Sample size for calculating avg Fin.Times

[Dallas]

This might save you a bit of time but no idea who created it.



AverageRaceTimes.zip

Thanks for this Athos, appreciated... If only it had 'going' and 'class' as well. I think without those times are going to be way off if GF vs Yielding, or Class 5 vs Class 1 runners.

Can I ask where you found this... is there any others??

This is the one I've used the last few years

Standard Race Times.xls

[Brovashift]

I think by class, going and distance's are the basic fundamental things that need to be considered re avg race times. Things like weather, wind/rain, while something to consider, they're a lot less common, particularly during the summer months. I dont want to be anal about it just a baseline to help identify weak runners ahead of time, as well as other criteria. Which is all available online already I know, but I find a lot of sources either too expensive or just doesn't flow when comparing form.

As far as I am aware there is no way to know from data if a horse has woken up on the wrong side of the hay that morning and can't be arse running on sand while having his face yanked and arse spanked, and so isnt willing to perform on the day. Thats where race reading comes in I guess and if Im not seeing what I want or expect to see then I dont pull the trigger and move on to my next race.

I've got a copy of that Mordin On Time, well half of it anyway lol in pdf. I thought it was a bit out dated now? Im sure I asked about it on here a while ago. I know the paperback isn't cheap to buy, was about £130 on Amazon, used!

[Brovashift]

This might save you a bit of time but no idea who created it.



AverageRaceTimes.zip

Thanks for this Athos, appreciated... If only it had 'going' and 'class' as well. I think without those times are going to be way off if GF vs Yielding, or Class 5 vs Class 1 runners.

Can I ask where you found this... is there any others??

This is the one I've used the last few years

Standard Race Times.xls

Cheers Dallas... What is the "LBS Per Length" column?

[ShaunWhite]

What is the "LBS Per Length" column?

Lbs is pounds (weight)

[Brovashift]

What is the "LBS Per Length" column?

Lbs is pounds (weight)

I know lbs haha, C'mon Shaun, Im not that thick pmsl

I was just wondering how the lbs per length worked. Just reading up on it now.

[Brovashift]

I didn't think about horse Age, or WGT the horse(s) are carrying... I guess you could really go down a Rabbit Hole trying to factor in everything to get a perfect avg finish time for each scenario.

Im guessing "RP Standard" stands for Racing Post Standard times, does it? (In Dallas's .xls)
Looking in that file as well I see approx 1000 variation re distance at each course. Thats a lot of web scraping!

As Im using Racing Post so I could just use the RP Standard times as my standard/Avg, and time the first race to see how it compares to the standard time, then make allowances for current going. Other factors like Class are a bit difficult though...
I can gather data by course and see how long it takes, but I gathered all data for past 2 years and it took over 2hrs to complete.

[StellaBot]

The other thing to be careful of is changes of actual distance of race which will def skew results

eg here was a recent meeting at Fakenham

https://www.britishhorseracing.com/raci ... 2023/11098

If rails are moved out- in the above example some races are a furlong or so longer

Add the time of a furlong and if going is slower it adds many seconds

Prob best to start with "variables"
Distance
Going
Time
Grade
Added distance
Weight(possibly) Mordin on Time and Phil Bull advice there
Characteristics of tracks ie layout
EG Epsom doesnt have 5f races now as it would go over a main road
The last I remember , was Beverley quickest 5f as all downhill?

[StellaBot]

Year Winner Age Weight Jockey Trainer Time
1987 Clantime 6 09‑12 Willie Carson Richard Whitaker 0:55.33
1988 Durham Place 6 07‑12 Willie Carson Kim Brassey 0:55.59
1989 Gallant Hope 7 07‑10 Bill Shoemaker Gerald Cottrell 0:54.89
Epsom Times before stopped because of road

[StellaBot]

The TPD is live up to date

I cannot and wont try to compete with that however it works

[Brovashift]

The other thing to be careful of is changes of actual distance of race which will def skew results

eg here was a recent meeting at Fakenham

https://www.britishhorseracing.com/raci ... 2023/11098

If rails are moved out- in the above example some races are a furlong or so longer

Add the time of a furlong and if going is slower it adds many seconds

Prob best to start with "variables"
Distance
Going
Time
Grade
Added distance
Weight(possibly) Mordin on Time and Phil Bull advice there
Characteristics of tracks ie layout
EG Epsom doesnt have 5f races now as it would go over a main road
The last I remember , was Beverley quickest 5f as all downhill?

How do you know when rails have added/shortened a circuit, is there a usual/permant measured distance to start from, then +/- the rail movements? Looking at RP today and this; Rail movements: 7.05, 7.35, 8.05 & 8.35 +9yds means absolutely nowt to me!

Just reading this again; is that saying 9yrds have been added?

[Brovashift]

This might save you a bit of time but no idea who created it.



AverageRaceTimes.zip

Thanks for this Athos, appreciated... If only it had 'going' and 'class' as well. I think without those times are going to be way off if GF vs Yielding, or Class 5 vs Class 1 runners.

Can I ask where you found this... is there any others??

This is the one I've used the last few years

Standard Race Times.xls

Just noticed today that my scraped data displays distance in furlongs to the nearest .5. and this sheet is accurately using .1 to .9 decimals.

I know its not going to be very accurate but as I wanted to pull in the Standard times to display on my userform I am wondering if you know of any way to round the numbers to the nearest .5 so I can get a match between this sheet and my daily racecard sheet.
Example; Im looking at Leicester here, Chase, 2m6f151y / 22.7f... but in my scraped racecard csv file it displays it as 22.5. Wondering if I can round down 22.7 to 22.5 to get them to match and display on my userform when race seleceted.

I know its cringe, but just to get the functionality working for now, and will have to sort something better later. The scrape is from a reputable source as well, maybe why they do it, I dont know.

Any ideas?

TIA

[ShaunWhite]

What is it you're actually trying to do again? An average time for every permutation of any factor? And how do you plan to use it?

Aka... is this solution actually the answer to what you're trying to do?

[Brovashift]

What is it you're actually trying to do again? An average time for every permutation of any factor? And how do you plan to use it?

Aka... is this solution actually the answer to what you're trying to do?

Its nothing too complex, I just wanted to display those RP Standard times in Dallas's file by race course and distance selected on my racecard analyser userform, as a visual standard time when comparing the days selections historical times at the course/distance/going/class etc. to see if they've perviously ran above or below the standard or avg times.
I am using pen and paper at the moment but have now created a userform that pulls in the days racecards and 2 years historical data. Not enough I know but the 250k rows I do have are slowing the app up already, so have created an AWS db to run the scrapes automatically daily so I can accumilate it that way and connect to that eventually. Probably have to remake the whole thing in Python at some point, this was just easier for me.
The userform displays the days racecard and times in a treeview where I select a race time to display the corresponding race data, together with all available historical data from each selection on the racecard. This was just so I can clearly see and differentiate between things like trip, going, class, wgt, previous results etc. because using the racing post is a f nightmare, giving me asian eyes! lol. I am displaying the days racecard and corresponding data in 2 listview, I wanted nested listview but turns out can't be done in excel, so had to use listview instead, it works anyway. Now I am writing some code just to hightlight positive and negative data like up in trip, I will colour the cell red for potentially negative, likewise, down in class green for example, or if same, amber. This is just to make my life easier when reviewing the cards, I can quickly see which runners I want to spend more time on and looking deeper at price, pace, etc. Im almost there now. Once done Im expanding it to assign numerical values to each one of my criteria, depending on how much weight it gives to my overall handicapping, to come up with a scoring system with the aim of making better decicions.
I dont really want to automate anything but if it worked well I may consider it lol. Taking the time to analyse the cards works excellent for me over jumps season, full confidence. Im finding flat season a lot harder. better than last year, but not as easy as jumps. Which is why I've thrown this together. The main thing during jumps season is the obstacles, from a horse/Jockey perspective. Flats, with obviously no obstacles, the main things between horses now has to be speed doesn't it? speed and stamina, depending on distance.

So going back to what I wanted to do with the standard times. I wanted to pull in the rp standard from Dallas's file (which I've edited) by using the currently selected raceCourseName and raceDistance, in order to display the standard time and LBS per length in labels at the top of my userform, primarily for convenience. But I am not going to be able to do it because my racecard distance data is rounded to the nearest .5 (22.5f), and Dallas's file has the times more accurately for the same course and distance at 22.7f. So most of the times are not going to match. I don't want to bodge it. Im looking at my scraper again, which someone shared with me off GitHub, and I've noticed that I am not getting all the data it suggests the script scrapes, so will see what I can max out of this first I think.

UPDATE: Looking at the python script again I can see there is a lot of data missing that Im not getting, theres even the going stick measurements, and rail movements, never saw that before. I should be able to achieve what I want by using the 2m7f format instead, with a bit of jiggery pockery lol.

[ShaunWhite]

Glad that was the not too complex version

One question it raises though, and I never watch horseracing so I don't know, is how much does a race depend on tactics rather than everyone running at their optimal speed? I watch athletics, cycling etc and the speed in the first part is almost irrelevent compared to the sprint at the end. And the way handicapping works I thought it wasn't good to win by too far or as fast as you can?

I guess all this pace/speed stuff has been around for decades though so if it's proven then it's all worth it.

[StellaBot]

Soz Brovashift

Just seen your message re how do you know if distantracks can only increase in distance ces are moved

Nowadays tracks can only increase in distance as all were remeasured some time ago

The BHB shows this data in advance of racecards and same data after results
(I think Im right about this)

eg if click on "results "

https://www.britishhorseracing.com/racing/results/

Then select Market Rasen yesterday
https://www.britishhorseracing.com/raci ... 2023/13184

Other way which is new to me

is
https://www.britishhorseracing.com/raci ... 2023/13184

Then select Results and this will give previous Market Rasen results with any distance changes
in Excel format


https://www.britishhorseracing.com/feed ... /dc_33.csv


Hope this helps