Customer Reviews

Handicapping Speed: The Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse Sprinters

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...Someone has finally taken the next logical step beyond thecanonical work of Andrew Beyer, 1975's _Picking Winners_, and given usthe next step in looking at speed handicapping. Which is good, because of all the types of handicapping out there, Beyer's is the one that the public seized on, and it's since become so popular that Beyer's figures are published in the Daily Racing Form, and are so deadly accurate in most cases that those races which can be unlocked through their application have become unprofitable. Carroll gives us another way of looking at speed, a new take on velocity that turns the work of Broahmer and Sartin on its head, and in doing so takes the many complex calculations of _Modern Pace Handicapping_ and instead substitutes the kind of one-number handicapping ease that the crowd loves. Does it work? I don't know, I have a whole lot of fact-checking to do before i go endorsing Carroll's methods and theories. But as a book, it's a pretty good one. Carroll doesn't go over the same old racing history as most books, but instead gives us background information that we haven't seen before-- the various schools of handicapping, how the money flows, and most notably conformation, something many handicapping books steer far clear of. Most of it has nothing to do with handicapping speed, but any knowledge a player can get is knowledge he can put to use, if he knows how. A worthwhile addition to the shelf of the horseplayer, and if it works, it becomes the sixth book in the canon.

Charles Carroll knows his subject and knows how to communicate. Written in 1991, the book contains excellent insights and is a good read. It is unfortunate that neither the body of the book nor the appendix contains adequate information concerning the results of his study of the initial segment of Quarter Horse races; especially the 50 yard times that are referenced but not quantififed.

I always enjoy reading handicapping books and try to take at least one idea from each that I can use in my handicapping methodology. This just didn't give me that. I don't play quarter horses, so maybe that's where this is useful, but basically this is just another way to calculate speed figures, but the process is more simplistic than even the published figures. Bottom line- I enjoyed the read, but I don't think there is anything I can use to improve my handicapping.