Comments (11)

1. R Hills is God | 19 September 2008

   If I water one part of the track more than the other such that,say, the inside or far side is running 0.1 secs a furlong faster, we're talking about a 1 second advantage in a 10f race.

   How the hell can the difference between running 59 and 60 seconds in the first half of the race possibly trump this?

2. Simon Rowlands | 21 September 2008

   Firstly, you are referring to an actual physical bias, not some nebulous phenomenon that is supposedly causing front-runners or hold-up horses mysteriously to overperform or underperform.

   Secondly, I would say that a 5 or 6 lengths advantage occurring from the existence of such a physical bias is significant but that it is still nowhere near so large as a substantial pace bias.

   Horses frequently run a number of seconds slower than they are capable of for no reason other than that they are either not asked to go as quickly as they could or that they are asked to go too quickly.

   A horse like Doyen in the King George in 2004 ran about 30 lb/40 lb slower than you would "expect", simply because of the run of the race. The overall times of ALL of the horses in that race were compromised - but to differing degrees - by pace.

   It was not the track that caused this to happen, it was the pace of the race and the tactics employed on the individual horses. An analysis of the pace of the race showed that it was run in an extremely inefficient way. This sort of thing - to varying degrees - happens dozens of times every day.

   Watering of the type you mention on a straight track would have the effect that runners on one part of the course would be advantaged over those on other parts of the course. This has nothing to do with pace biases.

   Watering which makes the rail "dead" on a round course would advantage horses that come wide, but would not specifically favour horses that raced up with the pace or those that were held up, unless either group were more or less likely to race on the slower or faster part of the course as a result. Were this so, it would still be more accurate to say that the course was, say, favouring horses that raced wide, not those that had been held up.

   It may seem like hair-splitting, but if people cannot understand the differences between real physical biases and a string of chance happenings or pace advantages then they are likely to misinterpret events, both pre-race and post-race, time and again.

   Commentators on such matters would do their readers/viewers/listeners a big favour if they just stopped to consider WHY a sequence of events has happened and whether that sequence is likely to continue, rather than assuming that it is as a result of the horseracing equivalent of Mars being ascendant in Taurus.

   Simon

3. Charlie | 23 September 2008

   Hi Mr Rowlands

   I found this

   " express the pace of the race numerically"

   
   Can you explain what you mean for me please

   
   Cheers

   Charlie

4. Simon Rowlands | 23 September 2008

   Hi there Charlie.

   I suspect you are referring to a post I made about pace on another forum. I have just added to it with an example of how pace could be expressed numerically, though the example I gave was deliberately simple.

   Sectionals are perhaps best expressed as a horse's speed in the sectional compared to its speed overall. So, Armure (winner at Kempton yesterday) had a final 3f speed roughly 108% of its overall speed.

   It can also be established from numerous races at the course and trip what an optimum finishing speed is (just over 101%) in order to achieve a good time, and an adjustment to the timefigure (+13 in this case according to my methodology) can be made.

   Essentially, however, the figures identify that the horse finished a good deal faster than could be expected given its overall time. This usually indicates a steady pace prior to the sectional, though that is not the specific purpose of my use of sectionals to date.

   It would be simple enough to establish whether this was the case from crunching the numbers slightly differently and to express the findings as a number.

   Simon

5. Charlie | 23 September 2008

   Thank you

   I'm sure you know this, but just in case

   
   Huey Mahl in his book Race is Pace stated something like "Pace of the Race" is the Fly sat on the race leaders nose.

   So "Pace of Race" is the velocity of the leader at a certain point throughout the race

   POR in US racing is normaly the leaders velocity at the 4f pole in Sprints and the leaders velocity at the 6f pole in Routes

   Btw, you can make "Pace of Race" Figures the same way you make overall Timefiguers

   Hope this helps

6. Simon Rowlands | 23 September 2008

   Not sure I understand the Huey Mahl quote.

   I am entirely self taught where sectionals are concerned over the last 20 years, relying on basic principles, and have read little about the subject and even less of interest.

   The sectionals you mention regarding US racing would not be the best ones to concentrate on if you were going to tackle British racing. The most significant sectionals, in terms of those that give us most information with which to adjust the overall race time, come about 25% to 35% from the finish in most British Flat races.

   It is good to consider ALL sectionals, of course, though that is not realistic now that they are not provided by an outside authority.

   In danger of going off topic here, anyway. It was not my intention to praise sectionals but to bury the concept that you can assume horses will (or will not) do well racing prominently at a certain course without consideration of pace, which is specific to the race in question.

   Perhaps the whole sectionals thing could be covered in more detail at a later date, though it has become a somewhat academic subject these days unless you are prepared to gather your own.

   Simon

7. Ian | 05 December 2008

   Hi Simon
   I very much enjoy reading your articles, particularly those concerning race times, even though I'm yet to be convinced about the merits of adjusting final times in relation to sectionals. Have you ever thought about using your considerable knowledge to write a book on these subjects? As most British racing books out there are simply not worth reading.

8. Simon Rowlands | 05 December 2008

   Thanks, Ian; that's very kind of you.

   I made a few enquiries on this subject at the end of 2005 but was discouraged by the poor returns for authors in this field and the difficulties in publicising one's work. "Form and time handicapping explained" (with a section on sectionals) may yet see the light of day, but I suspect it won't be until I have a lot more time on my hands, possibly this time next year.

   Cheers

   Simon

9. Ian | 06 December 2008

   I hope so, I'll look forward to reading a copy. I find myself agreeing with most of your ideas and theories but I can't get my head around using sectionals to project final time figures so it will be especially interesting to read more of your thoughts on that subject.

10. Rob Kelly | 25 May 2009

    Common sense should tell us all that the configuration of the course MUST affect the shape of any race. Newmarket is not Chester. Also, it would be good to hear from an experienced JOCKEY (if there is one who visits this forum) what HE thinks about the theory of track bias in favour of back/front runners.

11. Simon Rowlands | 25 May 2009

    There is absolutely no doubt that the configuration of the track affects things, Rob.

    As mentioned above: "...Yes, the conformation of a course can make it more likely that a horse racing at or near the front will remain there. For instance, in order to come from several lengths off the pace in a race run at Chester you are likely either to need to come the long way round before the short home straight (a disadvantage, though you may also miss a lot of traffic on the rail), or for the leaders to have gone too fast, or both."

    and: "...Course, trip and prevailing conditions determine how a race "should" be run, in other words, and the various horse and jockey combinations give rise to how the race is run. The various positional advantages and disadvantages follow from the difference between the two."

    The point of dispute seems to be whether courses miraculously "favour" front-runners one day and hold-up horses another for no logical reason. This is what we are meant to believe if we pay attention to some pundits. The real reason is usually very obvious: it comes down to pace, and pace is race-specific.

    Now you mention it, I would also be interested in the views of a jockey on this subject. I am not convinced they all understand it fully - Patrick Veitch recently wrote about some jockeys foolishly taking up the same position in a race regardless of pace - but I have seldom if ever heard any of them trot out the kind of nonsense on this subject that we are regularly subjected to in the media.

    Does anyone know a jockey who would be prepared to comment?!

    Simon