Wow Hobie and Linny, thanks! Clears up much, does create more questions but need time to digest what you’ve said.
Counting backwards from the finish line was a big help.
I have heard that my OTB offers a seminar of some sort on this, but I have yet to get the details.
Thanks again so much!
AB
The most common conditions are lifetime conditions:
Maidens (never won a race)
Never won 2 races lifetime (NW2L)
Never won 3 races lifetime (NW3L)
Never won 4 races lifetime (NW4L)
Of course its easier for a horse to run against horses with similar achievements - a maiden is obviously at a disadvantage in a race against horses that have won 4 or 5 races in their life.
There are also conditions called “beaten conditions” - non winners of a race in 6 months (NW/6 mo), non winners of 2 races in 6 months (NW2/6 mo) and so on. These are just the basics, there are more conditions to be found in the condition book. But a horse who has won 3 races in the past 6 months is considered a “tougher” horse than a horse who is eligible NW/6 months, even if they race for the same claiming price.
When a horse has run thru its conditions it has to run ‘wide open’… against the toughest horses for that claiming price. Oftentimes a horse is competitive against condition horses but cant compete against the wide open horses - hence the sales tag.
Horses have so many starts to remain eligible to have a stall at the track and to race there. Here a horse must be 1-2-3 or 4th at least once every 8 starts once they start for a $5k tag (or less elsewhere), unless a maiden - maidens get 10 starts to be at least 4th once they run for the $5k tag.
This make it more confusing?
Jessi
Thanks for the information Linny, I somehow forgot about horses putting their tongues over the bit, even though I have had this problem with mine on occasion…
I have a Daily Racing Form on past performance for my OTTB, and have no idea how to read it. any help out there? It’s in PDF and I can’t copy and attach it here…
What it means is that the horse has 28 Dosage points in its first four generations from chefs who are in the various categories. 10 points are from chefs whose offspring excel at classic distances; 8 points from chefs whose offspring excel at sprint distances, 4 points from chefs whose offspring excel at intermediate distances like a mile; 4 points from the solid chefs, and 2 points from the professional, stamina laden producers.
The index, worked out by the formula on the Roman site, comes out to 1.55 or closer to the classic distances of just over a mile than to the sprint speed of less than a mile.
The CD means that on a scale from +2 (brilliant) to -2 (professional) the horse is just over 1/4 of the way to a pure sprinter, based on sire line speed versus stamina. That is a stamina laden profile for an American horse in the 21st century.
The point of dosage is to help determine in what distance a breeding is likely to produce competitive race speed.
Generally works a measured in furlongs. Occassionally 2yo’s will have some 2f works but generally you see 3,4,5,6 and even 7f works. Certain trainers have patterns that they use. The great Allen Jerkens (Hall of Famer, defeated Secretariat 2x during his 3yo season, with different horses) will use long (6 or 7f) works. Trainers who apprenticed with Jerkens often show the same tendency.
Hobie Cat or Xctrygirl work with the horses directly and could give more details on the “why” they use certain distances. As a handicapper I mainly look for frequent, steady works. The clocking of works is a very inexact science and I don’t count on them to be exact to the 1/5 second. It is nice to see a horse who have been laid off show some speed (fast works) in the morning. To me it says he’s sharp and still interested in running.
The jocks pull the top pair of goggles down as they get dirty…they keep pulling them down as needed, or til they run out. 
You can kinda see it in this pic.
OOOOooooooo this one is much better.
Hoping final turn allows hotlinks… if they dont work let me know!
Jessi
Edited to add:Edited to give a better explanation: The jockeys put all the pairs of goggles on at once when they go in the gate, usually 5 or so. The goggles are very thin and flexible, not like scuba goggles or anything lol. Then as they get dirty the jock grabs the top pair and yanks them down below his chin, revealing the clean pair underneath. Hopefully they dont run out of goggles before the race is over! But they usually have a good idea how many they need. They use more pairs of goggles when the track is horribly muddy or if they have a horse that is known to be behind horses early on in the race… eating dirt for the first 1/4 - 1/2 mile. It takes a lot of talent/coordination… I could never get the hang of it messing around in the morning schooling races. Balance weight on balls of toes, reins and stick in one hand (the same hand you are steering with), grabbing just the top pair out of 5 or so pair of goggles and yanking them quickly down w/o dragging the ones below halfway down your face, totally obscuring your vision and impairing your breathing to the point you start gasping for air, inhaling all that dirt that is getting thrown back on you. All of this while going 30-35 mph on a TB. Oh, and you dont pull your goggles down with the reins in one hand and the stick in the other… at least I couldnt - only time I tried it I almost poked my eye out with the stick! Back in my younger (and much braver) days…
Racing 101 Question 
Will someone list commonly measured timed distances, and what is a good time for a horse to work over that distance? Such as… Going a mile in … is a respectable time, but … is a really fast time? Thanks!
Hey Vineyridge (and eveyone attending VR’s brief rundown on dosage class
)! Here’s Blush for educational purposes:
Her CD is exactly 0.0, and her DI is 1.0. She had 27 starts, won 3. Her minimum winning distance was 1 mile, and her max was 1 1/16th mile.
I dont recall ever seeing a horse race in a bitless bridle but I’m not sure if there is a rule about it.
Tongue ties keep the horse from getting the tongue over the bit and/or swallowing his tongue.
It’s not really a question about good numbers or bad numbers.
It’s more what distance a particular horse’s breeding indications that s/he would have an aptitude for. The higher the number, the more sprinter bred the horse is.
In your example, the horse had 6 brilliant chefs, whose offspring performed best at distances of a mile or less (I think that’s the cutoff, but dosage is based on European racing where longer races than here are more common). It had 4 classic chefs, which would be horses who won races at classic distances. In this country, that would be between 1 1/16 miles up to 1 1/2 miles.
The calculations are very complicated and mathematical, and the assignments, I think, have to do with a particular chef’s winning offspring’s actual races and distances. So a computer will take the six brilliant and 4 classic chefs and come up with a number that is slightly weighted toward brilliant. How to figure is on the chef de race site.
It is possible to have a negative DI, but that’s extremely rare in America.
Personally I like to look at the CD, which is center of distribution.
With 0 to start from, you can go positive toward brilliant ( sprinter speed) or negative towards professional (stamina).
The Main Track at aqu is 9 furlongs with a chute for a 1 turn mile. Belmont is the only 1 1/2 mile track in the US. saratoga is also 9f but has only a 7f chute.
Originally posted by Linny:
. A trainer might tell a rider to “let him gallop to the 5/16 pole, ask him for a bit more, then set him down at the 1/4 pole.” Here the trainer is asking the rider to let the horse build up to the workout speed before the point where the timed workout begins. It gives the horse a “running start.”
Does this make it worse? 
Sometimes knowing a little bit is more confusing than nothing.
What lengths of workouts do you note? I guess what I am trying to ask is what is the significance of these various workout lengths?
Hope I am asking that right…come back if you understand what I am trying to say.
Thanks again so much.
AB
Thanks hobie cat! That will make a nice, easy to locate, informational topic.
Can anyone else think of some often asked questions that can be answered here? Might as well get them on one thread, for easy access.
Hey foundationmare - like the way I hijacked your thread? Sorry, I hope you got the information you were looking for.
Thanks Linny! Looks like my girl was a “claimer” for 4 years!
Why is dosage important? HOw many peeps really buy off on that? Seems to me if one confines expectations based on pedigree, well you can see how that is faulty, no?
Dosage tries to give you an idea based on the horses in the pedigree what the horse should have aptitude for, short, long, mile, and so on. It does not have the capacity to take into account physical aspects of the horse… such as the horse with a bad knee or ankle that prefers to go one turn (as two turns gets to stinging too much) or the horse with a narrow airway/ paralyzed flap that cant go as far as his pedigree suggests. And we all know there are no guarantees when it comes to breeding animals. Just probabilities.
Do you pay attention to Beyer speed figures? I do, it is one of the numbers I can actually understand, but I know many don’t. What gives with that?
Personally I dont give a whole lot of credence to Beyer speed figs, because they go back and adjust them if needed. They are determined by people, not computer calculations. Case in point was a few years ago… some horse was running in the Derby, hadnt run in the big usual preps, took more circumspect route, and his speed figs at the other, smaller tracks were way lower than his fellow Derby entrants even tho he was considered of a comparable class. They went back and refigured his speed figs to be more comparable. This came directly from a handicapper who worked at the time for the daily racing form. So, my point is, they arent engraved in stone. I am thinking 97 or 98 was that Derby?
Fractions are equated with various distances along the track, pole xyz, no? Which of those are important and why? Please address as though you are talking to third grader, I just dn’t get it.
A mile is divided into 8 furlongs. You have poles that mark those furlongs. The one right before the wire (dealing only in furlong poles for the moment) is the 1/8 pole. Then you count backwards around the track… the idea is that from that pole is the distance to the finish line. So then you have the 1/4 pole, the 3/8 pole, the 1/2, 5/8, 3/4, and 7/8. Roughly, the 1/4 pole is at the head of the lane, the 3/8 is on the end of the backstretch going into the turn, the half and 5/8 are on the backside (5/8 is across from finish line on a mile track), the 3/4 pole is the beginning of the backstretch, and the 7/8 is a furlong after (to the right of) the finish line.
A bulleted work is fastest at given distance, track, what?
The fastest work at that track, that distance, that day. Each day the fastest 3/8, 1/2, 5f, etc times for each track are “bulleted.” They are then ranked in order for the # of horses worked. For example, if you look here at the 5F works you will see two of our horses who worked in company, Bowler and Seattle Theme. They had the 2nd and 4th fastest works of nine horses to work 5f that day. Seattle Theme ended up about 6 lengths in front of Bowler (usual estimation is 1/5 sec = 1 length). They are both 3 yos, Bowler by Boston Harbor($25k stud fee at the time), Seattle Theme (a filly) by a son of Seattle Slew standing in TX named Seattle Pattern($1K?). My point here being that ST is a VERY nice filly who won her first start and has been very competitive allowance company, I feel she is stakes quality. Bowler is a maiden who has run twice (poorly). It was good for both of them, gave him something to concentrate on and work towards, and gave her something to tighten her up for next race against some VERY nice fillies.
If you want to get into the 1/16 poles…(we wont mention the 70 yard pole, heck some tracks even have a 40 yard pole!) here is a list of poles, in order of running a one mile race BACKWARDS. In otherwords, from the finish line CLOCKWISE around the track (the wrong way). Because the fraction always represents the distance from that pole to the finish line (which is always the same place in front of the grandstand, almost the end/right of the stretch).
Here goes (please NOTE this is a ONE mile track which represents the majority of tracks, but there ARE tracks larger and smaller than one mile!):
finsh line
1/16
1/8
3/16
1/4
5/16
3/8
7/16
1/2
9/16 (or 4 1/2)
5/8
11/16 (or 5 1/2)
6 f
13/15 (or 6 1/2, not a real common one)
7/8
15/16 (not real common either)
Ok are you bored now?
Jessi
I claimed a horse for one of our posters, Lord HelpUs, whose family had bred and sold him as a young horse. His name is Commanche Trail, and he was sent out to be the rabbit in the 94 (?) Travers for stablemate Tabasco Cat. Unfortunately it didnt work as planned, CT was in front early but eased, the winner was the gray Holy Bull. Tabasco Cat was third I think, and I cannot for the life of me remember who was second… we claimed him in 98 or 99 when he was an old man, he is now retired in Southern Pines. He has a page on my old website at http://members.aol.com/jesspzro/ct.html and YES that is me on him for his first cross rail with a rider…
Here is a blurb from the article:
In the 1994 Travers Stakes, Commanche Trail led the field through fast early fractions of :22.83 and :46.35 for a half-mile while being used to set the race up for a victory by stablemate Tabasco Cat. The tactic did not work as Commanche Trail was pulled up after a mile and Holy Bull went on to win at 4-5 odds, with Tabasco Cat third. Commanche Trail, a son of Copelan bought by trainer D. Wayne Lukas for $115,000 as the co-sale topper at Fasig-Tipton Kentucky’s 1992 select yearling sale, went on to win two stakes, including a grade III event, before dropping into relative obscurity
I dont think that adding 4 seconds to a track record would get you anything meaningful. Here, our track record is 1.08 and something for 6F. Right now they are racing 6F in 1:14 and 1:15 because of the deep track from the freeze/thaw cycle we have been having. Nobody has worked 6f in past couple days, but the 5f works have been 1.06-1.07 and change. Remember, the further the horse works the more it means if it can maintain a 12 second furlong for example. A :36 3/8 isnt nearly as impressive as a 1:12 for 6 furlongs, to me at least.
We will work a a horse who has not run in 30 days about 1-5 days before the race. Distance and timing depends on the horse - a young strong horse who is a handful will often work 1/4 the day before the race, we tell the jock “blow them out down the lane.” An older horse who is not as sound and more laid back will work 1/2 4-5 days before the race. This gives the horse time to recover and start feeling ‘on the muscle’ again. If we know the horse is doing to go out and throw a bullet work we will work 3/8 and gallop out a half (to the 7/8 pole) as this is less stressful than working a bullet half. We have had a couple horses that blow out or gallop the morning of a race (we race nights here)… mostly mental cases that are otherwise too difficult to control, esp in the gate. We had one gray horse that would track the mornings of his races, blowing out down the lane, and then coming off the track the rider would jump off and he would be walked back from the track with a person on each side of his head, with him kicking 6’ in the air. Psycho. But otherwise he was unmanageable in the gate. He kicked me in the face once, bit my other half in the face leaving a scar on his cheek… but I digress.
Young horses who havent raced will start on a weekly work schedule once they have galloped at least 90 days and been open galloping (2 minute miles). It will be something like
1/8
1/4
1/4 if needed
3/8
3/8
1/2
3/8 if needed
5/8
1/2
6 f (maybe)
3/8
Race
Of course a couple of these races will be from the gate so the horse can be “okayed from the starting gate” in order to race. Some tracks have the morning starting gate in the 6f chute, others have it in the 1/4 chute. As a trainer you have to keep in mind that you want the young horse to learn to work past the finish line and take that into consideration when planning your gate works. For example, with the gate at the 6f chute here in the morning you have to either work a horse 6f to go past the wire or work 3/8 to finish at the turn, I dont care to work them so that they are pulling up right before the wire. Older horses know where the finish line is.
Part of training is knowing how hard to train your horse to keep them at their best, fitness, soundness, and happiness. That includes the distance you (as trainer) choose to work them, how fast you want them to work, and the timing of the works. They dont go as fast in the mornings as they do in a race. Did I forget anything? 
Jessi
Beyer Speed Figures (BSF’s) are one of many different numbeers assigned to each performance by a Tb. They are the most widely disseminated as they are published in the Daily Racing Form. They are not set in stone. Beyer and his squad of minions DO adjust them, as Hobie Cat mentioned. They don’t always account for variables like wind patterns. They do sup[posedly account for wide trips BUT don’t be fooled. Sometimes the rail is “dead” and the outside trip is better! As a handicapper I do look at them but only in looking for general patterns.
For example, let’s say horse’s last 5 BSF’s are 76/79/60/78/80 and today’s race is a 6 furlong $16k claimer. The races represented by those #'s were all at this class and they were mostly good (wins, or within 2 lengths of the winner) performances, except that 60. I now have to figure out why he raced so badly that day. Was it muddy, did he get a poor start, was the pace too fast? Lets say that all the other races in the sequence were at 1 1/8 miles and that bad showing was at 6 furlongs. Today’s race is 6f. Maybe he doesn’t run his best at 6f. Now I have to see if he’s ever run well at 6f.
To me they are a guide, a starting point for other research.
Handicappers and horsemen break races up into furlongs or 1/8’s. Hobie explained the position of the poles. The are measured BACKWARD from the finish. Remember that at most tracks the FINISH line doesn’t change, the starting place does. Six furlong races start at the 6 furlong pole. They pass the 5/8, the 1/2, the 3/8, the 1/4 and then the 1/8 pole as they race. When horse train most trainers clock the individual fractions by furlong to see “how” they got the distance. The poles tell the trainer (on the ground, or maybe a pony) when to click the watch. They are also used to get your bearings on the track. A trainer might tell a rider to “let him gallop to the 5/16 pole, ask him for a bit more, then set him down at the 1/4 pole.” Here the trainer is asking the rider to let the horse build up to the workout speed before the point where the timed workout begins. It gives the horse a “running start.”
Does this make it worse? Sometimes knowing a little bit is more confusing than nothing.
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