weight for age ?

[Posts: 491Joined: 26 May 2009, 19:28Location: Swindon]

@ Slowhand

The speed figures for 2yo's are supposed to get higher as the year progresses as they continue to mature, and it is usually aroung July you see the class backwards types start to appear.

My top 2yo at this moment is Penny's Pinic with a rating of 85 and I expect by the end of the year to see a 2yo rated in the 95+ bracket.

The Raceform scale covers all distances, and I use it to work out the going allowances, I add the WFA adjustment to 2yo and 3yo races to bring all the age groups into line, I find this helps.

[Posts: 62Joined: 23 May 2010, 18:17]

I am fully aware that 2yo's get faster as the year progresses, that was my whole point BB.

Lets say you rate a 2yo a bare 80 at the beginning of May, you don't add wfa and it next runs in July. In that race it meets a 2yo you have rated as 82 at the end of June. In that situation with average progress your original 80 horse may now be an 85 horse but you would favour the later 82 horse over it.

Alternatively you add wfa to both and would get a higher rating for the earlier one when they met in July.

[Posts: 372Joined: 26 Feb 2011, 00:03Location: Stroud]

Those of you wanting to average two sets of different figures are playing with fire. If you are set on figure handicapping and buy half a dozen books on figures. It may cost you £60, which is nothing compared with what you will loose blindly following a useless weight for age scale.

There is a perfectly legitimate argument to completely ignore weight as a out come factor. Some very successful professionals are of this opinion.

Personally I believe that 95% of racing post stats and figures are
poor value or complete rubbish.

I anyone one who uses weight as a handicapping method could honestly explain to me how they know "2lbs is one length" at 5f I would be very much interested as it is impossible for me to understand.

[Posts: 1861Joined: 25 Jul 2011, 05:04]

I suppose it's tried and tested and the majority of time it comes out as it should or they would have changed it accordingly.

Of course you will always have exceptions to the rule. Canford Cliffs giving weight to Frankel for starters.

There are 3 year olds and there are 3 year olds and sometimes them getting WFA is a joke.

I would have thought treating each case on it's own merits would be the most advisable way to go.

[Posts: 82Joined: 10 Mar 2011, 22:20]

From what I have read in Beyer on Speed he say's weight is a relatively tiny component among all the factors that affect a horse's performance and that it is almost impossible to measure accurately the affect of weight.
So from this are we to assume that we do not take into account weight when we are looking at a particular race and look at how the horse's have run in their previous races?

[Posts: 372Joined: 26 Feb 2011, 00:03Location: Stroud]

From what I have read in Beyer on Speed he say's weight is a relatively tiny component among all the factors that affect a horse's performance and that it is almost impossible to measure accurately the affect of weight.
So from this are we to assume that we do not take into account weight when we are looking at a particular race and look at how the horse's have run in their previous races?

Yes you are correct. More relevant information can be gained in the time you have spent 1000 hours working out that weight doesn't matter. I'm referring to sprints and mid. 2lb weight is the last thing that has any bearing after the jockey silks.

[Posts: 1072Joined: 12 Jul 2002, 10:58]

Horse body weights are a more important factor than weight carried on their backs.

For example, Black Caviar has raced with a body weight that varies by 33 pounds. So going up or down 5 pounds is relatively irrelevant. All this "inside" information is freely available in Hong Kong but in UK to the trainer only. Hong Kong pros will not bet unless the body weight is right for the race.

Unless UK punters have that information, especially in a country that majors on handicaps, then both the punter as well as the BHA handicappers will always be put away, race after race after race.

The racing media are particularly clueless in saying such and such a horse has a "10 pound pull" when if the horse body weight was known it could be somewhere say between a positive +43 pound pull or a negative -23 pound disadvantage. That is a huge difference in estimating a horse's chances within a handicap.
If the horse wins it was the "10 pound pull". If it loses, it was just an off day for the horse or the jockey "gave it a bad ride".

[Posts: 62Joined: 23 May 2010, 18:17]

Beyer didn't have an interest in weight because nearly all US races are claimers with little weight shift. He might have a different view if he rated our races.

I think weight generally is overstated by those within the industry. Trainers are obsessed by it to the degree that when their horse gets a few lbs more than they feel it should have they run them in "can't win"races just to get the weight back down. Why do trainers do that if weight makes no difference? Why do trainers tell jockeys not to win far, what difference should it make?

I'm playing devils advocate with the questions here.

Weight obviously does make a difference, its measuring it to any accurate degree that makes punters want to ignore it.

[Posts: 372Joined: 26 Feb 2011, 00:03Location: Stroud]

One theory is that it isn't the weight they are bothered, but do not want a high official rating, which of course are the same.

High the rating shorter the odds.