After reading everything here. Where does that leave us with a race in front of us to handicap ? Averaging out a horses sectionals and distance times I think. One of the reasons I mainly stick to 4yr, olds and up is because it a lot easier to do for most of the field, as there is [useually] enough info. in the runners stats to do so.

I believe the info. regarding sectionals and race times are important, very important but they both are still only two of many pieces of the puzzle. Using time in Aust. racing conditions as the main piece of selection criteria would be flawed and giving it more importance than it deserves [and it does deserve a decent amount]. We should except that many stats, just can't be reduced to scientific accuracy in horse racing and time is just another one of them. A variable often influenced by unpredictable factors. Many of them already having been mentioned in this thread so far.