Velocity Benchmarks

[Segwin]

In reading Tom Brohamer's Modern Pace HC (thanks to FLT - the book is a wonderful read so far) he refers to speed and pace. On page 37 he describes "Feel The Beat": In this field she qualifies as the "speed of the speed". She is capable of throwing sub-45.0 half miles at her opposition.

Is there a resource that defines what is the norm for speed at the calls for and given length race? While I can look at their running style, and can spot the E horse, how fast is fast? Is this E horse below par, par, or above par? I would imagine that certain tracks might have a bias (a topic for another discussion) but 6f at Parx should be pretty close to Thistledown as far as par times go - no? I would imagine that it needs to be broken down by class as well.

Perhaps it doesn't matter as the job is to compare each horse against each other for this race.

[lone speed]

You are right about your final assumption..it would be nice to know but the pace times will be distorted by different track configurations, mainly the length of the run up from the starting gate to the placement of the first point of the teletimer. This is the point where the first horse to trip the teleminer starts the timing of the race. Each track has different placement of the starting gate and different run up distances.

On top of this placement of the run up distance, the placement of the starting gate near the turn or on a long straightaway or on top of the hill turf course at Santa Anita would all affect the timing of the early pace calls...

Maybe others can provide a more detailed example.

[Ted Craven]

Originally Posted by Segwin

Perhaps it doesn't matter as the job is to compare each horse against each other for this race.

Terry,

I can only echo lone speed's first sentence and your final supposition. The beauty of looking at a race as a today matchup - never before encountered quite like this one - is that all you need to know about how an Early horse will fare today is right there in the PPs.

Usually, if no other Early horse can match a faster Early at the 1st call, the slower one is not the winner. Certainly true by the 2nd call mentioned by Tom B. So, in one race at one track the early pace may be 22.2 45.1 if no one else can run to that, while in a different race (same track, same card) if all an Early horse needs to run is 23 - 46 to stay ahead of any other Earlies, then that slower pace is the one for that race. BTW, in such cases, the double red 0.0s at the first 2 calls on the RDSS Segments screen tells the tale.

(Not that knowing the runup and the usual, or daily or intra-day early/late bias of a track is not useful or interesting. Though, a separate discussion from your opening quote from MPH.)

HTH,

Ted

[Mark]

Equibase publishes the run-up distance in each of their Past Performances. For a while 10 years or so ago the Racing Form had this information in it. A mile track with two shoots is a fairly standard configuration. A few tracks are 1 1/8 miles and Belmont is the only one I know of in North America that is 1 ½ miles. Arlington, Gulfstream, Churchill Downs have 1-turn miles. In fact, Belmont runs one turn routes up to 1 1/8 miles. So you have to be careful using these lines against standard two turn miles. There are also differences in the Turf courses with some tracks having more than one course and different starting positions to say nothing of the position of the inner rails. At the minor tracks you get 3 turn routes. A true Bull Ring is a half mile track but a number have been expanded over the years to 6f. MNR for instance, is almost teardrop shaped and I believe it is 7f. Note that MNR races do not transfer well to other tracks and this is probably the reason, that and cheap horses. In years gone by, Pars or Par Charts were generated from Claiming $10,000 claimers and then each 20% class jump or decline was considered 1/5 of a second faster or slower final time wise. With the popularization of conditioned claimers and the degradation of the breed these are no longer valid. Many smaller tracks run a standard claimer either $4,000 or $5,000 claimers with conditions, NW 1L NW2L, NW3L and NW4L as well as NW6months, NW1Year, NW26months and so forth. The difference in these is often their pace characteristics. You should be able to find a book or paper on this if you google it.Doc Sartin thought Par charts were BS and “The Hat” thought most adjustments were bogus. He did grant track to track differences but he learned what they were from handicapping races. There is just no substitute for doing the work of handicapping. If you focus on one track primarily you need to know what the differences in 1st fraction times are of all the feeder tracks. In addition, there is often a significant difference in the 1st fraction times between sprint distances at the same track. 5f and 5.5f 1st fraction times will almost always be faster than 6f and there is a natural bias as you extend out to 6.5f and 7f because the 1st and part of the race is run down the straight backstretch. There is no incentive for track managements to make things uniform. It costs them money to update things and it makes them easier to handicap so their price levels drop. It is more important to determine what the individual horses can run in a race than any set of Par charts. As “The Hat” always contended, a race is a unique energy field consisting of a set of horses that never ran together before and will never run together again.

[Segwin]

I dig this place - lots of very helpful people.