how to tell if a horse in any good

[The White Rabbit]

Hi guys
Thinking seriously about wether to invest to try to compete in the better races or just stay as an occasional stable.
My big concern is that I cannot judge if a horse is any good or not, To explain if you look at times horse do not perform to anything like their workouts. So until you race you do not seem to know where to place them. Even the some will run great in good races and then nothing. It may be me and the way that I look at the info available but having looked at horses with great breeding and great workout times I still see the same thing that I do not know how good the horse is as it could run very badly after running very well. If someone could help me to understand how to work out the good from the bad would be grateful.
All the best

Wi

[Greeko Holdem]

Your missing one thing here.. it's called blood lines.

Workout times are a guide , but the blood lines and breeding are key to winning races.

[The White Rabbit]

No even looking at very well bred horses doing great work out times i dont see how to work out if its any good without running a good few times.

[Winning Ways]

You are in the same position as every other stable here,you may breed horses doing good times but until you run them you wont know if they are any good or not,only when they run a race will you know if they have any heart or not. I personally like to put them in at the deep end straight away,but many stables like to enter a high claimer first run,then if the horse wins move it up a grade a so on. For myself as a general rule i find that if a horse does mega times they turn out to be duds,i like horses that do what i would call honest times,not to fast and not to slow,but middle of the road as i have found these turn out to be my best horses from my own experience.

[Ms Stables]

I am by no means an expert. But I can tell you what I look at to figure out if my horses are good enough.

The times in races don't seem to mean near as much as the difference in times between the horses in the race. The level of competition determines most of the outcomes of the race. For example if I run a horse that is working out at 1:08:60 and is a fairly good runner on the track in a 3k claimer and it runs against other horses that are working out at 1:08:90-1:09:00, my horse will have a good chance at beating a track record. You will also notice that say we have 4 other horses in this race and 2 won a dollar value race and the owners moved them up to 3k, but the other 2 horses have won a 20k before but have lost since and the owners have moved them down to 3k. The 2 better horses will run times much better than what they workout at while the 2 bad horses will run times close to or worse than the workout times.

Horse 1: 1:08:08
Horse 2: 1:08:41
Horse 3: 1:08:43
Horse 4: 1:09:01
Horse 5: 1:09:20

Now that I have learned this I know this doesn't mean Horse 1 is a world beater and should go straight to a qualifier race. It just means it is that much better than the horses that will at best win a 20k claimer in their career. To me this happens in all races. If I take Horse 1 and run him in a D division race and he runs against four horses that were put there because they had won some 12k, 20k claimers or a couple 6k starter allowance races in a row I might still win that race comfortably. Then with a track record and a D division win I think he is unstoppable so I put him in another D divison this time running against four horses that have come in middle of the pack in qualifier races, and he will get beat soundly, probably running much worse than his workout times. Unless of course he proves to be a stakes horse and wins or puts up a good time compared to the winner.

I have found that you have to research the horses you race against and determine how good they are before you can determine how good yours is. I also have been checking the workout times and putting the horses with the better times on my watchlist to see where the other trainers are entering them and how they do.

Hopes this helps

[The White Rabbit]

Thanks guys
Suppose its suck it and see. I hoped that there was some science involved but seems that still only way is running in good races to decide if the horse is up to it.
Think on the basis of this will stick to being a very small stable and see what happens
Best
WR

[Ryan Express]

Workouts tell you about a horse's range of potentials.

But within that range, there is only one, single, reliable predictor of how good a horse is -- how good are the other horses your horse has beaten in races. Speed figs don't matter. You consistently see 99s in 2k claimers. Those horses crumble against better horses. If you want to know how good a horse is, take a reasonable sample size and click on the races the horses has done well on. Has the horse beaten other good horses? This is the case because the programming overly simplifies the "heart" factor.

If your horse works well and beats really good horses early, you have a good horse. And you should stick with the horse through rough spots. If you horse well but only occasionally picks up a win against weak fields, abandon the horse because heart doesn't get dramatically better.

[Orb Farms]

I have a Colt, who I am NOT going to, and NEVER will Geld......He BARELY catches 1:08.98......but he has put away some decent horses in two straight races... Ryan Express could NOT have said it better. I remember 8 seasons ago, Norm told me he had a champ-type horse with similar numbers, but GREAT breeding, and the horse went on to overcome the "2-3 race honeymoon".....So Norm knew he had a star, despite not seeing the Gaudy 1:08.54 type numbers that seem to frizzle more than they fry!

So, It's the HEART and the Racetrack results, against GOOD horses, that depict and REVEAL a VERY good horse.

My very best,

Orb