Profile Of A Winner - Part 2

Do the Profiles Work?

The simple answer is yes, they do work. There would not be much point in reading any further if they didn’t. The systems focus is not on eliminating horses that can’t win. The focus is in trying to quantify the relative chances of each entrant. Every Breeders’ Cup starter is screened through the Profile and given a score based on how well they fit the Profile. I’ve entitled that the 20-20 score. I named it 20-20 because at the time I was working on the Derby Profile which had 20 statistical factors and 20-20 is a description of perfect vision. Perfect vision more or less describes the intent of the project, it does not select winners, it gives you an unclouded look at the field so you can select winners. Each entrant is given a 20-20 score and graded based on that score.

For the purposes of the project I have compiled the 20-20 scores of each Breeders' Cup entrant and proposed that a win wager equal to their profile score be placed on each horse. So in essence you’re betting every horse (unless they have a negative profile score) but in different amounts based on their statistical chance of victory.

I realize that no one in their right mind would wager like that, but the purpose of the exercise is to show you the value of the system even when no discretion is applied. If one can make money by blindly following the system then you ought to make even more by exercising some sound judgment when you’re actually at the windows.

Betting on every horse at the levels determined by the profile would have returned a 32.18% profit. Meanwhile betting the same amount on every single horse would have yielded a –5.88% loss. So clearly there is value in what the profile produces. Another great thing about it is that it’s not dependent on single boxcar winners for profitability. The equity curve is actually quite smooth with only 3 losing years out of 12.

Another way to use the system might be to only look at the horses that had a perfect profile score for their race. Over the last 12 years there were 222 horses with a perfect score in 91 races. So on average you’ll get 2-3 horses in each race that are “perfect”. These 222 had a cumulative Breeders' Cup record of 222-72-24-26. So 1 in 3 was a winner and a horse with a perfect profile score won 72 of the 91 races. That’s 79%! Betting on all of these horses would have yielded a 149.28% profit with no losing years.

You can view a breakdown of the 20-20 scores for each Breeders' Cup entrant since 1996 by visiting this link.