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It's possible I'm doing everything wrong, but here is how I analyze the same race.
I started with 16 pace lines. I usually pick three or four lines for each horse and look them all over right next to each other. I analyzed them all and tried to determine the most represenative line for each horse. A lot of back and forth. So I'm left with seven lines. (except for Madam I have two, which I'll explain later.) On top are the raw numbers and below are the adjusted.
Now from the top screen it's easy to see who had the lead at any call in the race because it's highlighted. Since no horse ran wire to wire in any of my selected pacelines, and using adjusted times, I took Madison's first call time of 48.5, Madam's second call time of 115.7 and Bluey's finsih time (the fastest final time) of 147.7 [After reading Richie's post it could very well be I'm selecting the final time incorrectly, but this is how I've been doing it in cases like this.]
My adjusted projected pace is 48.5 115.7 141.7
Like Richie, I felt the speed horse was weak and would die, plus he ran a very poor race. That leaves a horse coming from off the pace. But will it be presser or sustained?
First the sustained horses:
Paris is too slow at all three calls.
Satty is OK at the first two calls and a little bit slower at the finish.
Now the pressers:
Brick is 4/10ths slower at the first call, faster at the second call and tied for the finish.
Madam is too slow at all three calls.
Bluey is tied with Brick.
Bayou is slower at the first and third calls.
At this point is where I have been having my biggest problems. How will the race run? If it's sustained, throw out the pressers, if it's presser, throw out the sustained. This race is a little bit easier than many, because like Richie said there is only one weak speed horse and two good pressers. So if you go with a presser then you have two horses who not only ran good races but very closely match the projected pace. If you go sustained you lose. It gets tougher when you have one or two sustained horses who also match or exceed the projected pace. Or if you have two or three speed horses. Having two or three speed horses doesn't always mean it will run sustained. I've also seen pressers go wire-to-wire and leave a couple of speed horses in their wake. Sometimes the speed horses never even go for the lead. And I've also seen a speed horse win with several other early horses in the race. Like I said, this is my biggest stumbling block.
As you can see, using the adjusted times didn't hurt in this race. I haven't seen where it hurts that much in other races either. Belive me it gets complicated when you have horses coming from 7 furlongs, 6.5 furlongs, 1 1/16 and several other tracks. In this race all of the horses had raced at EVD and run at this distance. Let me ask you this: what would you do with a shipper in this field coming from an AP 1 1/16 race? It's even harder when you don't have the three-year tack records or the DRF speed ratings so you can construct your own. Using the adjusted times I don't have to worry about it, assuming of course the software handles these situations within a certain degree of accuracy. I'm just trusting Speculator to be close enough often enough to get me in the ballpark. If it proves to be way off, then it's back to the drawing board, but so far it hasn't been a problem. Like I said earlier my biggest headache is deciding how the race will run.
Also notice how it solved the problem of the two horse. I left in the 8.3 distance paceline of the two to show that the adjusted speed rating is much slower for that race even though the pace of the race comes out faster. So for the two I just chose his race at today's distance, which is also the fastest speed rating and final time.
I could go on and on, but I talk too much. Feel free to comment.
Steve
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