I don’t want to get into the old debate about the veracity or appeal of ‘I’ve been tolds…’ on here. Done that, very repetitive, got the T-shirt, etc,. But one thing that I’ve always pondered is why the ‘Daily Thread’ is never full of ‘I’ve been tolds…’ that won’t win. Rather than full of ‘I’ve been tolds…’ that will oblige. Read an article the other day, and I’m sure most are aware of this anyway, that most bets placed by those supposedly ‘close’ to stables are ‘lays’ (i.e. horses that will lose) rather than win wagers. First can I point out the basis for theses bets isn’t any nefarious reason but rather that they ‘know’ that the animal is running merely as a ‘prep’ for something else, is running merely to secure a relatively low handicap mark, is having a ‘quiet outing’ to achieve a drop in its handicap mark, is out for little more than an educationary /schooling run, is running over a distance that is totally wrong, the owner is insisting it runs in something completely ridiculous, etc., etc.. Why then isn’t the ‘Daily Thread’ full of ‘I’ve been told this won’t win…’??? Always contemplated that one. Meanwhile, also why do ‘I’ve been tolds…’ only ever appear on the day of the race itself?!? My number of ‘I’ve been tolds…’ is seemingly considerably, and I do mean considerably, lower than most on here but whenever I have heard a ‘whisper’ it’s always miles in advance of the target – the obvious one being over 2 months when a then work colleague owned a share in Mighty Moose (was listed on RHH at the time I’m not aftertiming!). Whilst a few weeks ago I told the regular readers to look out for a horse called Two Sams when he makes his handicap hurdling bow. Again well in advance of any run (which is still to happen). Why therefore do ‘I’ve been tolds…’ only appear on the day, in the main, itself?!?
You sure on that stick? I can't see any entries yet. Might it be today, together with the handicap weights?
Good luck. Is this going to be web based with all the data on your server or is it purely for your own benefit? I've had a look at that. Looks like it is only historical data you can scrape? Will you want to get today's/tomorrow's runners to link in? Today's/Tomorow's runners can easily be imported free but I'm sure you are aware of that. There is also a free mobile app on Timeform here if it's of any interest. I haven't tried it because I don't have a mobile and prefer to work on my laptop. I might ask them if I can get in on my laptop as it will probably be better than what I do now. I presume you have looked at Horseracebase and Flatstats to see what they offer in terms of further analysis.
Yes I have scripts for todays/tomorrows runners, I save every race in JSON format. I will then link these racecards to the database to get the form for every runner/trainer/jockey and I have plenty of ideas for the stats im going to calculate.
Sounds great but a bit too technical for me as these days I don't touch code and I'm an old fashioned back end designer. If it isn't too much trouble could you PM me to show me how you get your runners into processable format. I just copy and paste the runners into Word and convert the table to text delimited and import into MS Access. Everything I do now is in Access as it's a very simple tool to use and the emphasis is all on design.
Cheers chaps, hoping for couple bits for Chelts like last year where we had that 20/1 monster, another one of them would do nicely! Also working on a new system too
