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Sectionals and kilometric reductions

cosmicsports

cosmicsports

Colt
I have a set of data from races with the wire to wire times, the early speed (first 2 furlongs or 400 meters) and the last 2 furlongs.
To make any sense, I first of all have to convert everything.
If the coming race is for 8f say and the previous ones were 7,6,5,9 ... furlongs, I have to convert those 7,6,5,9 ... to equivalent 8s. Otherwise nothing can be deduced.
I 'd also have to convert cross-track if they come from different locales. It could be 7 (Ponte), 6 (Windsor), 5(Windsor), 9(Nottingham) and now we are at Haydock. But I don't have such issue whereas if you do the same work, you have to make track-to-track corrections as well.

From the racing data it's easy to work out a simple formula like "speed 6 furlongs = k . speed 5 furlongs".
k is about 1.29 if I remember correctly.
I 've done this several times in the past but now it's been since 2014. I can't make sense of my old scribblings so I 'm going to work out these things anew.
The question is how to work out some more elaborate formulas uisng sectionals ?
It looks at first sight as if when I convert from 5 f to 6 f for example, or 6 f to 7 f the late fraction is more important, has a higher weighting. Is that so and do you know of any place discussing such formulas ?
 
cosmicsports said:
do you know of any place discussing such formulas ?
Click to expand...

The only place where this would be discussed is Timeform, you would be hard pushed to find somebody that even understood the subject.

Applying sectional times to the turf racecourses in this country has a couple of drawbacks, notably the going allowances and rail movement adjustments.

Just taking a look at yesterdays meeting at AYR.

AYR/SUN 03 JUL

http://www.britishhorseracing.com/race-info/fixtures/results/fixture-results/#!/2016/755

Good to Soft, Soft in Places (GoingStick: 7.3 on Sunday at 12:00)
Rails:Races 1,2,3,4 & 5 extended 21yds; remainder as advertised. Stands' Side rail in 5m.

As you can see the rail movements have added 21yds to the race distances, on my calculations I would adjust the winning times by 1.4s.

Then we have the problem with the going allowance, I made it -0.46s/f (good to soft) so the sectional timing would need adjusting again.

Mike.
 
That's a card with total times plus information about the movement of the stalls and the going stick.
I don't know what that last is.
For the non-savvies who read let me explain that time measurement gives a lot of headache. It's not simple as with human runners. If our champ runs in Munich this week and in Tokyo next week, it's about the same thing. If he runs the 100 meters in 9.8'' then his current mean is 9.8'' and we say that's how he is going to run in Tokyo plus minus the chance factor (the natural statistical deviation). In horses it's not so. It's go figure and you have to take into account all sorts of factors. Or you don't have a clue and you cannot find any winners.
What I 'm after is sectionals, the effect of sectionals.
I mean there are horses for distances -we all know that- and it's the sectionals that tell the tale. Without sectionals the raw kilometric conversion will say that if a horse is making the 5 f in 56'' then he may run the 14 f in 149'' -which might be a good figure. But such a horse may well be a donkey for the 14 f and in fact his trainer does not even enter him. The kilometric conversion does n't explain why that is so - but the sectionals do.
 
No way mate.
What I said was there may be some non-savvies too who read us so let me say some simple things for them.
I don't do UK statistics but it interests me of course.
Unhappily not even the rich cats among our press editors seem to be able to afford Timeform services (Greece is where I am).
But it interests me. Timeform are a source of good quality info, overall.
Now my question was on theory rather than the daily sheets.
I 'll try the American forums -which I have l left for some time. They know about these things and if I find something interesting I 'll post it here too.

As a matter of fact I have right here in front of me a periodical with some 50 pages on South Africa and Bath. It's from last Wednesday 29/6. There are tables alright but unprocessed.
Look at this entry:

No 1 KARENS STAR

14/12/15 Wolves 1900 meters, 1.58.82
9/12/15 Wolves 1740 meters, 1.49.68
21/11/15 Wolves 1740 meters 1.51.45
13/11/15 Wolves 1740 meters 1.48.76
21/09/15 Leicester 1400 meters 1.26.17

The coming race (29/6) was Bath as I said 2350 meters (1 m 4f minus something).
What am I to make out of this ? What is the speed projection for the coming race ?
I mean going by the simple way, no sectionals - there is no information on sectionals.

For South Africa further down the pages, similar poor presentation.

I don't care about those Greek mags really. I don't work for them.
But in case you are interested and you want to offer advice, I can mail it to you so you spot what is missing.
 
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