a question to anyone on page 21 systematic betting vdw sayfirst of all let me point out that the bottom 3 can be discarded strait away because they have not the class or the form for this race ,is there a number at which vdw thought that horses did not have the ability for a given race it looks as if the horses ability has to be more than a half of the ability of the race is this a rule of thumb

don't think so but if you study it well you will see how VDW eliminated them.

Les,

I'm not sure but I think you are under the popular misconception when VDW is talking about class in these examples he is using the ability rating. Shimshek a horse VDW said came into consideration on a class bassis in fact had the 2nd lowest A/R, only in front of a maiden Golden Isle.

Be Lucky

Les

I've only looked at a dozen or so of Van der Wheil's examples so far but in more than half, including Little Owl (ability rating 36, race class 108) and Sunset Cristo (ability rating 24, race class 97) from the March 1981 article, the ability rating of the selection is well below half the class of the race.

George
In time you will see that most people on this thread are genuine and are very open about there choices win or loose, And then there are those who want you to think they no a little bit more then the rest but in reality are no better than anybody else at finding a winner.

ps. Do you own the correct form books yet

no i ment ability rating of last race vdw can say 4 are automatically scrubbed in the old newton example but where does he stop and what method is used to decide

do you own the correct form books yet? sounds like something you would hear at the local lodge

Paul

Yes. I'm more or less complete since the mid 1960s with just a few missing either side of 2000 when I was too busy with work to make subscribing worthwhile.

study systematic betting and take notes you will notice what he does,he did say it was simple and what he does is simple.

jib

OR were they not available at that time? If they were I think he would have used them as a guide,even after all this time prize money is king,but common sense must be used some races have inflated prize money ie sales races like that sprint at Newbury.The off course bookmakers are finally killing racing with the ridiculous prizemoney on offer and all the extra racing.

WALTER

NUDGE NUDGE

GEORGE
As mtoto says 5 most consistent in the field is a good rule, also with group 1 races the ability rating works well, but then it should because these horses are generally the best around and have collected the best prizes around many times.Below group 1 it becomes more difficult (for me any way). VDW did state when a trainer raises a horse in class he should never give it to much to do.How you tell if it was given to much to do im not sure , maybe one day somebody will say but i will not be holding my breath.

Paul

Presumably the examples will guide us. Sunset Cristo was raised in class from 75 to 97 and deemed "almost a certainty", while a winner (Billet) of one of the races discussed in the Roushayd chapter was raised from 48 to 227 and described as "the possible winner ... but not good enough for me on points which should by now be clear". Logically the smaller the rise in class the more likely the horse is to be able to win at that class, so maybe one of the points against Billet was the very large rise in class.

quote:

Originally posted by Pipedreamer:
.The off course bookmakers are finally killing racing with the ridiculous prizemoney on offer and all the extra racing.

Pipedreamer, I think racing is doing a pretty good job of killing itself. The bookies don't really need it anymore, what with betting on cartoons and especially the roulette and poker machines. My local shops seem to have a lot of eastern europeans as clients. One came up to the counter the other day to cash a cheque so he could put more money in a m/c he'd alledgedly lost 1500 quid in!!!

quote:

Originally posted by George Johns:
Johnd

I don't think the answer lies just with the various means of rating shown in the March 1981 article. Van der Wheil makes it crystal clear that they provide a "working platform", and that then one has to appraise the form etc of those that seem probable at that point and there seems to me a particularly relevant paragraph two down from the Little Owl table in item 39 of "The Golden Years". And it was doing this latter that led me to the conclusion that none of the three consistent horses in either the Old Newton Cup or the Lancashire Oaks were up to his Little Owl/Sunset Cristo standards.

GJ

You are making the classic mistake here in dismissing 2 good winners because they don't fit with your view of the method. As I have advocated many times in recent years, the puzzle is much better solved by analysing one's own mistakes on contemporary races, and adjusting understanding from that, than it ever will be by reliance on bald ratings, or trawling through ancient examples.
You dismiss Mad Rush, although he obviously had class, because of his low a/r yet, like most, you readily accept Prominent King in virtually the same situation?
You also dismiss Anna Pavlova as inconsistent, yet freely embrace Roushayd in almost identical circumstances?
Obviously you were wrong on both counts, as the results should tell you: Mad Rush does have the class and Anna Pavlova is consistent, what you need to figure out now is why those facts are not shown by preliminary ratings.
Nothing changes - except one's view.

Pd,

By the time Roushayd ran the OR was indeed in practice.

However it would have taken a few seasons of observation before anyone could see how it was being used by the industry and how it could be exploited.

For my own part it has taken several seasons of results of C2 (B) flat hcps to see how the OR works and is worked.

In the case of hcps the effect of the OR can be seen quite dramatically as today's races only have about half of the weight range of those of the pre-OR range. However that change has been gradual because the OR, immensely more complex than it appears, needs time to be understood.

Johnd

I haven't got a view of the method. I'm merely trying to follow the thinking in the March 1981 article and apply it to some current races while I have a look at some of the other Van der Wheil examples.

With the Old Newton Cup I got down to three, which included the winner. I didn't find a clear selection from the three, and well done to Tuppennycat who named the winner. But with respect to Tuppennycat, it is not clear to me from the discussion of the five examples in the March 1981 article that Van der Wheil would have regarded Mad Rush as strong enough to bet.

Indeed the work I've done overnight increases my doubts about Mad Rush as a Van der Wheil bet. I have checked as best I can the ability ratings for the four "outstanding bets" - Celtic Pleasure, Rifle Brigade, Orchestra and Derrylin. Although I can't get to precise rankings in each case because there are French and Irish runners where the horses' records aren't in the Form Books I have, from what I have been able to do it seems certain that each was among the top four in their races. So with the ten "certainties" (six from "The Golden Years" and four from the Roushayd book), the "almost a certainty" (Sunset Cristo), and the three stated as bets for Cheltenham in 1981, that makes 18 strong selections/actual bets. Only one of these seems to have been outside the top four ability rates, and that was 5th. I don't know how significant this is, but it seems pretty consistent with the instruction to "mark off the four highest ability ratings", and of course Mad Rush was well down the ranking for the Old Newton Cup.

George Johns

Ability is first mentioned by VDW in Look before you Leap In. Here, he is suggesting making a list of good handicappers with the form figures 21, 31, 12, 13, etc in their last 2 runs of the previous season. He says check their previous best performance by any reliable method but many will find Split Second's speed figures more convenient. He says the important thing is to establish PROVEN ABILITY and suggests a speed figure of 80 plus. VDW selected 6 horses for the National Hunt season. What did he use to establish the proven ability of these 6?
Ability was again mentioned in his following letter, 3 weeks later, when he gave the constant form + ability formula for the first time. It was a year after this that VDW introduced his class rating, based on prize money won, which could be used as a way of comparing one horse against another in terms of ability.
Before you go any further checking VDW's examples can I suggest you check the Drumlerry example with regards to ability based on prize money won?

JIB

Official ratings were computerised in 1973 and in 1975 the handicaps (on the flat) were graded 0-60, 0-70, 40+, etc in the system that still exists today (near enough). Whether the official ratings were readily available in the sporting press from that time I simply can't remember. I don't know when the same thing occurred in National Hunt racing.

Garston

It was much later when ORs became readily available - certainly the 1980s. Superform included them in their Form Books long before Racefom, but still not until into the 1980s.

I'm assuming that Drumlerry, the only reference to which I've found so far is in item 20 of "The Golden Years", is low in the ability ranking as Mtoto has said a good many are. But unless there is another reference to him, he was only a "recent good thing", and we know from Kenlis in the March 1981 article that that doesn't equal bet. At the moment I'm more interested in those stated to be bets and the highly praised selections ("certainties", "almost certainties" and "outstanding bets"), as Van der Wheil seems to suggest in the March 1981 article that being at or near the top of the ability ranking may have been part of what he looked for in a bet.

Some more booklets are in the post to me which apparently include later selections, and I'm hoping some of those will be stated as bets or described as "certainties", as I'm running out of those in "The Golden Years". But I've seen in the Roushayd booklet that Van der Wheil described the great Desert Orchid as "more or less a certainty" for three races in the 1986/7 season, and Zilzal as "a virtual certainty" for a race in September 1989. So those are my next ports of call.

Friday's July cup

Antepost fav is Kingsgate native at 7/2 is this a vdw good thing?

How much improvemnt will you put in your figs for this horse?

O'Brien is team handed again and 1 to note is US Ranger still available at 10/1

George,

While I understand the logic of the path you are following looking at the selections you think VDW saw as the strongest. I do worry that to much attention MAYBE being placed on the turn of a phrase. VDW starts the article by saying"I evaluated the Ascot card for Saturday, September 30th, producing two horses which I considered good prospects". After a sentence, but more importantly the result being known that good prospect becomes a virtual certainty. Just a thought. Personally, I can't see the worthwhile difference between outstanding bet and a good thing. Pegwell Bay is a horse VDW said he backed and you will find he was only 5th best on the A/R, to add to Park Express and Pipsted.

I'm not saying its not a angle to look at, but I do wonder how much can be read into a turn of phrase.

***************
It was a year after this that VDW introduced his class rating, based on prize money won, which could be used as a way of comparing one horse against another in terms of ability.

Garstonf,

Reading the above remark. Are you saying the class rating is the same as the ability rating? If so how could PK not have a winning class rating as the ability rating is only based on wins? I think they are two VERY different ratings.

***************

JohnD,

I think you are very wrong to even suggest Mad Rush and Anna Pavlova could/would be VDW selections. Trying to compare them with PK and Rousayd is way of the mark.

**********

Pipedreamer,

I can only agree about the over complications. But the question remains how does one eliminate BL and others, and stop him/them being the c/form horses and selection? To many it is just unexceptable to even think VDW didn't use the A/R when making his selections. Fortunately for me anyway I don't have any such problems. I like to think I just follwed VDW's advice and read and understood what was there, + I have not added bits in to suit my understanding. The main one being BL wasn't out of form, he just wasn't good enough in or out of form!!

Be Lucky