Before I ask the question I will acknowledge that those who have studied all the old examples maybe reluctant to answer on the grounds that I should find out for myself.


How many of the winners VDW named were in the 3 lowest for consistency WITHOUT taking the betting f/c into account ?

From memory Love from Verona, Son Of Love, Roushayd were not too consistent.

Didn`t the late Jock Bingham state that he himself used 6 methods all of which were based on consistency ?

**** I accept that some may suggest I`m trying to cut corners by asking this question but you get nothing in life without asking ****

Cheers,

i considered kings ironbridge and lunar crystal both had good consistent form,i let them both run L.C price,K.I i was concerned about late night out,there was nothing to be gained from making a book so i let them run

the horses you mention,may not have had low consistency ratings,but i,ll bet your bottom dollar there form was.if you know i mean

investor,

they sure did have form

today using the method as i described it for reel buddy,tillerman and arctic owl- coupled with in form showed up lady bear.

DETERMINED

there is more than one aspect to consistency

johnb has touched on one with strawberry patch

consistently running in higher class races.

there is also consistency of the market place price to consider.

also consistency over different courses and different distances and not forgetting the going

Mtoto - Yes, I did consider FP and Tillerman as form horses in the context of their respective races. If a horse has recently shown good form(in context) but then apparently puts in a bad one, then reasons have to be sought. Tillermans running at Newmarket was too bad to be true and his uninvloved effort at Ascot could also be forgiven given what he was attempting on Saturday.

Beacon Light would have been a form horse if it had beaten Sea Pigeon at Sandown and that would have made him the class/form horse. But the point is he didn't beat Sea Pigeon, therefore he wasn't a form horse and as a consequence not the class/form horse. It's a bit like those who supported Where Or When suggesting if he had more room, if he had finished faster,etc,etc. At the end of the day it is what actually happens that needs evaluating.

Anyway, good to hear from you. I thought maybe you were taking a sabbatical

Tillerman , Arctic Owl ,Lady Bear Capricho

Well Capricho wasn’t bad but the rest?
All this theory is all well and good but
How easy it is to fit the theory to the result after the result is known
And wasn’t Tillerman lucky
Good job Hughes held Where or when in isn’t it
Otherwise Tillerman would have been a loser
He wouldn’t have been highlighted then would he
Prove me wrong
use all this theory before the race
My guess is they will go down the pan faster than a turd followed by the toilet paper
Get real
It’s not that easy

Hi Determined

I'm interested in why you should want to disassociate consistency from the first five/six in the betting forecast. VDW regularly brought both together.

When you work through the examples, you'll find that the great majority of the horses VDW described as "good things" or better came from within the first five/six in the forecast (though not always the Life's forecast, eg Strombolus), and were among those within the first five/six with the three lowest consistency figures.

There were some exceptions, eg Son of Love does not feature in the first five in the betting of any forecast I've seen (and was not near the first five in any of the major bookmakers' early morning prices for the race), and with a consistency aggregate of 8 was higher than several others in his race (but an aggregate of 8 over three races is still very consistent).

In terms of their consistency ratings (the aggregate of their three last placings) the three horses you name were higher than many of VDW's examples, but the highest - Roushayd at 13 - was hardly gross. And in terms of relative consistency within their respective races, only Son of Love (in absolute terms the most consistent of the three) had a rating above the three lowest ones (and then by only one point).

I think one of the features of VDW's approach was that there were few, if any, absolute rules, but several "rules" in the sense of principles that normally applied. Position in the betting forecast and consistency are two of these latter.

Regards.

Determined,
Further to Fulham's post, offhand I can only think of one other horse identified as a bet by vdw using any method that wasnt in the top 3 for the consistency rating with or without regard to the betting f/c and that was Travado (4th top), the 3rd horse in the rating for that race being a 40/1 shot(in a 6 horse race).
I don't know about anyone else but I think a consistent horse has to be a class horse (at whatever class level it may be racing at) simply because it HAS performed consistently over what may have been different going, different distances or different courses or when raised in grade etc. These are the horses you want to be carrying your money, not some horse that MIGHT return to form now that it has its right conditions or when its dropped in class. When we start making excuses for a poor run we are using guesswork and we wont always be guessing right. There have recently been a number of high profile losers who actually failed to make the first 3 rated for consistency in their races, despite supposedly being the class horses in their race. That initial consistency negative often soon points to other negatives when the form is assessed which at the very least can save us a losing bet and at best put us on to a winner in the same race. Logically, when considering a bet in a top class race when any weakness a horse may have be it weight, conditions, going or whatever is likely to be found out why on earth would someone want to bet a horse that is inconsistent?
The basic attraction and challenge of vdw was the possibility that this 80-90% claim of his was for real and judging by the list of "good things" posted by Determined and applying the method properly I think it is. Look at that list, all the horses could be seen immediately as potential good things by simply applying the mechanical procedure. The only loser unshipped its rider leaving the stalls!
OK. Maybe not everybody bet all those horses for whatever reason, but you can bet they didnt back anything else against those horses either. Its just being patient enough to wait for the next one to come along, as they invariably do.
regards,

Barney, Fulham, Guest & Statajack,

Thanks for the recent posts. Consistency seems to be the key along with temperament.

That said, I do feel there is scope to find the Tillermans, Florida Pearls, etc.

Also, how consistent was Lady Bear yesterday ? I didn`t look at any races yesterday but Lady Bear did look to be a canny piece of placement by the trainer.

Also, go back to Mtoto`s `getting winners` post of many months ago. Very nice prices but how many were consistent ?



Boozer,

Take it from me, Tillerman was there before the race.


St Leger,

I wonder how consistent this year`s potential winner might be !


Cheers,

going back a few posts i put forward an alternative way of coming to the conclusion that roushayd was a bet, this fits in with some of vdw's other points that he mentioned in other letters etc.

when its applied those are the results

I am not for one minute suggesting that this is the answer, as you say it cant be that easy and its not.

but there is far more to Roushayd than a higher SF when upped in class.

I had hoped it would make things look a bit different regards the example and generated some disscussion but alas everybody already has it bottomed out.

I backed lady bear you ask the bookies at ripon.

[This message was edited by Barney on August 27, 2002 at 06:23 AM.]

determined,

as statajack rightly says the easy ones will come along if we exercise temperament but they will mostly be short priced.

We are dealing with skullduggery and coniving of the highest order and there is big money to be won so all is not as straightforward as we would wish for.

Statajack

Righthand Man in the 1984 Welsh National would be another exception if you include the whole field (and, arguably, even if one confined one's attention to the first six in the forecast).

good morning..youv,e obviously done well with the methods over the years,upon evaluating a race you come accross a consistent horse that is 5th in consistency,but when crosschecks are applied,the horse looks to have good claims,do you always let it run,or would you use some judgement,afterall one crosscheck involves the five most consistent.

Investor - Good point about the crosschecks. VDW actually gave us quite a few and no doubt had a few others up his sleeve. The 3 highest ability ratings from the 5 most consistent in the field gave Saher in the Lincoln and Aldaniti in the National that year. How many use this method to crosscheck some 20 years on ?

VDW also said that the method used for Travado,Arthurs Minstrel,Rivage Bleu,etc had nothing to do with what he had previously shown.

Barney

We could argue the toss till the cows came home regarding Lady Bears race
I make a habit of checking the form of a race where the winner bolts up if only to see if I could have had it before the race.

I can picture you now at Ripon (considered going myself as I am only 40+ miles away) with your racing paper neatly mapped out with the ability ratings .
I have reservations about abilty ratings, as the man himself said they are not perfect for OBVIOUS reasons.
Its those obvious reasons that cant be explained away on here or anywhere else that worry me
To use “The will to win” as an excuse for a horse that runs second say Btn a SH in a valuable Hcp getting nothing in the process while the winner gets an enhanced rating doesn’t make sense.
Tell me this
Would you have been drawn towards LB if the abilty rating had been say 36?
If you had to make your living out of the game could you have confidently struck say a £200 bet on LB
Or would you have been nervous of other horses in the field and chickened out
As vdw said the top boys only go in when the green light is flashing
What I am suggesting regarding Lady Bear’s race is
There were too many green lights flashing

By the very nature of "good things" they are likely to be at the lower end of the market, but looking at that list not too many were at odds on though were they?. If someone wants to build up their bank quickly there shouldnt be too many problems there.
There is scope to find Tillermans and Florida pearls but if you want less losers you'll have to let them run. It might even mean less profits but there's a trade-off between profit and strike rate so I would say go with whatever option you prefer. I think the more money one bets, the more one wants to count on collecting and the less one would be inclined to take chances, at least initially.
For decent priced races, I dont think skullduggery is too much of a problem as a trainer has to give away some clues, otherwise how will he know the horse has been properly prepared? he can only really tell by looking at its last run and then estimating the work needed to bring about the amount of improvement required or the amount of work neccessary to keep the horse ticking over without going other the top. If the run is too poor he risks the horse not being ready. If one is going for high prizemoney there is less chance of skullduggery than when bets need to be landed which is one of the reasons searching out the best class races was advocated.
On the subject of crosschecks, I would agree. Things arent cast in stone and it would depend on the individual race but personally I intend to adhere to the top 3 in consistency. If its not one of the 3 most consistent from the top 5/6 in the betting how can we be as sure it will maintain its current level of form in today's race? The percentages show that the most consistent win the most races, its that simple.
On the Travado method, it is different tp previous ones agreed, but again they also qualified on consistency.
regards,

Determined,

Could I just point out the horses I listed many months ago were based on my idea of the Roushayd method. In that method, no mention is made of consistency or the betting forecast.

Investor,

If consistency is going to be a criteria for a method. Do you not want the best of the consistent horses? VDW went to a lot of trouble to show the lower the rating the better the results. Going above a certain figure (even if it is within the lowest 3/4) seems to be not putting the odds in your favour. Do you want the best, or the best of a bad bunch?

Barney,

Good to see you back. You say you put up the last few horses to raise discussion. I will ask in a polite way, which method do they relate to? They are neither improving, or consistent. You say there is more to consistency than finishing position, but that is what vdw was pointing too with his statistics. For a long time I couldn't understand what VDW was getting at when he worried about consistency. I am glad to say I came to the same conclusion as Statajack as to the importance of consistency.

Guest,

One of the first disagreement we had was about 2 people could understand vdw and come up with different selections (in the same race). Your remarks about Florida Pearl and Tillerman have only reinforced this. I know many people who are well versed in vdw, and they would make both out of form. If I'm reading this right you must have had Tillerman the c/form horse, and a bet?
The point I was trying to make re BL, was if he had beaten SP. How would that have made him the class horse in the Erin? You said yourself he had never won or come close to winning a race of that class. How would beating a horse he was 'excepted' to beat, improve his class, to make him the class horse? The class of the race he was beaten in, is nowhere near the class of the Erin. So how has the class of BL BEEN RAISED.

IMP,

Afraid my wife wants a word with you. I had to stop the mowing, couldn't get the weeds, the grass kept getting in the way. Managed a fair bit of nailing up new wall paper. The house is now flooded, and the electric's don't work. The best of all I painted the car a nice pink, then it rained. :-))

Be Lucky

your last post raises the same point i made on the 24/6 on this thread.
mtoto mentioned something similar a few weeks back and to be honest it is the only reliable way that makes any sense when looking at a horses ability.

this is basically what i posted-

there has been plenty of discusssion as to the best way to rate for ability,my favoured option is to take into account win and place money won.there are many who dismiss this idea and only calculate win prize money but i think this can be very misleading as to a horses true ability in future races.lets take a look at this example of an imaginary race-

5f 10k race
the winner (horse a)going into the race has an ability rating of say 400(4k prize money won from 10 runs)after picking up this 10 k prize its new a/r stands at 454.
now horse b who for the sake of arguments finishes 4th beaten 3/4 lengh's behind horse a picks up no points for a gallant effort and is re callucated next run on 363(assuming its previous runs/wins were the same as horse a)
at first glance without all the previous facts who would you back next time?what if horse b was hampered?or had any one of numerable other mishaps that commonly occur.
it can be argued that the same thing might happen to a horse that is just run out of a place but you have to draw a line somewhere and i would much rather take the places read litterally and not just the winner

Mtoto

I have to disagree with you (and with Guest, if you have correctly summarised his view on the matter) re Beacon Light.

The 1978 Erin was, in VDW's terms, a class 90 race. Beacon Light had won a class 85, which is more than Prominent King had done up to that point (his best win being in a class 25, and best performance being 3rd in a class 96).

I know that you don't think VDW's way of rating the class of races is satisfactory, and the 85 that Beacon Light won is, at first sight, open to the criticism that, being a 3 horse race, it wasn't up to much. But when we examine the class of the two horses he beat we find that they were first and third in the previous year's Champion Hurdle, ie in his class 85 win Beacon Light beat, getting only 3lb, the Champion hurdler, and (giving 3lb) the 3rd in the Champion Hurdle.

It can be argued that Night Nurse was not in form when Beacon Light beat him, and as NN fell at the last, BL might have been a bit lucky to win (though NN had been passed when he fell). However, Dramatist was very much in form.

On what he had achieved, the Erin was very much within Beacon Light's scope. That he didn't win it seems to me to be down to the fact that (like NN in his race with BL) he was "out of form", and might well not have recovered from a hard race on "heavy" only a fortnight earlier.

Its interesting that when Beacon Light and Prominent King met in the Champion Hurdle a month after the Erin, BL came out on top, though the race was won by yet another Erin runner, Monksfield, who had been "out of form" prior to the Erin but showed he was back "in form" by his run in it.

Overall, I think one sees in the Erin an extremely sophisticated appreciation by VDW of the balancing of class and form for a given race. Never mind that there were several horses in the race with higher VDW ability ratings and greater achievements in the Form Book than Prominent King. Horses such as Decent Fellow (ability rating 38 and winning form at class 117), Master Monday (ability rating 39 and winning form at class 125), Meladon (ability rating 41 and winning form at class 105) and Monksfield (ability rating 23 and second in the 1977 Champion Hurdle) were, like Beacon Light, "out of form". Prominent King, on the other hand (ability rating only 18) was "in form", and thus at that particular time in position to win that particular race.