CHAPTER SEVEN

WEIGHT
A lot of people say that there are only two figures you need to know to find winners, time and weight. Some punters are convinced that speed ratings are better if they are adjusted for weight. So why aren’t they. After all common sense tells you that a horses performance will be affected by an increase in weight. The problem is it doesn’t affect all horses to the same degree. Some horses carry extra weight better than others. One obvious reason is the size of the horse. If you have been to see the horses in the paddock you will be aware of the huge differences in size. The going also comes into the equation, horses find it harder to carry weight when the ground is soft. Finally the horses condition has to be considered. If a horse is improving and starts to win races his weight will go up, but often the disadvantage of carrying the extra weight is overcome by the horses increased level of fitness. Despite the added weight a horses speed figure can continue to rise. Who is to say that when that figure eventually drops it is due entirely to the increased weight and not simply the fact that the horse has gone over the top and is ready for a break. There is no simple equation you could apply across the board that would apply to all horses in all circumstances and I am sure that any attempted adjustment would lead to the speed figures being distorted. Because of this I make no adjustment whatever for weight. For the 2005/06 season I attached the weigh the horse actually carried to the rating. There is nothing more time consuming or soul destroying than pawing through the form book to find the weight carried by a dozen horses in their last three races. I now have that information at my fingertips. Below is an example of the new layout. The race was at Wolverhampton on 16th January 2006. Four horses had ratings in the 70s with Oldenway and Bethanys Boy top rated. Oldenway had two impressive runs behind him (76 and 80) but both at Southwell on the fibresand and today he was set to carry 9-1 up 5lb. Bethanys Boy by comparison had run 74 over course and distance and was carrying 8-11 down 3lb. So despite Oldenways superior speed figure the 8lb swing in the weights and the surface put Bethanys Boy well in. Oldenway went of 5/2F with Bethanys Boy 7/2.

Bethanys Boy beat Oldenway by 4½ lengths to register his third course and distance win with a rating of 77.
So although the weight is an important calculation I don’t think it should affect the bare speed figure. ‘Split second’ speed ratings in the ‘Raceform Update’ are also calculated without weight adjustment. The reason for this recent change is a study they carried out. After taking random samples of 1000 horses to check the effects of carrying more weight they found that for every pound more that a horse carried from its previous start its speed figure was reduced by 0.4 of a point. Which is what you would expect, however, they also found that for every pound less that a horse carried its speed rating went down again by 0.3 of a point. This would seem to back up the point I made earlier only in reverse. The improving horse has carried increasing amounts of weight until he reaches a peak of fitness, once the horses performance deteriorates the handicapper reduces the burden but the horse still runs slower because of its lack of fitness. One thought occurs to me, if a horse has its weight increased on a number of occasion and runs slower each time and then the weight is reduced and it slows down yet again, it wont be long before it is standing still.