Tote Outage

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by dilanesp

Important clarification. Still, they absolutely have a right to be pissed and to demand an investigation.

You're the lawyer. Should there be some kind of lawsuit, insurance claim or something that comes out of this.

[the little guy]

Originally Posted by dilanesp

Important clarification. Still, they absolutely have a right to be pissed and to demand an investigation.

my guess is insurance will cover their losses.

[dilanesp]

Originally Posted by the little guy

my guess is insurance will cover their losses.

I agree that's most likely.

[classhandicapper]

Even if this was a 3rd party failure and not Amtote, it raises a question about the quality of that 3rd party and whether they need to move to a more reliable provider or have separate providers for the main network and a backup network if possible.

[Mulerider]

Originally Posted by garyscpa

And how much does Horsetourneys contribute to the pool?

Could be wrong, but I think that as a result of the Stronach/Derby Wars lawsuit, the tournament sites are considered an ADW and negotiate fees with the tracks that they feature.

[lex]

Originally Posted by ScottJ

If the AmTote infrastructure continued to operate (and that is a very big "if"), a communication outage (even the outage of a redundant line) should never have compromised the underlying pool data already collected. The bets that were already in the pools at the point of the outage should stand. The first rule in real-time communications - always save the known valid state. Therefore, it must be the case that the pool states could not be validated (meaning they were corrupted) immediately upon the communications failure. How is that possible?

I'm curious about this too. For places that gave a refund is it because their bets weren't actually in the pool before things fell apart?

[classhandicapper]

I know Lumen Technologies very well. It started out as Level 3 Communications under James Crowe in the late 90s with a brand new state of the art telecom network, was growing rapid in the tech boom during that period, struggled badly in the telecom bust after the 2000 dot com/tech crash, bought and merged with a long string of companies in subsequent years trying to survive, ultimately was one of the few survivors of that bust, was eventually bought/merged with Century Link (a monumental blunder of epic proportions), renamed to Lumen a few years ago and has struggled badly in recent years.

I have a long history with that company and it's not a pleasant tale.

https://paulickreport.com/news/horse...ys-tote-issues


"On Monday, the Daily Racing Form clarified that broadband services are provided to RCN by a company called Lumen. Lumen's contract with RCN includes two separately-maintained broadband links, but both unexpectedly went down at the same time on Saturday."

“We know it was a hardware failure on [Lumen’s] part, but that’s all we know right now,” Roberts told DRF.

"Roberts said officials attempted to re-route the necessary data to Tampa, but found that the track's two in-house networks - Comcast and Time-Warner - were also out. Roberts believes those two services are also provided connectivity via Lumen."

[dilanesp]

I would add this is the sort of thing that can hurt racing especially with new fans.

The TB Derby is the track's biggest day. They probably do draw some casual fans. Imagine being a neophyte who picked the winner of the TB Derby, the big race, and was unable to bet it. Think that person is going to have a positive memory of their experience? Think that person is going to tell their friends nice things about Tampa Bay Downs?

[the little guy]

Originally Posted by dilanesp

I would add this is the sort of thing that can hurt racing especially with new fans.

The TB Derby is the track's biggest day. They probably do draw some casual fans. Imagine being a neophyte who picked the winner of the TB Derby, the big race, and was unable to bet it. Think that person is going to have a positive memory of their experience? Think that person is going to tell their friends nice things about Tampa Bay Downs?

Did sports betting suffer a major loss in players when they didn't pay off millions of dollars in bets on Pebble Beach a month or so ago? How about disputed player prop bets when, like when Draymond Green played just seconds of a game last year? There is a pretty long, and continuing, list of these.

[dilanesp]

Originally Posted by the little guy

Did sports betting suffer a major loss in players when they didn't pay off millions of dollars in bets on Pebble Beach a month or so ago? How about disputed player prop bets when, like when Draymond Green played just seconds of a game last year? There is a pretty long, and continuing, list of these.

I think they hurt. E.g., online poker scandals (such as Full Tilt improperly using deposit money for operations) definitely hurt that line of business.

This was a major screw-up that affected folks on track on a big race day. If something like this happened at Saratoga the folks in your organization would be extremely, and rightly, pissed about it in part because of its impact on casual fans who come to Saratoga and who you want to come back.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by dilanesp

I think they hurt. E.g., online poker scandals (such as Full Tilt improperly using deposit money for operations) definitely hurt that line of business.

This was a major screw-up that affected folks on track on a big race day. If something like this happened at Saratoga the folks in your organization would be extremely, and rightly, pissed about it in part because of its impact on casual fans who come to Saratoga and who you want to come back.

In the grand scheme of things most people will get annoyed by something like this but shake it off because they've have similar experiences with technology elsewhere.

The problem for racing is that there's been a never ending stream of issues whether it be stakes horses breaking down just before the finish line on TV, wild odd changes after the race starts, drug busts of big name trainers, overages and DQs of major stakes horses, uncompetitive pricing in terms of track take and information, inconsistent rulings on DQs, debatable rulings on late scratches, suspect relationships between tracks and CAW teams/bet takers and now you even have to worry whether you can get a bet in or get paid properly if you have the winner on a ticket.

At some point a bunch of issues cumulatively turns into "WTF am I doing betting this game?".

That goes double for guys like us that spend many hours every week calculating figures, watching replays and handicapping increasingly unbettable races.

[dilanesp]

Originally Posted by classhandicapper

In the grand scheme of things most people will get annoyed by something like this but shake it off because they've have similar experiences with technology elsewhere.

The problem for racing is that there's been a never ending stream of issues whether it be stakes horses breaking down just before the finish line on TV, wild odd changes after the race starts, drug busts of big name trainers, overages and DQs of major stakes horses, uncompetitive pricing in terms of track take and information, inconsistent rulings on DQs, debatable rulings on late scratches, suspect relationships between tracks and CAW teams/bet takers and now you even have to worry whether you can get a bet in or get paid properly if you have the winner on a ticket.

At some point a bunch of issues cumulatively turns into "WTF am I doing betting this game?".

That goes double for guys like us that spend many hours every week calculating figures, watching replays and handicapping increasingly unbettable races.

I agree with all of that, but stuff that happens on big race days when normies are at the track to see it happen are particularly bad for the sport. This is why stuff like breakdowns at Churchill during Derby week hit particularly hard.