Finding the Fulcrum
 

I was following another post yesterday and wanted to try to find the fulcrum of the race today.
The fulcrum contenders are 5-6-7-8-9
The 9 looks to be the best fulcrum but in the PP's is shows only one race with that pace. The 5 looks to have ran that pace in the last 4 lines
So I have the Fulcrum Horse as #5
Don

Fulcrum
 

I do it a little differently. I use the adjusted EPR numbers
Because I can't do track to track adjustments the dtv adjustments

I come up with the 8 horse

Attachment 40050


Setting the fulcrum pace of race as per Pace Makes The Race
I have the fulcrum as a 93 EPR That means I am looking for horses who have finished competitive = less than 5 BL at the second call and final time against a 93 EP


Last line for every horse TPR phase 1 numbers

Attachment 40051

Looking at this screen which is the last line for every horse.
The fastest EP is horse 1 but horse 1 is not the fulcrum because it was not competitive against at the final time.
The next highest is horse 10, but horse 10 also does not make it
because of beaten lengths at the final time, nor does the next
best horse # 2. I just will keep going down the EPR rankings till I find the horse who ran the fastest second call EPR and finished within 5 of the leaders at the second call and final time.

In this race that would land me on horse 8.
It ran a 91.5 adjusted EPR at CRC in the last line
It was 2 lengths behind so the fulcrum pace of race
in the Feb 7 race at CRC was 93.5
Now I need to see if the 93.5 competitive finish was not atypical for horse 8. and I see that it is not
Horse 8 has run competitively against a 93.5 EPR in other races
So my fulcrum in today's race is 93.5 or about a 45.2 raw

Bill

How did you get 93.5 from horse #2. Not sure why it wouldn't be 91.5 from horse #8. Are you looking for the highest EPR and LPR with no more than 5 beaten lengths from 2nd call to finish? The video you made shows using the Original Screen?
Thanks Don

This is from one of Bill V. previous posts on the subject.

The rules for the fulcrum horse were set by Michel Pizzolla who was part of the original group for a spell.

According to the book Pace Makes The Race pg, 104 M. Pizzolla

" First of all, the fulcrum pace is always taken from a horse's last pace line.
Always. This is a rule as far as I am concerned. I get comments often at
seminars about this, and I point out to the person making the comment that
since I am the person who came up with the concept of the fulcrum pace, I
am entitled to have the final say on what is or isn't a fulcrum pace ! Always
take the fulcrum from the last line. Even if a horse typically runs faster and
in its last race a runaway rhinoceros interfered with this horse causing it to
run a second call ten seconds slower than usual, use another horse: always
take the fulcrum pace from the horse's last paceline. You may ask why I am
repeating this so often and why I am so insistent about this. When I first
presented the concept of the fulcrum pace, I had several exceptions to using
the last pace line in favor of a faster second call time further back in the horses's past performance.

However. what I have found was although those techniques were better at predicting the actual pace of race
and which horse or horses would be setting that pace,
it would tend to setting faster fulcrum paces and
consequently eliminating too many legitimate contenders."

Bill V. made a video about it as well as Because I Can Jim. Site search for them and watch both.

If you don't have an original copy of Pace Makes The Race you should try to find one - makes for a great read.

All the best.

Thanks Segwin, I am using that post and the video, and it is a good post on understanding it. When I started doing a few of them, I started having problems.
Thanks

horse 2
 

Hi Don and thank you Terry
Don the 2 is not the fulcrum because it was beaten by 14



I am getting bombarded :) with emails and pms which is nice,
about why i'm using the adjusted EPRs but in the video I used the original
raw numbers

As Terry brings up RDSS has done all the phase 1 adjustments for me.
Do I know how much slower a track like CRC is than Tampa ? No
Do I know if there is a track class difference from CRC to Tampa? No
Do I know the adjustment from a 18 DTV to a 8 DTV ? No
Do I know the distance adjustments from 6.5 to 5.5 at CRC and Tampa ?
No.

But RDSS/Trackmaster does and as long as I believe what I see
( I do) why should I venture to guess what these adjustments are.

Hope that helpsIts good to ask why so always do so :)

Por
 

So after the race we learn that the pace of race was a 45.6 or 45.3 in 5's
The 8 was a none factor. What the fulcrum does show is what the
pace of race a horse can compete against. Micheal Pizzolla's method
told us a horse better be able to compete against a 93 EPR

Here is the winner # 9 Yes indeed the winner and the fulcrum pace in this race # 7 both can run competitively against a 93 (45.2 45.3) POR

Attachment 40054

Attachment 40055


Attachment 40056

Thanks Bill, So after you find the fulcrum horse, You than go through the match up. Should the fulcrum horse fall in your top 4 tiers.
Thanks
Don

Bill:

It is not clear to me what you are doing with the fulcrum after you identify it. In this write up, you find it and then don't mention it again. Are you using it like the projected pace figure in the Match Up to qualify contenders?

I have the 2nd edition of Pace Makes the Race, and the authors dropped the term "fulcrum" (as well as Michael Pizzolla) in that edition. In Handicapping Magic, Pizzolla uses the fulcrum horse as the bench mark for pace figures which are hand calculated for each horse.

Thanks

MikeB: I never knew there was a second edition and only have the first. Nice to know.

I'm not surprised he was left out of the 2nd edition as my understanding was the Doc booted him for supposedly stealing.

To my knowledge they didn't believe in the fulcrum and used Fr's from different horses to come up with the match up. I.e, the first Fr from one horse and 2nd Fr from another to come up with the match up & Dream Race.

Jimmy looked at all of a horses lines to come up with his black magic / voodoo hcp., not just the last line or a fulcrum from that line.
Mitch44

Hi Mike B and Mitch
Mike I promise to get more clear on how I use the fulcrum,Mitch brings up a few good points.
I am looking at the pace of race , but only at the second call, Mitch makes a great point because the race starts at the break and then what about the first fraction ?
The fulcrum works but I felt that of all the step for phase 1 it's probably the most problematic
The 4 authers of Pace Makes The Race , original version ,
All wrote there parts separately. But for them to include Pizzollas fulcrum helps me to use it .
Only 2 of the 4 authers updated Pace Makes The Race
Doc says he did not because although it worked Phase 1 was
a feeding ground for pirates and he didn't want his name on something that only got $6:00 horses * I repect fully disagree.
I don't know about Pizzolla ,
The remaining 2 authers updated the numbers
And took out stuff from Doc .

Anyway I promise to get a little more involved with why and how I use the fulcrum ,
GS
Bill

One story I heard was that there was a disagreement between Pizzolla on the one hand and Hambleton and Schmidt on the other hand about the use of TPR.

Pizzolla argued that adding the early and late ratings together just gave you an overall speed rating, and that using the two separately gave you more information. The other two said that the TPR was a compound rating that was more powerful than a simple speed rating.

Pizzolla went on to write "Handicapping Magic", which comes up with two separate ratings, one is speed adjusted for early pace, the other rates the final fraction adjusted for beaten lengths. Both use the fractions of the fulcrum horse as kind of projection or par, rating each horse relative to the fulcrum. The two ratings are in entirely different formats, and cannot be combined.

Fulcrum
 

Mike B

Its about 10 minutes to post time so lets see what happens

Here are the last lines for all the horses in race 7.
Its a 9.0 turf race at Turf Paradise. For now lets just look for the fulcrum
Looking at the last lines, the only horses that qualify are horses
3 and 8 because they were less than 5 bl at the 2nd call and final time .

Attachment 40020

Here are the TPR numbers
Who has the fastest ( best ) EPR
Its horse 3 withan 87

Attachment 40019

now as long as the 87 EPR is not aberrant for horse 3 , than the 3 would be the fulcrum - I would expect about a 111 EPR in this race,
although 9 furlongs

More to come ,

okay I will post up the official result chart
 

This points to the 3 being the fulcrum and the 2nd call pace of race
being about 111

Now I snapped this as the race was being run' I just ran ,

Attachment 40021


Look who !! The 3 battled for the lead right from the break,
It had the lead in the second fraction but it was dead tight at the second call,
The 3 was right there.. The pace of race was 112 but the fulcrum correctly called the 3 ,

Now how do we use this before the race?
Like I said Its hard to explain how this is possible but it seems to work often.
You may not get the exact pace of race , we were off by over 1 second
here , but you will get a very good idea of the leaders by position
If you have a deep closer with only a 76 EPR but your fulcrum is 87
you have to ask, Can my horse make up 10 points of EPR ?
Is Its LPR strong enough to overcome being 10 points behind

More to come, but this is one of the ways I us the fulcrum

My look at the 7th from TP
 

Step 1 Top 5 TPR Line 1
8 5 6 4 3

Step 2 Fulcrum horse
3 87 ( 111 )

Step 3 Running styles
Horse 1 Sus Line 1
Horse 2 EP 1
Horse 3 EP Line 1
Horse 4 SP line 1
Horse 5 Sus line 1
Horse 6 Sus Line 1
Horse 7 Sus line 1
Horse 8 SP line 1
No reason to go past line 1 on anybody

Step 4 Who has the top EPR
The 3 has the best EPR 87
Early Presser

Step 5 rate the lines make your decisions
Now will the 3 with a 87 LPR
be able to hold on ? .

The top TPR horses
They are 8 3 and 5
Top 3 VDC = 3 5 8

My bets 3 and 8
5 may be too far back with only a 78 EPR

Attachment 40022

pace lines
 

horse
Attachment 40023

Attachment 40024

Attachment 40025

Attachment 40026

horse
 

5 6 7 8

Attachment 40027

Attachment 40028

Attachment 40029

Attachment 40030

The results
 

The 4 wins - just a shade off my radar :rolleyes:

Attachment 40031

The only line I would have changed is on the #1 horse and would have used L 2 which more fits his running style otherwise little difference in TPR.

A very contentious race and a great challenge to handicappers but very gettable. Would have been a great race to put up much earlier for followers to get involved. At these levels they can be very good challenge.

Mitch44

will do
 

Hi Mitch
Yes it was, I missed this one but the numbers as you say were tight.
I looked at line 2 also. The 84 EPR is not really this horse's comfort zone
We can see this by the much shorter blue LPR line, The blue lines for line 2-10 which shows its normal LPR style/ability is to run with much more late energy,
I looked at its + lines and thought " positionaly too far back" looking at line 1
I said what was its excuse ? The comments "4 path btwn no late bid" so I don't know . I went with error on the side of off form, Looking at line 3, at the same distance and surface but against better shows nothing with only a 169 TPR

As far as this race, I only put up my work up to show Mike B some of the ways I go about using the fulcrum, I wanted to post the fulcrum before the race, so I could show its ability, I only had 10 minutes.
Once the race was over I figured i would post up my looks
i will post practice races in their own threads and i will give us all more time :)

If you would like me to post a race to give you enough time to work it.
ask me :)

Good skill
Bill

Finding the fucrum POR
 

This is a video I made for the RDSS2 forum in 2013. In this video I use the same fulcrum guidelines, I look for the fastest 2nd call POR from the last line only.
But rather than look at the adjusted EPR rating on the TPR screen,
I use the raw pace of race fractions

Here is the video
Attachment 40057

Yes Bill post one ,your choice. Then many more can get involved. The feedback should be good and diverse.
Mitch44

Thanks, Bill.
 

Bill - this is a favorite thread. It's such a rich vein of ore to mine. You put a lot of work in it and I wanted you to know it's appreciated.

mick

Horses running in the fastest paced races have endured the greatest pace pressures. USE THAT as your guide:If others show faltering from that pace of race, they will not be a choice today.

Use SEVERAl lines to find the comparisons, don't get stuck in sample error. The better horses REPEAT their efforts and there-by can be counted on more readily.

SAMPLE ERROR: drawing an incorrect conclusion from too small a data set. Or, the plague of small numbers. That is a denigrating expression of Bernoulli's theory of LARGE NUMBERS, (actually used in insurance actuarials to predict probably of death by age and lifestyle) aka the MORE examples one investigates, the closer those observations are to the reality of the situation.

Read The Drunkard's Walk, a great primer on the foibles of statistical evaluation .....it is eye opening.

Imagine I am from Mars and want to invade Earth. The rational way to scout the target would be to send MULTIPLE probes or groups, all around the planet, and multiple times of the year, to get an idea what they were going to encounter.

I am a dummy so I send ONE expedition and it happens to land in a nice meadow in June in rural Minnesota where I see open land and small animals.

Between these two groups, WHICH would you say probably had the better reconnaissance? and which WILL suffer the effects of Sample Error.

The Drunkard's Walk
 

Thank, Tim. I always appreciate a recommendation on a good book. I've ordered it from our local library. And thanks again for the press box tour. It was special.

mick

Follow Up #16, pages 3-4, Doc talks about the procedural template for the trackside clinics they were doing at the time.

Also, on page 34, an article that goes into greater depth.

This is a concept that is more theoretical than real.

One needs to find COMMONALITY of pace of race challenges for ir is EXTREMELY DOUBTFUL that any ONE pace line will have all the aspects (early, middle and late) that will serve as a yardstick for all in the race.

The more I study this (and since 1986 I have looked a more than a few contests) I came to a conclusion: all horses have a RANGE of pace of races TO WHICH they can contend. What we call "cheap" animals have the narrowest range of challenge response, all the way up to the stakes winners who have the widest (to give truth to the old saying that CLASS laughs at pace).

Find a few pace lines that are real challenges at this level: put them in the program and find the PACE OF RACES that are the toughest of those listed. You start there. Line up the other horses in the race (ALWAYS LOOK AT ALL OF THEM INITIALLY), see how they match up.

the idea of ONE fulcrum just is not a long range practical standard to attempt to discover. A range is about as close as you can find.

I know this thread is a few yrs old but I'd like to chime in about the hefts of Doc's work.

actually,
doc said two members of Pirco stole his mailing list. Not long after, I got a flyer with both Pizzolla's and Schmidt's names on it, so not hard to figure out who Doc was talking about,

Lefty
 

I wanted to do a follow up race, using the fulcrum method.
I don't usually bet Woodbine till latter in the season.
Mitch posted his selections today in the selections forum, so I was following along.

Race 1 2 and 3 had no fulcrum horses .
Race 4 was a MC10 .I had a tandem race fulcrum with horses 1 , 2 and 9,

The POR fulcrum was a 87 but horse 3 will boost that POR up in this match up

Remember: The fulcrum is a very strong elimination tool.
Its a paceline selection aid.
The fulcrum horse places or shows a very high percentage
I look at the fulcrum as kind of like a mini dashboard of the match up.

Here is my work up of race 4

Attachment 46197
Attachment 46198
Attachment 46199
Attachment 46200

Horses
 

4.5,7
Attachment 46201

Attachment 46202

Attachment 46203

Horses
 

8 , 9 and readouts

Attachment 46204

Attachment 46205

Attachment 46206

Attachment 46207

Woodbine
 

Hi Mitch

I was following along.
I demoed race 4 in the TPR section

I wanted to demo a fulcrum example.
Its been awhile but the fulcrum tool works well as always
race 4 was the first race with a fulcrum qualifier

Good Skill

Not to be argumentative Bill but the fulcrum is something I don't believe in and consider a waste of time. That time can be used for better handicapping purposes. What good is a factor if it can't be used in all races with the exception of FST or MSW? That leaves far too many races that render it useless IMO, such as the first three races at WO of this post.


Hey but what works for you and me is what makes racing a challenge. Hell even the "Hat" Bradshaw didn't believe in it. And following his early guidance has served me well in reference to the Fulcrum while saving valuable time.


Hope your doing well Bill and glad to hear from you, I wish you health and success.
Mitch44

All races
 

Hi Mitch

Thanks for the nice words

MITCH I'm not sure why you say the fulcrum can't be used in all races ?
It can be as long as at least 1 horse has a last race where it ran less than 2 beaten lengths
at the second call and 5 beaten lengths at the finish. As long as the race is not aberrant
The highest rated qualifying horse in any race is the fulcrum , it really takes not much time to find the fulcrum with R D S S .
Just auto select the paceline selection to last line. Then find the highest rated EPR horse on the TPR screen and see who the qualifiers are who ran at today's track and distance

Anyway. Like they say it's just a tool in the toolbox.

Good skill luck today :)

Hi Bill how you doing?. I'm not into the fulcrum either but I thought it was within 5 at both the 2nd call and finish to qualify as the fulcrum. Am I incorrect?.
Tim

Hello Bill,
The reason why I said the fulcrum can't be used in all races is because you said;"race 4 was the first race with a fulcrum qualifier." I guess there are a lot of "aberrant races."
"It can be as long as . . . "


It is just that a tool because it can't be applied for all races. Its also a tool that's a waste of time. If one picks appropriate pace lines the match up takes all that into consideration with the lines picked. I'll side with "The Doc" & "The Hat" as far as the fulcrum goes. The mythology has evolved and the masters were never nor did they become stagnant. We would not be where we are today without that evolvement.
Your free to use whatever you want and waste your time anyway chosen Bill.

The fact of the matter is this thread has nothing to do with the fulcrum and there is a thread for that which is the only place fulcrum stuff should be posted. These threads get hijacked far too much by inappropriate things that belong on a separate thread. A perfect example of that was Richie P's thread on contenders which got hijacked with Excel threads, which should have been a separate thread. I believe you started that also.


What I would suggest is you remove any and all posts about the fulcrum from this thread to include my comments in reference to the fulcrum garbage and in answering those threads. When someone clicks on a thread they don't want to have to go through hundreds of posts that don't interest them for going to the thread to begin with.


Catch a wave Bill and have a great day.


Mitch44

correct
 

Yes, Tim
According to the fulcrum chapter of the original Pace Makes the Race.
In the Competitive Requirements paragraph, page 104
It clearly is stated " less than 5 beaten lengths at the second call and the finish"

Thanks for catching my error

Bill

Bill

Nice workup of the race, hope your feeling better

Tell Dad hi

Jeff

Also nice way of showing using RDSS