Using QT3 in your handicapping

[Ken Massa]

QT3 = Quirin (speed points) Top 3

This number can be found in the header of all screens in HTR2001

Qp = Quirin speed points. Range is 8 - 0

Suppose we have a field of 5 with Qp: +8, +7, +6, +5, +4
Top 3: 8+7+6 = 21 QT3

The chart below will help you assess the meaning of the QT3 number...

QT3............Comment
---------------------------
23-24.........Blitzkrieg!!
21-22.........Strong front pressure expected
19-20.........Moderate early pressure
15-18.........Normal
10-14.........Light or no pressure up front
0-9.............Nobody wants the lead

The key question when evaluating a front runner is how much forward pressure will the horse face and will that exertion compromise his chances. A race with 23 QT3 would probably feature a combative tussle for the lead and hurt one or more early runners for sure. This is a excellent situation to wager against a favorite that will be involved in that early fracas.

A common circumstance features a QT3 of about 15-18 with just one of the runners having +7, or +8 Qp. He will likely have it his own way on the front end and be long gone if he is fit.

[Carl]

Ken,

I have gone so far as to build in an "average Qpts" into my table for querying, and can't make it do a thing. Races with high average Qpts behave much like races with low average Qpts.

My guess is this will lead to nothing also. It is "surprise speed" that kills, and that is IMO better found in Ev1 pl1.

Still, if we don't try it, who knows? And even then "you never know......"

[Ken Massa]

Healthy skeptism Carl

It is really easy to prove the value of QT3 vs Fr1 in the new export. Maybe Mike or someone else will do it for us.

nQT3 = x (1-24)
nFr1 = 1

Now run the query on fast dirt sprints and routes. Tally the Fr1 win% and ROI at each level of QT3. It might be interesting to see those results with Fr1 and L/P (Ev and Lv).

Turf results might be worthwhile to check - but I'm skeptical on turf of anything.

The averaging technique as a method to predict early speed can get diluted by too many low values and obsure the high point speed. I'm not surprised that wasn't successful. The Qpc might be another technique that has merit, or at least waste some more of our time writing about it here!

Qpc is the percentage of all Quirin points from each horse vs the total.
nQpc > 25(%) and nFr1 = 1 might be revealing

BTW: sorry I didn't respond about PayPal and the contest fee. It was a good idea Carl. I had a PPal account once, didn't use for a long time and my info has been lost in cyberspace. I'll set a new one up next year to have a depository for this sort of thing.

[Bruce]

Would it also be worthwhile to track true "F" types against the E/P horses? The more "F" type horses in the race, the liklier a speed duel will result. E/P types who can sit a length or back off the lead may be able to sit off a faster pace and still win especially if the track is playing for speed.

bruce.

[hurrikane]

I've done the same Carl with the Qpts...helps see the front end but not the finish. I'm guessing the key is "fit" horses. Maybe combined with the good effort field.

so many new ideas ...life is good.

[MikeDee]

When I looked at Q pts and speed duels before, I came out the same as Carl and HK didn't really see it in the queries. The duels just didn't seem to materialize, nothing really there. Once I get my db revamped with the new export I'll take another look at your suggestions Ken and Bruce.

Spent the day looking at pl4 versus pl5. Very small plus and minus differences nothing that IMO would make you want to change what you are doing now. I'll stick with pl5 for my db.

[Carl]

I am not even so sure anymore that that it even exists.

Or, if it does, it is IMO an overbet factor.

Kinda like the concept of "weight" for the 2000's......

As an aside, I LOVED Seattle Slew. Like "pressured pace"? That horse did not care, pressure me or no, he believed in I just go. And he just went. Loved him in the (I think) Peguses, three horses including Exceller eyeballed him at one point, and he just kept on a going like the Everyready bunny.

[MikeDee]

It is going to take me a while to do much testing because I'm going to use the new export as the event to clean house on my db. So far I have one track ready to go AQUi. I ran the test suggested by Ken. Small sample fast dirt sprints and routes at AQUi from 10/99 to present.

Results are attached. Missing QPT3 values indicate that there were no fr1 or lp1 runners at that qpt range.

[MtKen]

My 2c--The interesting pace scenerios come up when the favorites are frontrunners going against a rabbit with a faster EV1 or EP than they have ever ran well against. The frontrunners collapse & the closers have their day. It seems like it is often the E horse who decides he's an S horse that day who wins.

[tomcat]

Howabout testing the Q's by the track, dist and sex? Last year when the Keeneland track ran so fast, the Q's were the best bets. Also, consider testing 2yr olds who haven't learned to pace yet.
Mike and I were both testing Q's some time ago and large batch testing went no where. But at the same time we no that horse who have trouble learning to pace (the 7's and 8's) will have trouble in a lot of situations to finish the race. Turfway, it seems to me doesnot favor the early horses in 2 turn races. Some tracks turn early and favor the high Q's when tracks get wet and they cannot grab the surface in the stretch.

[Donnie]

What's real fun, so far, is to take the lower rated races (11, 12 and 13's) and really analyze the front runners...hit 2 fer 2 today sneaking out to the track!! One paid 7-1!! Yowser!! Thanks again, Ken!!

"All these tools and only one man to use them!"

[long lost fred]

I have a couple of questions for HTR database guru's........how many horses that have QP'S of seven and eight get the lead at first call? How many horses that have the best fr1 get the lead for todays race off that rating? How many horses with QP'S of seven and eight and rated first in fr1 get the lead? Lastly how many horses win in each case? Regards llfred

[MikeDee]

sorry LLF, no can do. Our db's don't have past performance data where we can answer those kinds questions. Just the htr factors, q points, etc for all the runners in a race

[MtKen]

MikeD:

I'm wondering if avg. payouts do anything by Qt3 range?

10 or less, 11-15, 16-20, 20+.

Any chance you could check that? I'm hoping there is a bulge in the graph somewhere, maybe at the top?

Thanks,

Ken

[George]

Donnie........I have been doing well with the low qt3 as well. Finding when there is standalone speed it is usually a good bet at decent odds. Also have found closers above par for race type work well at the lower qt3 levels.

[Bruce]

George,
are you saying that when the QT3 levels are low meaning little pace pressure, that closers with above par figures do well? That's counter intuitive (but would be lucrative since most people bet speed in races like that)


bruce

[Donnie]

Bruce,
The "logic" I am applying is that if there is little pace, then as per Brohammer, the AP numbers tend to tell the tale...I have been looking at frontrunners in such races on frontrunning tracks whereas I would assume that closers on "closing" tracks would play in their favor providing their strength is in the latter part of their race. Am really liking the QT3 numbers as a quick indicator of whether they will go quick or not. If they don't, who looks good on the front end of a speed favoring track, cause the closers then have nothing to run against....

Gonna do some tests on the lower numbers and see if anything interesting is there....

[hdcper]

MikeDee,

Really enjoyed the excel spreadsheet data regarding QT3 for sprints and routes. It appears that dirt routes provide the best positive ROI plays, especially in races with a QT3 total ranging from 19 to 23 points. Noticed that the win$ total payoffs were hidden in the spreadsheet and with further analysis it appears most positive ROI situations were from average payoffs ranging from $20 to $32(in fast dirt routes with 21,22, and 23pts). However, at 19 or 20 pts positive ROI is the result of increased win percentage rather than large average payoffs.

Addition information would be helpful in determining what might be expected in future plays, if the specific odds of winners and non-winners in each category were available. Also it would be nice to know if the winner(horse rated FR1) was typically the highest rated horse in speed points and if not where it was rated in the top three.

It appears that the thought process that a highly contested pace negatively effects the early horses, ends up providing nice payoffs for these type horses because of the public's perception.

In closing, tactical speed appears to be much more important in routes because of the slower pace needed to get and hold the lead. And maybe any horse or horses with speed in routes are overlooked unless the public see only one lone front runner.

Thanks for sharing,

Hdcper

[MikeDee]

hdcper,
It's a small sample at a single track so I don't think we can put to much into the numbers. I just thought I would put some food for thought on the table. I only hid the price on the sheet to try and clean up the noise on the spreadsheet, I figured if someone was really interested they could dig it out.

It appears that the thought process that a highly contested pace negatively effects the early horses, ends up providing nice payoffs for these type horses because of the public's perception.I don't know...IMO the theory may be whats' bad. A few months ago I looked at this and could not find any real evidence that in a so called pace melt down that the closers won any more then they did if there wasn't a melt down or that one of early the speed runners simpy out lasted the other and won. Like Bruce mentioned the stuff that George is looking at flies in the face of the theory.

Maybe the theory works better in young horses of quality but in cheaper older runners that have been around a few turns.....do we really know why one day they decide to run and the next 3 or 4 they don't?

In closing, tactical speed appears to be much more important in routes We continue to see, in the data early speed doing well in routes in both win% and ROI.

I'm going to continue to look at the q point stuff, once I get re-organized

[George]

Bruce.........realize that the play of low qt3 and above par closer seems backwards. But in limited testing it appears to produce profits. Low win percent(28%) but strong average mutuel of over $14.

The key is horse must be "above average" FR3 in last race. I keep a table of average winning velocities (F1,F2,F3) by race type and par. Horse must have last race F3 exceeding that average.

It is quite easy to build the velocity pars. Mine are by par level within sprint-dirt, route-dirt, and route-turf. Not enough sprint-turf to bother with.

The query is in effect F3 > VPAR.F3 and QT3 < 17. Had just cleaned out datafiles when new export came out so did not have a lot of data for testing. Will move some data back in shortly and test further.

Playing "all" F3 rank ones will NOT produce profits.

[Donnie]

Strange, George...I was thinking along those same lines yesterday as to building par tables instead of using rankings due to a number 1 ranked in any of the three segments of a race does not necessarily mean it is a "strong" segment, which in a paceless race would definitely benefit that horse!

[Carl]

Originally posted by long lost fred
I have a couple of questions for HTR database guru's........how many horses that have QP'S of seven and eight get the lead at first call? How many horses that have the best fr1 get the lead for todays race off that rating? How many horses with QP'S of seven and eight and rated first in fr1 get the lead? Lastly how many horses win in each case? Regards llfred

Hi Fred.

I would guesstimate that 50% to 65% of both sample groups would have the lead at some point in the following race. I bet a lot of "bad" Fr1's, but, even so, they do seem to make it there for a little while most races anyway, even if just for a second between calls.

The Fr1 of course has the advantage of having it's speed more hidden, hence is I find generally a better bet than the high qpt horse.

[Glen]

I haven't imported the data yet...But a couple of guesses I would have on low Q point races.

Like someone said above, AP horses might do well, PSCAN and CLA horses.

High Q point races. I would guesstamate top 3 Ev horse w/ CLA advantage are the ones to go with. Mabye F/X horse? Perhaps ACL plays might be good too.

BTW, can't wait to be able to test the races that have horses exiting ++ races. ie super fast finish time. Perhaps there might be something to it. If not, back to the salt mines.

[hurrikane]

Interesting points George.
When you built your vel pars..did you build for every par number or by ranges? Wondering if you get enough sample by individual numbers or did you go by ranges...89 to 93..94 to 99 etc?

Also..seems there was a listing of par ranges somewhere..anyone remember where?

[Rick]

In the HX1.txt file Ken has it listed as 85-115.

[George]

Hurrikane......built the vel pars sometime ago when I had around 15,000 races in db. Did them by detailed pars and some of the lowest and highest pars are suspect because of low amounts of data for those levels. Ran an old shareware prog called REMLINE against them to "smooth" the numbers and did adjust some of the highest and lowest.

Better approach would be to build using more races than I did.

In general have been disappointed by results of using the vel pars. Think maybe a horse that just cranked an abnormal fraction may in a lot of cases have just ran his race and will need some recovery time. Still looking at it. The f3 versus low qt3 is best use I have found so far.

[long lost fred]

Carl and George have you thought about using QP'S at the second call in sprints and routes instead of fr1. Use same procedure as for fr1 and use the f3 fraction to see if horse can continue on. I know there are current compound factors now in use utilizing ep and fr1. Just a suggested approach to evaluate quick horses and ability to stay.....Regards..llfred

[George]

fred.......thats an excellent suggestion and worth looking into. Carl and I both have long played the "ugly" FR1 with no staying power demonstrated. There very well could be a subset of fr1 with staying power that would be profitable spot plays. Thanks for the suggestion.

[long lost fred]

George another suggestion would to use the QP'S in sprints 6f at the 5/8 pole, 6.5f at 6f, and 7f at 6f. View advanced PP'S for last call before finish.For routes it's the 6f mark. For sprints use the stretch call 1/8 from finish. The routes remains the 6f pole and last fr.Regards..Fred