Jimbo,

Beyer doesn't make pace figures, but he definitely makes subjective evaluations about how the pace impacts races. His last book goes into detail.

The other stuff I was talking about is best demonstrated by 1 extreme example because it's WAY too long a conversation to go into detail about and I'm sure JB doesn't want me to go there.

Suppose I am in a race with the best miler in the world. We run togther in an extremely slow pace for 7/8 of mile with me on the outside all the way. Then we sprint home the last 1/8 mile. I'm not a very good miler, but I can sprint for an 1/8 of mile at a pretty good clip. At the end of the race, the world class miler winds up beating me by less than the amount of ground I lost throughout the race. That means I get a better speed figure than him.

Obviously, giving me credit for ground loss is mathematically correct, but it's a gross misunderstanding of which of the two of us is actually better. Both of us had used up very little energy for the first 7/8s of a mile because the pace was so darn slow. So we were both able to sprint to the best of our ability for the last 1/8. The ground loss was a non-factor in the result.

There are other applications like this, but they are few and far between because they are related to extremes and the sometimes unique qualities of individual horses.



Post Edited (04-26-05 18:42)