Tournament Question

[tbrown]

I am not very experineced in tournamanet play, but I entered one at Finger Lakes next weekend for a shot at $10,000 and a ticket to Orleans.
The format is 12 races, 6 mandatory from FL and 6 optionals from tracks to be selected.
Pick one horse per race, you get the proceeds of $100 Win/place on your pick.
What is a good strategy for this type of betting? 12 races seems to me too few to count on hitting longs, but it is almost certain somebody will have a boxcar fall on them. I can play two entires, so I was thinking to go for the best shots at winning on one and putting all the longs on the second, hoping to hit one or two or maybe getting a couple of places.
Just got the DRF tourney book in mail Saturday, so study time this week.
Thanks for any suggestions.

[Cliff]

Tom,

Sorry nobody has answered sooner. I'm no expert, but, here's my 2 cents worth. For the record, that's 2 cents more than I've made off tournament play this year!

1) Always, within reason, buy the most entries you can. Within reason means don't play with this month's mortgage money.

2) Win/Place tournaments offer a whole different strategy than just Win tourneys. Often times, a nice priced Place horse will pay more than the Win/Places prices together on the Win horse.

3) You can probably expect to have to at least double your bet/play money, maybe triple it.

12x4x2 = $96
12x4x3 = $144

The host at Finger Lakes could give you some idea of the winning totals from past tournaments.

4) The $ listed in #3 are directly related to the number of entries. The higher the number of entries, the higher the number it takes to win. Last I looked they had 83 entries. Looks like you could anticipate well over 100 when it's finalized.

5) Gut feeling here....you can be a little more conservative on the Mandatories...maybe lower your necessary odds to make the play by a couple of points, i.e., from 6/1 to 4/1 or 8/1 to 6/1. ALWAYS be willing to go for a bomb if it looks like it MIGHT have a chance. If a $40+ horse hits, you can almost guarantee, at least one person out of 100 will have it.

6) Don't be surprised if your strategy for your tickets get reversed somewhere during the tournament. Be flexible.

7) Read the rules.

8) Read the rules again.

Most of this is common sense stuff. Hope it helps a little.

Cliff

[tbrown]

Thanks, Cliff.
Been boning up - really impressed the way Fig2 screen is pointing to good 4-1, 5-1 winners that come slightly off pace at FL. Big Beyer and early speed is taking local money, but E or P horses with improving figs able to be within 3-4 lengths early are worth waiting for. Looks like a grind it out day, but I get six of my choice at sleceted simo tracks....bring on the turf!

[Cliff]

Tom,

Forgot to multiply the numbers in item #3 by $50 to get the $100 payouts. Hopefully, FL will have a standings sheet posted throughout the day so you can tell where you stand. I think you probably figured that out already.

Also, it's usually a good idea to keep a bullet or two in reserve for late in the day. If chalk has been hitting all day you can make up ground quickly.

Good luck. Either way head on out to LV and the Orleans. These dang tournaments are a lot of fun and can be addicting!

Cliff

[km]

T-brown, goin for the money at Finger Lakes - good for you!

Save one of your optional bullets for the very last race simulcast. Most local tourneys shut things off at 6pm. Be sure you know what the final race will be. "Hold the Line" said General Maximus when the barbarians attacked the Romans. Hold the Line with your last bullet in every tournament.

Do not waste a single bullet on a horse below 4/1 unless you are in the lead on the final race or need a few points to pass another player in the finale. The serious action occurs late in the tournament nearly every time. That's why you wait. In short tourneys, you still need points, not winners. If there is one bomb, it will wipe out all the other players, no matter how many winners they have with the chalk earlier. At Finger Lakes, the big bomb that kills everyone is unlikely, so cross your fingers that it won't occur and stick with logical 4/1 - 8/1 types. You can't trust any horse over 15/1 at Finger anyway, there is no predictability with them, it will be a fluke or drug move. More likely, someone will tag a playable $30 horse at BEL or AP or CRC to win your contest. You need to take a few shots on those yourself and get into a winning position. You won't win unless you hit something over 10/1 during the tournament.

Cliff advice is good, get as many entries as you can afford and fire away on the optionals. Throw caution to the wind and let it go on those strong early or late velocity runners that have poor form, this is not the time to be picky, 3/2 shots look good on paper, 17/1 winners look like crap in the pp's, forget recent solid form and speed figures and and go for the longballs that have more subtle clues from HTR.

Ignore all talk from other players. There was a guy that hit the first 6 winners in a row at TUP last December. He was sky high and lecturing the room on how to pick em. Six consecutive low priced winners and he thought it was in the bag. We laughed him off and sure enough when the longshots started coming in, he was buried in his own chalk and didn't even make the top 20 at the end.

Favorites below 4/1 are a deadly mousetrap in tournaments, the cheese looks real good and the horses appear the best on paper, and many of them do win, but you will get exterminated if you fall for it.

[tbrown]

I came in 13th out of 100. Missed a money spot by under $500.
Overall, I am pleased with my perfomrance-$100WP format I "won" about $3600 and was in a clump of close finishers. Winner was shock speed and amassed about $6,000 and never looked back.
I had two bullets left the last at Calder Saturrday, and the last at Belmont. I played #11 at Belomont, and he ran third at 24-1 and at Calder, #5 who ran 4th at 33-1. Close but no cigar.
I hit a couple of 7-1 shots which really helped and finished 3rd with 4 longs! Ooooooo, those photos will kill you.
I met two members from the PA board there, so it was a double fun day-since August I have met a lot of people from PA and from here and this makes the whole game just so much more interesting.
Fig2......best thing since sliced bread.

[km]

Excellent tournament for you 'Brown, well done. And you had fun too. That's what it's all about. Hope to see you in Vegas soon for a bigger one soon. Thanks for sharing your experience and appreciate the compliments on HTR.

[Donnie]

Hey Brown! Nice job, especially if that was your first tournament!!

Just wondering how exactly you are using the Figs2 screen.....?

[tbrown]

Thanks Ken and Donnie-yeah, my first real tournement that I had to pay to get into.
Was really a rush going into that last race so close......I think my eyes were bleeding after going over those two optional races left!

Donnie, I use the Fig2 screen just like the sheets to look for patterns. I can throw a lot of horse out just by seeing those fig trending Northeast. More importantly, I can look for horses not to run so good today based on the last race. I use the patterns to pick my pacelines, then go to velocity for the seperation. Usually only have 3-5 horses to look at, but using on old Sartin suggestion, I try to get 5 in so that a "3" rating means something. Two things I have learned is that the time between the peak races and the next peak is important. I threw out many favorites that just hit peaks or new tops and were coming back in under 20 days. I caught one nice one with a top that would take the races three back-with a bounce and a slight recovery race in 12 and 28 days. Today was 40 days since the top and it was repeated.
I love the graphics of the Figs screen. I just don't always seee these things with the numbers in a coluumn.
I copied a series of posts on the sheets by Sheets Guy and Dr, Larry and have been studying them along wtih Ragozin's book, Litfin's book, and Ken Lampeneau's booklet on figures.
This sure makes paceline selection easier and the pac and per numbers on the same screen are very helpful. Sometimes a horse will peak or top, then regressm but if you look at the pac and per numbers, he might actually have set a pace top while "bouncing" and then I assume that he is still on the improve.
Oh yeah, the new work out number is a good indicator when a trend might be ready to change- just another piece of the puzzle.