THE FOURTH DIMENSION

A System for finding winners of handicap races on the flat

Although not always the case, it is a general rule that a horse does not get
a handicap mark until it has run three times. Then it's fourth run will often
be in a race with experienced handicap runners, and it will be running off
a handicap mark it has been given by the official handicapper.
Sometimes that handicap mark (which is a bit of a guess) will be, in
effect, too high - or too low.
If it is too high the horse has no chance - If it is too low, the horse has
every chance. And this is what we are looking for.
But we are not about to try and work out the correct handicap mark for
ourselves. Instead we are looking for a number of pointers which might
indicate that the horse is, as they say, "Well in". We have identified the
following as factors to consider:
Factor 1 = The horse finished 3rd, 4th, 5th, or 6th Last Time Out (LTO);
Factor 2 = The trainer has engaged a professional jockey to ride the horse
- rather than employing a young apprentice rider. (Although there are two
or three really good apprentices who are so good they might be
considered...These apprentices will usually only be claiming the
minimum allowance of 3 lbs.).
Factor 3 = The SP or predicted SP will be less than 8/1
Factor 4 = If the above considerations end up giving you more than one
horse, you may wish to select the most fancied (i.e. the shortest priced
horse). Or you may try a reverse or combination Forecast bet.