[Ted Craven]

Bill, and everyone,

I just spent tome time talking with Craig Walker from TrackMaster, refreshing my understanding of how TrackMaster DTVs (or RVs!) are calculated.

DTVs for different surfaces are always different (Turf DTVs will always be different from Main Track).

DTV for a given surface will be the same for all races, regardless of distance, EXCEPT:

1. when a certain number of the horses in the same race all run final time Speed Ratings (SR) which are significantly faster than their expected SR. Maybe 1 or 2 horses running so much faster might happen, but several of all horses in a race doing so most likely indicates an event impacting track speed for that race (weather, e.g. grooming). Thus, the normal DTV is modified for that race to bring the SR in line with what those horses would be expected to run, based on a calculation involving their SR over the past 6 months of their histories.

2. When the Official Track Condition changes from previous Condition, the DTV for that race will likely also change - e.g. from Fast to Muddy.

All these DTV calculations are done algorithmically, not by human intervention, for consistency and predictability.

So, For PRX August 9, the Dirt Track DTVs were:
Race 1 = -9
Races 2 - 8 = -1

The Weather was listed as Clear and the Track as Fast for all 8 races.

Thus from point #1 above, since the DTV of Race 1 was calculated as 8 points FASTER than all the rest of the day's races (-9 versus -1) it means that more than a few of the horses in that race ran faster than their past 6 months' SR indicated they should probably run. Thus their final time SR should be smoothed out to their likely normal ability by recording that some event related to that race (the first one on the day) enabled the horses to run faster than their norm. So the DTV was increased FASTER than the DTV shown for all the rest of the races that day. Horses in the rest of the races on the Dirt that day all ran consistently and the DTV was shown as a consistent -1.

If you want to cross-check a day's set of DTVs from the TrackMaster Result Charts for any other card (say, 1 or 2 cards?), just let me know. If this does not relate specifically to Older Sartin programs, perhaps we could put that in a different Forum.

FWIW, I have been spending a lot of my programming time on RDSS integrating TrackMaster XML Result Charts with the RDSS database. Shortly after each race (~20 minutes) the Chart is available to download and integrate with all the other info for that race, so the DTVs are visible as the day progresses. You can correlate the DTV with what you are seeing race by race by way of weather and track maintenance (and thus have confidence in those numbers). (You can also use the Results to maintain realtime Track profiles of 'what's winning', as well as maintain Decision Models and update Betting records - but that's a different discussion).

I hope that helps!

Ted