Track Master DTV Quality Control

[Hoof 11]

Interesting, thanks for that Ted.

How a track gets groomed before the racing day starts can have an impact on the bias. For example, after the morning workouts at Woodbine, the track is generally Gallop Mastered, which means they are raking down 1½” in depth. Once a week they Cultivate the track after the morning workouts, which means they are raking down 4” in depth, or they might Roto-till the track which is 5” down in depth. The deeper they go the softer the track becomes, thus having a bias of slow or fast depending on the surface and track. As the surface gets raced on it gets compacted back down, and the type of grooming in between races will change the surface’ consistency. Was the track sealed the day before? If so, what was done to the track this morning? Then you factor in the sun, cloud cover, temperature, humidity, precipitation before/during/after, and you have another set of variables.

What lacks in the industry is transparency, how many tracks are forthcoming with their track maintenance programs?

[Bill V.]

Thanks Ted and Hoof

This is from the factor analysis manual



August 9th was a Saturday

Parx runs live racing Saturday Sunday Monday and Tuesdays
unless there is a Monday holiday, In that case they may also run on Weds.
They may card a race on Friday if its a big race weekend like the triple crown races or the breeders cup ,

When they came back to race on Saturday August 9th, they had not raced
since Tuesday.

I want to look closer at that first race on the 9th I find it odd that a MC 10 for 3+ F
( bottom of the class ladder ) would produce so many fast times

[Bill V.]

Hi Ted

I have been looking this over. The explanation you got from track master
may be good in general but I hope they take a closer look and see that there is something odd here.

First of all This race is very aberrant but just for 1 horse.
Look how Miss Molly blew away the field



Pars

Based on my Parx database par for Maiden $10,000 Females 3 or 4 and older
is 24.6 49.3 115.2 and 142.6

Miss Molly alone exceeded par by running on a big lead and earning a
92 Final fraction ( phase 1 ) and a 138.7 final time .

No other horse in the race ran to par.

Here are the Phase 1 readouts for the previous 15 winners
of MC 10000 for older females only

Look how aberrant the readout are compared to the others.
Miss molly ( listed last ) ran its LP and TPR and 3rd fraction energy
Very different than the other 14 winners





Lastly who else in the race ran faster than expected ?
Using Valm the par POR for these 15 races would be a 63 speed rating

Besides Miss Molly, Who else exceeds par ? only the place horse is close with a 59

When the PP's come out for each of the other horses from this 8/9/14
race this is how Valm will rate them I used a flat 16 DTV since they all ran on the same track anyway

My theory is the race variant was set too fast only because 1 horse blew away the field

I could very well be wrong but I don't see any reason to rate this race 8 points faster than every other race that day.

[Bill V.]

Miss Molly ran today 9/23/14 in race 5
Looking back at my previous post
Valm calculated the final time of the 8/9/14 race to be 82

Track Master has given the race a 85




Miss Molly ran early but faded in the first race follow her maiden win
but as this chart shows that race was a way to high class turf experiment
( because of the wild 3rd fraction) they tried her on the turf

Today Miss Molly returned and ran in a CL 10 Non winner of 2 life
I have tracked where the previous 15 MC 10 3 + F winners next ran follow their maiden win. In the other 15 races for 3 + F maidens This class level is seems the correct place.




The problem is the 8/9/14 race is so aberrant. This further supports my
feeling that the -9 is not true

In today's race 9/23 race 5 Miss Molly has found her proper level
but look how she ran Very Early with a Early % of over 70
Her Phase 1 numbers for today's race were EP 80 LP a very week 68.5
That is 23.5 points off the "92" she earned on a easy uncontested early lead on 8/9/14.

Miss Molly is a early energy runner but that August 9th race final fraction
will always mess up your Sartin Program readouts

[Bill V.]

Yesterday 9/22 race 9 was the next 8.0 3 + F MC10 race run since the
8/9/14 race

The winner Sugeily ran just about to par

[Bill V.]

Originally Posted by Ted Craven

Bill, and everyone,

I just spent tome time talking with Craig Walker from TrackMaster, refreshing my understanding of how TrackMaster DTVs (or RVs!) are calculated.

DTVs for different surfaces are always different (Turf DTVs will always be different from Main Track).

DTV for a given surface will be the same for all races, regardless of distance, EXCEPT:

1. when a certain number of the horses in the same race all run final time Speed Ratings (SR) which are significantly faster than their expected SR. Maybe 1 or 2 horses running so much faster might happen, but several of all horses in a race doing so most likely indicates an event impacting track speed for that race (weather, e.g. grooming). Thus, the normal DTV is modified for that race to bring the SR in line with what those horses would be expected to run, based on a calculation involving their SR over the past 6 months of their histories.

2. When the Official Track Condition changes from previous Condition, the DTV for that race will likely also change - e.g. from Fast to Muddy.

All these DTV calculations are done algorithmically, not by human intervention, for consistency and predictability.

So, For PRX August 9, the Dirt Track DTVs were:
Race 1 = -9
Races 2 - 8 = -1

The Weather was listed as Clear and the Track as Fast for all 8 races.

Thus from point #1 above, since the DTV of Race 1 was calculated as 8 points FASTER than all the rest of the day's races (-9 versus -1) it means that more than a few of the horses in that race ran faster than their past 6 months' SR indicated they should probably run. Thus their final time SR should be smoothed out to their likely normal ability by recording that some event related to that race (the first one on the day) enabled the horses to run faster than their norm. So the DTV was increased FASTER than the DTV shown for all the rest of the races that day. Horses in the rest of the races on the Dirt that day all ran consistently and the DTV was shown as a consistent -1.

If you want to cross-check a day's set of DTVs from the TrackMaster Result Charts for any other card (say, 1 or 2 cards?), just let me know. If this does not relate specifically to Older Sartin programs, perhaps we could put that in a different Forum.

FWIW, I have been spending a lot of my programming time on RDSS integrating TrackMaster XML Result Charts with the RDSS database. Shortly after each race (~20 minutes) the Chart is available to download and integrate with all the other info for that race, so the DTVs are visible as the day progresses. You can correlate the DTV with what you are seeing race by race by way of weather and track maintenance (and thus have confidence in those numbers). (You can also use the Results to maintain realtime Track profiles of 'what's winning', as well as maintain Decision Models and update Betting records - but that's a different discussion).

I hope that helps!

Ted

Hello Ted

I have bold faced something that does not sit well

First off If you have the Monmouth 8/22 card If you can checkout race 3
(I don't have the card) But I have the horse that finished 1st 3rd and 4th from the Parx 8/9/14 race
If you can let me know what speed rating horse 5 Sweetpuddin who placed) earned in the
8/9/14 race ? It does not look to good since Swweetpudding ran in the back of the pack at MTH too

According to what Trackmaster told you about their faster than in 6 months rule ( who thought this was a good idea ?)
This does not appear to be a valid reason to give this race a fast adjustment

We see Miss Molly did earn a WILD 85 SR

I am curious to see how much faster Sweetpuddng ran in the 8/9/14 race
If she did not then nobody else in the race ran faster than their normal
speed rating ability

Here are the other horses in the race besides Sweetpuddin
These two horses who have run
back both get very low speed ratings of 12 and 14
First View who finished 5th and Stormy Norma who finished 6th have not raced since the 8/9/14 race

[Rverge]

hello Bill v, please take some time and read this about TV. its long but interesting.
http://www.chef-de-race.com/pfs/variants.htm

[Bill V.]

Thanks Chef

I skimmed over the link. I will read it fully in a few minutes
In the mean time from what I skimmed I still feel, and will believe until I see
otherwise what speed rating was given to Sweeputtin (mth 8/20 race 3).

I am at this point convinced that some sloppy recording by trackmaster is still the issue.
I have tried my best to show that Miss Molly's race is not from a faster than the rest of the days races by 8 points track variant Its simply a case of a horse running a aberrant wicked fast 3rd fraction after getting a easy early lead

The Parx 3 year best, and track record for 1 mile was set by Peasant. 134.77



Peasant is ordinary bread and butter claimer.
Here are the RDSS readouts we saw before his record setting performance
on Jan 4 2104. The race was a 16,000 claimer for non winners of a race in 6 months.
The Trackmaster variant for that day was -29 or 29 fast ( frozen hard )? but unlike the trackmaster's alleged sloppy work on august 9th, every race on Jan 4th
earns the same -29 variant. All the winners times are faster than par.
Peasant earned a 104 speed rating. Its Phase 1 readouts
were EPR 95 LPR 88 = 183 He ran 7 early on the early late and 68.35 percent medium.

[mowens33]

Rverge, that was a good read!
Thanks for the post!!
Mike

[Mark]

The methods of timing and chart calling are flawed. Whether the gate is placed properly or the timers are working correctly you just never know. When you add to this situation variant production that is computer generated, you have to expect these kinds of anomalies. Len Ragozin used to have his own timers at tracks around the country, particularly turf courses and time from the opening of the gate. So it is certainly acknowledged that horse racing is technology deficient and error prone.
Being forewarned is to be forearmed. You have to look at each horse past performances and note the lines that just don't belong. Horses can make major jumps in speed but it normally associated with maturation, change in surface or reaching fitness after a long layoff.
When you see a speed figure that is haywire don't use it. Bradshaw always spoke of preponderance of evidence. Make sure that the circumstances exist that could possibly support a big improvement in speed. Examine and evaluate each running line from gate to wire and convince yourself that the race was legitimate. The tracks have to incentive to insure fidelity in there reported times and charts. The bigger the prices the better in their view.