Is Horseplaying a Science? Fagedaboudit!

I was heading off to Mohawk for dinner and to watch a few races on Saturday. I was having a poor day at the thoroughbreds; and had a poor day Friday as well. I had a nasty case of seconditis, and I am primarily a win bettor. Before I planned on getting ready to go, I flipped my handy jcapper output to race 8 at Monmouth. Up popped up a horse at a 20-1 morning line. He had the #1 ranked pace figure (which on the turf at Monmouth has been good lately), he had a little program that I wrote for Monmouth turf races as a play, and he was ranked third overall. His name was Fagedaboutit Sal.

7

+FAGEDABOUDIT SAL Yellow_++_UDM Mth_turf_UDM

.0622(6) 15.08

156(1) 41(4) 92(2) 103(2)

(3) (1) (2) (5)

(5) (8) (9) (2)

ML

20-1

I decided it was time to take a shot, he was 25-1 on the board and climbing, and worth a play. Well, my pal Sal took the lead early and never looked back:

#	Horse	Jockey	Weight	Win	Place	Show
7	Fagedaboudit Sal	Fragoso P	117	80.40	23.80	10.60
1	Kiss the Kid	Elliott S	117		3.80	3.00
9	Classic Campaign	Desormeaux K J	117			2.80

Even Larry's call was a good for the excitement near the wire ........ "Are they gonna catch Sal?......... Fagedaboudit!"

Anyhow, suddenly it was a good day. Things can turn on a dime.

Now the fun part. Today I was playing a few races as well. With about two minutes to race four I flip over to my Monmouth printout.

I see this:

8

+FAGEDABOUDIT GAL Mth_turf_UDM

.1908(2) 4.24

147(1) 58(2) 93(1) 85(2)

(2) (5) (2) (8)

(9) (7) (9) (2)

61(2) 61(2)

ML15-1

#1 pace figure, she's on turf, the handy Turf UDM program I wrote signalled her - and she is a bomb price. It's pretty much a carbon-copy to Sal, 24 hours earlier.

I immediately called a friend who was playing and he said "I know what you are going to say!". I said "how can I not bet this horse today, it's gotta be some sort of sign (half-jokingly)?"

Well if this was a cool story I would say she jogged....... hold it. She did:

#	Horse	Jockey	Weight	Win	Place	Show
8	Fagedaboudit Gal	Rivera L Jr	119	26.40	9.80	5.40
3	Goodness Greatness	Marquez C H Jr	119		3.20	2.40
4	Gaelic Journey	Lezcano J	122			4.00

She took the lead, just like Sal, and never looked back. Also just like Sal, the two chalks filled out the tri.

I am a hard-number horseplayer. I look at numbers, I study the game. I do not believe in karma, or coincidence, or anything else along those lines.

But today I suspended my belief. For this one day if anyone told me that wins and losses in racing are all pre-determined, and that we are all just pawns in the game, I would not be able to argue.

Note: I rarely speak of my personal betting here in any specifics - that goes for wins or losses. We all know it is generally considered bad manners in the Internet world to speak of horses you bet that won, after the race. Come to think of it, it is just like real life. Anyhow, forgive me just this once, because frankly I can almost guarantee something X-files like this will never happen again.