Ranchwest

You might be on to something with the negative information data . One of my angles involves an attribute which a contender does NOT have.

Recurrent troubled trips for jockeys might prove to be a sound downgrading factor.

I am currently working on tracking jockey troubled trips. I know that a troubled trip can happen to any jockey at any time. But I am thinking that jockeys that have a lot of troubled trips may not be very good wagers. What do you think? — RanchWest

How are you doing that?
Comments?

How are you doing that?
Comments? — Dave Schwartz

Yes, based on a list of keywords that appear in the long version of the comments. I realize this is not perfect, but I am thinking that it would be data that is very under-utilized. It took me about an hour or so to set it up and after that it is fairly low maintenance.

I also flag horses with troubled trips. I figure that a horse should also be forgiven for the occasional troubled trip, but when it keeps happening, maybe it isn't a coincidence.

Ranch right now I am keeping track of track biases and specifically looking at poor/bad or "negative" biases that I can see

I am doing almost 99% of the tracks on North America right now and have data starting from the start of this month if anyone wanted a quick sneak peek of what I do (which is probably nobody)

specifically looking at poor/bad or "negative" biases that I can see — Conley

Yeah, I am thinking that very few people look at the negatives. For biases, the only discussions I recall are against outside posts on the turf. Not even a lot of discussion of outside posts in routes, even when the runup to the first turn is short. Some of the dashes have short runups to the turn, too... I've seen some tracks where a 1-2-3 post tri box on dashes was winning disproportionately, suggesting that the outside posts sucked.

I saw another negative today. A horse with zero Quirin points and no recent closes went off as the favorite. If the horse doesn't run early and doesn't run late, how is it going to win? This was Bistrita, R5 at FL today, 5/23/22. Went off at 1/4 odds! And, I had her with the 5th best composite speed rating in a 7-horse field. Doesn't even seem possible, though it was the low odds on my automated odds line.

I also flag horses with troubled trips. I figure that a horse should also be forgiven for the occasional troubled trip, but when it keeps happening, maybe it isn't a coincidence. — RanchWest

Please tell me about HOW you do that.

I'm designing a note-taking & searching process in The Studio, and, not being a note taker myself, I'm a little lost.

Ranch right now I am keeping track of track biases and specifically looking at poor/bad or "negative" biases that I can see

I am doing almost 99% of the tracks on North America right now and have data starting from the start of this month if anyone wanted a quick sneak peek of what I do (which is probably nobody) — Conley

Are you doing this in a spreadsheet?

Here's my word array:

aTroubleWords := {"steadied","Jostled","Bobbled","awkward","stumbled","bothered", ;
"hopped","hit","shuffled","Pinched","hesitated","checked","boxed","squeezed", ;
"lunged","ducked","lost footing","dwelt","Bumped hard","clipped","slammed", ;
"blocked","slipped","Took up","Jumped","Reared","Tangle","Threw head", ;
"Pinballed"}

I make an abbreviated set of PP's showing only the troubled trip lines. That way I can see how many troubled trips each horse has.

I am doing it the old fashioned way in a notebook ;)

I am doing it the old fashioned way in a notebook — Conley

OMG!!!!

OMG!!!! — Dave Schwartz

You probably recall that I told about my friend, the paper handicapper, who referred to himself as a Big Chief Tablet handicapper. :lol:

I saw another negative today. A horse with zero Quirin points and no recent closes went off as the favorite. If the horse doesn't run early and doesn't run late, how is it going to win? This was Bistrita, R5 at FL today, 5/23/22. Went off at 1/4 odds! And, I had her with the 5th best composite speed rating in a 7-horse field. Doesn't even seem possible, though it was the low odds on my automated odds line. — RanchWest

There were 2 horses in that race that had zero Quirin points and no recent closes and in the 6-horse field, neither of the two won. The winner paid $36.20 to win. Bistrita ran second with the $2 exacta paying $85.50. Incredible. A win bet on all 4 of the other horses had high enough odds to ensure a profit.

Respectfully, single race examples have only slightly better than zero value.

The answer must be verified with much larger samples.

Without a few hundred negative picks made either completely rule-based or before hand, it's all anecdotal.

That's why I react so negatively when someone speaks of building models in notebooks: in order to do research, one must look across dozens of pages in such a notebook.

Respectfully, single race examples have only slightly better than zero value. — Dave Schwartz

I will be testing the zero/zero play. But being the 4th of 6 (there was 1 scratch) in Composite Speed cannot be good for a 1/4 favorite.

But I do make a lot of final decisions based on pace scenario. When a horse doesn't run early and doesn't run late, I look elsewhere. But, again, I will research this zero/zero play. I have included it on my quick cap decision screen.

The filly seemed to be bet heavily because she was taking a huge drop in class! Dropping from a $30,000 claiming race at BEL to $5,000 at FLX.

The filly seemed to be bet heavily because she was taking a huge drop in class! Dropping from a $30,000 claiming race at BEL to $5,000 at FLX. — Mark

The beautiful part of parimutuel wagering is that when someone is really wrong, someone else can be really right.

I will be testing the zero/zero play. But being the 4th of 6 (there was 1 scratch) in Composite Speed cannot be good for a 1/4 favorite. — RanchWest

Three of the zero zero horses today. They finished 2nd, 3rd and 4th. So far, they are 0/5.

Troubled trips...

So far (still early):
Routes: 4.95%
Sprints: 5.74%
Turf: 6.06%

Highest percentage for a jockey:
41.2% of 17 mounts.

You guys totally amaze me!!! Ranch you are so creative, Coley do all this work for every track by hand and Dave always looking for a way to make the process easier.
When it comes to negative factors, it seems to me that Pickmaster was used in HSH to identify negative factors some years ago. I don't recall the outcome but it felt like a worthwhile venture. Dave do you remember that effort?
Could there be an opportunity to report these items in a good news/bad news function?

When it comes to negative factors, it seems to me that Pickmaster was used in HSH to identify negative factors some years ago. I don't recall the outcome but it felt like a worthwhile venture. — Tony Kofalt

It used to work very well for negatives but that stopped about 2016 when the 1st public choice became extremely efficient in the market.

Now, it works quite differently.
One must find the BEST factors and understand the "RATIO-of-RATIOS" and "1stROR." Both of those are fully explained in Percentages & Probabilities 2022.

(It is a highly-visual explanation.)