I have to preface, that I do rating, not systems, but what you say is only partially true.

If you mean that for instance, you are looking at all the horses that won last start and then take it as gospel that they will win again, yes it's back-fitting.

On the other hand if you are looking for horses that won their last start in similar class, same distance and preferably under the same track conditions, then you are doing genuine research.

What I'm trying to express is;

For example - Backfitting may have produced a profit over the past year by backing horses at Sydney Metro tracks that have form X62 ..... now whilst there may be some logic that it's 3rd up and improving, ..... will it continue ! All you've done is discover a pattern which may not repeat for another 100 years ?!

It's a fine line lomaca, and I'm not even sure how to properly explain myself.

No Barney, there is no logic in that, not without knowing the rest of the details of the race, the history of the other runners etc. etc..

No there is NO fine line between the two Barney

I think it's me Barney, looks like every time I utter an opinion here lately, it's being misinterpreted misunderstood or I'm just a poor communicator.

Time to give posting a bit of a rest I think!

Cheers

"It's a fine line lomaca, and I'm not even sure how to properly explain myself".

Maybe Barny the difference is simply being able to justify to yourself why a certain perameter produces a certain result.

If you've got a good idea what might be causing the result, then I can't see what the problem would be to backfit that scenario. Just saying horses with R in their names win more often so I'll rule out all horses without an R or some such twaddle.... now that's backfitting.

This should not be perceived as an attack on the world famous, ever successfull "R System" however.

__________________
"Not winning on a horse that came first is one thing.....Losing on a horse that didn't come first is something else entirely!!!"

This explains it, this is what I'm getting at ..... Found this over the past few weeks of looking at all the posts.

** The problem that I have found with all systems over many years is that when you spot a profitable anomaly, as you have, the dreaded "regression to the mean" usually kicks in and brings it back to normal. **

lomaca, as they say, "It's not you, it's me!"

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Thanks for posting. Edited as 6 lines of large bold type = shouting.

Well I'm getting nearer, only 60 pages to go, then I'm going though all the notes I've made. What stands out are the number of probable successful systems given to us by the hobby punter who enjoy what they do. I'm more certain then ever that some of the systems listed would be worth following.

For the life of me I do not understand why a system that works and has been tested over a reasonable period all of a sudden falls over ?!

Reading all the posts you get an idea who the posters are and what they have to contribute. Some don't post much but their words are worth bottling. Some post a lot for a bit of fun, yet they are knowledgeable, and they too need to be taken seriously. You just need to sort out what's useful information for you. I'm sure there are some who've given away their "secrets" from time to time, but the antannea needs to be alert to pick this up.

Most of the systems are similar of nature. Some no doubt are winners, some need an element added to them that a mechanical approach could not pick up.

At this point in time, it appears that it might be easier to use the information gleaned to pick a stable of a few horses and follow them for a few starts.

There are a couple of themes that I've been interested in that haven't yet surfaced in my study of these posts. I look forward to the last 60 pages!