SUCKER BETS---(part 26)
(continued from Part 25) by Joe Takach

I once questioned the starter at Santa Anita about this situation and his exact reply was “The best horse will still win”.
What???????????????
How’s that for race track management “Suit-speak”?
It is painfully obvious that if the starting gate is not moved forward every time the rails are moved out, the final times of the races are positively incorrect and are much slower.
So if you ignore or don’t have access to every “rails out” position on the Southern California circuit for every day going back at least 3 years, you are “in a world of hurt” when handicapping any turf race. The subscribers of my DAILY SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA HORSES TO WATCH are the only players on Southern California circuit that have accurate daily “rails out” information dating back to April 2001.
Accurate????
Aren’t the Equibase charts totally accurate when they list the “rails out” position on one of their charts?
Yes and no!
Even if you keep your own Equibase charts for the Southern California circuit, they too are inaccurate when it comes to the 6 ½ furlong Santa Anita hillside course! There are only 3 “rails out” positions on the downhill sprint course, namely 0, 7, and 14 feet out.
The Equibase charts only list the main track “rails out” position.
The rails have never been out 24 or 30 feet on the downhill course because of its extreme narrowness at some junctures. You couldn’t possibly funnel 10 or more horses into those multiple tight downhill turns, as there would be serious traffic jams not to mention many injuries for both horse and rider. This is why when the rails are out 7 and 14 feet over the downhill course, the far outside horses are immediately scratched if there are no scratches to their inside.
So how does the DAILY SCHTW know this serious omission in the official Equibase charts?
Long ago I questioned the official starter as to the downhill “rail positions” and was very strangely offered the truth. There were only 3 “rail positions” of 0, 7, and 14 feet out with no 24 or 30 feet designations.
I nearly went into shock because I couldn’t remember any “racetrack suit” ever offering me the “truth” to a direct question in over 40 years on the track!
From that day forward and to this very day, a staff member of the DAILY SCHTW on track that afternoon will literally walk up to the far end of the downhill course near the dirt crossover and “empirically” make the visual determination of 0, 7, or 14 feet out. It ain’t hard to do. This information is contained in our DAILY SCHTW service, so our clients are never in the dark as to any rail position at either Santa Anita, Del Mar or Hollywood Park.
In Part 25 of this series I stated that you should always favor horses closest to the rail (hedge) unless there is a negative inside bias. I promised you an explanation of a negative turf rail bias.
Here we go.
Let’s say the rail is out 30 feet and the inside is the best over this specific course (which is usually the case on any firm and dry grass course). However, it rains overnight before the next day’s card. The wetness is not enough to cancel turf racing and move the races to the dirt, but enough for track maintenance to move the rails back inwards to zero feet.
Since rain runs down hill, one would assume that when the rails are at zero, the inside is the softest of all paths. If you said that makes sense, you’re very correct.
While the inside was the place to be on a dry track with the rails out 30 feet, after the rain and movement of the rails back to zero, suddenly the inside becomes a “bog” and the very last place you want to be running your horse. He’ll only be spinning his wheels until he gets off the deep inside and moves outward to firmer ground. Though he’ll be losing ground, he’ll get compensated and run better because he can grab the surface instead of slipping and possibly injuring himself.
I can’t possibly go over every scenario where the bias will change when rails move in or out. You have to pay attention to each individual day, take notes and make the compensating changes to your handicapping.
In our above situation where the wet inside was horrible, suppose that an even-money favorite got his clock cleaned that day. He ended up a well-beaten 6th after breaking from the 1 or 2 hole and forced to run over the deep inside for half of the race. The negative running bias he was subjected to that afternoon might have been the culprit producing the loss and not the horse himself!
The very next time this beaten favorite runs, he could be totally dismissed by the betting public because they didn’t take that negative turf rail into consideration! They lost their money the last time they wagered on him and assume that he’s going the wrong way! More often than not, he’s just fine and the victim of circumstances.
Good turf horses are not like 10K claimers. They are not “in and outers”. Their performances are more consistent because for the most part at all class levels, they are more racing sound than dirt horses. When they run a really bad race, only5 things are usually possible---they showed up in the paddock with a new “physical ailment”, they ran against a bias, they caught legitimate “trouble” during the running of the race, they actually did get injured during the race, or the connections “stiffed” the horse.
The fact of a bias beating me early on in my turf-playing career didn’t take all that long to solidify in my head. I once overheard a couple of handicappers dismiss a horse I thought to be the best bet on the card. One remarked to the other that “so and so” never picked up his feet last out. Of course he didn’t, he caught a bad turf rail and ran in quicksand! I knew how deep and giving that inside turf course was that specific day and capitalized!
The crowd must have thought like the gullible guys that I overheard. My horse went off at a fat 12-1! He won for fun---that quicksand actually enhanced his overall conditioning by “legging him up”. When he ran on a firm course, he performed normally.
If you can follow and properly interpret the “rails in and out” and biases changing with them, you will cash big win mutuels on a very consistent basis.
Without this essential information, you’re likely to make a “sucker bet”!

PART 27----MORE “SUCKER” BETS

© Joe Takach 2006