Agree with you wholeheartedly there, thekey.
The question then is, which horse is weighted the best according to class, AND in relation to fitness.

Surely this reinforces hermes little fun plan of backing the top horse in the weights which is a last start winner. And my jockey plan incorporating last start winners providing they are in the top three weight wise.

Ummm - no. The horse with the most weight is simply the horse that in the handicappers opinion, based on previous results, is the best horse in the race. Not necessarily the best horse at all.

Agree also becareful, but the handicapper can't allot penaties to a horse on what it will do in the future, nor can anyone forsee the future.
So all of us (punters/investors/gamblers/coattuggers/whisperers and manic depressives) can do is go on past results.

:wink:

becareful,

It should be noted that I said best, not most likely to win.

An example from Golden Slipper Day in the 1500m race won by Mowerman, Old Comrade was top weight having just won the Australian Cup. Surely he was the best horse in the race(which other horse was a group 1 WFA winner, Referral won the George Ryder at group 1 in 1999 it was the second top weight), however under the conditions of the race did Old Comrade have the best chance to win? Probably not.
Did Referral have the 2nd best chance.
No way.

But until one of these other horses wins at that level these two will be better horses.


How else can you determine what is the best horse in the race other than by looking at past performances?

Yes, you can only make an educated guess. The only way to ensure a profitable outcome in the longterm is to work out the likelihood of each runner and then the odds that you will accept. When you are able to obtain over the odds, that's when you can make a profit.

That's the most sensible thing I've heard all day!