Michelle,

You really should start by listening to the "Audio Seminar" and "Multimedia Seminar" under the "Introduction" link on this web site. Click on the Intro link, then on the right hand side of the page there are a few links to some learning tools. That's a great place to start.

Unfortunately, using the sheets isn't as easy as looking at the 8 horses in the race and saying the #3 horse had the lowest number in one of his races, so he'll win; or his numbers have always gone down so he'll win. If you look at the sheets of some horses, you'll see that the numbers move around, sometimes up and sometimes down. So, a lot of sheet user use the sheets for "conditioning handicapping". That is, looking at the patterns on the sheets and trying to figure out if the horse is ready to run a better race today or a worse race--sometimes they are tired and although one may be faster, it might not be TODAY. That's what the patterns help determine.

It takes a lot of time and practice to really understand how to use the sheets effectively. Thorograph is excellent because they offer the resources to allow you to practice using yesterdays sheets. Analyze races and then check the results. Once you are comfortable, you can then purchase current sheets and use them at the track.

The area that I think Thorograph is lacking is in the area of resources that teach the sheets. That is why I recommended earlier that you look into the tapes from the Ragozzin site. I don't want to argue about the quality of numbers that each company produces, but I personally found a tremendous amount of value listening to the Ragozzin tapes that I have used to help me better analyze the Thorograph sheets.

It may be true that some patterns from years ago may not work as well anymore, but the tapes give you a very good foundation of things to look for and think about. Then, practice looking for those patterns and see if they still work. Many of them do. The tapes give you a good handle on when a horse may Bounce (i.e. run a much worse race) or may explode (i.e. run his best race ever). Many of the patterns are still good and work on both sheets. There is only about 1 hour of training material from Thorograph and about 18 hours from the Ragozzin tapes. I think the complexity of the sheets combined with the complexity of Thoroughbred handicapping requires one to soak up as much information as possible, so definitely look into the tapes.

As a beginner with sheets, I think you'll find the Thorograph's are much easier to read, understand and use; plus, you've got all the historical data you'll ever want available to you to practice. And that is truly a great benefit.

Hope this helps.

p.s. One thing to do is start listening to some of the training material and learn a couple of patterns--learn about the bounce. Then, start looking at sheets and see if you can recognize patterns. After you do that for a while, learn other patterns and see if you can use those to help you pick horses. Over time, you'll continue to learn patterns that you like and feel you can win with and others that don't work for you. But start slow and build up your knowledge base through learning and practice.