val4 or spec160

[Ted Craven]

David,

On this board and elsewhere, Tim Y (citing Michael Pizzolla in his book Handicapping Magic) has made the case, which I now accept and employ, that horses are more likely in Turf races to run back to prior shown ability on Turf than they are on non-Turf surfaces. Thus, if the horse has recently demonstrated reasonable current form (e.g. recent competitive finish, early run at the pace, good closing move, steady series of works returning from a layoff, etc), consider accepting its best Turf effort regardless of how old it is to represent it in today's Turf match up. I actually don't know (or care) why this is...

Check Tim Y's posts here, searching for 'Pizzolla's Window', as he calls it, meaning a timeframe outside of which you would usually NOT use a paceline. In Turf races, the idea is to 'open the Window' wider than you normally would (e.g. wider than the last 90 or 180 days, or last 3 lines, etc). I studied Pizzolla's chapter on Form Cycle Windows, and actually did not find a discussion specifically on 'opening the Window' for Turf races (maybe I missed it...). However, my own repeated success in Turf races with older Turf lines (given a good estimate of current ability), gvien me confidence to use this technique for myself.

Perhaps Tim Y will elaborate.

All other things being equal, I want to see the horse with high L/ep, Tpp, Hidden and Total Energy (i.e. emphacizing F3 but also F2). However, I also try not to get too fancy, and will accept the wisdom of the Bottom Line/Betting Line and VDC, especially if it is confirmed by the Segments screen. I don't have evidence that Late or Sustained visual running styles win more than their fair share of Turf races - perhaps others do. The 12f Turf WO race I cited above was won gate to wire by the only confirmed visually EP Turf horse. (In the event, its turf lines were all recent, but I rated others off older Turf lines).

If I had to use dirt or poly lines for a horse (due to no Turf), I would use more recent lines, and generally tend to deprecate their chances to win at first asking, versus confirmed Turf horses.

Hope that helps. Looking forward to hearing you've become a Turf specialist! Actually, some handicappers I know here are precisely that, and perhaps they will chime in.

Ted

[Bill V.]

Hi Ted

I just looked at the race Using spec mode and doing races the way i always do I did get the winner in Tier 2 with the ML favorite in tier 1 But to be honest I would not have had confidence to bet the race The race distance of 12 furlongs and the mix of dirt Poly and turf lines and turf horses that never went very far made line selection a guessing game at best
It was a nice price and the horse is right there I do pretty well with turf races
using the adjusted numbers and spec mode

Thanks
Bill