used VBA or even macros could do this as well.


Please note that all of this is implemented in our software, so this is not theoretical.

[Capper Al]

Dave,

With all do respect, most of my rules are not understood until after they are tested. In a normal coding project, one codes from a premise and follows the steps you suggest. I'm not interested in coding Hamilton's or Brohamer's pace formula or Beyer's speed figures. I do learn from these gentlemen, but I want to supersede or better adapt their ideas along with adding a few of my own. Yet, I agree that getting into coding, be it a programming language or a spreadsheet, yields a better understanding of the game and is a worthwhile endeavor. What I disagree with is that anyone knows the premise and just has to code it without the risks and adventures involved. Many in the forum have that tone in their posts, as if they understand the game without profiting from it.

[raybo]

Originally Posted by Capper Al

Dave,

With all do respect, most of my rules are not understood until after they are tested. In a normal coding project, one codes from a premise and follows the steps you suggest. I'm not interested in coding Hamilton's or Brohamer's pace formula or Beyer's speed figures. I do learn from these gentlemen, but I want to supersede or better adapt their ideas along with adding a few of my own. Yet, I agree that getting into coding, be it a programming language or a spreadsheet, yields a better understanding of the game and is a worthwhile endeavor. What I disagree with is that anyone knows the premise and just has to code it without the risks and adventures involved. Many in the forum have that tone in their posts, as if they understand the game without profiting from it.

My philosophy is one of coding/formulating "ideas" that can then be tested in an automated fashion, against real races and results. The good "ideas" are kept and the bad ones discarded, until you end up with the "core" of a "method" (and there can be many, many methods, to handle many, many different tracks, distances, surfaces, classes, etc.). One size does not fit all, IMO.