Gulfstream Park and Santa Anita Park - 1/26

santa anita race 8

2 WP

5/1.  recency, pace, stamina.  taking a shot the chalk doesn't put two good ones together and the 5 off the bench maybe not ready for her best plus she's a 6YO now can't expect improvement.  think this 2 needs to sit off of the 8 who should struggle late at this distance/surface and maybe put in a legit effort down the lane.  1 unit.

race 9

8 WP

8/1 right now.  late speed, surface.  like his late movement going long on turf.  0.50 units.  all of them are iffy this fav is the fav purely based on figs and "class" but he has big questions to answer on surface anbd distance. 

race 10

3 WP

12/1 ml.  certainly no Groupie Dolls in here.  jerry has the chalkie but he also enters this gal.  small play against a vulnerable field.  she has a very long and steady sequence of drills.  daddy is 12% in the debut and won his debut by seven.  might do nothing but if they are as modest as they look who knows anything could happen.  0.40 units. 

just a rough night on the town

Posting two mistakes/lessons learned here for documentation purposes (I made more than just two including playing some when i should have passed) so I can remind myself how vicious this game is in giving it to you when you do it right and taking it when you do not do things the CORRECT way.  Primarily for my own benefit but if you saw something else by all means I always want to learn.  The money not earned doesn't piss me off nearly as much as not doing it the correct way pisses me off because when done right the money follows. 

The way I look at it about 75% to 80% of races at legit tracks produce an outcome that makes sense.  You can look in the Daily Racing Form or whatever you use and see exactly why the top two and many times even top three finishers hit the board.  The other 20% of the races are chaotic and extremely difficult to project intelligently with any consistency.  So, 8/10 races make sense and 2/3 races are won by someone other than the chalk.  Somewhere in here is the "meat on the bone" so to speak to try and make money.  On top of that you have to overcome the two biggest challenges in this game in my view (takeout is another issue): 1) prices being hammered down on the tote in a matter of minutes if not seconds, and 2) the huge amount of variance. 

SA, Race 10 on 1/26

As stated above I was on the 3 with a small play leaning primarily on fitness (turned she was simply way too slow in her debut at least).  This was MSW for Cal Breds with a field of twelve fillies with six first time starters.  The first thing I look at in MSW races is the horses that have run already to see if there is any asset they appear to have that would overwhelm the field (late speed, pace, stamina, etc.).  Then I look at those same horses to see if any appear to be projecting forward to major improvement today based on perhaps fitness, change in distance, change in surface, or trainer's numbers 2nd time out.  In this race none of them looked anything close to being too tough to beat to me.  Hollendorfer/Bejarano had the chalkie but she took the lead in the stretch in her debut and got beat by two and a quarter lengths running evenly late so vulnerable to me if repeated.  Plus they are Cal Breds so not likely that any are monsters.  I focused on the firsters based on my feeling that the others were very beatable. 

The 8 won quite easily and paid over $22 to W.  I am not saying this was a gimme or a layup but it was very, very playable. 

This 8 was 10/1 and not 5/1 primarily because Mitchell is only 4% in the debut and only 7% in MSW.  When looking at a firster here is what I look for to decide if it is worth a shot relative to the price on the board:

1) Recency/Fitness

2) Trainer Stats with firsters and relative things on surface/distance

3) Breeding

This 8 horse had twelve recorded drills going back to 10/22 all spaced out nicely except for a sixteen day gap and ten day gap in December.  However, after the new year there was what I call a "pickup in the pace" of the drills with three straight sharp drills.  On 1/5 she went 5F and was ranked 18/103 that day which is meaningful.  On 1/14 she broke from the gate and was ranked 8/42.  On 1/20 she went an easy 3F.  the info was there to suggest she may indeed have a high level of fitness relative to her competitors and that she was moving well with that gate drill after the strong 5F drill. 

I gave the trainer stats above.  Mitchell doesn't fire often first time out but he's been around the block he knows what to do if he gets a new one that can run a little bit.

Breeding- Daddy wins at a 15% clip in the debut.  The Dam won her only start and ran a 69 not terrible.  ALL THREE SIBLINGS won.  Enough info to think she might be able to run a little bit. 

Lost opportunity with tons of value at 10/1!

Lesson/Mistake 2

GP, Race 10 on 1/26

G3 Holy Bull for 3YO

I was on the 4 and gave a disclaimer about the two potential issues.  The horse ran 4th but was not close.  Bad ride to rush him up but even if he stayed back and relaxed would not have caught the top two.

Like I said I thought this was an extremely vulnerable chalkie at 4/5 and great opportunity to beat the fav and get value.  The fav did run well getting 2nd but I still feel the same way it was a terrible fav to accept 4/5 on. 

The 7 won and paid $11.40 to W which is very solid (unless you are god's gift to the world and think 9/2 is "not good enough"). 

This was a field of nine and ALL horses except the 7 and the 5 were off some sort of a layoff.  Horses definitely win off of layoffs but this right away triggers a potential edge on recency. 

The 5 simply looked too slow and his one spin around two turns saw him getting flat late in the race against a much softer crew.  Toss.

I definitely considered the 7 but was a little bit skeptical since his fig jumped so much on January 1st when he just ran a race on December 15th (kinda short amount of time to improve that much).  However, it is what it is and the fact is this horse popped to a new high on the same track three weeks earlier running a 95 and also ran a fig (95) that exceeded the highest fig ever run by any of the others!  Furthermore, after that spin on New Year's Day he bounced back with two solid drills in Miami one being 5F and one being 4F.  On top of this, his two dull races prior to his big win on 1/1 he was caught going wide in both.  The race prior to that around two turns he won easily with a cleaner trip.  This horse was very sharp compared to his competition and just popped to a new lifetime best performance. 

Recency - when did the horse last race?  How has the horse performed in recent races?  Is the horse showing good energy LATE in his recent races?  Does the horse appear healthy, physically fit, and prepared to fire right here and right now in today's race under today's conditions?  YES

Only reason not to play him was the potential bounce and maybe questions on his class.  other than that I should have had a very, very logical 9/2 winner. 

Usually the sharpest recency ends up being bet down to chalkie especially if it is a prominent trainer/jock.  If it has the figs it'll be 3/5.  This one was sitting there at 5/1ish.   

Two great posts Atlas.  Thanks for the insight and sharing the good AND the stuff we can learn from.

I had trouble including the 7 at GP because outside posts going long have been a death sentence.  I think that effort is even better than it looked.

HB

Yeah, I hear ya on the post position.  The more I look back at this race the more it looks like it was damn near a gift.  Recency is just too damn important and add on the fact that he just showed huge improvement plus given the running style he would be right there and not relying on a huge move from the clouds to win. 

You know the deal.  Sharp recency.  Brown.  Castellano.  Turf.  3/5 on the tote.  Those ones are obvious.  This one had some nice things in it's favor and was 9/2. 

I always struggle with post position.  I can see the stats but it's tough to know who was in a given slot in each race.  Is a post 1/25 because it had 24 bums and one decent horse relative to the class of each race, or is a post 1/25 because almost every caliber of horse is not winning from there?