Are There Too Many Tracks Running Simultaneously?

[Nosed]

Seems like there's just not enough horses to go around, so we're getting a lot of races with 6 and 7 horse fields. At least in the last couple years.
Any opinions?

[Longshot6977]

I see this is your 1st post. This has been discussed many times before. I'm pretty sure we all agree, but would do you want us to say about it?

[nearco]

Now there's a subject that's never been broached before on this forum.

[Nosed]

Okay,yes it's my 1st post, so I guess it might be redundant, but still haven't noticed it as much in last couple years, and I've been playing horses a long time.
I think tracks ought to do like Beulah and River Downs were doing a few years back and alternate their races through the simulcast, thereby each track running fewer races. Might work as long as it was same racing commission.

[letswastemoney]

I don't see the problem with 6 or 7 horse fields...if you know the winner. As for too many tracks running simultaneously, don't play them all. Don't even think about them.

Pick one or two cards to focus on, and don't even consider what else is going on.

[tanner12oz]

Waaaaaay to many tracks

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by letswastemoney

I don't see the problem with 6 or 7 horse fields...if you know the winner.

Is this a joke?

If we follow this way of thinking...then we should be begging for 2-horse fields...where we can REALLY "know the winner".

[garyoz]

Too many tracks and too few horses as we all know, but you need to keep owners in the game and support more than the top tier of trainers. The rich can't keep getting richer. It is expensive to own and run a horse and it is not going to get cheaper. Purse distributions are always an issue. I really find stake races with few entries not the best use of purse money.

It is difficult to get races to fill--particularly allowance and open races. So if a 5 horse field gets a smaller outfit close to whole, I don't have a problem with it. I may or may not play (probably not), that is my choice.

[letswastemoney]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

Is this a joke?

If we follow this way of thinking...then we should be begging for 2-horse fields...where we can REALLY "know the winner".

No. And I said nothing about 2 horse fields.

Shorter fields take out a lot of variables and you don't have to worry as much about poor trips.

I would be more likely to play a 6 horse dirt race where the winner is easy to spot, than a 12 horse turf race where 5 horses have the same shot. When the turf race gets rained off and and onto the dirt, it's even better.

Obviously there's a limit to the thinking, as I wouldn't play a match race.

[therussmeister]

I too feel I get a better return from six hose fields than I do with twelve horse fields, but it's hard to tell because I don't run onto enough twelve horse fields to compile solid statistics. Also I consider myself to be a short field specialist.

[Hambletonian]

a diluted equine talent pool.

pre-slots, trainers at the mid level tracks would take their better horses to the big tracks before they ran through their conditions. Once you go through them, you can never go back, so why not race for 35k as opposed to 20k.

today, there is less incentive to do, with many mid level tracks boosted by slots, and everywhere is now like SoCal, where there have always been very limited places to ship, and few horses shipping in.

most tracks end up with a horse population of the resident trainers, whatever that may be. so if you have 20% maiden claimers in the horse population, then that is what the racing secretary has to card.

the number of tracks will be reduced, probably due to redevelopment more than anything else, but i am not sure that will address this issue. if you are an illinois based owner and racing ceases in that state, do you get involved out of state or just close shop?

the number of tracks racing has already been reduced, and it would be hard to argue that the quality of racing has improved.

as far as field size, large fields probably hurt churn,as it is better to have 1000 folks win collect 80 bucks as opposed to one person collecting 80K. large payouts may be interesting PR, but i have to believe it does little to enhance handle long term.

I personally like 8 horse fields, but that is just a personal preference.

[Stillriledup]

Originally Posted by Hambletonian

a diluted equine talent pool.

pre-slots, trainers at the mid level tracks would take their better horses to the big tracks before they ran through their conditions. Once you go through them, you can never go back, so why not race for 35k as opposed to 20k.

today, there is less incentive to do, with many mid level tracks boosted by slots, and everywhere is now like SoCal, where there have always been very limited places to ship, and few horses shipping in.

most tracks end up with a horse population of the resident trainers, whatever that may be. so if you have 20% maiden claimers in the horse population, then that is what the racing secretary has to card.

the number of tracks will be reduced, probably due to redevelopment more than anything else, but i am not sure that will address this issue. if you are an illinois based owner and racing ceases in that state, do you get involved out of state or just close shop?

the number of tracks racing has already been reduced, and it would be hard to argue that the quality of racing has improved.

as far as field size, large fields probably hurt churn,as it is better to have 1000 folks win collect 80 bucks as opposed to one person collecting 80K. large payouts may be interesting PR, but i have to believe it does little to enhance handle long term.

I personally like 8 horse fields, but that is just a personal preference.

I agree with the 8 horse fields comments, you can make a really nice score in an 8 horse field and have a much better shot to win than 10 horse fields or more.

I've quite often skipped fields of 10 or more just because there are too many horses. If i want a big payout, i'll hit a tri for more than 1 dollar in an 8 horse field rather than have to rely on a 1 dollar tri in a 12 horse field actually paying something worthwhile.

[proximity]

again, in a six horse field you need approximately a 3% error per horse to even erase the take to break even, let alone have any kind of edge on the race. while such mistakes do happen, in general the modern horseplayers simply aren't that stupid so if you want to be a winning player ( and we are on pace advantage) you're going to be wasting a lot of time passing these short fields.

I nearly equate such cavalier talk about short fields to the habitual straddlers at poker who (of course) can beat the game from under the gun playing every hand from that position.

[Robert Goren]

The number of TB births is decreasing every year. Some tracks are going to have go or else we will get even shorter fields. Week day dirt fields are pretty short now everywhere. There does seem to be more turf horses these days so we get larger fields in turf races. I don't like that. Some of the problem seems to be that small trainers have trouble getting stall space for their claiming stock. The larger tracks would rather have a bunch of maidens who can't run a lick and take months off between starts trained by some big time trainer than a hard hitting bottom level dirt claimer who runs every three weeks or so trained by a small trainer. The big horsemen run the show these days and the bettor is an afterthought. It is no wonder that handles are way down from 10 years ago.

[Robert Goren]

For the record, I would rather have a twenty horse field than a six one. These I am happy to take six because there so many four and five horse ones.