Sky Racing experts Joicey and Kiaarn Dickens show punters how to rate a horse, and how these ratings can be used to help find more winners. They also tackle the age-old question… what is a furlong?
The following podcast contains opinions from Paid professionals the information provided in this podcast is generally nature and is not advice gambling is not a financial strategy for free and confidential support call 1800 85885 or visit gambling help online.org AU hello and welcome to episode 3 of horse racing 101 uh the podcast designed to help recreational punters improve I’m Paul Joyce joined by the one and only K Dickens how are you I am fantastic and very excited to be back in studio yes we’re looking forward to this one we’ve
Done two episodes already if you haven’t already watched them make sure you do they will set the foundation for what we’re going to look at today and uh starting today we’re actually going to clean out the closet and we’re going to just touch on a few things we may not
Closet uh probably your closet I suppose it’s probably messy than mine bad idea so that’s why we’re got to clean out your closet so what we’re going to do is just touch on a few things we didn’t probably touch on in episodes one and two that we want to cover off uh again
All of this design just to help pns get a little bit better at what they do a few tips and hints and if you uh adopt these I think it will definitely help your overall punning experience and hopefully improve a little bit on what you’re already doing so that’s the aim
Of what we’re about to get into so we’re going to clean out the closet Kanan and the first thing we’re going to touch on here is sectional times because it’s a term that’s around a lot some people swear by them they live and die by them
Other people don’t even use them at all uh sectional times of course is what we’re going to touch on so first of all I use them do you use them and if you do how do you use them okay so I don’t use them um it’s not a rule of thumb thing
With mine I use them when I’m doing Saturday meetings if I see a horse that I think’s doing better work than others I will then go to the sectional times to make sure that that backed up what I saw with the eye opposed to it maybe being flooded by
Passing some horses that were ending on their runs and the other thing I like to look look at is final 600s and if a horse was well back in the Rock how well it’s done to make up the margin that it’s done or a horse that’s burnt the
Candle at the beginning of the race and being able to back it up at the end but it’s not something I live and die by um but something I do use yeah for sure I’m pretty much the same as you actually I look at the sectional times pretty much
For every meeting when I go back through them if you can get hold of them obviously New South Wales pun Intel is a wonderful app that gives you every single bit of the sectionals you could possibly need and in Queensland on racing Queensland they do pretty much every track now in Queensland provincial
Even some country tracks so uh you can get your hands on them very easily and uh as you said I use them to back up what my eyes have already told me when I’m watching a replay uh and sometimes you will catch something in the sectionals that the eye may have missed
Uh doesn’t happen a lot but it does happen here and there you might see a horse with the fastest or second fastest closing splits that when you watch it the first time you thought oh is that really right and you go back and watch it again and you’re like yeah that did
Did actually close off a lot better than I first thought I think too if you don’t want to get sucked into it too much because it’s definitely something you can because it’s what you’re looking at uh on paper with times and you you may think well you know but it can be
Smoking mirrors a little because that horse may have had the most economical economical run opposed to others so it’s just something I think you got to take on face value use it superficially I would say that point you made is outstanding because it is the one thing that comes up time and time
Again a horse with a soft run back on the fence cuts the corner runs the best final splits of the race and you know puns can fall into that horse next start but as you said it it had such an economical run the horse three wide four
Wide doing the work that only ran3 a second slower for the last 600 was probably a better run and and made a run from the 800 you know they they can’t make sustained runs that long so so bit like a lot of things we’ve discussed it’s important to look at but it’s not
The be on end all in our opinion and I think it’s just something you have to add into the mix of doing your post race form it’s another tool in that tool box oh you got it in there well done all right now we’re going to discuss rail
Placement this is something that is again not the be and end all for sure but obviously the rail can be in a true position it can be up 2 m 3 M 6 m 8 m 9 10 depending on what track you’re betting on and those rail placements do
Move uh constantly these days which is something back in the old days punters didn’t have to worry about but these days rail placement is a thing it can affect how a track plays how important is it to you it is is all about knowing your tracks so obviously we cover the a
Lot of the provincial meetings up here in Queensland and I think I’ve built enough a profile on each track that I know if the rail’s out at say the Sunshine Coast it’s it’s not much of a worry they’ve still got a lot of territory to work with and it’s not a
It’s it doesn’t have a camber it’s obviously got a crown so you’re getting closer to that Dryer part of the track um but then you get a tight turning more tight turning circuit track such as IP switch it’s it’s a lot more important in terms of where you’re drawn um and
Obviously the field sizes are limited more too so um just knowing your tracks Eagle Farm not so much doesn’t really worry me at all um but then dooman it’s a little bit different too on the flip side 100% couldn’t agree more I think coming from Sydney with my background
Down there uh you know Rose Hill when the rail starts to Edge out further and further uh especially when the track’s good to to riding fairly fast uh you know you really do want those on Pace fence Runners um there’s no question about that randwick probably not so much
A bit similar to Eagle farm and Sunshine Coast there’s such a big open space there that it’s rare that the rail placement will have an effect but at canbury it will have an effect as G if the rail goes out at Canby and the tracks riding quite firm and fast uh
It’s going to be very hard to come around them and make ground so I mean it’s logical and I know a lot of punn keep stats on it all uh and and the track played this way on this particular day this way on that particular day
Again for me I’d like to take it day by day me too you know you’ve got you’ve got different and we walk a lot of tracks right so when you walk a track the profile changes from from week to week so so it’s hard to line something
Up from 4 months ago uh and then compare that to the same track but it’s a totally different profile 4 months later like in the middle of winter compared to peak of spring uh two track the same track can be very different exactly it it’s grass coverage it’s it’s the
Irrigation or rainfall it is how long the grass has been left or how short it’s been cut so it’s another gray area and another thing to not buy too much into I think in terms of um thinking that again it’s the be all and end all
Well done all right let’s move on now to wet tracks we did just touch on track condition obviously wet tracks is a thing that does thwart punters at times we can get some thwart thwart it means that it means it gets in their way a little bit uh
Because obviously we can have wet Winters where you might get Sydney’s had plenty of them you might get three three months of heavy tracks uh and you just can’t get away from them and it’s hard to assess horses form when they haven’t raced much on wet track tracks I mean up
In Queensland I think the last 12 to 16 months we’ve been lucky to have three or four wet tracks like genuine wet tracks so we’ve had a we’ve been lucky that we can just constantly do our form for good tracks but when you do get a run of wet
Tracks or an unusual wet track out of nowhere how does it affect you doing the form well I’ll go back to what I can see on paper in terms of their their stats but some horses you can’t necessarily uh brush them with the brush that that either a they don’t handle the wet
Tracks U because you just don’t have the data they haven’t run on enough wet tracks to say that no they don’t handle it when they did run on that wet track were they fit were they ready to win things like that so it’s building profiles on the horses themselves we’re
Lucky to do that up here in Queensland um it comes down a H’s feet their action so many different things um again you’re more seasoned horses that are well raced you can really build data on whether they’re genuine wet trackers but they also have to have Fitness on their side
So It’s Tricky it makes it a lot more tricky um I think when doing the form for wet tracks and how genuinely wet is that track too and I think that’s a beauty of getting to the races and for us as well which other punters can’t but
That’s the again the beauty of our coverage we can go and walk the track exactly right and look I think again I agree with what you say I think when you when we’re going to get into rating shortly uh and obviously there’s a section there for for going and you can
Add or subtract a certain amount of points for various horses if they’ve got if you’re proven they’re not a wet tracker but they’re running on a wet track you can take a bit off them if they love a wet track but they’ve been running on dry tracks for a long time
Obviously you can increase their rating because they should improve getting back on a wet track for the first time the other thing of course which you touched on is that all horses are different and I’ve seen horses that their first 20 starts didn’t like a wet track at all by
The time they’re six and seven yeah they start to perform better on wet tracks so you can’t Lock and Load too early I think you’ve got to be willing to uh adapt at all times pivot always pivot with horses and I know false favor what I would consider consider a false
Favorite a horse that is is unders in the market is a horse I know racing on a good surface I’ve actually I’ve seen the horse in the flesh I know they’ve got a flatter foot I know they don’t have as much heel so them on a good four or good
Three surface top top in bedding or something like that I can pick holes in that but then when I can wait for them to get onto a softer surface well that’s when you’re ready to back them yeah that’s a good point we just touched on wet tracks Obviously good trucks has
Also got the your little Ines that you need to have a look at obviously some horses handle firm tracks a lot better than others as well so track condition something all punn should have a good look at all right next of all we’re going to move on to where do you bet
Obviously we both like a little Punt and uh obviously where do you bet how do you bet and uh how I bet with tab joyy of course we both bet with tab that’s the obvious answer but uh like how do you approach a meeting as far as uh when do
You like to get your money on do you like to get it on you’ve done your form before the Market’s coming out you want to jump on that top price or do you want to wait until the last 30 seconds to get all that information in front of you oh
Hands down do the form obviously pick your first four before markets are out but if you’ve just got a dead set stand out top selection I am re refreshing the app waiting for markets to open because that’s when I want to bet on a single and just bet on that horse in particular
Obviously sometimes it changes you you you happen to take unders which I seem to do all the time um so but that that’s my usual um route is is I’ll if I’ve got one I just dead set thinks the best bet of the meeting I’ll sit and wait for markets to
Open and have that single bet jump in early to think that it’s going to firm yep well I think that’s the way you’ve got to approach it especially with the roles we have doing the form early and and making our decisions uh and then waiting for those markets and if we
Think it’s value you can’t resist but jump in and take it early uh the other option of course and I’ve heard a lot of uh very good punters talk about this is waiting until the absolute last minute to get your money on uh because by that
Stage you have access to every piece of information you can possibly ask for which includes what we just touched on on track conditions weather uh last minute fluctuations in the market things that change on a day that you didn’t expect when you did the form 36 hours
Before the races so again lot of different ways to look at it and approach it but as far as I’m concerned I’m I’m on the same path as you I like to get on early and try and snap up that value when the tab first post their
Markets and uh yeah I’ll do it through the tab app with your Exotics too qu quadras I will do the race before the quty and it’s just what you’ve alluded to you’ve got the data how the track’s playing um certain things like that track surface is it is it a Genuine s
Genuine good because it might be some horses that you could possibly add in for a bit of value and things like that I think that’s great advice uh putting your quties on as late as possible yeah is certainly something that I like to do as well all right now where do we get
Our access where do we access our information from Kanan obviously we do spend a lot of time doing form we discussed it on episodes one and two and uh we do spend a lot of time in the office pumping away at the form replays looking at our form guides Etc what sort
Of sites do you use what sort of sites do you recommend for punn to jump on and have a look at I think Riser obviously for your fields and your most updated scratchings and things like that um rise off of your gear changes so I’ve got
Another tab open for that um then we’re going to racing Queensland for replays racing New South wals for your subers replays um and then I look at race net and that is essentially to see the number of winners that have come out of subsequent races and and then be able to
Find those winners and and see if it holds up ratings wise 100% I think that’s something I taught you wasn’t it I think it was yeah you’ve learned one thing out of me in the last two years which is great and look I pretty much use all those sites as well I think
Racing Queens land rise racing New South Wales is a fantastic site to do your replays from and of course you’ve got your tab app as well if you’re out and about and you don’t have hold of a computer your tab app will often have most of those replays on there as well
Uh if you want to use your phone or your tablet you can still do your replays off the tab app so that’s a good little uh hint if you are out and about and you still want to have a look at your replays doing your form all right tricks
Of the trade Kean we’re going to get stuck in into this now with you uh this is just any little Edge that you’re willing to share I know you’ve got a few little how would I call them just just little ideas methods ideas processes that pop up into your head from time to
Time and you’re like I always like to do this I always like to do that and most of the time it’s pretty close to the mark so uh just share a few of those with us if you want to I guess in Queensland um which is is is my backyard
And so I I probably pigeon my pigeon hole myself to Queensland racing too cuz I’m just so invested in it so you get to know your trainers I guess their processes with horses a trainer like David Van djk is he near unbeatable when he freshens up his horses of what may
Have been a underpar run prior uh Tony Golan when he gets horses from down south he sets them up on a blank canvas he takes all the gear off them and um genuinely gen gen gen genuinely generally generally generally generally generally yeah generally uh you’ll see
An improved run um first up first up for sure for sure yeah um and obviously we touched on choke downs and things like that is where is where I like to hone in now another area that I’ve noticed with you uh which youve you’re definitely a
Lot better at me than this miles better at me than this is your eye for a horse in the yard golf there’s only one thing you better I me and this is it all right I’m I’m not giving you any more so you better enjoy
This one but it’s your life for a horse in the yard obviously you’ve spent your whole life around horses your adult life at least yeah um and even though I have since I was a kid going to the races I’ve never been as Hands-On with horses
As you have so you’ve definitely got a knack uh I’ve seen you at the races before when you haven’t done the form and you’ve just had to basically turn up and do your best out of the yard and you’ve still managed to walk home with a couple of double figure winners so what
Do you look for in a nutshell when you’re trying to find horses out of the yard I still am working on thinking what’s my sort of black and white goto when looking for a horse in the yard because it is different and I’ve always said if you go
To the races look at the shiniest healthiest healthiest horse uh that’s stepping out nicely overstepping and things like that it just does not guarantee you a winner it just does not mean that’s the best horse on the day um it’s just building a profile on horses
You know getting that data on a horse you see in and out um particularly from their first ever preparation seeing how much they’ve grown in their break because if they’ve been able to grow and mature you know that their Mark’s not reached yet might go on to a lot better
Things so it’s it’s it’s for me it’s building the profile forecasting when they’re going to Peak um I like to go down after the race and you can have a look how much they’ve blown up over the back you can listen to them and see that recovery too because that gives you an
Indication of how fit they were or how much Fitness is to come so it’s a number of things that that go into it and it’s something I’m still I’m happy to PVE it on every time because every horse is different so I don’t think there’s a a
Black and white answer for it but it’s a number of things that I use when looking at them in the yard yeah you’re certainly very good at it and is the only thing you’re better than me at I could probably ride a horse better than you you’re definitely not better than me
At golf I’ve never seen you play golf but you I’m not very good at golf but I’m still better than you can hit a golf ball I don’t know about that um I think you’d be good after the golf game when you get to the clubhouse but during the
Golf game the 9 maybe not so much all right K that’s cleaned out the closet I think we’ve covered off most things we want to cover there most puns are asking questions there they’re the sort of questions they wanted to find out so thank you very much for helping us out
With that all right now you’re going to start to probably probe me a little bit more as we get into actual ratings now we’re getting into the nuts and bolts of things here in episodes three and four we did tell punas from the very first episode we were going to attempt to help
Them assess their own markets so from a field of Runners we want to get all the way to you assessing your own set of prices and then you can use those prices to determine where the value sits in the market so it’s like the granddaddy of
All things you can try and attempt to do as a pter and we’re going to try and attempt to do that on this podcast so we’re going to start off with ratings because that is the foundation of assessing your own markets so um we’re going to get into it now and look you
Can just ask questions as they arise but basically what we’re going to start off with is is what are ratings right and that’s just a numerical number which scores a horse’s performance that’s the easiest way I can describe it so if a horse runs in I switch maiden or a
Randwick group 2 it’s going to get a figure and that figure is basically the horse’s score from that run and over time you’re going to build up those scores every time a horse goes the races and you’re going to be able to line them up and see if the horse is improving if
He’s getting worse with racing if he’s just flatlining across every single time he goes out he runs the same score uh and that will help you line up obviously horses when they compete against each other that might have run at randwick or might have run at dooman or might have
Run in melbour and then they start meeting in the same race well how do you line that form up the easiest way to do it is to use their rating which is just a simple number that scored their performance if one horse scores higher than the other that horse should be the
Other horse I mean it’s pretty simple right makes well in theory in theory exactly it’s a lot more complicated when you get into it but that is the theory yeah and that that’s the G and that is why ratings are so important to use I think they’re great too and and they’re
So accessible too so if you don’t have time to do them yourself which not many pters do you can get them from anywhere uh and that’s do you get them and that’s probably what we’re going to talk about I mean you can get them from racing Australia they do their own each state
Does their own racing Queensland racing New South Wales I’m sure Victoria do their own I’m sure every state does their own uh and then you you’ve got companies that you can buy them off as well you got professional outfits that keep even more extensive data more extensive ratings whether they’re time
Ratings weight ratings whatever you want to do and you can purchase them as well but uh personally uh if I had the time I would do everywhere but uh with the time I’ve got I concentrate on just keeping my own uh in Queensland so in terms of determining value in determining value
So that is the key so we’re going to get to that as far as a rate what what you do with a rating to use it to turn it into a price will then be able to indicate to us where the value sits in the market so we’re going to get to that
In episode 4 but we really just wanted to cover off what a rating is and we’ll just give you a quick example right so out of all the years I’ve been keeping ratings the highest horse that’s ever she she actually blew my rating scale to a new level because I thought I’d gone
As high as I could go black cavar held the top rating on my figures a figure of 83 now a figure of 83 doesn’t mean much to anyone but that was my highest figure at the time right so no horse had rated High than an 83 that was black cavier
Wings came along and in the end I L there’s nowhere else to go I can’t keep giving her an 83 like she’s better and better than that so if she ended up hitting an 84 so she’s been the highest horse I’ve ever rated obviously you can
Look at time form ratings I think off the top of my head she might have been around the 130 something Mark like and that was also extremely high if not the highest at horse for Australia U black Cav was probably right on her heels as well so they’re pretty obvious ones but
They’re they top most rating charts in Australia over the last 15 or 20 years the other thing we’re going to show we’re going to put a table up because there’s a little bit of mats coming in episode 4 don’t worry don’t worry it’s it’s H primary scho it’s going to be
Pretty it’s going to be something you can handle uh we’re just going to put a table up which just convert converts rating figures into markets and and gives you percentage chance of winning as an assessed price and we we touched on this right in episode one with our
Coin uh when I flipped you a coin and there are only two options heads or tails and it was 5050 which meant heads is a $2 chance tails is a $2 chance we’re going to get into that now with horses so it’s a lot more complex but
The theory is the same we’re just trying to work out what percentage each horse chance have of winning MH we’re going to convert that percentage to a price and you’re going to be able to look at find your value you’re going to be look at that price against the market and you’re
Going to be able to see your value so when we get to that stage it’ll make a lot more sense but uh that’s what we’re at to with ratings hopefully that covers it off well enough obviously you can go a lot deeper with ratings but they’re
The basics uh the nuts and bolts of how they work and then something punter shouldn’t be scared of you know there’s something that punter can look at we’re going to talk to uh one of the ex- handicappers in a minute aren’t we Mitch Mitch Tran and he’s going to give us his
Idea of of sort of when he was working working in the handicapping department how ratings worked and even what he says I think will make things a lot clearer so you had a trat to Mitch and we’re going to have a look at that shortly yeah he’s he’s a really switched on guy
Too and he’s now working as Tony Goins racing manager so um without knowing it as as common knowledge I assume he he’s pretty crucial in helping best place horses um to not necessarily beat the handicap but but be well waited waited all right well you did have a chat to
Mitch so let’s have a listen to that now the the jobs um covers a lot of ground but mainly um coming up with the race fields and uh to do that with with handicapping we’ve obviously got the template and the ratings base system now so um you know each each horse when they
Win a race uh get a rating and um rering those horses after each run is is a really important part of the job and um yeah that’s that’s where most of the time goes so for those who don’t know what are handicapp ratings and where do
Punters go to find them yeah all horses ratings uh normally displayed on racing austral after their their run so um racing Queen’s got a a pretty good handicapping template or and policies and procedures that are that are on their website and um yeah punters can
Can go there and and get a lot of really good information there so how do those ratings relate to the weight given to a horse in a race it depends on the race um you know benchmark races are probably the normal um explanation for that the highest rated horses get the most weight
So Benchmark 80s um an 80 rated horse will get 60 kilos now we’ve we’ve recently changed it in Queensland so top weight get 60 and then they weighted down from there depending on their rating so um Benchmark races are really well utilized in Queensland for for
Horses that have found their Mark but um yeah they’re good betting races as well so is there a way that punters can use this system to their advantage and what should they look for I think um of of late you know the last 5 10 years in
Coin and we’ve really started do utilize class set weight racing um more so in town on on Saturdays you’ll see very frequently you’ll see class three plates and class six plates and um essentially what that means is you’re weighted off how many races You’ve Won um which is
Your class and um yeah you can you can have horses that are significantly higher in the ratings carrying the same weight as as horses that are very low in the ratings so you can really sort of identify which horses can win and which horses can’t okay K it’s time for
Changing gears one of our favorite segments on the show we discussed an important gear change we had you out and about doing some research some quality interviewing and you caught up with Sheldon the farer for the Tony Goen stable and you asked him about the effect of concussion plates fact or
Fiction punish shouldn’t place a beted on a horse when they see concussion plates in the gear CH fiction yeah no trouble at all there um just all it is is helping the horse cop a little bit of concussion on on a hard ground so yeah
Go go for go so there it is and I agree with Sheldon um for obvious reasons because he’s a subject matter expert but um I wouldn’t be deterred too much by the gear change of um concussion plates it’s it’s it’s obviously a little it’s like a little padding in in the um brace
Plate itself of course to absorb that little bit extra concussion and and mainly you’ll see it go on when we know we’re going to get a good track um so so trainers will forecast if we’re going to be on really on top of the ground and they may add the add the concussion
Plates and the similar way to raise plates so for mine I’m never too deterred unless that uh horse has been running quite under par on good tracks Prior time for no doubt everyone’s favorite segment on the entire podcast K and it is of course language because uh racing has its own language and you certainly have your own language and your own words that you like to throw around and use quite often and we call
This the kism for a horse de debut toing least tongue I need a tongue tie this is a new one that’s really just coming into into your lingo probably in the last few months but it’s constantly out there and of course we’re talking about what is a weird Flex weird Flex is
When somebody is essentially in a roundabout way self-promoting thems or something and you can really bring them back down to earth or the people who are listening by just sort of throwing it out there and being like hm weird Flex you know like weird flex and everyone will instantly realize
That that person has been big noting themselves exactly right so that’s when the weird Flex comes out it’s it’s you’re just basically pulling them back to Earth with with a weird Flex it’s it’s a simple term but it pulls them back and lets everyone else know that
Hey old mate over there was just pumping up his own tires exactly right so we’ve got to the bottom of weird Flex now how about this for a racing t ter because this is one that you got to wind the clock a long way back and I’m sure
Punter understand what it means you hear it all the time yeah but have you ever actually thought about it like we’re talking about the word Furlong I mean we say it all the time they’re at the furong pole there’s a furong to go they’re R the fastest final furong of
The race what is a furong it’s 200 M and where did it come from I have no idea but I probably should but it doesn’t matter because I know what it means I don’t know the origin of it but as a track work writer um for a long I we SP
Obviously we still speak in furlongs but that 200 M so there something you dealt with every day um you know 5 Home2 and things like that so that’s right yeah you know you’re going out to do your work over certain amount of furong so it’s very old school but it’s very
Relevant still we don’t say 200 M well this is what I’m getting to should we start saying 200 M or should we keep the term furong do not fix what’s not broken well okay so just just a touch on furong then because it’s not used anywhere but
Racing no one else uses a furong right you don’t have car racing using furong you don’t have sprinters using furong you don’t no furong races in the in the Olympics they over 200 M I didn’t actually think I have to I Ser that so I’ll give you where furong basically
Originated from or what it’s actually 2011 m is a furong and it originated from something along the lines of and this isn’t 100% accurate so just bear with me it it’s like when they used to plow a field with an ox but that’s how far back we’re going we’re going 400
Years ago an ox could only pull a plow so far yeah and they say well that’s a furong yeah so he has basically plowed that field for 201 M so that’s as far as a furong should be and we’re still using that term now in 2023 but we’re only
Using it in horse racing weird flex and obviously the Americans use it a lot the furong pole like they say it all the time right we use it talking amongst ourselves and track work and who ran the fastest furong we use a mile a lot too
We use a mile L 1600 M mile yeah you know but obviously a mile is still used a lot in the US 800 M as opposed to saying 800 M that’s right so their terms that are used I love them I think it’s part of racing language I don’t want to
Change it I certainly don’t Devil’s Advocate and say let’s start calling everything metric because uh it’s our own little piece of history and I love it and I think the Americans love it I’m not sure if they use furong a lot in England and in Europe I’m not sure I
Assume they do I’m going to do some heavy research that’s that’s the kism into the furong talk for this episode so hopefully you got something out of it you know how I love those little bits of trivia I know you can’t stand them but
You no I like to get them out there the ox and yeah the cart and plowing and anyway it’s out there now all right so now we’re going to get on to something a little bit different I the one meter where does why is furong 2001 I think
That’s when that’s when the ox got tied right he just said I’ve done 2011 I’m not doing 202 yeah that’s just an ox for you it doesn’t sit well with me you know I’m very OCD and it doesn’t see well does it no that extra met that extra
Meter is really going to get into your head forget you even said it yeah you forget most things I say so that one will go down just with the rest of the Others we’re going to discuss let’s get topical that’s another segment we’ve had on each of our shows and we just talk about something totally different every week and this week is really different and and for some punters it’s might be a little bit eyes eyes glaze over uh
Because we’re talking about the modern punting landscape and what it looks like and what it looks like right now as far as serious professional semi-professional punters go is mathematical models it’s machine learning its algorithms it’s punching data into a computer and spitting out a set of prices and betting off those
Prices compared to the market obviously that’s how they believe it works best and I’m certainly not going to say it doesn’t work um and I’ve worked very closely with a lot of people working on these models to try and get the most efficient effective model they can possibly get uh and particularly with
Machine learning which is a massive new thing on the scene our kids are coming out of uni with these degrees in machine learning and it’s getting very close to AI as well which is where this is all probably headed artificial intelligence just so the term machine learning is
That is that an overall about all this all Gathering data it’s it’s almost the so an algorithm is basically when when punn have got their own data put it into a mathematical equation that spits out a price for a horse right machine learning is a little bit different to that
Machine learning is more like you just throw the data into a into a funnel and that data sifts through this funnel you spin around a th times and it spits out your answer right at the bottom so you don’t even really know what data the machine is using more than another part
So with an algorithm you might say I want to put most percentage onto my weights a little bit of percentage onto the jockey a bit of percentage onto the horses ratings with machine learning you just throw everything into this funnel and it’ll spin it around it’ll pick the
Bits it thinks is the most important and it’ll just run patterns and patterns and patterns thousands and thousands of times and it’ll spit out down the bottom I think this horse should be $150 and that’s how machine learning sort of headed and AI is probably headed in the
Same direction on not on top of AI at all but uh machine learning I did a lot with trying to help uh a lot smarter people than myself come up with a program or model to say that that worked you didn’t you say that and uh and and
You know what they find it really hard to find that Golden Nugget they find it hard to get over the line why I know plenty of reasons why and we’re about to discuss them which is why we bought this up to and and the funny thing is it’s
It’s in the name machine machine horses and not machines they are not machines joies are not machines exactly right K so that X Factor that X Factor they are looking for I don’t think you’ll ever get it I don’t and I don’t believe it’ll come through data either which is what
We’re just going to touch on quickly I mean it’s too in depth to to have you could talk about this for days but we’re not going to uh so we’re just going to have a quick chat about it now um and and it really is machine learning or algorithm computer models versus just
Old school doing the form and most P listening to this or watching this love doing the form it’s what you and I love doing we love doing the form and trying to solve the puzzle ourselves we don’t want to be told the answer by a computer exactly uh whilst we use computers to
Help us solve a puzzle we don’t want to be told by that computer what the answer is like we’d like to work it out ourselves so from your point of view and you just touched on it uh where do you think your Edge is verse verse your your
Machine learning you know gurus I think to I don’t have machine learning so and again I said to you earlier ignorance is bliss for me I haven’t seen an Al Al algorithm ALG i al algorithm yes algorithm swept and and and and all these numbers and
Figures and stuff come out and I don’t want to and I don’t think I ever will I know it holds some weight in terms of ratings and things like that and it’s and we we spoke about it earlier with staying races where I probably lack um that sucker punch with working out
Horses on the best weights and things like that we spoke about that though because when you get to staying races in general they’re horses that have had a lot of starts and there’s a lot of data and that’s where I lose my Edge because I’m not finding the upand comer or the
Horse that moves the best and things like that it is just horses a lot of time at their mark and it and it’s it’s all to do Fitness and their runs in the race and things like that so for me with with that I’m a very and and not
Everyone else would be the same but ignorance is bliss for me it’s not something I ever want to delve into um because I’m happy enough that what I how I do my form and what I go off my eye and replays and and and an old school pretty vanilla basic approach is is
What’s always going to work for me yeah so I think common sense and logic takes you a long long way yeah in doing your best and then a lot of it is luck in 100% And I think if you just stick to your simple principles you use your
Common sense you use your logic you use that human brain and you tap into your strengths and you know where your strength so we’ve touched on most of them during these podcasts uh I know where my strengths are and they’re in very similar areas I think we we both
Like lightly raised horses where there’s not a lot of information there’s not a lot of data and you know those people using those computer models are then losing the edge that they’ve got and we can really concentrate on the edge that we’ve got which is our own knowledge our
History our background and patterns that we’ve seen time and time and time again in our own minds which repeat themselves time and time and time again uh and I think that is why your average punner sitting at home betting fairly small but having fun trying to find Winners I
Wouldn’t be too put off by the fact that you’ve got these machine gurus out there that seem to push the market around a bit too when they think they’ve got it right they’ll move the market because of the amount they can turn over uh I think
We’ve still got our one little Edge a pocket at least where we can play and be very competitive yeah I’m all for the little man and I think too it’s about not being influenced too much when you’ve got a system that works it’ll it’ll work again um when I say about
Things you can be influenced about in in punting um that that would be one of those if if if you come up with your own set of full tips and then someone says impossible this horse cannot win on on it weights and things like that once you’re starting to get influenced you
Will lose sight of um you know what’s wored before and what usually works all right the last thing we’ll say on that is and this is what I did learn working on a lot of those models and machine learning um uh programs is that they are only as good as the amount of
Information that goes into it so y the flip side of that is when you’ve got races where there’s not a lot of information they can access I think that gives the smaller punter a huge Edge so that’s the way I like to look at it
All right K we’re going to get on to the final part of the show and that is our black Booker of the week now you gave us two black Bookers to follow in episodes one and two it’s important to note of course by the time this gets shown or to
A or someone views it these black Bookers could well have run either one or lost or or be well into a campaign and and things could change very quickly with horse racing as we know so these certainly aren’t locked in Gold we’re more talking about the process of
Finding black Bookers and what we look for in a black Booker I think black Bookers are very important for punter especially those recreational punter sitting at home who might have the time to do their own ratings or delve into the form for four or 5 hours but what
You can do when you’re sitting it home is watch a race see a really good run and make a note of it put it into your tabat whatever however it works for you best and make sure you see where that horse turns up next start and then
Analyze what sort of race it’s in is it the sort of race you are hoping they turn up in uh and then if it is have a look at the price and and assess whether you think it’s value or not so it’s an easy thing that any punter can do and
And it just works you know or Le at least it it it works at times obviously never going to work every time but uh it’s something any punter can do and I think it’s it’s going to improve their punning yeah certainly certainly so this week we’re just going to go with a horse
Of Kevin Kemps one of our favorite trainers up here he’s training from to wmer the horse is called rubah we’re going to show you a replay of it and uh it’s just a really eye-catching run in fact her last two starts have been terrific things haven’t gone right she’s
Ended up shoved wide on both occasions she’s run on well touching on what we’ve covered today the sectionals are matching what the eyes about to show us in this replay and and the other thing I really like to look for in blackbook horses is lightly raced horses with
Upside and she’s only had six starts uh she’s never been far off them uh she’s coming back from a listed Race So Kevin’s got a lot of options with what he wants to do with her on the back of a listed race for a horse that’s only one
One start and I think she’ll get out over some sort of a trip in time as well at least well beyond 1200 M so there’s a black Booker for this week that ticks a lot of things that I look for uh lightly raced has had a few excuses probably
Some disguised runs that aren’t going to jump out obvious from the form guide and uh let’s see how she progresses going forward with it it’s just jogged me to say something say something well as well what we’re looking for in Black Bookers because there’s many different things
And of course I touched on quite a few in episodes one and two another thing I just thought of with your maidens with horses you don’t have a lot of data on so it is a lot on the eye and things like that and ites it’s not common but
An example um a million years ago when I took Tor Tor Torah from D to Target that town Townville cup Rocky cup maai cup uh they took a small team and one of them was a maiden and I think she raced it must have been a class one put her in
Class one the only race we could find that was you know within when she was ready to race and she there was other maidens in that race because it was you know it was due to lack of racing back then this is a long time ago so there
Was a few maidens in that race uh she beat every Maiden home in that class one and then Ren not disgraced behind the class one horses who already won a race she went out in a maiden her next start at Rocky $51 bolted in it is another thing you
Can look for horses racing out of their grade and coming back to their grade absolutely good story good point too uh all right C we’re nearly done for this show uh so we might sign off on episode three and just put a teaser out there for episode 4 because we are going to
Try the big granddaddy in our final episode of this series at least big we are going to try and take pun step by step through framing their own market so get get your pens paper ready we’re going to do our best to make it as easy
As possible it can be done and it’s only going to help you going forward if you learn this little skill uh we’re also going to touch on bankroll management something that’s super important for anyone even your recreational part of the bit small managing bankroll is key
Uh I think to improving your pting and of course we’re going to have our usual gear change we’re going to have another pianism which everyone loves and of course there’ll be much much more so we’ll be back in episode 4 you win some you lose more for free and confidential support call the number on the screen or visit the website
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