I’m listening to it right now. In terms of the history he cites, those who have not done so should check out History Lessons 1 and 2 in the Archives of this site. Ragozin took credit for inventing things that were demonstrably going on decades before he was making figures, and Friedman bought it. So did I, back when I was there as a kid.

It is telling that Len still says “a variant� for the day. They are the only figure makers I know of that still have that ridiculous dogmatic approach, and it’s how they botched the Oaks figures so badly. And in History Lesson 2 there’s a quote from the 1950s that shows serious handicappers knew even then the track changed speed. For more on that, see “Changing Track Speeds�, also in the Archives.