Punting and the Quality/Class of Horses.

[Brendon]

The quality of horses in the Saturday metro races is higher than the mid week races nearly always. Yet a few have said you get more value from midweekers. But those same punters have canned the quality of horses going around in the Saturday metro meetings perhaps as a reason for a drop off in their strike rate at those meetings.

I'm certainly not accusing anyone of sour grapes. I think its real, and my strike rate has gone through the floor since the start of June. Still I'm wondering if its the drop in class in metro races, or maybe another reason that is making the bookies rich this time of year.

If a punter can pick winners at a mid week country race, why the sharp drop off in the strike rate in the winter at the always stronger metro race meetings?

[crash]

In metro meetings, as you say there is better class horses, but compared to country or mid-week metro meetings, there are more possible winners because there is more class.

In winter, it's hard to line-up the form from proven wet trackers and runners with no or little wet form yet [how do we know their not a duck?]. Also worth thinking about is the problems with the slower pace that wet tracks produce [it's bad enough as it is on dry tracks]. Horses get into far more trouble in slower races due to bunching up in a mob.
Syd. also produces some very small fields and they can be very hard to pick because they are often very tactical races.

My SR also goes down in winter.

[Stix]

Track condition has never made any (significant) difference to my S/Rate...... maybe 1-2%, but that's in my favour and not the otherway. Others really struggle when the tracks are wet and some don't bet at all.....I don't worry too much about wet tracks, dead tracks, good tracks...any will do me as long as my selection has met the criteria.

[Brendon]

crash,
I was going thru some vids on Sunday, and from the ones I looked at, you are on the ball with your comments. With the downpour late in the week in Melb, there may have been a few bad lanes that some jockeys discovered were there, too late.

I also think that trainers are more likely to keep their best and most reliable horses for the spring and autumn. "Reliable" being the operative word in this context. I don't expect all my picks to win, but I have been gobsmacked recently to find out they didn't get a mention in the steward's report, except for maybe something like: "jockey Damien Oliver was at a loss to explain the lack of..." Normally when I'm punting well most of my picks come in the top four, at least. A lot of horses this time of year seem to be hit or miss.

I can think back 10 years plus, and after a few wet weeks the picking was easier. Maybe there are just not enough wet days today to expose all the form.

stix,

its probably my money this month you are winning. Use it wisely. LOL

[Stix]

stix,

its probably my money this month you are winning. Use it wisely. LOLI'm not setting any records for June or the start of July...... :o ... but slightly infront.

[crash]

I agree about the hit and miss form Brendon and also the variability of alleys.

[Crackone]

I think the class is not there,
my system through up 137 horses to consider last June 08, this June 81. Even May 134 to 96 this year.

[crash]

The quality of horses has been going down for years. The breeding industry has a lot to answer for but I won't get into that story because I'd have to point a few fingers.

[Brendon]

The breeding industry breed a lot of fast 2 year olds.

[crash]

The breeding industry breed a lot of fast 2 year olds.

And a heck of a lot of pet food too!

[Stix]

Australian breeding industry has this (IMO) unhealthy lust for breeding speed horses, so much so the trend to find stayers overseas is a growing one - one S P O'Donnell is probably the most well known and most active in this pursuit.

We try and attract overseas runners to our big races, which traditionally are over a mile and greater, yet the breeding seems aimed at horses that are to run upto 1400m...and very fast. Our stayers seem to be keeping them at bay, but don't forget West Coast, Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Port Adelaide have all conquered the flying caper and taken the AFL Premiership Cup home in recent time and adapted in a very short time period.....

[crash]

I thinks it's all about cost Stix. Training stayers nowadays is an expensive proposition as it takes time to bring them on and a lot of trainer expenses. A sprinter however is [mostly] doing it's best work from 2yr. old to 4 yr.old and if it can win at group level, future stud fees can result in astronomical $ amounts.

Take for example Encosta De Lago [with only a 11.8% win SR] at Coolmore stud. At a service fee of $302,500 the stallion has generated revenues of over [hold your breath] $68 million and it's not even the top earner! Stud fees is where the real money lies, not prize money and if an owner and a suitable trainer can produce the goods from a young horse, serious riches await. A quick initial earn on investment will alway predominate a slow earn. So that is why owners predominately invest in sprinters, not stayers.

[crash]

Any horse can jog and sprint. If we look at times today of most staying races we find mostly very slow times [jog and sprint]. These horses aren't stayers, they are mostly pretentious stayers that are basically sprinters.