re-lady felix has not run for 578 days that is why it has no pm.
horses old pm are only considered reliable if achieved within the last 12 months so any horse not running within a year has to start all over again as it were.after running today it will have a pm for its next run.

pipes conditional jockey d howard who rides malarkey also thinks knightsbridge king will win the race

good luck to all today

2.15 s/w indian steps 71 d 7 a/w 71/71/71
as you can see lto this horse recorded a personal best which goes a long way in showing us it is improving.today it runs off the same mark and on this has some 28lbs in hand of the rest of the runners previous form.the next best is bella beguine but the best this one can offer is a pm of 41.
now for the bad news the trainer/jockey do not pass filters.poulton only just fails but the jockey is bad.
if only the poor horse had a decent jock on then it would be a definate bet.
interestingly this is also a qualifier on an old thread of mine-pp runners.
it will most likely win as long as the jock lets the horse do the thinking.

3.35 kelso
knightsbridge king 96/e 16g/96/96/96
fabrezan 89/d 16g/85/85/85
park city 80/e 16g/80/73/80

all ok trainer/jockey

kk improving trip/going ok but fabrezan allthough scoring pm 7 points lower but in better grade so is bang in there with every chance especially as it also has personal best lto.i have stuck pc in allthough it has to improve quite dramatically to trouble top 2 it is a p.hobbs horse and would not be beyond the realms of possibility but for it to realistically beat either kk or fabrezan it needs to find a stone's worth of improvement on its recent form.
this looks an ideal race to dutch the top two and for any tricast players pc makes up the third spot.

3.50 s/w

four to concentrate on here

daunted 65e 14 a/w 65/65/65
remnisant 67f 12 a/w 58/64/70
barkby 71e 16 a/w 72/71/71
rebelle 60f 16 firm 45/60/60

trainer/jockey's ok

daunted should finish 2nd behind barkby on these figures but it has never won over 16f and the weight must surely tell today.

remnisant's best pm puts it in with a shout but again the distance is a worry.

wide margin monday winner barkby looks good here with a pm of 71 running virtually off the same mark and achieved in a better grade than two of the others.

rebelle is a bit of a dark one the numbers tell us it needs to improve but it promises to stay 2 miles around here and also has a 12f course win to its name.

on the whole i think this will go to the recent winner barkby whose trainer must have allready had this race in mind before mondays victory and i wouldn't be at all surprised to see the remaining places filled by 2 of the other 3 most likely rebelle and daunted respectively.

3 races looked at and typed up.
and i had my wheatabix in between.
so roughly on time with my 10 min a race quote.
just hope they all go in now.

max nice to see some horses being discussed keep up the good work and be lucky today

Hi MAX,
Thankyou for your excellent assessment.
Hope you have a profitable day.

B-sel.
(PS. Hope you like the post on the other thread

after re-reading the original post i think i should explain a little more about the actual raings and also fill in a bit about improvers and comparing them with established form.

it all looks very straightforward there in black and white but really you do have to be prepared to read between the lines when evaluating a runners chances.

here again is the original example used-

big bad bob 97/d 96/99/99 d ! x ! !
susie sue 94/d 94/94/94 e x x x x
fredddie boy 95/c 92/95/101 c ! ! ! !
lucky lad 90/c 99/90/90 c x ! x !

from this we know that freddie boy would have been the selection but now imagine this,that down the card bbb had had 4 runs-ss had had 12 runs-fb had been running well all season with 18 runs and ll had also been around the block a bit with 19 runs.
the picture now changes somewhat because allthough bbb needs to improve on his latest and best pm of 97 when compared to fb's 95/101 in higher grade you have to ask yourself which of the 2 have the more potential for improvement?undoubtedly bbb with only 4 runs under his belt can be reasonably expected to show some improvement.looking at the figures bbb needs to find at least 6lbs on fb to theoretically deadheat whereas fb with 18 runs and a very good latest and best pm may be at the stage where his form has levelled out.this assumption is backed up by the fact lto fb's pm was 6 points lower than his best whereas bbb's lto pm equals his best which shows that further improveme3nt is most likely under the right conditions.
do not fall into the trap where you automatically assume that the horse with the highest pm will come out on top.there are numerous other considerations be it trip/going suitability or trainer/jockey form/draw/etc.
a familiar pattern concerns pipe who quite happily will introduce a newcomer who goes on to rattle up a sequence of soft wins at minor courses.this all looks very impressive when you take its form at face value but more often than not will be found wanting when the decent prizes come along at the better courses.also the pipe/a.p factor obviously has a lot to do with the price but these are the type of horses who are crying out to be layed.dream with me was a good example last week.bar its ascot win it had been winning minor races easily but last week was made market leader on the strengh of this.you only had to take a look at its pm's and at what level it had achieved these in to know that it was out of its depth when the tapes went up.

remember do not take anything at face value.a horse who comes out best on the figures may not be the best bet when all factors are taken into account.will anything improve past it?.your shortlist will invariably contain the winner but weigh up the pros and cons,only then stick the money down.

early season 3yo races on the flat are also worth mentioning because they can be a real nightmare for the punter who relies on 2yo form ratings.
have the horses trained on ?
have they improved over the winter?
who knows?
basically what i am saying regarding this is to watch and wait with any horse coming back from a break be it flat or jumps.do not take pm's from 6 months back to be written in stone.
i will leave you with two more snippets of info-

80% of all winners last ran within 30 days.

80% of all winners ran 4th or better in either of their last 2 runs.

max.

Max,

Thanks very much for an excellent and informative post. I like to use Topspeed latest/best as a guide to fitness/form - have you evere used the two ratings in conjunction?

regards
rb211

Thanks Max for your agreeing to start on Monday with leson one.
Would you mind using the paper version of the RP as I think it would be easier to follow., and would you mind doing it in two parts over Monday and Tuesday.
May be it would encroach less on your time if you did it in the evening after the days racing.
thanks again warrington.

Max,

Excellent topic, and something I've never been able to do properly, hopefully, now, with a bit of practice I can suss this form lark out.

But when you look at the days cards what factors encourage you to rate a particular race, or do you look at all races?

In trying this out I seem to be drawn towards smaller fields of 8-10, more often than not handicaps where the prices may give an opportunity to dutch even if the alleged fav. comes into the reckoning.

Since you started this topic I've selected a couple of races per day to have a go at rating. To date they have all indicated the winner in the shortlist and the prices have been sufficient to dutch, but whether this is more luck than judgement I cant say yet, interesting though.

Etrigan

i like you tend to stick to smaller fields,hurricane lamp yesterday being a good example allthough that wont put me off the big h/c's and therefore bigger prices,i also like to have a dabble at the tricasts with reasonable success.
glad to hear you are giving it ago and finding the winners.
i will from monday start to look at a couple of races daily and go through the process so that anyone not entirely sure will understand whats what.
with regard to the topspeed querry i will post about this over the weekend as it ties in nicely with the impending all weather season upon us and is a good example of topspeed relevance as opposed to the jumps.

yesterday indian stepper finishing 2nd was a very warm fav and allthough the horse that beat it was 2nd rated indian stepper should on past form have won easily,if anybody read my post yesterday in reply to b-selective you will recall my concerns over the jockey and this is what i find interesting,horses whose form indicates a much better winning chance when compared to the field BUT who fail on either trainer or jockey filter as did the aforementioned.
this race really was a no win situation for me as the ratings said yes but the 10% rule said a big no,what to do in these situations is down to the individual but i have found over the years the best policy is to follow the 10% rule and keep your money in your pocket,a bit like the vdw adage of"when all things line up very rarely do you fail to collect"or something along those lines.
yesterday from the three races i was asked to look at the three horses to study in the 3.35 kempton finished 2/3/4 and only the shock 25/1 winner spoiled a big t/cast.the other two races gave two more winners allthough they were 2nd rated at very nice odds.this only goes to stress the point made yesterday about not following the top rated runners blindly and reading between the lines.it maybe some peoples preference that from their shortlist to back the runner with the highest odds e/w regardless of how it looks when compared with the other shortlisted runners,i wouldn't put anyone off this idea but again its down to individual choices.

Max

Been busy so Only just found this thread and would like to add a big thankyou. I look foward to your future posts.

John

Max - do you check out all races, or just some that catch the eye.?. This methodology of weighing up the form is great. Its simple to use and certainly sorts out the non runners. I've had two R/Forecasts one came in and the other looked good only Janiture fell. Also in the 1:10 @ Hereford the PM showed 4 horses. No definite bet but the first three home came out of the four. This also happened in the 3:20. Maybe its just beginners luck or does this always happen?. Having said that I can't tell why the fourth horse didn't get into the fray so any sort of combination tricast is still as far off.
Cheers

Hi max,
Ascot 2.05 TAMING (I Think we should all back this one ????? whats your thoughts.

B-SEL.

I am sure your help is invaluable to many, and well done.
I notice you say 80% of winners have run within the last 30 days.
That's great, except that 80% of runners have run within the last 30 days.
Also you say 80% of winners have come at least 4th in their last 2 runs.
Do you know how many runners came at least 4th in their last 2 runs?
I don't know, but I can make a damned good guess!
As someone said a bit ago you are doing that many systems (including making thousands off Tony's system) I just don't know how you do it,
Do you not end up with 4 bets a race on occassion?
On the one hand you filter the losers out, on the other hand you do systems blindly. it must be very confusing.
Cheers
swish

I would back TAMING if it was odds against, but I doubt it.
4 on trot is rare.
BARACCUDA later with 9 on trot is a very rare exception. Even so can it do 10?????
All the best
Swish

I'm more or an optomist and would say because it has had nine in a row it should go on and go ten. Having said that @ 1/2 I'll pobably just look on.

Using this form evaluation method, if I'm doing it right Rob Leach 3:45 @ Ascot is right up there, or in front of, Tikram and Deep Sunset.

Max How far do you go back in records when doing the going / distance filters. Ie one season, two years, entire horses form?.

Cheers

Oh dear - Rob Leach won @ 9/1 (13/1 on exchanges this morning).

Looking forward to part II - Topspeed, this weekend.

Nice One.

Well done with ROB LEACH!
Cheers
Swish

only just managed to get back in after finding a back door.comp will not let me go through gummy's homepage but i suspect its me having problems not gummy.

mikey
well done with rob leach,it was a very hot contender and i managed to dutch it along with hawadeth.

will post up later regarding topspeed.

swish
have a look at my post to measwell on "do you know the rules thread" regarding my stance systems v form.
i am not interested in defending my motives for posting on here and will let the results speak for themselves.
afterall anything i advise will be for free unlike some members who let a few winners go to their head and think their the next henry rix.

once members are familiar with the concept they will have a way of finding winners for life and have no use with the here today gone tomorrow flyboy tipsters.

picking up on a couple of your other points-you should appreciate the general idea surrounding pm/ts afterall you are a big speed figure follower allthough i sometimes think that you place way to much emphasis on them and this blinkers you view on other important factors.

i do not end up with 4 bets in a race on occasions because simply if information contradicts i simply leave it alone.i have never felt the need for tipping up 3 horses in a 101 races every day regardless of their price.

why bring up the money i make on tonys system?are you doubting either the fact i am following it or its ability to make the figures claimed?
it has nothing to do with this thread and has no relevance but if you are interested then yes i am using it and have made plenty since mid september but like i said at the start of this thread it does not give me the satisfaction like when i study the form and correctly select the first three home in a tricky h/c and whatever system or method i may be following i allways check it out and compare with the field using the rating method described.
it has served me well over the years and will continue to do so supporting a family of five and a menagerie of pets so is not just a saturday afternoon hobby for me.
i live and breath horseracing and put in the hours that would make a junior doctor fall asleep and have seen it all but the method i describe is i believe the definitive winner finding method and for those with the patience to spend a little time getting up to speed with it will have the tools to make a considerable ammount of money.