See our introduction to WPR Ratings here: Brief Explanation of Ratings

TRB Response: The G1sc column is the number of lengths short of what we consider to be a decent G1 standard for that category. 

The figures we publish post-race and in those charts you are looking at... they're normalised to weight-for-age, so that horses can be directly compared regardless of age, sex, distance or time of the year.

When they come to compete in a race, they get allocated a weight, which is usually different to WFA (unless it's a WFA race)

That means all past performances need to be adjusted from the WFA value, to allow for having either less or more weight than our WFA value.

This creates values that we call "at the weights". In other words, the level the horse could run to at the weight to be carried, if they repeated their last start, second last start run etc. 

If you find a WFA race, then you will see the values in the charts you look at are identical to what you see in GTX. 

2YOs and early 3YOs are typically carrying much more than WFA in races, so you will see the value in GTX are significantly lower than the WFA figures you see in those charts.

GTX allows you to compare horses at the weights they are set to carry. The ranking tables allow you to compare horses on the basis of pure talent at a weight consistent with their WFA.

Question: Can I apply regression towards the mean with Horse ratings?

TRB Response: The concept of regression towards the mean definitely applies with horse performance and ratings. It's a key concept.

Each horse has a given level of talent and over time their form is made up of runs that are peaks beyond their general level of talent and runs well below.

A horse that has typically rated 88-89 in its good runs and suddenly rates 93, shouldn't necessarily be expected to rate 93 next start, especially if it's well exposed in terms of number of career starts and runs this preparation. The horse is more likely to regress next start, perhaps not all the way to 88-89 but still lower than 93.

Think of it like a cricketer that might have an average of 40, then comes out one innings and scores 100. If you are rating the expected performance of that cricketer next time, you intuitively wouldn't expect him to get 100 again.

The higher up the rating scale a performance was and the more it was above the horses general level of talent, the more likely it is to regress. Horses in lower class races with lower ratings still regress, but if you have been an 80 rater in the past, plus or minus a little and suddenly rate 85... then it's easier / more common to hold that level of performance than a horse that generally rates around 90 on their best form and suddenly rates 95.

The same applies if the horse suddenly rates poorly. There are all types of reasons why horses rate lower and you can typically expect them to progress more towards their median level of form next start. Consecutive poor runs or sustained periods below past mean levels of performance can also mean a horse is out of form or perhaps past their best. You have to use your judgement.

When it comes to younger, lightly raced horses and those earlly in their campaign then you need to be more liberal with your judgements. Horses can be 'on the up' and improving to still establish their typical level of talent. Again, the level of ratings plays a role. It's very easy and common for horses to go from 80 to 85. It's more difficult, but still certainly possible for horses to improve from 90 to 95. It's much more difficult and rare for a horse to improve from 95 to 100 and hold that as a typical level of good form. SP's can also play a role. If a horse has been starting short in the market then there is an expectation of talent (relative to that race) and improved ratings can be trusted more than if a horse starts long odds and overachieves against expectations.

There are no fixed rules or algorithms you can apply. It really is an art form that you can develop over time and is very much a horse by horse basis.

The test is to ask yourself "in the context of this horse's age, starts, stage of prep, overall history and recent form... keeping in mind regression to the mean (positive or negative), what rating figure reflects a level of performance that is reasonable to expect from this horse?"

There's no reason why you can create a couple of different race / rating scenarios if there are key horses that present some uncertainty in terms of recent form against their mean. How does it change your view of the race if you make different assumptions about how a key horse might regress either up from a poor run or down from a spike? How does that affect your betting decisions?

The purpose of adjusting ratings is simply to help identify good betting prospects so always keep that in mind. Don't get caught up in the mechanics of tinkering with ratings and forget the actual purpose. There's no real science or precision, they're just assumptions and forecasts that help lead to betting decisions that make sense to you, where the prices on offer seem worthy for the uncertainties faced.

If your view on a race doesn't offer any clear betting opportunities then it's typically best to move onto another race. There are plenty of opportunities that present themselves without spending a large amount of time trying to mould a race to fit an existing belief or outcome... whether it be the betting market or a horse you would like to back.

Question: I understand that the base WPR is determined without jockeys taken into account. So I guess I was looking for a bit of guidance/information as to how much I should adjust a WPR due to a jockey advantage/disadvantage? Do you have any advice on how others have adjusted WPR for a jockey advantage? Is there any system that is advised - For example; James Macdonald on the horse so increase its WPR by 2 points?

TRB Response:

1. Don't automatically adjust all horses based on their jockey. Consider the difficulty of the ride. A horse that finds the front easily is a much easier challenge that most jockeys can handle, compared to one that needs to find a position from a wide draw, work through traffic, build momentum, time a finishing run etc.

2. Be conservative in your adjustments. Don't allow jockeys to totally override and reshape the assessment of a race. Horse talent and form is always #1.   

3. Jockey changes are more important to consider from a rating perspective than if it's the same jockey riding. A big positive jockey change can be a sign that a horse is expected to improve. In this case it's often best to consider recent form in line with the horse's best form and adjust your base rating, rather than picking a recent run and trying to add a bonus. Ultimately you are trying to forecast the possible performance (range) of a horse. It doesn't have to be a mechanical exercise that involves one figure, plus another, minus another etc. Consider the total information available and think more in terms of "Given everything I know and think, what is the range I think this horse could perform at today?"

Question: I'm inquiring about what the correct setting for apprentice allowances is meant to be in the WPR program. At the moment my program (and hence markets) make no adjustment for the apprentice claim. When I manually adjust the amount of weight an apprentice can claim, there's no change to the market. When I go to Setup/ Ratings Extended/ WPR the Allowance function is greyed out, so it can't be manually activated. Is the program meant to ignore apprentice allowances as mine currently does, or do I have a bug in my program?

TRB Response: The reason that apprentice allowance is greyed out in Setup / Ratings Extended is that the WPR ratings you see against each run as well as the GTX-assigned based rating are already adjusted for weight to be carried. So adding anything extra for an apprentice allowance on top would effectively be counting it twice.

When it comes to WPR, you don't need to do any adjustments for weight at all. Every value you see on the screen is already adjusted.

If you have a case where there is no jockey in the early file and you note the ratings.... then a claiming apprentice is added when the jockey file is downloaded, you will see that all of the ratings have adjusted for the value we assign to that claim. A 3kg claim moves ratings +2.4 points.

You can see in the image below that my WPR Rating setup with the Allowance greyed out is the same as yours.

Question: I generally try and do the form soon after acceptances to see if I can nab an early price or two. Do you guys ever tweak your ratings after acceptances? If so when are the ratings  'locked in'?

TRB Response: There are rare cases a rating could change after the very first file production. If horses are on a quick backup from their last start, to do our meeting reviews properly and finalise the WPRs for each race, we need the verified times and individual sectionals. They can take 2-4 days to come in after a meeting. Metros come faster than country meetings. 

Once we have those, the review is done and final ratings determined. 

Even if a horse backs up in 7 days, our normal timing will still have the final rating in the first file produced for 95%+ of these horses. However if there is a slight delay to sectionals for whatever reason or a horse is racing on a Monday or Tuesday and it’s 6-7 days after their last run... and those files are first run on a Thursday then it’s impossible to have the final rating in the first cut as that file run is only 2-3 days after the race. They will always be up to date in the morning re-run which is done the day before each meeting.

Question: How is the WPR Predictive Rating for today calculated?

TRB Response:  GTX uses a concept called a "Master Rating" for each horse. That rating is based on a horse's history of both actual performances and expected performance, derived from its starting price. 

For example, take a simple scenario where two first starters run a rating of 81 and one starts $21 and the other $2.50 

The next time they start, if they had the same weight, the horse that started $2.50 would have a higher master rating than the one that started $21 

The master rating is adjusted after each start depending on performance. 

It's built around a philosophy that a horse's form is dynamic and a horse is much more than it has displayed at its last 1-2-3 starts. 

Previous peak form and as mentioned, expected performances as indicated by its market price have historically shown to be important influencers. 

It does a good job across a large number of races, but that's not to say the method is faultless. It's purposely designed at a relatively basic level, to allow individual users to extract further value out of the rating via their own analysis and by making personal adjustments... which is a different topic in itself.

Question:  Can you please comment on inherent weaknesses that might exist in the WPR ratings methodology?

TRB Response: There are no consistent scenarios that indicate weakness (to our knowledge).

 That doesn't mean the automated assessments could not be better, of course they can... but It's very much a case of how an individual race presents. 

The goal is to try and forecast the level of performance you think the horse will reach in this race based on past form, suitability of conditions and the suitability of the upcoming race, considering form distance, track condition, map, pace etc. 

Regression to the mean is an important concept. Be cautious of well exposed horses that suddenly run a ‘spike’ rating. Form is dynamic throughout a horse’s career, made up of ratings in line with its median level of talent, some well above and others well below. 

A horse is much more than how it performed last start, so it's important to look at its overall form, stage of career cycle etc. and come up with a figure that makes sense to what you can expect today. 

Take a cricketer who averages 20 (a poor score) that currently steps out and hits 50 runs. Next time he bats, you wouldn't rate him to get 50 again, you'd have to make some allowance for regression back to his mean. The same applies to horses in many respects. Also, horses racing in moderate form, that have consistent previous form at a better level can easily improve. 

Adopting the logic of "if it looks right, leave it" is perfect... that will save time and ensure you aren't tuning out some of the inherent value in the automated process. If it doesn't look right, then it's a matter of considering all of those things mentioned above and coming up with a figure.

Question: Why do jockeys not play a part in the rating process?

TRB Response: Simple answer is that the automatic WPR assessment by GTX is kept relatively simple on purpose, so that users have the opportunity to extract more value from them compared to others due to their own knowledge and skill. Jockeys would be one area that can apply. Different people have different opinions on the relative difference between jockeys, their importance and how that might apply to a particular scenario. For example, the demands on jockey skills riding an easy leader in a small field from a good draw is different to a MF runner from a wide draw with a short run to the first turn. 

In saying that, the automatic assessments still product a great result in terms of ranking the field and can be the basis of a good betting strategy.

Question: I am wanting to get more from the WPRs and have been tweaking them to make them more predictive in today's race.

However, a couple of question if I may:

1. In adjusting the WPR for today's race, will the new WPR follow through to the horse's next future race? That is, is it like Wintune where fine tuning a rating will hopefully lead to better future prediction.

2. Why are the historical WPRs different for the same horse for the SAME race when you step back in time? For example in today's race a horse has a set of prior ratings, but go back to the last run and the lead up ratings (for the same dates) are different.

Are you able to share your technique(s) for adjusting the ratings? The User Guide you prepared gives a good overview without being too specific.

To give you some background my approach is like this:
Looking at the WPR Rating Graph, then adjust the Base Rating up or down to reflect where I think it should be, based on:
- current price (i.e. if the rated price is too low then reduce the Rating)
- recent past performance ( win/close to win/same class = most likely no adjustment but reduce rating when opposite is true)

Overall trying to keep the rating to a mean trend line rather than sudden up or downs. Your comments would be appreciated.

TRB Response: There is no Win-Tuning for WPR's, it defeats the purpose of relying on our / my process of developing the ratings in the first place. If users wish to develop their own set of customised ratings then others like Trakform, Trakline or Formline are available to tinker with.

When using GTX for an upcoming race, any changes to the base rating of a horse is affecting your forecast assessment for today's race, not the merit of past runs.

Question: A horse called Cornforth is declared in races 2 and 5 at Rockhampton for Friday. The WPR figure given for its last start win on the 29th May shows up as 85 in race 2 and yet 83.8 in race 5. How can a horse have two different ratings for the same performance and which one is correct?

TRB Response: When we do our WFA Performance Ratings, the figure assigned to each horse is normalised to WFA, i.e. as if they carried a weight equal to WFA for their age / sex / distance / time of year. That means performances and horses can be directly compared to understand the relative quality between horses on comparable terms.

At the weights, a 4YO Gelding with 54kg a horse might run a 99 rating which wins the race, but when normalised to WFA the horse would end up with something like a 95 rating.

When that horse comes to race again, his last start is a 95 at WFA, but then we must take into account the weight he is allocated for today's race. Weight below WFA will increase his potential performance (at the weights) while a weight above WFA will reduce it from that number.

This is how the numbers are shown in the form of GTX, the performance the horse could achieve today (based on last start, 2nd last start or whatever) at the weight it is going to carry today.

In the case of Cornforth he ran an 83.1 rating last start, normalised to WFA. In race 2 he has 56kg, which elevates his potential performance at that weight to 85.0 In race 5 he has 57.5kg, which elevates his performance from 83.1 to 83.8 at the weight to be carried.

So in essence, both ratings are correct.... it's just a case of different races / conditions.

Question: Why are the historical WPRs different for the same horse for the SAME race when you step back in time?

TRB Response: The numbers you see on the screen against each run represent the horses WPR normalised to WFA, then adjusted for the weight to be carried in today's race. So they will change depending on the weight the horse has in the upcoming race.

For example, if a horse has a last start rating of 100 normalised to WFA (which sits in our main database) then comes into a race carrying WFA of say 59kg, then the LS figure in GTX will show 100. If it came into a race with 54kg, or 5kg below WFA then the figure would show something like 104, which reflects the benefit of weight below WFA. The figures against each run in GTX show the horse's forecast performance "at the weights" in the upcoming race. This means you can directly compare the figures of individual horses as you see them on the screen, without doing any further adjustments.

The adjustment of ratings for an upcoming race is more an art form rather than specific science with fixed rules.

The idea is that you are trying to forecast the performance the horse is likely to run to today, based on all of its past performances as well as other factors like the suitability of the race, fitness, track, going, distance, pace, likely position in run etc.

If the automatic rating in GTX looks okay then just leave it. You don't need to split hairs... it doesn't add any value to your betting decisions. In my experience the best betting decisions are the clearest when you do a simple review of each race / ratings. If you have to start splitting between 0.5 points here and there based on assumptions and uncertainty then it's a good sign there's not a clear betting opportunity.

When forecasting performance you should keep in mind the concept of regression to the mean. Each horse has a given level of talent and over time their form is made up of runs that are peaks beyond their general level of talent and runs well below.

A horse that has typically rated 88-89 in its good runs and suddenly rates 93, shouldn't necessarily be expected to rate 93 next start, especially if it's well exposed in terms of number of career starts and runs this preparation. The horse is more likely to regress next start, perhaps not all the way to 88-89 but still lower than 93. Think of it like a cricketer that might have an average of 40.00, then comes out one innings and scores 100. If you are rating the expected performance of that cricketer next time, you intuitively wouldn't expect him to get 100 again.

The same applies if the horse suddenly rates 75. There are many reasons why horses rate lower and you can typically expect them to progress more towards their median level of form next start. If a horse has 88-89 figures and then suddenly rates 75, I would perhaps forecast it to rate 86-87 next start.

When it comes to younger, lightly raced horses then you have to allow for the prospects of improvement. A sudden spike can be trusted a little more because the horse is likely still improving.

As I said, there are no fixed rules, it really is an art form that you can develop over time. The ultimate test is to ask yourself "in the context of this horses history and recent form, keeping in mind regression to the mean, does the figure I've allocated reflect a level of performance that is reasonable to expect from this horse?" The purpose of adjusting ratings is simply to help identify good betting prospects so always keep that in mind. Don't get caught up in the mechanics of tinkering with ratings and forget the actual purpose. If a relatively simple process you follow doesn't highlight any clear betting opportunities then it's typically best to move onto another race. There are plenty of opportunities that present themselves without spending a large amount of time on individual races.

TRB Comment

The actual WFA Performance Rating for each of a horse's past runs is the figure the horse ran as if it carried WFA in the race. So an 89 rating for a 5YO male horse over 1400m is the rating achieved assuming 59kg.

If that horse then goes into a race and is set to carry only 54kg, then using that previous run, his actual potential rating is 89 + the allowance for carrying 5kg under WFA. So in this case GTX would show 93 against the last start. (the horse normalised WFA number 89, adjusted for the weight to be carried in today's race.)

If the horse was to carry 60kg which is +1kg on WFA then his 89 rating would be reduced in GTX to show 88.2.... which is the level of performance he could be expected to achieve at the weight to be carried today.

The bottom line is that you don't need to worried about weight carried when you view the ratings in GTX.

The ratings shown on the screen already take into account the weight to be carried today.

TRB Comment

WFA Performance Ratings are initially calculated and normalised to WFA. They're the figures we quote in reports and commentary. That's because we are looking post-race and comparing horses on an even playing field.

When they are entered in a future race though, they are assigned a weight to be carried. At this point the rating and weight carried becomes relevant to forecasting performance and comparing horses within the race. For that reason, the figures you see against each run in GTX are adjusted for the weight to be carried. In a WFA race there is no adjustment, so the numbers you see on the screen are equal to the normalised rating. However in other races where a horse may carry above or below WFA the figures on your GTX screen will reflect that.

TRB Comment

The WPRs shown against each horse's past run are reflective of a range of factors including the quality of race times and sectionals (refer WPR User Guide). The method GTX uses to assign a base rating is relatively simple (but still produces great results) and that's by intent. It allows users who might want to get into understanding horses, form etc. to extract more value out of the ratings by forecasting the likely performance of each horse based on their past ratings as well as the suitability of the race coming up, including the pace shape, horses position etc. This will generally deliver the best benefit from using the ratings.

You can use additional tools and insights to help you forecast rating performance in the upcoming race, by identifying potential improvers, horses that might not run as well because of changes in race shape, or other reasons. It's not entirely necessary though.