Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

[jbelfior]

Blue Grass post position winners (yes, I know it includes several years of polytrack but this is from 1937).

1. 13
2. 12
3. 10
4. 14
5. 10
6.  4
7.  3
8.  5
9.  2
10. 2
11. 2
12. 0
13. 1
14. 0

So of the 78 BG winners,76% have won from post 5 and in. Pretty close to the 76% winners from post 1-4 so far this meet.

Good Luck,
Joe B.

[kmart4503]

A comment for most of the post position numbers being thrown out:

Not sure that purely wins by post position is a great indicator.  Perhaps, wins as a percentage of starters from each post might be more meaningful.

Just my 2 cents.

[TGJB]

Absolutely. Better yet, ROI of each post. ITM also worth looking at.

But basically, post matters most on races with a short run to the turn. Don\'t have to be Sherlock Holmes.

That part of the seminar writes itself. Other parts, not so much.

[miff]

K,

True,but believe you will find the result close to the same if every post had the same number of starters.

Long string for a basic point,outside posts are nfg in two turn races generally, more so with a short run to the first turn.

BC Pre-entries in 4 days.

Mike

P.S. JB said that a minute ago

[jbelfior]

Mike: What\'s the definition of an \"outside post?\"  6 and out? 7? 8?  The point from the long thread is that there appears to be a huge dropoff at KEE as you go past 4.

Good Luck,
Joe B.

[miff]

Joe,

Depends on field size and the ability of an outside posted horse to make early position avoiding getting caught wide.Cant put a post position number on it, tend to look over the field and how a race appears on paper before tossing outside horses.

Mike

[SoCalMan2]

miff Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Joe,
>
> Depends on field size and the ability of an
> outside posted horse to make early position
> avoiding getting caught wide.Cant put a post
> position number on it, tend to look over the field
> and how a race appears on paper before tossing
> outside horses.
>
> Mike


This just occurred to me, why not do the stats from the outside in rather than the rail out?  For example, what is the percentage of the outside horse?  One from the outside, two from the outside, etc?  Every race has that, so there will always be an outside horse.  That may be a more elucidating way to run these stats, no?

[horsegoer]

Why can\'t it be that just about 76% of the time the better horse was in post 1-4?

[Molesap]

Because if 95% of the horses were from posts 1-4, that would not be very good would it?  If there were 10 horses in every race, it would make more sense in general. Or if 80% of the favorites were from those posts that would not look so hot either. In addition, I think you need you have to consider the gate number versus the post position - they are not the same thing. If there is a full field of 14 in a race and there are 14 stalls, every horse loads up in each one, but if there are six horses, they might skip the first couple of gates and load the first horse in gate #4, but that horse will be listed as post position #1. Might make a difference.