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Thoroughbred Handicapping:
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Track Tracts

Are you �nuanced out� yet?

If you are, I still want you to keep reading. This is positively the last installment of this extended writing. I promise no more nuances, but I do have to place everything in perspective for you or feel that I do.

Let�s start off with an obvious statement just to get everyone on the same page no matter if you wager on track or at a satellite facility.

Putting nuance handicapping hand in hand with �Predatory Handicapping� doesn�t require a blind leap of faith. If you�ve been reading this series since the beginning, their interaction should be quite obvious. The whole point of nuance handicapping is to give you yet another inclusionary or exclusionary angle to supplement your existing modus operandi.

Nuance Handicapping by definition is �predatory� because it makes you go the extra mile, as does physicality handicapping.

Most handicappers are quite indifferent when it comes to more work or incorporating something new to improve their game. And in a way, I�m glad that they are. If everyone kept my pace, my methodology would soon become �common tender� and, most likely, unprofitable.

To this very day, it amazes me how so many good players will spend 6 hours or more �paper� handicapping a Saturday afternoon�s card. They put up speed and pace figures, look up trainer/jockey combos, post position stats, examine charts and incorporate a host of other things that make up their personal methodology-----but that is as far as they go!

Very few of them choose to take their game to another level by utilizing both nuance handicapping and physicality handicapping and in doing so, become more predatory in their approach to the game.

If on track, most players are interested in getting a good seat to watch the races they bet. Go to any paddock at any racetrack in America. Take a look around and see how many handicappers are in the paddock for any given race note taking, verses the total attendance for that afternoon.

I�d estimate that situation to have a ratio of 20-1.

And by that, I mean for every handicapper you see pacing the paddock looking at horseflesh, there are 19 other handicappers or 95% of all attendees that are located somewhere else on the track other than in the paddock, be it the clubhouse, grandstand, front apron or the infield.

I have no idea what that ratio might be at a satellite outlet since I�m always on track. But if you are strictly a satellite player, the next time you visit your local emporium in an attempt to �Beat the Beam�, you might want to take notice of those players who are paying strict attention to the TV monitors vs. the casual or momentary glancers. Most likely, that ratio is also about 20-1.

If you ask the 19 out of 20 handicappers who aren�t paying attention to either nuances or physicality and nearly all will say that they play the races to have fun. They don�t want to go to work. That�s exactly what they are trying to get away from. They claim that running around is too much effort and that they came to the racetrack or their satellite outlet to relax and enjoy themselves, not to continue their workweek!

Okay, I can live with that.

When I go out to see a movie to have fun, I wouldn�t want to be forced to do 20 push-ups every 10 minutes for an hour and a half while viewing the flick. I went to the movie to relax and have fun, not to sweat and bulk up!

But maximizing the potentiality of the nuance angle or the physicality process to become a �predatory handicapper� does require quite a bit of moving around. I completely �get� anyone�s point about going to the track to have fun. Breaking a sweat for 5 straight hours can hardly be looked upon as �fun�.

As you probably know, my staff and I publish the DAILY SCHTW. The physical running around that is described above is what we do every day in every race, rarely getting a chance to sit down.

It�s a drag!

But many moons ago when first getting into this game as a teenager, it wasn�t long until I discovered that winning was fun and losing wasn�t!

At the end of any losing day, I was a hundred times more tired than on winning days though working and walking just as much on either day.

Whenever I had big winning days and I was in my �gloating zone�, my energy level would soar and be quite high until I passed out at night with a wide smile on my face knowing that I had beaten the toughest game on the planet---if only for a day! It never mattered how tired I was at the end of any day, just as long as I walked out of the track with more money than when entering.

Figuring how much I had won for the day was all the �fun� I needed.

Here�s another benefit to implementing both �nuance and physicality handicapping� to your selection methodology to become more �predatory�.

At 57, I know that the best thing in the world for me personally is to be constantly walking every racing day.

This labored movement assures me that the �percentages� are on my side healthwise to remain more mobile and betting a lot longer than my seated counterparts.

Why not join me?

Copyright �2003 by Joe Takach.  All rights reserved.
Joe can be contacted through his website at www.joe-takach.com.

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