Perhaps.. I don't think there's anything wrong with not betting in a race full of horses who have never raced before, and I certainly do think there are races which are easier to analyse because of less things left to chance, like horses first up from a spell (are they forward or not) etc. If you have a 1600m race and all the horses have had at least a couple of runs in etc, this is a better betting proposition than the blue diamond preview.

Duritz.

There are systems and there are systems. I think most of us on this forum are not countenancing the mindless things such as "horse names with an x in them or horses with four white socks." (Hey, could one of you database guys check those two out for me?)
The kind of approach to selecting (and possibly even backing) horses that I have in mind when I use the word "system" is in fact just an automation of a logical selection method. That selection method would probably only consist of the same criteria that any form analyst would use.

There seems to be confusion about the difference between a mechanical system and form analysis. With the later, personal judgement is involved and with the former it isn't.

Being discretionary with the type of races to bet on is 'how the world works' for anyone serious about making a profit at punting. Welters would be at top end of races to bet on and maidens at the bottom end. Giving all of them an equal chance of making a profit from is the main reason most of the punting world looses.

I agree with crash. A system is automated. As I said earlier, I think form analysis begins when you have to make a decision about the chance of a horse.

When I talk about a system, I am also not talking about "third letter R" as one lady I used to work with betted on, I am talking about mechanical, rigid rules which allow no human intervention, like can be seen in the "up up and up" thread, ie up in class up in weigght, up in distance. Form analysis is not a system because it requires imagination and thought and decision making, hence the word analysis.

Duritz.

Form analysis is not a system because it requires imagination and thought and decision making, hence the word analysis

Analysis is when a whole is broken into it's individual parts, as opposed to synthesis where each individual part is formed into a whole.Systems men break down the whole into individual parts and assign a value to each part.From the sum of those values comes a rating.In other words they analyse and then synthesise.

The value given to each part requires imagination,thought and decision making too.The really clever guys then create a computer program which enables them to take the legwork out of it.

After that comes the really intelligent part.They keep it themselves.

However the initial rules programmed into that program which then takes the leg work out of it are arbitrary and inflexible. "Doing the form" is about treating each individual horse separately, an automated program doing the form treats them all the same.

Instead of wasting time HANDICAPPING, people should be thinking about wagering. Period. The average punter CANNOT gain a handicapping advantage over the crowd in 15 minutes by looking at the program. But he or she COULD gain a wagering advantage, if they would stop thinking about the runners, and START thinking about taking money away from other players.

In my handicapping, I spend zero REAL time doing anything. I have computers that do all the work. But when I was developing my software, I probably spent ten times as much work on wagering and understanding the crowd as I EVER did on ranking the runners and figuring actual probabilities.

I or any good player can walk blind into a race meeting with a program in my hand, look up at the Tote board, and literally write down, immediately, in order, the runners in the race from best to worst. That takes one minute, and only one minute. And the BEST HANDICAPPER IN THE WORLD isn't going to do a better job than that, at least within about a 3% level of accuracy! I, nor anyone else can handicap 100 consecutive races, and hit significantly more winners on the nose than the crowd.

So when people spend a lot of time splitting hairs, what they are doing is trying to find either A) the race where the crowd DID screw up (a rare event) or B) the race where your particular handicapping bias works better than average. Again, that's a small minority of races.

People laugh at playing nearly every race. But think about this. The crowd make EXACTLY THE SAME KINDS OF MISTAKES ON EVERY RACE, IN EVERY CARD. All you have to do is understand what those mistakes are, why they are made, when they are made, and what advantages that gives you as a wagerer.

Here are a HANDFUL of wagering inefficiencies based on trifectas that can be exploited.

1. People bet the 3-Box trifecta. This introduces two inefficiencies. First, the favorite finishes in first place far more often than in third place, so the tri-box puts too much money on the favorite in third. Second, the worst runner in the box will finish in third much more often than in first. Thus the worst runner in the box has too much money on him in first place.

2. People bet the 4-Box trifecta . Same general situation as above, but more subtle.

3. People DO NOT bet the 5-Box trifecta, but ambiguity in the middle-class races leads to the use of 4-box tris that effect all but the worst runners in the race. The key to understanding the effects of the 4-box tri (and somewhat the 3-Box tri) is in segmenting races based on the strength of the favorite, or the top two runners.

4. Once the strength of the favorite goes past a certain level, a significant percentage of the crowd will switch from boxing to Standouts with the strong favorite as the only runner on top. This usually opens up plays with a strong favorite in second place. Second-place isn't overplayed by the box bettors, and when things switch to Standouts, the money moves from second to first on the strong favorite. Strong favorites still maintain a high percentage of second-place finishes, and they become overlays under most circumstances.

5. People overbet the 1-2-3 trifecta box (by Number, not rankings), and the 1/23/23 Standout. If your wagers include those bets at all, you're throwing money away.

6. The Tipsters selections in the daily's are certain death. It only takes a handful of people playing those picks to totally hammer those wagers into underlays. Avoid the straight trifectas, and the boxes around those selections.

7. Of course, where the crowd OVERBETS (like #5 and #6 above) there are opportunities created elsewhere. If you get a situation where the Daily's Tipster picks 1-2-3 (or 2-1-3 or that box of three in general) you are GOLDEN on almost any other play. Then is a great time to go very wide and very deep, because overlays will be like shooting fish in a barrel!

And so on

I know this is out in left field compared to what most people are thinking about, but I can't tell you how important this stuff is if you actually want to approach the wagering seriously. There are places where your time is valuably spent, and there are HUGE places where your time is effectively wasted. Not one person in 200 knows that. That's why some people CAN make money. And it's not because they are any better at picking winners

Thanks woof, thought provoking and interesting post.

Gee Woofer.You frightened me!
Made the hair on back of neck almost stand up.
Had to save that page and will read it again when I stop shaking!
Well done.

If it weren't so scary and captivating,I would have asked how many times did you time out whilst writing that epic.

Two factors required to make a profit on the punt.
1. Picking winners
2 Getting value for every bet you make.

For those with a limited time to devote to those tasks they will probably concentrate on the area they think they do best at.The trouble is that spending the majority of your time on finding winners wont do you much good if your not getting value from your betting, especially if your form analysis throws up the same findings as the general betting public. Even though I enjoy doing weight ratings I find that the time they take to do thoroughly gives me less time to concentrate on getting the best value for them. I guess the bottom line comes down to the question, Are you making money from your betting over the long term?? If you are then keep going with what you are doing, whatever the method.