Handicapping.com - Your Thoroughbred Racing Website

Unless you’re a newcomer to the game, you know that early speed is one of the most important factors in thoroughbred racing. Twenty years ago, Dr. William Quirin turned the concept into a hard reality when he published the landmark book Winning at the Races-Computer Discoveries in Thoroughbred Handicapping.

Dr. Quirin turned the track talk into hard numbers, declaring that “Slightly more than 55 percent of all races are won by horses with enough early speed to run first, second, or third at the first call (a quarter mile in sprints, and a half mile in routes.”Perhaps the most dramatic statistic to come out of his work was the finding that “…in short sprints (5 to 6 furlongs), 62.6 percent of the winners came from horses running no worse than third at the first call.” While his work used much data from East Coast tracks, the conclusions about early speed have been shown to be generally true for most North American tracks.

Since Andy Beyer wrote his first book, Picking Winners, players everywhere have searched for the elusive but not impossible dream of finding a race with only one horse that shows ANY early speed at all; a front-runner in a field of deep closers, who, other things being equal, would be an overlay at 1-5!

But a more likely scenario, a common one as a matter of fact, is the race in which you see between three and five, or even six horses in a large field, whose past performances show that: (1) each has won going wire-to-wire, (2) each has won or finished very well from just off the pace, and (3) each tends to stay fairly in good form when properly placed and not asked to run in a race where he clearly doesn’t belong.

One school of thought is to use pace handicapping figures to calculate the percentage of early speed each horse expends in similar races and compare that figure to what could be called the energy par for the track. This works, but it requires more recordkeeping and work than a lot of players want to do. And when the figures come out very close, you’re not much better off than where you started just looking at the pp’s in the Form.

In the absence of highly detailed information about a track (do I hear someone saying “simulcast spot play?”), here’s what I do for sprint races:

First, I mark the front runners with a big “E” next to their names for fast and easy reference. I am careful to note that if a horse has run first to the quarter-mile in even just one of his last ten races, he could do so again today and mess up the pace or early running for position for true early speed types. He’s not a real front runner but could be a nuisance.

Were they easy, no-pressure wire-to-wire wins? If so, did the horse get loose on the lead and remain unchallenged throughout? That’s a no-brainer win and not outstanding. I’ll look closer, to see if I can determine if the field was simply a very weak field; make the horse’s record show me whether I should be impressed or not!

If a win was contested or the horse finished up close (such as a fourth place finish by less than two lengths), I know that the horse is not a one-dimensional speedball, a “need to lead” horse who runs hard and fast early, who burns up all his gas early and wins mainly by virtue of a perfect trip and the other horses (and jockeys) deciding there are other races to run another day.

Next, I study the horses who look like they can be first, second, or third at the half-mile, whose running style is to lay close to the pace and make their move late, in the style of a presser or a stalker. Are they effective (meaning win or a close second) or do they tend to hang or flatten out and pretty much simply maintain their position throughout the race?

Now I apply two general guidelines that I find have worked well for me, usually in cheaper to mid-level claiming and minor allowance races:

1-If there are two front-runners in the race, I tend to favor whichever handicaps on top using other handicapping factors to win or run second. Unless they are very evenly matched, equal runners who do not figure to run eyeball to eyeball for the entire race, but rather to chase one another until it’s crunch time, they may well make it a two horse-race OR a one-horse race with mid-priced pressers making it a race for second.

2-If there are 3 or more genuine, always-try-to-get-the-lead types who all look like they will run their usual race, eliminate them from win consideration.I look for pressers who can make their main run past the tiring leaders down the stretch, who will generally return decent, if not good prices, since the public tends to make the early speedsters the favorites.

No, it doesn’t always work. Some days, a front runner will be in absolutely dead fit condition and hang on all the way. Some days, the jockeys, agents, and even trainers either read the Form or do a little pre-race handicapping based on their familiarity with their opponents, and decide to try rating a horse that doesn’t want to be rated, pushing a presser to run harder early, or “wait to see” what will happen the first few steps out of the gate, enabling one of many frontrunners to grab a big solo lead without having to work for it.

This is why in this type of racing situation, you need to use odds to help determine your playing or passing the race, as well as how to use your funds wisely. Personally, I rarely bet to win in these situations and go for quinellas and exacta part-wheels, as long I can reasonably project that the payoffs will be worth the risk.

One final word-I’ve intentionally avoided discussing the other handicapping factors that must be considered in every race-track bias, class, condition, jockey changes, and so on. Every handicapper I know incorporates these, but at the time that works for them in their own handicapping procedure, their own sequence of analysis. In this case, I would consider these other factors after I had decided how the race should be run according to all things being equal in my script for the race!

I mentioned earlier that using pace handicapping to determine the percentage of early energy expended in a race does work well In another column, I'll tell you where and how it works best.