Pace and Cap - Sartin Methodology & The Match Up

Pace and Cap - Sartin Methodology & The Match Up (http://paceandcap.com/forums/index.php)

- Sartin Methodology Handicapping 101 (102 ...) (http://paceandcap.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=116)

- - Concept of deceleration. (http://paceandcap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=11631)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lt1 (Post 115594)

Nice work Mitch and Bill. I just like to point out that imo keeping a model of tracks you play is important. As an example although at most tracks horses with %meds at or over 70% rarely win it is not always the case. Currently at Parx based on my contender and paceline selections the % med of the winner in the last 10 has ranged from 69.1 to 71.4[2times]. Prior to that the avg winners %med ranged from 68.2 to 70.7. If I remember correctly Mth was another track where horses with 70%+ med could win. The other thing I like to point out is Doc stated in his 1 on 1 video that concerning balance was that although horses with a balance over 8 rarely win on dirt they do on turf. The second thing he pointed out was not to be fooled into thinking that the horse with the lowest balance number will be your winner. In short know your tracks.
Tim

I forgot to mention the dist was 5.5f. Sorry about that my bad.
Tim

Thank you
Mitch, Tim and Mick and Papajohn

It looks like i picked a nice demo horse in Let's Parlay

Solid effort from the # 2 ranked TPR and RX 2 rated horse

Attachment 46150

Attachment 46151

Yes Bill you did pick a good one. Nice payoff also of $11.00 , hope you made some money off it.

The absolute best of deceleration is V/ DC . I forgot Ted placed it on the TPR screen which is a big benefit to those primarily using TPR. I'm still using the older version.

DCL is very good but the whole race needs to be consider or what takes place before the 3rd FR. V/DC does all that. Get on the V/DC train,its a direct line to where you want to go.

The train pulled into Parx today and V/DC robbers walked out with $$$$$$

All aboard,
Mitch44

Incredible Posts

Folks,

This is all great stuff. You have all made my night, and my weekend.

Happy Punting,
Jon

Glad your getting help here at Pace and Cap

Good Skill Jon
Bill

Gentlemen, a terrific review and a for me a coherent pulling together of some loose ends.
Pat

Great post and a great group for sharing information. After over 40 years of this game I love I have never agreed with a set of rules for pace line selection. I use an intuitive approach as I think many great opportunities are missed with a rules approach. I always go back on races and check to see if I missed anything on the winning horse. I read the pace lines from the bottom up and look for horses that come back well after layoff and trainers who prepare them well. I live in Florida and only play Florida tracks. Trainers are creatures of habit and have jocks they switch to when they feel a horse is ready and generally prepare them in prep races. The only bottom line way I measure success is ROI .... either I feed them or they feed me.
Again, I thank everyone for sharing info and I will always test new ideas.

Bill V tags one again

Hey there

This thread certainly has had a great interest as showing what those reading do bring to the front and also from the last line

Lawrence

Deceleration and Distance

Deceleration has a major influence on a horse’s capability and limitations of their best distance. The biggest reason there are so many 5F and 5.5 F races at minor tracks is because those horses can’t make it at major tracks where most sprints are ran at 6F.They literally decelerate to much at 6 F to win and be effective and are shipped to the minors, very similar tothe major leagues of baseball for those who can’t make it in the big leagues.
There they find a home and are competitive winning at the shorter distances however the purses are less. Even at the major tracks longer races have higher purses, speed and the ability to carry speed is rewarded.Trainers that can’t train routers are apt to make less money than those that can. Even within the sprint and route structure longer races are rewarded such as a 7 F verses 6 F or a 1 1/4 vs. a 1 1/8. My experience is that the racing world is oblivious to the deceleration factor. Trainers experiment in most cases and stumble upon a horse’s best distance after the horse fails to win and only getting several place or shows. The better trainers are aware of higher purses and experiment much sooner to find it.

The racing secretary actually fixes all the races at the track, by carding races at many various distances, surfaces and not allowing winning horses to enter a particular race. His goal is to give every horse an equal chance to win, earn purse money and to prevent any one horse, trainer or owner from winning all the money. It works to perfection.

My experience also is that very few are aware of the deceleration factor to include inside connections and handicappers. They are very well aware that each horse has a best distance which isn’t the same thing. Real class horses can win at several distances, they can carry that speed with little deceleration, however even they have limits and a best distance. A horse that can’t win at 8 F can and does win at 1 1/16 and one that wins at 1 1/16 can’twin at 8 F due to the deceleration factor. Connections all tend to wear blinkers in that they all believe they have the best horse in the race and lose their objectivity.

Being well aware of the deceleration factor when choosing pace lines I try to stay within ½ F and if not possible never more than 1 F.Races tend to run slower going longer and faster going shorter, choosing lines not within 1 F will destroy readouts.

Also another reason why I perform an analysis my top contenders is to determine their best distance and surface, there are several ways or tools to quickly accomplish this. Your analysis begins with the race conditions of the race where it describes the distance and surface of today’s race along with other valuable information. Quickly finding the best Speed Rating or two best will put you on target. Same with the Total Energy rating for each race which RDSS provides. The earning box also provides clues as to surface etc.,however make sure its current, not a 7 year old that earned something as a 3year and is no longer the same horse. I use the earnings box to see if a horse ever performed on today’s surface or distance if their chart doesn’t show a race for today’s conditions. I mainly use the horses past performance chart which is current. This allows you to get off the train at the right station say in N.Y.’s Penn Station where as deceleration will take you from there right to the track such as Aqueduct. An analysis of deceleration allows you to arrive at the track and pull right up to valet parking.

It’s a take no prisoners attitude when it comes to money,especially at the track. Better trainers exploit the inefficient ones by claiming horses from the unwary or just plain incompetent trainers. Better trainers are very aware of the best distance and surface of horses in the game.By examining deceleration we can anticipate when a move will pay dividends and be ahead of the crowd while many times having more knowledge than the connections themselves to include trainers. Not just for claims. This is an area that hasn’t been fully explored and contains several ways to implement this factor and they tend to pay better also as most handicappers are too speed oriented to include Sartin devotees.
Within a certain distance such as 6 F there are many horses who are only running for minor awards or none at all because of the deceleration factor. Not only does the factor of deceleration greatly affect the various distances of races it greatly has an effect within each distance itself or in other words every race that is run.

Mitch44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mitch44 (Post 115592)

Deceleration

papajohn3timesreference your question on balance, DCL and what is deceleration?

Decelerationis an important factor in racing, only RDSS is using it. The matchup has a cause and effect on deceleration and it also comes from a horse’s natural running style and how it uses its energy. Most races it’s a combination of both.

Balance is a basic or crude way of looking at deceleration and consists of E/Ep# + E/LP# + TPP # rankings to get the balance number on the Energy screen. A crude way to also look at the matchup. The lower the balance the more efficient the horse can run in today’s matchup. Those with a high balance can be tossed. Sartin said horses over 8 seldom win. Caveat here: the low numbers are best, the more contenders in a race the higher the numbers will be to include the best orlowest numbers. **** If you model this keep the same number of contenders for all your races in the model,Sartin always recommended 5 ***** I don’t believe one needs to model it toget the point.

Most horses have a specific running style and that style has an effect on deceleration. This style is best determined by % Med. Horses with a % Med. 0f70.0% seldom win unless matched up with a bunch of other high % Med. horses.These pretty much are an extremely high % deceleration and a toss. Ditto for extremely low % Med as they indicate a possible one run horse. Brohamer's bookModern Pace Handicapping goes into great detail on % Med. and its uses. It is not a standalone factor but is a tool.

Another way of looking at deceleration first appeared in PMTR book under advancedconcepts. It simply measures the difference from EPR and LPR E.g.

EPR LPR TPR Diff.

A 92 72 164 -20

B 72 92 164 +20

BTW who of A & B would win this matchup?

In RDSS you can see this on the TPR + EL screen by the red and blue lines, the faster early the longer the red line and the LPR is a blue line, the greater the plus difference the longer the blue line. The "Doc" loved visual stuff because he could grasp it better. Bill V is one who can make this workwell for him also. An early embryo version.

Moving along: The DCL you asked about is a much better way of looking at this. It’s amuch more accurate measurement. Obtained by 3rd FR divided by SecondCall E.g. 52.5 FPS / 55.3 FPS = 94.9 DCL. Here’s where members go wrong with this, high DCL numbers aren’t necessary the best. Low velocity horses don’t decelerate much. We’re looking for fast horses with the least deceleration thathold up to the wire. DCL measures deceleration but fails to consider energy. What you need to do is put the rating in context with Total Energy. Eliminate low Total Energy horses with low DCL numbers. Another way to put this is eliminate low velocity horses with high deceleration. If you look at the Velocity POH screen first you can determine the match up andwho can’t meet it. Think of which are the worst horses (low Tot. En. & lowDCL then go the BLBL screen and look at the rank. You’ll be surprised. After my analysis of screens including sometimes just the TPR screen I can determine what BLBL will be.

All that said about DCL, it still is just a tool and another crude way of looking at deceleration but better than previous methods. The reason I say that is because it’s only one measurement of deceleration. With the progression from TPR to 3 fractions and FPS (feet per second), compounded ratings came about such as FX,HE which propelled the Sartin Mythology forward. The rapid advancement of computers also made it possible to handle 3 fractions and all the additional math, with greater memory and faster calculations. Not only were the compounded ratings better it also propelled deceleration forward with such programs as Entropy which is now extinct and a crude version. Reading the Entropy manual will probably confuse the hell out of most, besides it has evolved and its formulas are no longer valid. My favorite program. The only thing good in the manual is concept.

The very best comprehensive factor for deceleration is V/DC. DCL is only one element or factor in it, as it contains several different measurements of factors in it and some other hokey pokey good stuff. An all in one rating that’sa little better than BLBL. It’s one factor that works at all tracks, distance and surfaces.

You need to look at the rankings of V/DC on the BLBL screen because they include energy and deceleration for several different factors being rated. For those pesky ties prefer the better BLBL ranking to break ties. You may have two 4 rankings for V/DC the one with the better BLBL ranking is the better of the two. Also you can go to the Primary screen to break ties, as an ex. if there are 2 horses tied with a ranking of 4 the one with the lowest total energy and highest ranking number is the worst of the 4 etc. The worst ranking not the difference in %. Depending on where the decelerationis taking place a horse could be tied in total energy or very close and have a higher % but be better depending on where the deceleration is taking place, the ranking number separates them better and BLBL total. You can really just scratch from BLBL and get the same results which is much easier. The other way gives a better picture of who is better, a clearer picture of ties. Especially when you’re down to 5 contenders for ties on BLBL orties in V/DC. It pays to look at several different screen.

All the above are tools and different ways of looking at deceleration with the latest, most complex and efficient being V/DC. Deceleration is basically when a horse is gutted, out of gas and running on empty, where that takes place and is caused by a combination of running style and the matchup. They throw in the towel, raise the white flag and surrender to the superior forces that attacked it.

Not just in the 3rd FR, if an Early horse doesn’t carry its speed intothe 2nd FR it’s a false Early horse and gutted at that point. V/DChas a measurement for that. This is also why horses that can run or put together two good Fractions are superior and force others not to run their 3rdFr. number and TPR. Ditto for S types that run two good FR or HE. One good FR horses seldom win unless everything collapses, a horse with a big 2ndFR seldom wins but it does in many cases propel them into the money (place& show) as they pass many gutted horses.

Without getting more into the nuts and bolts of it any deeper that’s about as simple asI can make it. Essentially it’s several compounded factors, each measured by deceleration of those factors, combined with energy which also takes into consideration the matchup and a clone of what Sartin taught Bradshaw who together collaborated to what is now V/DC.

Mitch44

I finally had a chance to read this post. Mitch, thank you for your insight on Dcl. Great read!