[AusRace] The Mile Rate

[Tony Moffat]

This calculation is an enduring part of harness racing. The race time *
1609/ race distance produces a value that may fascinate the harness racing
crowd.

Henk De Goold wasn't a fan of horses as such. He had a not very
complimentary name for them (read his books for more detail, and his
articles in The Age)

 Henk did all right when he bet on horses though, harness racing first then
gallops later in his life.

 He bought the idea of 'clumping' (price aggregation) with him when he went
galloping. This was the collection of prices around a horse other than the
favourite. Henk figured that nobody had a clue when that occurred. There was
the fav solely because it had won a few recently, or had been written about
as such, or the broadcasters had drummed it up. Then several points longer
were other horses, 3 or so, around the 6/1 mark (this was then), then longer
prices 12/1-15/1+ horses. Reading that market Henk felt that there was
'clumping' and to him this was a sign that nobody knew a lot about the
specific chances of runners.

But Henk was big on 'mile rates' and researched and wrote several articles
about their importance. Any runner with a good mile rate score, at any time
in its form record, could be depended upon producing that score (or slightly
less but never more) and with this knowledge selections in the next race
could be made - depending on 'the clump' of course. He usually bet three to
win, saved on one, (the favourite some times) and the other two he plunged
for  a total outlay of $500 (he wrote).

Another aspect that he talked/wrote about was 'the race in the race' which
he saw/realised/considered that drivers (not horses) often raced each other.
You had the winner, of course, and behind him was a clutch of drivers who
were racing each other (eg 5th beat 8th, 3rd beat 4th) for the rite to boast
I presume (crow, in todays lingo).

The mile rate, to my tiny mind (and its way of thinking) was anomalous. Lots
of those harness races were mobile starts which causes a timing blip
straight away. Meaning when did they start in a 11 and a half furlong race
(this was then) and it most certainly wasn't 11 and half furlongs from the
finish line. However, the time was accepted as being recorded over the trip,
the time score was good, the mile rate was enormous and they are scoring up
for the next.


"Clumping" was re-invented by Malcolm Knowles in his last book (before
retirement). He called it 'bunching' and the principle is the same with the
addition of several supplementary rules. It appears to work well on selected
races.

The 'Mile Rate' has been used in several systems also. 
SRX4 Martian Queen had a raw mile rate of 94.44 (the best of the runners
with 1600m form) and 93.91 off corrected time.
SRX5 Black Jade and 3Running Bear were joint selections with Running Bear
Winning - this rating was a combination of form race distances and
ordinarily would have been excluded as a betting race.
SRX6 Winner Prince Arkheem had a recent fast 1380 time (todays race is
1400), 2nd Spritza something has been galloping the place down over less
distance though, and 3rd BadBoy McCoy also has quick times in its recent cv.
The selection was Spritza something using sensible exclusion clauses
SRX7 One Penny was the fastest but was resuming. Hiraishin next, then In
Spades ( Indian Thunder and Invincible Faith  scratched) They went one two
three.

It appears there may have been more horses than jockeys at Gunnedah today
-there is a slew of scratches and some of the races had 20 acceptances.

Cheers

Tony


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