curious

Exactly!

I'm not sure that it is me that relegated the Admiral to cabin boy. He thought that 2yos should have a 10kg+ allowance from 3yos, right? What did NZTR decide to give them? 2kgs?

Wrong again. Mertyl has close to an even chance of beating Bertyl as it is (on average). And once there is performance to base handicapping on then that's what should be used. Handicapping must be based on INDIVIDUAL performance assessment, not averages for sex or age. That defeats its whole purpose. In fact it's plain stupid if you want competitive racing, punter interest and increased revenue.

Wrong again. Under my revised handicapping system the filly which finished .2 lengths from the winner would be re-handicapped in line with it's performance and the ratings of the horses it beat or that finished just ahead of it.

Yeahh..they'd be out of the handicap and start on the minimum.

Between .05 and .2 of a length but it varies depending on ground etc. Yes. Why? The filly has 50kgs of body weight less to carry. But if you look at the data in the above study, yes, the male will tend to be more likely to win. If they are first starters, they'd likely be in a maiden race, not a handicap. I didn't say there should not be an allowance in set weight races such as maidens. Actually, that's exactly the reason why you need a greater weight spread within the rating bands. Nothing to do with sex but to mitigate the advantage that higher rated horses have with the current system. Then, if horses can't win from the bottom of the rating band, they have probably reached their level in the handicap system and unless they can drop back or some other system is available to cater for them, e.g. claiming races, they probably need to find a new career.

No. I was asked by Purcell. Not necessarily unfair, but that it may have been contributing to changes in the results (and possibly the racing population) for both genders. No recommendations. p.s. I keep attributing the 2011 review to Carpenter. It was Mark Webbey sorry.

The alternative was put up by Carpenter in a previous review and binned by NZTR. Our evaluation simply showed that the binning had worsened the impact of the handicapping system cf. what handicapping systems are supposed to do, i.e. equalise the chances of all runners. The alternative to achieve that or something close is simple. Scrap the female allowance and handicap/rate all horses on demonstrated recent ability. Ensure that horses are re-rated much more quickly in both directions to a level where they are competitive. Have say a 7.5kg weight spread (1.5kgs per rating point) in each rating band to get rid of the bias in favour of higher rated/better horses. Pilot that, review and adjust as required.

Nope. Wrong. don't know him. Never wrote any handicapping proposal for NZTR or anyone else. Wrong. The sentence you read, if you'd read the rest of the article, was based on what I've already told you. You can't draw that conclusion ... without also adjusting for the ability of each runner, which we did, and could reach the conclusion that the female allowance (or something) was biasing results in favour of females (in handicap races), so you are wrong again.

You've been proven correct CS. And it appears he can only read one sentence and not comprehend the article.

For those that are interested, I note that James previously published a similar analysis of the impact of 3yo allowances. This also calls into question the widely spruiked idea that the impact of weight increases with race distance. https://www.thoroughbredracing.com/articles/does-weight-age-give-3-year-olds-unfair-advantage-you-decide/

It probably is, more importantly though, the interpretation of it. It's beyond others as well obviously including NZTR unfortunately which is why we have a completely stuffed handicapping system. That said, this is not some sort of arrogant campaign to bamboozle those who have a maths phobia. It's the principals that are important here. While I can write the kind of software queries required to do this sort of analysis, I usually get help because the more competent can do what would take me days in minutes. Neither Thomaas nor NZTR among others seem able to grasp this when examining the impact of any variable on results. I may try to explain this in simple understandable terms when I have time. For now, I'd just say that the above has been done right and is appropriately tempered with caution that it is not conclusive and can not be without adjustment for the chance/ability of all runners.

And here's some fairly robust analysis that suggests that the Admiral was wrong and the allowance should probably be removed although I note that's not what you asked. https://www.thoroughbredracing.com/articles/why-fillies-mares dont-need-weight-allowance-highest-level/

Off the top of my head Freda, I think it's 2kgs Oz, NZ, Japan. 3lbs UK, Europe? 4lbs Hong Kong.

I thought you did and of course I agree. You can not draw conclusions from strike rates whether it's jockeys or trainers or females cf males with comparing them to a reasonably accurate assessment of chance the horses would have had with that variable excluded. That's just dumb and one of the main reasons why most punters lose. Do that kind of assessment on the female allowance in the wfa scales and you will arrive at a different answer I suspect.

Check your maths ATA. 2.279m turnover @ say .15 gross revenue is about $340,000. Say half that net = 170,00. What did they give away in stakes? Unsustainable business I'd say.

What does retrospective mean Thommo? Going backwards like you are?

Did you go blind in the Maldives as well or are you off your meds again Thommo? I think you'll find one was a H10 and the other H11, not both H11 as you suggest.

Could easily be done. In the US almost all races are only 30 minutes apart. Horses for the next race should be in the back parade ring, saddled, ready to come in while the previous race is run. Simple. As to the adjudication. Imagine if it took the world cup video ref 10 or 15 minutes to make a decision on a run out. There's be a riot and then next time everyone would go home.

The only problem with that Reefton is that the gross margin on turnover is more like 12-15% so I don't see how you can pay out 25% on average to clubs after all other expenses?

Good idea to move them closer to the contending horse population. Trying to think of a NI track suitable to host them. Castlepoint?

That's certainly a lot more sensible than anything Messara or NZTR have come up with barryb.

Saw that. Who would do it though?

They manage at trials 10-12 minutes apart and a lot more of them. Of course they have to weigh in and out that would take a bit more organisation but they'd have much shorter days for their efforts.

Think you'll find those are the same boring old 35/40 minutes apart. An hour for the million. Not what barryb is proposing at all.