Wednesday Saratoga Race 1

[Jeebs]

We've got ourselves $20k beaten claimers going the full tour of Saratoga's main oval, and this race looks to serve as a prep for a 2-mile claimer on 8/9 for the neat distance runner Ea. Assuming that Ea runs here, his entrymate Irish Lion - entered in tomorrow's 8th at 7F - would scratch, leaving pre-scratch, a 7-horse field to go and in my mind, Jacobson holding the cards in this particular race.

Having had the chance to try RDSS the past month, I have essentially settled on a paceline strategy that seems to work best for me, and basically involves using Total Energy to gauge the Pace of the Race. Without trying to preach on a soapbox, I tend to be a bit on the liberal side with choosing/matching pacelines, especially with layoff runners. I know that this may go against the teachings of astute guys like FTL and Bill V. (and I consider them astute practicioners of the Methodology!) but for me, it seems to be effective. As Ted has reminded myself and others, consistency in the application of the Methodology is paramount to success.

Screenshots and Analysis:


Let's look for the pace of this race:


Off 47 days, Sovereign Default's past two outs were over off-tracks going one-turn routes at BEL. His most recent two-turn outing on the AQU IDT was also over an "off" course. However, his recent "fast" track two turn routes showed some true ability, scoring TE of 164.8 and 165.2 respectively. He could be the Early in here, but has shown some E/P tendencies. The other horse that could fight for "E" supremacy, is Jet Set Cat. While his best two-turn races showed ability to shoot for/fight for the lead, the TE scores for his 12/31 and 1/19 races would get swallowed up whole by the favorite. Also, his most recent two-turn dirt route, a "O" effort on 3/15, was first off a claim. He has shown nothing in his grass efforts leading up to this. If he somehow upsets the apple cart, I won't lose any sleep over it. The target PoR for this race is in the neighborhood of 164.8.

[Jeebs]

Charlie's Quest's two-turn routes in races similar to today's are +, O and + efforts (Lines 2, 4 and 9). He is a sustained runner, coming off a long layoff. The conservative approach would be to not select a line here, but I want to match up the two + efforts against today's pace to get an idea of what we might expect. To me, they look quite light against the potential TE pace of today's race (161.6 and 163.7). Now, three months later, Rudy throws a $20k tag on his neck. This runner may attract some public support on the drop in company, but I have a hard time seeing this horse in the mix based on my match-up.


Ea is another one coming off an extended break. As a SAR horse for the course, I considered Line 9 as a possibility, but settled on Line 2 from 2/16, as the PoR that day (165.0) is similar to today's, and he didn't do terrible, running a + effort of 163.3. Such effort might not be good enough to beat the favorite in here, but as we will see, the effort is better than most in the race. Again, a conservative player would probably not select a representative line and move on, but I want to give myself a chance to find something. Seemed like a S/P runner.


Given this one's recency, I selected the most recent line, a + race, albeit a muddy track going one-turn at BEL. His other + races (164.3 and 162.8) were against lighter PoR's than today's race, and his TE in his BEL routes somewhat in the neighborhood of today's PoR are light. A sustained style, I pegged as a non-contender.


Off 83 days, the last being a sloppy one-turn BEL route which was as "O" as they come. Rating this one's + efforts around two-turns (Lines 3 and 5), his TE were 161.9, which would fit well against a lighter PoR with his S/P run style. Against 165.0 and 164.3 PoR's, he didn't come close. Non-contender.

[Jeebs]

Most recent race for Kings Village was 1 1/2m at PEN, which really doesn't represent this race well. His most recent effort at a route distance similar to today's was one-turn at BEL, a O-grade effort at 161.8 TE. The recent + efforts around two-turns (Lines 7 and 9) are 161.0 and 161.7 respectively versus soft PoR's. Has done zip versus stronger PoR's. I'm unsure of what run style to expect today, but based on TE, it shouldn't matter. Non-contender.



Per Ea's custom, he turns it on in the middle and late fractions, but look at the 4 and 1's DCL spread compared to the rest of the field. Unless something crazy happens, I don't see much unexpected happening here, and the oddsboard will likely reflect that. There's no edge for me, and probably no bet other than covering in the D/D and P3 pools.


Thoughts?

[Latekick]

I only used 4 horses here. I didn't try to FORCE any lines in this one.

[Bill V.]

Hi Guys
I just walked in the door as the race was going off

The winner # 5 is a tough call. I would not have had it.

The long layoffs and the off track zero line, then another layoff and a drop
to CL 20 was too many issues,
I see Late Kick went down to the Saratoga line 5 same conditions as today
and a win.
Not saying this is the line but It shows a win at this level

Bill

[Latekick]

Bill the only reason I went back to that line is because i saw his last race live and I noticed how much ground he lost to the leaders from 1c to 2ndc and this is usually a negative, but I figured he wasn't handling the slop and he still made up A good amount of lengths late. I accepted that this horse MAY be sound so I went to his line that I chose.
I still didn't have this horse, I didn't think his readouts would be competitive

[Jeebs]

The gap in TE made it tough for me to have the 5 as a winner in this one. Layoffs are a universal question mark and Zito happened to find the right spot at the right time. As I said, there really wasn't any value to be had in the race. I just wished I followed my own advice about passing

[Hoof 11]

One thing you always have to pay attention to is form cycles, one thing that immediately stood out to me is Sinorice puts out a peak effort every 5 starts. Sometimes it's just by chance that this happens, whether it's class or distance or surface that has a bearing on this, it's up to you to decide.

I always look for cycles in the PP's, it is very telling on what could possibly happen today, but make sure you look at the conditions and distance to see if that had any affect on the cycle. Some horse's run well every other start, for some it's every 3rd start, or 4th start, or 5th start and so on.

Once you have established all the form cycles of the runners in a particular race, look at the best Total Energy rating of each entrant, i usually stay within a calender year and stay within the same distance and surface. If you have a price horse that you think is coming into form, and his or her numbers are competitive against the other contenders, drop the hammer!

Some horses are all over the place, and there's not much you can do about that, but some horses are very telling and they usually follow a pattern, so use it to your advantage.

[Latekick]

I have a longshot on top in this 4th so we ll so how it turns out.
I also see all the way at the bottom of BL/BL is the #7. This horse sort of interests me.
I think this race is between the 6-7-8. Im interested too see what happens in this one

[Latekick]

Heres the readouts