Merit rating appeal.

NHA PRESS RELEASE:

An Appeal was lodged by Trainer Clinton Binda on behalf of the connections of the horse OFFICER CLASS against the Turf Merit Rating of 86 that was allocated after his victory in the MR 76 Race that was run on 17 February 2009 at the Vaal Sand Track.
An independent panel consisting of Mess R S Napier, R J Bloomberg and P Davis was convened to hear this Appeal on 4 March 2009.

The Panel were of the opinion that taking into account the Guidelines utilised by the Handicappers that are applicable to Sand and Turf Merit Ratings and OFFICER CLASS’ form since being gelded, they believed that the Handicappers were justified in adjusting OFFICER CLASS’ Turf Merit Rating to be equal to his Sand Rating of 86 and therefore overruled this Appeal.

The Panel also advised that the Handicappers should re-assess OFFICER CLASS’ Turf Merit Rating within its next two runs.

The deposit will be refunded.

Ah yes, penalising a horse on the turf for a performance on sand. I know all about that one. Imvho this practice is unfair and each horse should have 2 ratings based on actual performances, not guesswork.

I figure that this amounts to retrospective handicapping, a practice that is generally frowned upon, but what can you do? I hope for my mate's sake that the horse is as good as the handicappers seem to think, but this surely defeats the object of separate turf and sand marks?

Officer Class MR80 (3yo 59Kg) won by 1.75L beating
Golden Web MR75 (3yo 56.5Kg) over 1200m

So your mates horse beat Golden web by 1.75L and 2.5Kg (total of 11lbs)
So Golden Web MR75 + 11 = 86 for Officer.

Or the 3rd horse Mastarsel MR81 by 3 3/4 and -0.5kg (also 11 lbs)
So Mustarsel MR81 + 11 = 92 for Officer

Or the 4th horse Quid Pro Quo (6yo 57.5) by 8 lengths (1.5Kg + 8L +wfa(7) =36 lbs)
= 107 for Officer

etc etc

They gave Officer Class an adjustment which made only the 2nd horse competitive with him next time, and he holds every other runner comfortably again if they meet again.

The question is why they gave him the full rating and rarely to other winners.

His sand rating is not the bone of contention, JackD. That they retrospectively put up his turf rating to equal his sand MR is, though. The horse has never yet shown the ability on grass to merit a mark of 86, which of course is not to say that he never will.

My humble apologies to all. I thought the objection was on the horse's latest run and because he hasn't run on the grass since he won his penultimate start there's no way for us public sector slops to know the rating until carded on grass again.

HOW the appeal board did not find that the handicapper is completely out of order is beyond me. It's an utter disgrace and Mess R S Napier, R J Bloomberg and P Davis should go back to handicapping school, if they've ever been in the first place.

In his last start a MR76 over 1200m grass, the result was:
0.00 1st Officer Class (3yo) MR77 57.5kg
0.75 2nd Cosmic King (3yo) MR75 56.5kg
0.80 3rd Brite Blue (5yo) MR68 56.0kg
1.00 4th Dinner For One (3yo) MR86 62.0kg

Depending which horse you decide is the line horse
2nd makes Officer Class 79
3rd makes Cosmic +2, and winner 81
4th makes Brite -1, makes Cosmic +1 and Officer +3 to 80

It's impossible to make Officer Class (77) an 86 on turf (+9 lbs) no matter how you fiddle this by winning a hcp by 0.75 !

Yet another poor show the handicapper who did this,
and even worse, the Appeal Board who rubber stamped it again.

Common Robert, the new broom supposed to sweep clean!
Lipps, speak to your other mate!

The handicappers are allowed to do this in terms of the rules or guidelines, at any rate with 3yos. It seems unfair and downright wrong to me, but you can't really blame the appeal panel. I cannot speak for any of them, but at the end of the day they were hamstrung by the rules. Maybe the whole system needs some tightening up?

Are we entitled to know what these rules and/or 'guidelines' are...do you have a copy? God forbid they make them up as they go?

I have nothing in writing with me now but I gather the handicappers may at their discretion give a horse the higher of its two MRs on both surfaces even if it is qualified for separate turf and sand ratings, if the horse is a 2yo or 3yo.

Looks like they guessed again.

Poor Officer Class effective stopped by the assumption that he's as good on grass as on sand.

Handicapping is a RETRO-ACTIVE process, you rate what you see not what might be!

Cleome perfect example of overrating by the Handicapper. Was near a 100 at 1 stage and only this week won it second race. Took all this time to get a rating where she was competitive.