Racing's Weekend of 'Disruption'

Hello everyone. That was a really quiet holiday weekend, wasn't it?

All that happened, by my count, was a horse race occurred where one of the leading jocks in the nation almost met his maker, a horse worth many millions was running loose around a track, and owner and defacto Horse Racing Commissioner Mike Repole went on video tirades on twitter. He also hammered Andy Serling who blocked him (ok, maybe this isn't too out-of-the ordinary). 

In my slice of the world, y'all were big time banging on the twitter pretty hard on this. I got flamed almost 3% as much as Jessica Paquette does, Zocalli was firing guns as the President of the God Bless Rabbits Committee. Thank goodness Beem's communist captors kept him shielded from all this. 

The thing that confuses me most about the reaction to this race was, in some quarters, the "surprise" it happened. 

Rabbits have been entered since bloodletting times in blue blood events with one sole purpose - to disrupt a horse race. 

When disruption happened in the JCGC, it's a natural and logical progression. It should be nothing to be surprised about. 

We can't challenge Mike Tyson to a fight and be dumbfounded that our jaw is broken. 

The broader question, I think, is why this phenomenon even exists. 

I've seen the whole "Frankel had a rabbit" thing referenced, but why did he have one? Would the world stop spinning if he didn't have enough pace to chase and he ran second? No. Would we as bettors be inconvenienced by him running third? Certainly not, we deal with analyzing pace in races 50,000 times a year and bet accordingly. 

As I see it, rabbits are entered particularly so blue blood pedigrees, owned by many people who make more money by noon than I will in my lifetime, can maximize the value of their bloodstock by earning black type. 

I don't think there's anything more to it. 

Rabbits aren't entered in February at Laurel; the trainers don't have enough money to enter another entry to kill off the lone speed and set it up for their closer. It won't happen at Mountaineer tonight either. In fact, if it did happen at Mountaineer tonight, the trainer of the aggrieved party might meet the other trainer behind the barn for a talking to, and it would never happen again. 

Even Sherrifs with Zenyatta didn't enter a rabbit in the Clement Hersh, where they went 3/4's in like 1:17 in a eight and a half furlong race to try and beat her. So what, if she loses she loses. That's horse racing. 

No, this is a part of the one tenth of one tenth of one tenth percent of horse racing; it's their world not ours. 

Until this tiny group gets together and wants to end it by putting restrictions on entries, horses who don't belong in a race will be there to disrupt the race. And in some cases, like on Sunday, they will succeed. 

We can be happy the disruption didn't reach its zenith because that would've been tragic, but when you inject chaos into a race artificially, things can turn bad in a hurry. 

Have a great Tuesday everyone. 

Optix - A Useful Tool to Battle the Sharps

I'm always looking for new ideas or mediums to learn in the game (in that evergreen quest to get better) and I'd been meaning to dive into Optix for some time. I finally bit the bullet over the last week, signed up, and took it for a test drive. 

For me, whether it be for DFS software, or a football handicapping medium, or for horse racing, I want a package to do a few things - i) save me time, ii) be easy enough to use and understand and iii) give me something I won't get in the PP's. I think Optix delivered on all three counts. 

"The Plot" 

Represented by squares and circles, the visual plot represents a neat way to look at the horses based on their running styles and early and late pace figures. It takes a bit to get your head around, but once you do, it can help confirm or deny what you're seeing in the PP's, and I found it to be remarkably accurate. 

Using this in tandem this week it helped me solidify a lean, or opened my eyes to using a horse who would have a favorable set up that I might've not uncovered. It worked well with another package I use. 

In fact, I was ambivalent on a longshot at Colonial that my own research found, but when I was able to see the Optix plot it gave me confidence that I should play the horse. The race played out as the plot detailed, and the horse paid $50 or $60. That was a nice bet. 

Notes

I found the notes feature incredibly useful. There are a lot of races to watch, and replay watching is time consuming. The notes alerted me to races where I may want to look at a replay, or encouraged me to look closer at a running line. It'd take me all day otherwise, and I don't have all day. This is one of the better features I've seen in any sellers' package. They definitely do the work.

The races are also (at several tracks) rated with a grade. I also found this helpful. 

Did this horse who ran eight points slower do so because of raceflow or kickback or a bad trip? There's no need to guess - the notes right beside the horse tell you.

The Horses, and the Data

Optix is not all circles and squares, but a past performance where you can drill down to look at any horse. Their figures, running lines, are all there. It's not hard to get used to and I didn't have to bring up the PP's to confirm or deny anything, really. Reading the lines and other pertinent information is sleek and easy. 

"The Green Report"

This report summarizes trip notes that can portend a good effort. 

Just on Sunday I knew I didn't love Fort Nelson in the 6th at the Spa, and lo and behold, the green report showed a possible bet back on the Bauer horse. I quickly checked out the horse, and thought the 9-2 looked pretty juicy for a possible live bet against a horse I wanted to throw out. He won going away. 

This saves you a lot of time. No, the green report horses aren't locks, but they are possibles. And because some of them are sneaky, they aren't hammered by a CAW 100% of the time. 

The Odds Line Interface

If you're handicapping live, the interface pipes in live odds, and shows you daily double odds. If you wonder if the 20-1 shot you like is going down to 6-1, chances are you'll know. 

In addition, and to me this is a tremendous service to players who don't make odds lines, you can contender rate your horses and the interface will make an odds line for you. You can compare that odds line to the board, double check if you missed anything, and fire away. I think this would be fantastic for, for example, a Breeders Cup card. 

Misc

The above just scratches the surface. There are many other reports, including a hot pace or slow pace report, which is kind of cool. You can sort or search the reports for races you may be interested in. There's a lot here I need to still look into. 

Summary

Sometimes I think there's a misconception that these packages, whether they be HTR or jcapper or Optix, that they will flag horses that simply win. That's of course not the way they work. We have to put in the work and make the decisions. 

But I am of the opinion this package is worth looking into. In fact, for a sports bettor or new player, I would not tell them to read 100 books or download the PP's, I'd probably point them to something like this. I think it would give them a fighting chance. The package uncovers enough nuggets of info that aren't overly public, and everything is linked, so if you're a numbers person that likes to visualize how a race may go, you can weave an opinion. 

I'll go off on a tangent a little now.... this business bothers me. 

Optix is a good package (and there are others), but what's their market? It's the $25k a year player that wants to be a $125k a year player. It's the $125k a year player that wants to be a million dollar a year player. What has the business done to this market? They've destroyed it. The CAW's feast off it, and a barrier to entry is 15% rebates to CAW's, while if you live in a "bad" state, you're screwed and getting nothing back. 

This is a great game, but the pricing and the way it's structured with short-sighted alphabet entities and horsepeople groups does it no favors. A strong ecosystem helps resellers like Optix. It helps third party promoters. And that in turn helps the business.

I wish the sport realized this long ago. It would help just about everyone, and the business might have fifty Optixs to choose from, because the demand would be there.

So, those are my thoughts. And a quick note - I know John a wee bit, and Chris Larmey I think mentioned on the twitter box he does a little work with Optix, but they didn't give me a free look or anything to write a post. I paid my $50 for the week.

Have a great Sunday evening and Monday everyone!

A Vital Listen for Everyday Players (& You too, Track Execs)

I spent a couple of hours the past few days listening to the Bet With the Best podcast with guest Marshall Gramm.  

In my view, it is one of the most informative and educational resources one could ever hope to hear on the topic of Computer Assisted Wagering teams. 

And as an added bonus, it's super educational for players who are not seeking lower takeout (if they can find it) and for those track execs (yes, especially you Kentucky Downs people), who can't seem to grasp or understand how betting functions and grows. 

CAW-Land is an odd place where much is nebulous, and where conspiracy theories can move faster than a knife fight in a phone booth. Marshall breaks down what, in his view, is real and what's Memorex and I think it's a huge service for players. We lose a lot in horse racing, and there's a lot to complain about, but being an informed complainer is always preferred; for me anyway. 

The early section of part one could be dry for some, but it does explain how models work. Marshall has done a lot of work on this, including research on one of the best computer gamblers in history, Bill Benter. 

The sections on price discovery are valid and informative and should help players navigate the board better. 

The rants on source market fee madness and the inability to lower takeout to help the ecosystem at the base are quite well done. For those who don't know how the system is built to function, it's very educational. 

The tips on keeping things simple in our betting against these teams is what I've long believed, and it's nice to hear that someone(s) smart like Marshall (and Chris) also adhere to. If we have not developed an edge to price discover and to construct tickets correctly - Herculean tasks in this day and age - how can we beat the pick 5? Superfecta? Super High Five?

The latter part of the pod struck on something I believe 100% to be true. Yes, if we try and beat sharp teams betting into 5% juice for 150 races this weekend we can not possibly win. But if we try and compete where they are not sharpest, we can. 

I've opened up probably ten two year old listed stakes or restricted stakes for winners the past few months where they were wildly off in their pre-race pricing. Can you watch a work? Read the way a young horse moves? Have an opinion on talent? I truly believe you can crush them, and when you crush them in a race you can make your entire month, simply because of the math. Those races are there. 

Our game has a real problem. Some people at the top, in my opinion, don't know what they're doing when it comes to pricing. As Marshall noted, a place like Keeneland can change the game tomorrow by, say, dropping takeout to 12% win and 15% all exotics with little risk. But as we've seen, Keeneland actually increased takeout and went the other way. Kentucky Downs' policy has been what I'd describe as obscene. 

Until they get with the program (if ever) we'll have to navigate this market by making it, in some cases, our entire routine. Chris and Marshall's pod has helped with that. A sincere thank you to both of them.

Have a nice Tuesday everyone.