Form Based Ratings

[Trilobite]

I spent most of this week coding software to download any race-card and give each horse a rating based on the form from past results. I would like your input to see if this method of rating can be improved upon. What i am doing for now is giving points for the following : Placed @ <= to todays Class = 1 pt Won @ <= to todays Class = 3 pt Placed @ todays Distance = 2 pt Placed @ todays Distance Plus 1f = 2 pt Placed @ todays Distance Minus 1f = 1 pt (stepping up in trip) Won @ todays Distance = 3 pt Won @ todays Distance Plus 1f = 2 pt Won @ todays Distance Minus 1f = 1 pt (stepping up in trip) (The above only score if the Class <= to todays race Class) Placed @ todays Course = 1 pt Won @ todays Course = 3pts (The above only score if the Class <= to todays race Class) Now the going is the hard part, as there are many differing official Goings written. But for now i have made a look up table and split the Going into 3 types: My_good = all the Good or better Goings My_soft = all the Softs or worse Goings My_standard = all the Standard Goings So, i give 5 pts for a Place @ todays Going and 8 pts for a Win. Again, no score if result was not at todays Class or Less. For now i have set the software to only do any results from the end of 2005 up-wards. ? To try and make the ratings fair i have calculated the rating as a % based on how many results were done. So a horse running every week isn't at an advantage from a lightly run one. Then i take the Trainer Stat for the course, add the Win & Place % together and Add that to the form rating. Then do the same for the Jockey Stat. This then becomes the Form Rating for each horse in the race. Testing this is interesting, but i want to know what you think about how i have set things out so far ? Would you do anything else or do the pts differently etc ? Ive included a basic spreadsheet of my testing the past couple of days so you can see.

[robert99]

Re: Form Based Ratings T, Basically this is a good and sound way to go. Your very top horse scores 17? points. Do you mean >= ? else a horse only winning a seller can score 6? -whatever, you may have not weighted class high enough in relation to C,D etc ? Horse dropping in class - nul extra points? Class definitions can be unreliable for different "class" courses. Even Gr1 races are of huge class variation. Horse stepping up in distance can be a plus but is mostly a negative. You have to look at past form to see which. Same horse dropping back. Duplication of points if same trainer and jockey and course win points. The trainer input is already taken into account with horse's past form points. The jockey issue is probably similar duplication but again the trainer has decided which rider to put up in the past and where to run. So nothing new to add to today's race. Firm ground horses can do badly on yielding ground but do OK on heavy.