Pace Makes the Race: An Introduction to the Sartin Methodology

Very good.

i would refrain from purchase of this book if i had to do over again. my puter does basically all that is in this book. this book was distributed when having a computer handicapping program was a rarity. it is predominately a book on how to calculate the various factors in pace handicapping.

Trying to get use to the data provided but looks like it would be a very helpful handicapping tool.

Tom Hambleton, Pace Makes the Race (O. Henry House, 1991) The book's attribution is a slight misnomer, though one that will pleasantly surprise readers as yet unfamiliar with it; while Tom Hambleton is a respected enough name in handicapping, the book is actually co-authored by Hambleton, Dick Schmidt, Howard Sartin, and Michael Pizzolla (author of the recent, and fantastic, Handicapping Magic). The book itself, however, is nothing of the sort; this is the introductory primer to pace handicapping a la the Sartin Methodology, and it has gained almost universal fame among horseplayers in that regard. It's a bit pricey for the two-buck crowd in new release, but used copies are often reasonably priced; if you're even a casual horseplayer, it behooves you to pick this book up, read it, study it, learn it, and live it if you want to get back more than pocket change for your bets. The authors promise there's nothing in this book that can't be done with a pencil and paper, and they deliver on that promise, though a few of the tasks are (the first time you do them, anyway) somewhat tedious and time-consuming (compiling track-to-track adjustments being an example). Yet, pound for pound, you're going to be sitting around with pencil and paper for a lot less time with Phase I of the Sartin Methodology than you will with other handicapping techniques. (Brohamer's Modern Pace Handicapping, which comes a few phases later in Sartin development, is complex enough that you'll likely need at least a spreadsheet if you want to spend less than an hour per race, for example.) This is good, solid stuff, and well worth using. The only reason its rating is so (relatively) low is that much of Michael Pizzolla's work here has more recently been expounded and improved upon in his Handicapping Magic, which is even simpler. That said, there's a good deal of information here worth knowing even if you're already a devotee of Pizzolla's book (as all serious horseplayers should be); it definitely deserves a place on your handicapping bookcase.

Older book, but gives good ideas on analyzing races and ways to improve your profitability at the track.