The “Horse-thorn” Effect

Understanding the role that “change” plays in racing performance.

By: The Player

Back in the early thirties, Harvard Business School professor Elton Mayo along with associates F.J. Roethlisberger and William J. Dickson studied factors that influenced human performance at the Hawthorne Plant of the Western Electric Company in Cicero, Illinois. Their five year series of studies gave rise to modern Industrial Psychology. While their conclusions were numerous, by far, the most interesting fact that emerged in their research was that ANY change they made to the workerÕs immediate environment led directly to increased performance. For example, a change in lighting led to better performance. As did a change in wall color. And a change in temperature and humidity. In fact, any and every change led to increased performance. The Hawthorne Effect was early proof for something that I have believed my entire life; that being, boredom is the parent of poor performance.

This principle is even more true for horses than for people. Spend a little time around horses and you will quickly see that they are very social animals with incredible personalities and very strong wills. Having a barn full of retired racehorses, broodmares and babies taught me one powerful lesson, “show me a bored horse and I will show you a disaster about to happen.”

Interestingly, there is a decrease in colic, in stall injuries, in hostile behavior, etc. when I introduce frequent, planned change. As a result, every couple days I change the volume and type of music in the barn, the specific paddocks I place each horse in, the type of treats I feed, the introduction of a toy ball, etc. No matter what the change, as long as it occurs often, each and every horse responds by with happy positive behavior, with increased luster in their coats, with less illness and so on.

I can absolutely guarantee you that change is a critical, positive determinant for performance in all horses, including racehorses. So important is the “Hawthorne Effect” in equine behavior, I have paid homage to it by calling it the “Horse-thorn Effect.”

Now hear this, understanding the “Horse-thorn Effect” can improve your handicapping immeasurably and make you a much more winning horse player. There are a few primary ways that the Horse-thorn Effect determines race performance.

FIRST:

The strongest way the “Horse-thorn Effect” presents itself in racing is found by a change in trainers. A change in trainer occurs when a horse gets claimed, an owner changes trainers or a horse gets sold.

Think about it. For a horse, a change in trainer means that he suddenly has a new stall, which for him, is a home. His bedding may be different. He may face North to South rather than East to West. He will have different things to look at. Different noises to get used to. There will be subtle changes in his feed and hay. There will be big changes in his daily routine. He will be surrounded by new human faces. He will miss old equine companions and make new horse friends. He might miss a companion such as a old goat, cat or dog or conversely he may gain such a friend. His liniment might change. The bandages could smell different.

While all this change might seem overwhelming to you or I, for the horse, it normally spells an automatic and immediate performance boost.

And that is why a horse will often perform better following a claim even for trainers who do not have very good win rates otherwise.

Now, the question is HOW exactly should you use this information to increase your own win percentage at the races.

Horses recently claimed or horses who are first time with a new trainer and same owner are prime candidates for the Horse-thorn Effect. Circle any horse for deep evaluation that are first or second race after this change. Over time, my statistics show that holding most other important variables constant, a change in trainers will produce a win about 20 percent more than expected and will be in-the-money effort in about 60 % of the races. That makes this factor HUGE in handicapping a race.

If you want to quantify that use in a numbers based system, try this “killer app.”

Make a list of all speed ratings for the claimed horse’s last three races, if the race was at a similar distance (e.g. sprints vs. routes) and at a similar class level or race rating. It doesn’t need to be exact, just similar. List all the speed ratings in a line and strike off any unusually high or low numbers. Now look at the range in the numbers. The “Horse-thorn Effect” generally means an increase in about 25% of that range value in that horse’s projected speed rating versus his actual latest speed rating. Add half a speed point for every percentage point the new trainer’s win percentage after a claim is ABOVE 20%. Subtract a full speed point for every percentage point the new trainer is below 20%. It works. It produces winners, day after day.

I tend to discount the “Horse-thorn Effect” when a cheaper horse is sold by one owner to another, especially after a decent race performance. Often times a “sold horse” is really a “cold horse&rdquo" so the Horse-thorn Effect does not apply. The outright sale of cheap to moderately priced claiming type horses generally mean that the previous connections feel leg problems are too severe and they would rather get a little something now, then a lot of nothing later.

TWO:

A second way the Horse-thorn Effect plays out in handicapping a race is found in horses that have recently changed tracks. Horses moving from Gulfstream to Belmont are typically good bets. Horses stabled at Tampa for six months and then moving to Mountaineer, Churchill or Woodbine, for example, are good bets. The dramatic change in environment is often enough to wake a horse up and overcome the definite boredom that comes from life in a racing shed row.

Circle every horse changing tracks for deeper evaluation. Remember, change gives the horse an edge so project an improvement for the runner, even if the race is tougher.

I usually automatically add 3-5 speed points just for a change in track. Be aware though that there are some tracks where the speed ratings are inflated and a change from there is never positive. For example, when horses come from Canada to Florida they rarely ever win. The same is true from Canturbury to Tampa. The speed rating for Woodbine and Canterbury are ridiculously higher than they should be and the runners never perform to expectation.

THREE:

A third way the Horse-thorn Effect can play a role in the outcome of a race is a change in equipment, listed medication, racing distance and sometimes even jockey.

Lets look at them one by one.

An obvious change of equipment would be the addition or subtraction of blinkers. Blinkers can help relax and focus some horses. Taking blinkers off can allow horses to see their completion better while racing and can lead to changes. While blinker changes are noted in the program, you need to understand that all blinkers are not created equally. A horse can be listed as running in blinkers one race and also in a subsequent race but the blinkers themselves could have been altered. For example, full cup blinkers could have been replaced with half cup blinkers or blinkers with cut outs. It will appear in the program as no change in equipment but, oh yea, the equipment changed dramatically.

Other changes can be seen in the addition or deletion of a tongue tie. Or a shadow roll across the nose. These are not indicated on the program yet can definitely effect the outcome of a race.

Let me give you a personal example. Years ago there was a horse at Philadelphia Park named Tentrap. He was trained by a good local trainer Phil Tristos. When Phil acquired the horse, the horse had finished last or near last ten straight races. When galloping the horse in the morning Phil noticed the horse was having difficulty breathing and he added a tongue tie to his running equipment. If memory serves me correctly Tentrap ran off a string of victories from 4000 beaten claiming races right up to $30,000. Equipment matters.

Many people look for changes in bandages. I am not really sure what value this has. A trainer normally either uses bandages on a horse or not. It isnât normally a race to race change. If so, and there hasnÕt been a layoff, I consider it a fashion accessory rather than a handicapping tool.

Some people don’t like the addition of bandages for a horse running with the same trainer. I would be more leery if there was a layoff between races of a couple month or more without a steady series of work tabs. Then I might start thinking about tendon issues.

Another change in equipment that can be noted during race updates is shoe information. The only scary change for me is the addition of a bar shoe as this indicates hoof problems. Horses in bar shoes rarely win. Conversely, a horse no longer running in a bar shoe is a very positive marker.

Another tricky equipment change that isn’t apparent to most people would be the type of bit used for the race. What a majority of the racing public is not aware of is that there are numerous different types of racing bits that can be used. Some bits are very light on the mouth and are most useful for horses that donÕt need to be ridden hard. There are other bits such as run out bits which control a horses tendency to drift out or lug in. Still other types of bits are very heavy on the mouth and help the riders keep the horses in check.

A change in bit sometimes is the difference of 5 or more lengths in a race. Medication changes can cause the Horse-thorn effect. While most of the actual medications used are not noted in the program, it is easy to ascertain first and second time Lasix use which sometimes signals a change in form. Some other states allow a second type of ant-bleeding medication which is also noted on the program. While just about everyone believes that first time Lasix is a critical variable in handicapping, the truth it that it is rarely predictive of performance.

The two exceptions are when a horse stopped badly in its previous race or it is a horse new to the races. I look for first time Lasix on most all first time starters I consider betting. Generally, it means that the trainer has the horse “well meant’ in the race.

I also look for a trainer who rarely uses Lasix and suddenly adds it. Allen Jerkins, for example, is an unbelievable bet first time Lasix since he only uses it on exceptionally bad bleeders.

A third Horse-thorn variable of slightly more importance is the change in racing surface or the change in racing distance. I always give horses a serious look that are turf to dirt or dirt to turf. And a change in racing distance can sometimes be very predictive. This is especially true with horses stretching out from sprints to routes . If a solid percentage trainer has entered the horse on a stretch out, I always give the horse extra attention, even if my “guess” off the breeding is that the horse isnÕt ideally suited to the distance. The truth is, no matter how smart we all would like to think we are, a good trainer watching the horse go everyday is in a far better spot than we are to predict the animals ability to run a route of ground.

Another huge change for a horse can be the jockey. Jockeys are not all created equally and by that I do not mean that there are great jocks, good jocks, average jocks and bad jocks. While that is, in fact, the case, and a positive change in rider can be huge, I also mean that certain jocks fit certain horses better and that when a horses style and a jocks style match than it can signal a big increase in performance. Some jocks are very strong and while that is good on certain animals, those jocks normally have heavier hands and many horses do not like that. Other jocks are good at getting nervous horses to relax while a fellow rider with an identical win percentage is terrible with nervous horses.

People ask me a lot about a change in weight. This is a constant debate among handicappers. The truth is that in a sprint 3 pounds or less is absolutely meaningless. Five to seven pounds difference, such as that seen with a new jockey’s “bug” allowance, well, that starts to become meaningful. The three pounds starts to make a small difference, the further the horse runs and in a distance race a weight difference of 7 pounds could be the difference in 3-4 lengths in the horse’s ultimate race performance.

One other variable related to weight which I never see talked about but has turned up as important in my own post race analyses is the weight carried cross factored with the style of the horse carrying the weight. Oddly, in sprints, higher weight seems to be more detrimental to early speed horses than it is to horses that stalk or race off the pace. If a early speed horse is picking up 3-5 pounds, it is definitely more significant that if that same weight were picked up by a horse making one run into the turn.

The running style seems to become less important at a distance where all heavier weights seem to become a small impairment to performance.

These are a few of the variables where CHANGE can predict increases in performance and a winning ticket.

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