Some recent & interesting non-weight related posts(i.e.,Marc Kramer,Derby1592,etc) got me to thinking about an untestable theory which I've never seen mentioned & which I've had somewhere in the back of my mind for a no. of yrs.

At varying degrees of frequency & length, it seems players sometimes experience an "awareness" mode of heightened alertness where patterns, betting strategy, & everything else seems crystal clear for even the most complicated & demanding of handicaping challenges. Whatever one does is uncannily right, even if it can't always be adequately explained, so that at times a race almost seems like a replay when it actually takes place & one almost dares to wonder about the entirely justified view that this is the most difficult of games. It seems that this state occurs more often when one is returning to the track after a hiatus or has recently made or is testing a major change in approach.

The timing may not be merely coincidence because these are also the times when one's mind is best able to avoid the the self-judgment & various thoughts stemming from doubt or fear of failure that seem to me to plague all horseplayers at times, again at various levels & frequency.

If there is anything to this theory, then the awareness state in question may be likened to the "zone" basketball players & golfers talk about, & might therefore be a state that one could take concrete steps to try to achieve. As I understand it, in sports this is done by performing drills to learn the art of "relaxed concentration", defined as focusing one's complete & undivided attention in a way that is very different than the "trying to concentrate" mode of a student studying to take a final exam.

It's said that one key is to work on being in a nonjudgmental "here & now", away from the interference of past errors, away also from the should & shouldn't have beens & the what might have beens. Another key is to deepen your interest & absorption to the pt where you literally lose yourself in what you are doing, free from overconcerns about results.

To a limited extent,I have tried to incorporate these concepts in my handicapping, but the reaction of my dopester posse to these ideas is decidedly mixed. What say ye, members of the Ask the Experts Bd.?