Handcapping weight.
 

Between races today at Santa Anita some of the poeple in the paddock were arguing about weight making a differance.

When the horses walked pass us I said I really liked the #5 Turnbolt in this race.

My fellow handicapper said he looked heavy, alittle over weight to him.

I said I don't consider the weight when I handicap. :rolleyes:

Well when i'm betting Hong Kong I always check the weight of the horse. It's a shame that information isn't readily available in basic pp's in the states.

really? why?
a number on paper won't actually tell you anything about the horse. there is no ideal weight...it's not like supermodels where they all have to be a size 0.

I do agree about sometimes a horse looking heavy or soft...and that CAN make a difference because it is an indicator of fitness...but I don't see how weight is.

Well whenever I get a cold or the shits I usually drop a few pounds and horses are no different. The listed weight of the horse just helps in figuring out if the horse is on top of his game or not.

But wouldn't most horses have an individual average weight that would be useful in knowing? Say the horse was coming into a race after a some-what hard campaign (ie. the Belmont following the Preak/Derby & a few preps) and was at a lesser weight..wouldn't it affect his performance?

I don't ever look at the pp's for HK do they list the weight at each start so you can chart change?

They did the last time I played. That was last summer, however.

Got ya, you added this part later. And so when a trainer says a horse didn't hold his weight, it was muscle mass he was losing.

ok...if they do that then I guess it might make some sense though I'm not sure I would find it useful.

the thing is that unless I was actually looking at the horse i wouldn't trust the number enough to know what it was telling me...if that makes any sense.