Del Mar 8/21 R10 Followup-
 

In race 10, #8 Sheriff Brown Line Pace Line selection.


The best percept is line 3 in the last 3 outings. Ok use it.
But and it is a BIG BUT-


L3- OC 40/38
L2- G3 400
L1-G2 250

As the horse stepped up in class- the percept dropped. I think I should use Line 1- as it could be a better indicator of how this horse will run in graded company, but......


Any advice? Thank you

I tried seeing him through lines 2 and 3. He stumbled early in his last.
Both lines I tried he looked the same: longshot to win but could have cracked the trifecta.

Many years ago, circa 1980's Sartin and his pace line book used class as an aide to picking a Pace Line. He did away with that in his later suggestions. I don't consider at all for the picking of a pace line.

I do look at class for my assessment of a horses current form, as to whether a horse improving or declining at times. Its one indicator. There are others but class can be very hard to access. Like many things in racing there are all kind of approaches to class and each has its negatives or weakness to their approach.

One example is the RC (race class) from TrackMaster which is within the RDSS program.
It determines an average Speed Raring for every horses in the race to obtain the RC rating of that race. Should a horse that finished 12th in a 12 horse field be considered at all for such a rating?

However to some extent it works. Lots of stuff works but what's its efficiency?

Its extremely hard to say the reason for any bad race or one race. Ever heard of in and outers?

Class IMO shouldn't be part of picking a pace line because it can be hard to quantify a poor performance. But like an adjustment, if its there someone will take it.

Mitch44

Makes a lot of sense Mitch, and thats what threw me for a loop there. Seeing the performances drop as class increased- I wasn't sure if people actually used that consideration into pace line selection.

Doing it, makes it a lot more subjective which makes repeatable handicapping difficult

" Doing it, makes it a lot more subjective which makes repeatable handicapping difficult."

Hanger your exactly correct because class is constantly changing from race to race. One reason is due to form, which is hard to nail down. Others are race condition and soundness.

Mitch44