[Ted Craven]

Chris,

Welcome to Pace and Cap, and to RDSS, and thanks for agreeing to help test the software from the perspective of someone relatively new to the Sartin Methodology.

For starters, may I suggest you begin a schedule of reviewing Follow Ups 70 - 88 in the Pace and Cap Library, with emphasis on discussion of paceline selection. Since RDSS duplicates all of the Validator readouts, all references to Validator screens and nomenclature is still applicable to your use of RDSS.

There are numerous consistent methods of identifying contenders and selecting pacelines to represent them today, but you'd be best advised to pick one method at a time to get a grasp on the available tools. As you know, RDSS (and the Sartin Methodology) is not a black box, but a pallette of tools.

Consider the following (which you will read amplified over and over in teh above Follow Ups): select the best of the last 3 pacelines, similar track, surface and distance structure. Where possible (and prudent) try to get confirmation of what a single paceline shows by seeking other lines which show the horse can duplicate the performance indicated by 1 single line you wish to use. You can use the Primary Screen in the 2nd panel of each horse's Past Performances, the Percpetor Total and Rank to see what are the strongest lines in a horse's recent history. (See the screen shot below).

As you get better at it and perhaps start to keep some records (or make general mental notes) you'll find that certain aspects of a horse's energy distribution profile count for more in certain races, surfaces or at certain tracks (e.g. Hidden and LPR, and Deceleration relative to True Speed in Turf routes), or EPR in sprints at some tracks during some seasons (e.g. AQU inner dirt, winter).

After selecting lines like this for horses, eliminate the worst from the Analysis Primary Screen down to the top 5 and ties Total Energy, then over to BL/BL to review the top 3 ranked, with V/DC corollaries.

The foregoing is a fairly cursory description of one method, and a bunch of Follow Up reading, and working races though will gain you more familiarity.

Start with that and let us know how it goes, or what further questions arise. In the meanwhile, in your spare time, you can also review Richie P's latest post in the RDSS Forum re using Match Up techniques, assisted by software. Again, I'd pick one or the other to focus on at a time, and become comfortable with a consistent method.

Best of luck!

Ted