A Harness Racing Data Insider’s Exit Interview

[tmgreg]

Greetings fellow harness racing enthusiasts! I wrote the following article late last year while still involved in the standardbred industry. The piece discusses my career in harness racing, where the game is at today and its outlook for the future. Although it never found an audience or outlet for publication, I though the content was relevant to share with those still invested in the sport. I look forward to seeing your comments.

Download PDF article here

[Any1Left]

I wish i could write as well as you can but here is my truth,     Everything you talked about is so ABC to me and most people reading this have no concept of what you are talking about but its dead on,      Your article is exactly what real players talk about but they are all gone but you left out a very important fact that someone is corrupting the pools with huge money going on horses that leave well and that makes the rake even tougher to beat and you have to look for closers because they become value an eighth of a mile into the race,         I never thought that carryovers would be a losing bet for the pro but all carryovers do is eliminate the rake and with the racing so biased on speed and small prices carryovers are nothing special even though it better than no carryover,       Send your article to drivers and management and most likely no one will read it or understand it but all you need is one to understand,    When i first wrote about the death of the game i had one of the big posters say that i have spoken to many gamblers and no one is quitting and this is one of the better writers on here and last join in and talk about stupidity and you will fit in,    i can go on and on but like the guys who have no clue would say it a dead game laddies without telling us why.

[Any1Left]

The one thing i will give you credit for is that you never brought up drugs and most here think thats the biggest issue and yes it is a sick problem but horsemen could care less and gamblers factor it into handicapping and drugs have always been an issue but with movement tracks like the bigm had in years past drugs were not a huge issue because drug horse are almost always up front and if the track has give good luck to those new people who think 2-5 is a good price,      The new form of huge cheating by giving up needless holes absolutely makes the game boring and i see people producing new children in PEI that will keep that train going.

[Billsmafia]

Great job! The piece is very well thought out and certainly makes you reflect on the direction that harness racing is going (not a good thing).

I'm intrigued by and strongly support two of the suggestions--the use of a variety of distances when writing the races and the need for larger fields. Watch the races at Vincennes from Paris if you have any doubts--fields often with 16 horses and many different distances on a race card. Parisians and French gamblers and sports fans love harness racing and support it. Crowds on the apron for every race are reminiscent of a different era in harness racing in the US and Canada.

Large fields require longer distance races to level the playing field. This idea doesn't mesh with half mile race tracks. How big a loss would that be? Racing at Yonkers, Saratoga, Monticello, Buffalo, Batavia, Northfield, Maine tracks and Canadian half mile "B" tracks has become unwatchable.

Thanks for your exit interview. Your insights and comments are right on target.

[Sakit]

Greetings fellow harness racing enthusiasts! I wrote the following article late last year while still involved in the standardbred industry. The piece discusses my career in harness racing, where the game is at today and its outlook for the future. Although it never found an audience or outlet for publication, I though the content was relevant to share with those still invested in the sport. I look forward to seeing your comments.

Download PDF article here

well written great job!

[Any1Left]

Great job! The piece is very well thought out and certainly makes you reflect on the direction that harness racing is going (not a good thing).

I'm intrigued by and strongly support two of the suggestions--the use of a variety of distances when writing the races and the need for larger fields. Watch the races at Vincennes from Paris if you have any doubts--fields often with 16 horses and many different distances on a race card. Parisians and French gamblers and sports fans love harness racing and support it. Crowds on the apron for every race are reminiscent of a different era in harness racing in the US and Canada.

Large fields require longer distance races to level the playing field. This idea doesn't mesh with half mile race tracks. How big a loss would that be? Racing at Yonkers, Saratoga, Monticello, Buffalo, Batavia, Northfield, Maine tracks and Canadian half mile "B" tracks has become unwatchable.

Thanks for your exit interview. Your insights and comments are right on target.

They tried the added distance at WEG and when i asked why the stoppage they responded that the public showed no interest and it was a stupid answer i expected.

[Any1Left]

well written great job!

I thought it was ABC but i might be wrong or i am wrong because i need to understand that to most people reading this he brings out things i assume everyone knows but that is for sure wrong on my part,    Nothing can improve as long as Great CANADIAN CASINO and WEG are involved because both have non gamblers running the show and to tell them that you need to get rid of computer assisted wagering and let the pools dwindle and the come up with ideas to make them grow is not something they grasp,   Great CANADIAN CASINO has poker at WOODBINE and other casinos in ONTARIO and takes a 20 rake from poker so anything to do with them is useless becuse two of their tracks have already close being FRASER DOWNS and HASTINGS and Flamboro and Georgian are near the end.    In Pennsylvania they allowed a 35 percent rake and POCONO and the Meadows said that sound fair so they for sure have no understanding about gaming and the BIG M  just has to go back and watch any card from 1990 and they will see real racing but today they have garbage racing and seem not to care and when they came up with no holes the horsemen who run racing made the decision not to oblige and no  panic button has ever been pushed and slots for them would be so wrong because they shown me their true colours and yes GURAL  is better than other but what is that saying,   Saying Putin is better the Hittler is a for sure but its sort of the same thing as he is still one of the worst people ever to grace this world,   Also racing Media PAULICK REPORT is a complete joke that for sure is bad for racing and never fixed one thing.

[Papillon]

I wish i could write as well as you can but here is my truth,     Everything you talked about is so ABC to me and most people reading this have no concept of what you are talking about but its dead on,      Your article is exactly what real players talk about but they are all gone but you left out a very important fact that someone is corrupting the pools with huge money going on horses that leave well and that makes the rake even tougher to beat and you have to look for closers because they become value an eighth of a mile into the race,         I never thought that carryovers would be a losing bet for the pro but all carryovers do is eliminate the rake and with the racing so biased on speed and small prices carryovers are nothing special even though it better than no carryover,       Send your article to drivers and management and most likely no one will read it or understand it but all you need is one to understand,    When i first wrote about the death of the game i had one of the big posters say that i have spoken to many gamblers and no one is quitting and this is one of the better writers on here and last join in and talk about stupidity and you will fit in,    i can go on and on but like the guys who have no clue would say it a dead game laddies without telling us why.

the bolded is why handle is "retail" dropping off rapidly--but handle has been rendered meaningless as long as slot welfare is propping up the entire industry

it's called betting after the bell ....that is allowed otherwise there would be a massive handle loss

[Calhoun]

Greetings fellow harness racing enthusiasts! I wrote the following article late last year while still involved in the standardbred industry. The piece discusses my career in harness racing, where the game is at today and its outlook for the future. Although it never found an audience or outlet for publication, I though the content was relevant to share with those still invested in the sport. I look forward to seeing your comments.

Download PDF article here

Nice article.

But you left out the most important factor.

You include discussion of TrackMaster. But what you didn't go deeper into TM. You should have.

TrackMaster is owned by Equibase. Equibase is owned by The Jockey Club, old line BlueBloods and TRA (Race Tracks). 

These are the 100 PEOPLE WHO CONTROL HORSE RACING DATA.

Every single program you've ever read comes from these same people.

You want a DRF for 1 card... $6. You want data files to do analysis?  Tremendously expensive and they for sh!t.

I'm no data scientist like you but I know a few. They all say that there need to be 3 types of files that would include every last line item for all racing.

But TJC/Racetracks don't allow that. Shortsightedly, they squeeze every nickel because it's a mature to declining market the way it's run.

Look at the data available for baseball. Think about the data crunched by FanDuel, et al to provide live odds.  Your brokerage website data, etc...

DATA SHOULD BE FREE.

[Any1Left]

the bolded is why handle is "retail" dropping off rapidly--but handle has been rendered meaningless as long as slot welfare is propping up the entire industry

it's called betting after the bell ....that is allowed otherwise there would be a massive handle loss

  I am really happy you post here because you are rare on this form and understand this game,   Years ago  i met a man in California that was one of the great handicappers on the planet and his name was jimmy the hat and i think he might have some videos online and Jimmy told me and 10-15 years ago that putting the tough puzzle of betting races was getting to easy and that would make him drop his bets because field were to short and prices were getting smaller every year,   Jimmy was featured on a breeders cup show a few times and was asked why he dominated the pik 6 pool in california like no one else and he just used the hard work theory and one of the funny things for me was every time i invested into his tickets it was a disaster and everyone i spoke with had great results but one day Jimmy told me that the rules always changed in gaming and he adjusted to the changes but new changes that were happening and payoffs being way to short that  it might be time to quit and that threw me into shock and i have now not spoken to him in years but he saw the this before i could see it.         Now getting back to what you were talking about PAPILLON i am really not sure how they are beating the system but for sure you are 100 percent right on money showing up after the bell and no gambler i have spoken to thinks anything else but i have heard many ways of how this is happening and it is happening,   This guys article brings nothing new to me or people i know ut he does a great job talking about it,   Dana Parham and many others have closed up shop when Elite came in because they could not compete and lets be honest for a group that bets 40 percent of money bet and claims it extracts value from seeing all moneys bet and seeing underlay after underlay win at all trot tracks it shocks me how they are not been investigated because they are not getting value from FLAMBORO WESTERN FAIR MOHAWK NORTHFIELD OR any harness track with winners dropping 80 percent in odds at times leaving a gate,       20 years ago fixing this game was about lowering rake and the drug issue getting to strong and its shocking to me that those issues are minor compared to the huge issues today,    Dead money has to be at a certain level for there to be a chance and that might never happen again.  I remember knowing many high end gamblers who posted on this site and all are gone and never coming back and this morning seeing this guys post about something that mattered was shocking because its been a long time and i thank him for his post.