What is a Good run....
 

in your opinion??

A in the money finish , within X amount of lengths of the winner or something else


Thanks in advance

Plus race
 

For a good race
In the money
80 or above speed rating
Beat half the field

for a plus within a zero race
I use the following

At or above an 80 speed rating
or adjusted down to within 3 of the fastest horses in the race

A move in the race. At some point in the race the horse
position wise involved in the race


Beats half the field example race had 9 runners
the horse finished 4th

How about this one borrowed from HTR software people...please correct me if I don't have it right.
Good race.....at or within 1 length at 2nc call OR 2 lengths at stretch call OR 3 lengths at finish.
Covers alot of bases...running short, coming into condition, etc.

I do agree and use the factors Bill attributes to a plus race. In addition, Jim Quinn gave some info at one of the Sartin seminars he spoke at which I think is still valid today. Quinn made the point that what he was trying to do with these guidelines is not be too strict early in the contender selection process:

A good race: Either finished in the money (1st, 2nd, or 3rd) or within 2 lengths of the winner in a sprint and 3 lengths in a route.

An acceptable race: Either beat half the field AND/OR finsihed within 6 lengths of the winner.

Lou adds: For an acceptable race, sometimes I stretch that to "within 9 3/4 lengths of the winner", depending on what the rest of the paceline looks like and what part of the current form cycle the horse is in.

He then defined what he considered acceptable form:


1-For horses showing a race within the last 30 days or so, he wanted them "up close" at the stretch call in their last race. Up close was defined as:

Within 2.75 lengths up to 6.5 f races
Within 3.75 lengths for races between 7f and a mile
Within 4.75 lengths for races of 8.5f and up

If the horse is dropping in class today, then he would accept these "up close" guidelines at any call - 1st call, 2nd call, or Stretch call

2-For Route to Sprint cutbacks, he wanted to see the horse show speed at the 1st or 2nd calls - either on the lead or within a couple of lengths. The only exception was if the router was taking a huge class drop where he might be able to outclass the sprinters.

I believe Doc said that he wanted the router's early calls to match the early calls and final time of the sprinters he was in against today, as well as to be up close.

Lou Adds: I tend to go more with Quinn's take on this as I simply haven't seen many routers cutting back with early positioning that are able to match the sprinters fractional call times in their route paceline race. However, the ones with early positioning in their pp's can and have won, although overall, routers cutting back don't win a huge percentage and I like them better at 7f or 6.5f.

3-For horses coming off layoffs:Quinn is liberal here when it comes to acceptable form

For layoffs of 31-60 days, all he looks for to determine acceptable form is a 4f workout within the last 10 days. Time of the workout is not important.

For layoffs of 61 days to a year, he asks for a 5f workout within the last 2 weeks. Again, speed of workout not important.


Again, the above guidelines are meant not to be too restrictive in early contender and paceline selection. Obviously, other steps in your handicapping process may eliminate some of these horses later on when pace, class, running style, etc are considered.

Hope these are helpful.

Lou

5 bl or less at any distance is a good race regardless of the finish position

there is NO set standard to beaten lengths. If a claimer that can only run 45.4 comes up against one capable of 44.0 and gets beat with improving early speed in several of it's pace lines leading to that race, you might miss it with these preconceived notions of a set number of beaten lengths.

in the race
 

Pino and Lou

good stuff. I agree with what you added about Quinn, Scott and Brohamer
using beaten lengths To rate a good race

Tim but no matter what the pace might have been
I think to be at 5 or less beaten lengths at the finish
shows that the horse was involved and handled the
pace of the race battle better than not

And hanging onto such "rules" completely eliminates understanding just what happened in those races: was it a complete debacle or was there improvement hidden in that pace line?. You never know if you don't look and make assumptions about what some arbitrary beaten lengths might mean or may not mean. Overlooked data does not tell the entire tale particularly about form cycles: THE KEY to seeing which way a horse is heading (Thanks Mark Cramer and Thoroughbred Cycles for enlightening me to ALWAYS look for them.)

The 6th at Philly today (10/15) is a good example of the 2 (first at over 12/1) and the 8 (much higher) running second. BOTH over the arbitrary limit. showed "hidden" improvement and are two of many many others.

Now putting these performances in the perspective of what else was in the race, unveils that hidden improvement for the following result of 2nd call maidens. BOTH were improving against faster paces than they could handle and met one today that they could.
6th race - Philadelphia Park - October 15, 2008
Pgm Horse Win Place Show
2 Five Year Plan 28.60 12.40 6.00
8 Devil's Dream 26.20 10.20
9 Sunday Worship 8.80

$2 Exacta 2-8 293.40

same card another example
 

4th race - Philadelphia Park - October 15, 2008
Pgm Horse Win Place Show
7 Cousin Coley 34.40 12.00 7.20
2 Crow Hill Dancer 4.40 3.40
9 Dream a Little Bit 6.20

$2 Daily Double 2-7 408.80
$2 Exacta 7-2 103.40

Improvement hidden by beaten lengths.