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Picking Winners: A Horseplayer's Guide | 
 enlarge | Author: Andrew Beyer
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
Buy Used: $3.48
You Save: $11.52 (77%)
New (28) Used (29) Collectible (4) from $3.48
Avg. Customer Rating:  13 reviews
Sales Rank: 14719
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.8 x 6.1 x 0.6
ISBN: 0395701325
Dewey Decimal Number: 798.401
UPC: 046442701327
EAN: 9780395701324
ASIN: 0395701325
Publication Date: May 6, 1994
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Free bookmark with every order. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More.
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Product Description
Just as football evolved with the introduction of the forward pass and basketball with the development of the jump shot, so too was handicapping forever changed by the use of speed figures--and it all started with Andrew Beyer's Picking Winners. This edition features a new foreword in which the author discusses the changes that have swept the sport since the book's original publication. Picking Winners remains a classic in the field of thoroughbred racing.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 8 more reviews...
 Save your time and your money March 3, 2007
12 out of 16 found this review helpful
Nothing against Beyer or any other handicapping writer, but devoting significant time to the study of handicapping is a fool's errand. The mathematics of beating the game are so prohibitively against the bettor that anyone with the ability to even approach break-even would be better served dedicating his/her time to more lucrative pursuits. Regardless of the race, the only thing that is certain is that the track will take about 20% for straight bets and 25% or more for so-called "exotic" wagers. In order to just break-even, you need the ability to identify errors made by the betting public of at least 20%. For any reasonable series of races in which the market is "efficient" (i.e. the betting populace has done a reasonable job of setting pay-outs) you have zero possibilty of making a profit. Studies have consistently shown that the betting public does a remarkable job in setting an efficient price. Obviously, in order to overcome the 20% "tax", you need superior information to that which is available to the general public. Given that "Beyer" speed figures are now common currency, the advantage clearly doesn't lie here. The racing form and video of previous races are common currency as well. You could take a walk down to the paddock and try to infer something there, good luck! Unless you have the ability to somehow communicate with the horse, this isn't going to really be that fruitful. Some horses look like garbage before a race and spring to life when the gate opens. Others look like Secretariat in the paddock and like a candidate for the glue factory once they hook up at full speed w/ other nags. Another point to consider is that your betting competition includes owners, trainers, stable boys, etc. who are around the horse all the time and certainly have superior information about the horses physical and mental state. Additionally, you can only speculate as to what the owner and trainer are intending from a given race. I'm not talking "fix" here, but it's not always the case that the horse's connections have entered this race with the main objective of actually winning it. Beyer is one of the leading thoroughbred writers in America and revolutionized handicapping with his speed figures, but the difficulty in beating this game should be clearly understood before you find yourself on the proverbial boulevard of broken dreams.
Funny, but not helpful. January 14, 2007
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
It was hard for me to give three stars for this book, because the author revolutionized handicapping. But I didn't think any of the information in the book was useful to me. However, I did enjoy the book as there were a lot of funny stories that I could relate too.
 Intelligent & Enlightening horse racing information! June 25, 2006
Andrew Beyer has been a godsend to horseplayers. He has made it easy to understand and gave us an edge when making selections. Understanding horse race betting and the past performances of horses has opened doors to novice and expert handicappers alike!
Great for picking more than just horses May 15, 2006
19 out of 21 found this review helpful
I've never bet on a horse race. I've actually only been to a track once in my life (we don't have a lot of it in this part of the country), and yet I still found this book tremendously useful. Why? Well, it was recommended to me as a guide to "Picking Winners," not just in the horse racing world but in the stock market as well. And, having now read the book I can say that it has proven a more effective lesson in choosing stocks than most of the investment books I've read.
Some of the areas Beyer explores which I think apply to the stock market as well (or to any investment situation as far as I can tell) are:
-the effect different track conditions can have on a horse's performance.
-considering the effects of trainers on a horse's ability to win, lose, progress, or decline in performance.
-spotting potential cases of insider information.
-When to bet on a consistent performer over an unproven newcomer and vice versa.
-detecting signs of physical malady or deterioration early before you lose money because of them.
-How to detect and hopefully stop a losing streak once one begins.
In short this book provides an incredible amount of insight into the ways of selecting the merits of one horse (ie stock) over another without discounting the influence of other factors (the trainer, ie management, for example) on the outcome. I highly recommend this book as a source of investing knowledge and insight and, were I to take up speed handicapping, would absolutely start here.
 Very Informative April 15, 2006
Andrew Beyer takes an interesting and analytical approach to picking winners at the track, while his easy style makes this a fun and understandable read. Beyer's biggest contribution is the use of speed figures - horses that show bursts of speed in their last race are usually good bets. There's also valuable information about track conditions and other factors. As one that rarely visits the track, I didn't realize that not every horse entered in a race is expected to seriously compete. This book came out in the 1970's, and the author has added additional methods for picking winners, but it still makes an interesting read.
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