What I find most ammusing about beyer figures is that it seems like there isn't 1 figure that is ever assigned without someone challenging it...but they continue to be the most commonly used and accepted figures in handicapping?

Got it....I'll go back to just doodle-ing on my chalk board for now....Morty was right, he told me that venturing into the smart threads would be a mistake...

With that being said do you think Casino Drive's beyer is an accurate one one race earlier?

I think it is pretty good, maybe a touch high.

Seeing how there are hundreds assigned every week, there are probably about 99% that don't get mentioned.

Probably because they're not visible enough to know what type of adjustments/assumptions were made. Most of the people using them aren't sick enough to follow some crappy NYB maidens in their successive starts to determine the validity of another race's figure, like we are.

You know what my biggest beef with them lately is CJ? Too much subjectivity. It's impossible to know the figuremaker's thought process, and it seems multiple splits of the variant on a single day to make them "fit" better is NOT within the principle in which they were initially designed by Beyer. Horses rarely run the same race twice in a row, I think we all know that by now. Why try to finagle the numbers to make it sound like they did? If a horse ran 5 lengths better and it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, why not leave it as such, with a designation that it's a questionable result, and let the handicapper determine the usefulness of the performance and whether or not it's repeatable.

you are right...i don't often see people complaining about those donuts they assign the 5000 maiden claimers at pimlico...

my point was simply that it seems as though whenever someone brings up an a specific beyer figure for a horse, you can find someone who will question it, one way or the other

and the reasons for why the figure comes back that way can be spun just like any other statistic...

i have my reservations about using the figures...i seem to have trouble with the theory that the horse ran a 58 last race, how could he have run a 78 today? or, the horse he beat (horse a) ran a 58 last race, so that's the figure he runs, therefore the speed figure for horse b must be calculated off of horse a...

i do however appreciate you taking the time to explain how these figures are calculated most of the time

I'm a Beyer user but I sort of agree with you, Phil. That's why I don't use t-graphs or rags. Just tell me the speed - i'll do the rest of the handicapping. The BSFs are better than those figs in that respect, though, and since I don't have the time to make my own figs I rely on the Beyer guys to use their best judgment.

I agree, but I'm glad, because it isn't all that tough to capitalize on it. Sometimes I'm wrong and the Beyer guy is right, but the public is betting the Beyer, so when I'm right I see it on the tote.

so true, ah for the good old days before the beyers were in the form

It was either the above OR Mint Lane getting 5 points (or whatever) higher than he'd run previously? Is that right?

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

The angst of the quantifier.

Actually, I was only talking about the last race in that post.

Why does he lose five lengths automatically simply because of his post? Does running style matter? Does Giacomo lose the same amount as Big Brown?

Anybody who saw his Tesio knew he ran a huge race there. I don't care what the figure came up on that race (86). [I didn't have a cent on him or the winner on Saturday, however.]

Agree on this, and one of the things I've noticed is horses who ran a good race in allowance company stepping up to stakes ranks often don't fit on Beyers despite being legitimate threats to win, and I think part of it is the self-fulfilling prophecy the Beyers have become (i.e., assigning a figure based on what it "should" be classwise).