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HANDICAPPING FEATURES FEBRUARY 28, 2007 On the road to becoming a winning horseplayer by Steve Zacks A very wise racetracker once told me that racetrack profits are to be found on two kinds of horses: high-priced horses with something going for them, and low-priced horses with everything going for them. Even with that good advice in mind, it was a long and frustrating journey to join the circle of consistent winners. Along that winding road I learned that the trip is not a smooth and steady path, but is filled with many zigs and zags, high points and very, very low points. Know thyself Another regular winner once pointed out that during the average month (if there is such a thing), there will usually be four very good days, four very bad days and 20 days where not much happens. Meaning break even, win a little or lose a little. Anyone who desires to make a serious attempt at becoming a winning horseplayer must make several key decisions. These decisions will be based on bankroll size and temperament -- the ability to deal with long losing streaks Too many start out on the journey with no idea of how to achieve their goal because they had not defined that goal. Someone with a big bankroll and a high tolerance for long losing streaks might well be suited to an approach geared to high-priced horses with something going for them because that method usually means fewer winners and longer losing streaks. Someone who does not have the temperament, or the bankroll, for long losing streaks might be better off with an approach that looks for lower-priced horses with many things going for them, where the win rate should be higher. Someone with the right skills and temperament might even elect to combine both. It is essential to know both who you are and where you are going before you can determine how you are going to get there. It is extremely important to understand your ability to cope with the frustrations on those days when nothing seems to go right. Understanding the psychological impact of bad results on subsequent activities may be the most understated and least understood factor in what goes into making a winning horse player. Even the seasoned professional falls off the wagon every once in a while and does things that they know are not wise. Once you have made initial decisions about where you are going and how you are going to get there, the next step is to figure out how you are going to approach the races. You cannot win every race, so choose what you are going to do You don't have to be at the races very long or very often to learn that you cannot pick the winner of every race. There are too many different kinds of races and too many different logistics which determine the eventual winner. That said, there are too many races that are not won by the best horse. Finding the winner of races for different age groups, at different distances, or on different surfaces, with varying class and race conditions, are very likely to have different logistics. Even if you manage to pick the right mix of ingredients in the right combination for a particular race, the horse may stumble leaving the gate, have bad racing luck or get a bad steer from his jockey. Many successful or winning horse players approach the game from one or a few selected windows, or points of entry. While we are sure that there are a few winners who play every race, many have established basic or minimum requirements before they will consider playing a race. Several examples of these entry points that work are: recent claims and/or trainer switches; first-second-and third-time starters horses who have worked within five or fewer days of the race a group of 10 trainers at each track which he/she knows and understands inside out look for trainers who are on current hot streaks; one waits for consistently high-percentage trainers who are coming off a bad meet and jumps all over them in the new stages of the next meeting. For example: J.F. Martin, a trainer winning at an overall 25 percent rate, had a very slow Golden Gate Fields meeting but was three for seven at the start of the recent Bay Meadows meeting It takes hard work to succeed Once you have made the decision about what it is you are going to do, you have to do the work to take it to the next level. This is a very complicated game, and there is nothing that is simple and straightforward that will make you an instant winning player. Three decades ago when we first published trainer and turf sire data, there was very little racing information available. In those days the past performances only listed 'alw' for all levels of allowance races; no purses, or non-winners conditions were listed. There were also no daily, weekly, annual or meet-long statistics for jockeys and trainers. Those who kept a little black book with the specific conditions of allowance races knew who was stepping up or dropping and held a big edge over the general public. Those who knew a trainer had won three races in the last two days, or had not won a race for six weeks also held an edge. Nowadays your task is much simpler as there is a plethora of information and sources from which to choose. To start you have to find an angle or entry point which produces enough winners at sufficient odds to produce a profit. It may be as simple as making a bet on Ramsey Zimmerman, who has returned a 12 percent profit on his last 600 rides, or likewise Alan Garcia, who is at 6 percent on his last 1,300 mounts. Or perhaps it's a bet on Kiaran McLaughlin, who is about above 12 percent on his last almost 500 entries. These are great starting points but if you can do extra work and refine the process, eliminating many of the losers, you can greatly increase the net return on the dollar invested. Even with all that information out there it is still necessary to know how to use it. Our philosophy to using trainer data is this: once a trainer has done something more than once and with more than one horse, it is a part of his arsenal for the balance of his career. Having had many conversations with many trainers over the last few decades it remains clear that most trainers remember things that work, and are willing to try them again when confronted with similar situations. Long-term observers of trainers are aware that there are many patterns which are still repeating themselves for the second or third decade. In this area it may be that the more things change, the more they stay the same. There are obviously pattern changes that occur regularly, but it is not rare to see a trainer do something to produce a win which worked several years ago, and which he has not used since. Suppose that that you have decided to focus in on a specific group of trainers at two or three of your key race meets, or on a certain specific factor such as a five furlong work within five days of a race. In one way or another, you start to build your database from the information. Either you buy statistics and commence work from there or you start to collect information as winners occur for these trainers or with the five-in-five pattern. This is a somewhat tedious and time consuming, however the process itself gives you a better understanding of the surrounding factors and at least you know the exact parameters of all the details in your database. You have decided on your point of entry, whatever it may be. You commence to build your database. The more you do on your own to better you understand the information that you have and all the nuances that go with it. In fact, if you choose something that is not generally publicized you will have higher wager value, and a knowledge base that belongs to a few others. Next week's subject: Hidden dangers in common trainers stats.
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