In one or two of your posts, you suggest that it is lack of available time that is holding you back from greater success with VDW, a perfectly reasonable assumption, particularly considering the lengths some contributors to this thread have gone to in a similar quest.
I, myself, thought exactly the same as you some years ago, and, after some early success,was forunate enough to be able to spend a great deal of time on studying the works of VDW, collecting the old form books, and spending countless hours raking the ashes of races long gone.
I learned a lot about horse racing, and reading form, from these studies,and this no doubt duplicates the approach made by a number of others on this thread.
It is a long, laborious, and often frustrating path to tread, and I, no doubt along with others thought I had found "The Holy Grail" on more than a few occasions.
My sole reason for this rather long-winded introduction, is to establish my credentials as one who has been there and done it, and to say that if this is the route you chose to take, you may well get there in time, but you will need a lot of that particular commodity.
There is, however, (In my opinion, of course) a much shorter and quicker route to your destination, one that has only become apparent to me in the past few weeks, and in the hope that you will benefit from this, I will give you a nudge in the right direction.
VDW's teachings have stood the test of time, and despite many attempts to prove them fraudelent, much of what he wrote still holds good today. There is a very good reason for this, and it is my belief that the foundation for his methods was based on plain and simple LOGIC.
Try to read and understand just one of his letters from this standpoint, and hopefully some of the mist will begin to clear. No doubt there are those who will demean this approach, but I assure you, it will take a lot longer their way.
From a personal point of view, my problem now is in the application of the method as I see it, in other words, TEMPERAMENT, a word that many pay lip service to, but very few, even at the upper levels of this forum, actually practice.
All the best for the future,

Johnd

Johnd

I post this as someone with a seemingly similar history of studying VDW's writings, with all the attendant frustrations, to yours. And, furthermore, as someone who knows full well that he is far from being at the end of the road. I currently find some of VDW's examples literally impossible fully to understand.

I've reached almost exactly the opposite conclusion to you, ie I think that the letters, examples etc can only be fully understood the more work one has done on them. It is the discoveries one makes that enables one to go back over the articles and examples and make more and more sense of them.

Least Determined should find that discouragingly long-winded compared with your proposition, I should like to offer a further thought which he may find more encouraging. One doesn't need to understand everything to be able to make good, profitable use of what one does understand.

Thus, while not feeling remotely capable of finding Rivage Bleu types such as Birjand, I do feel competent to find the class/form horse in most situations, and I think that level of understanding is sufficient both to understand at least half of VDW's examples (from which, of course, the understanding was derived) and to find several good bets a month. By good bets I simply mean clear class/form horses which stand up to detailed scrutiny and represent value for the risk involved - Smirk and Montreal being two recent examples.

It is thus my belief that, in the absence of someone really "spelling it all out" for them, Determined and others seriously wishing to get to grips with VDW's approach have no option but to follow the same time-consuming and frustrating path we are on, BUT they can have real confidence that there are significant consolation prizes well before the journey is completed (if, indeed, it ever is). From this perspective, the temperament problem is really just a matter of impatience - trying, as it were, to run before one can walk.

Fulham,

Your last post pretty much echo’s what I wrote to Barney on the 6 Nov. After many contributions to the SCHB VDW realised that the vast majority didn’t understand what he was trying to put across. Whether he was naïve in thinking that readers were generally more advanced in form reading than they actually were I’m not sure, but it would perhaps explain why the ability rating was not mentioned at the outset.

If one manages to get as far as finding out how VDW REALLY worked then like you say there will be more than enough opportunities by just supporting the Class/Form horse when EVERYTHING is in it’s favour.

Being able to balance the factors and isolate selections away from the top 3 rated on ability requires much more experience and know-how.

First of all though you need to be happy that you can isolate the class/form horses properly, and understand how VDW actually weighed up form.

John D has without doubt come to the right decision by stopping betting. Progress will be far swifter without the added pressure of losing money.

Chaz,

I have to agree with your post in principal, but may I ask a couple of questions? The first is how can you ever be sure you are following the VDW guide lines to reading form? Isn't that the main problem? with the old examples it has been done for you. An example of this is Baronet's Cambridgeshire, Why was Town And Country passed over? It is easy after the result to say distance, but he had won over 10f and this was a stiff 9. We can only guess that was the reason, but would all of us come to the same decision before the race? Or was there another reason, and we haven't bother to look because of the obvious? I am working my way through these old examples, and there doesn't seem to be a lot of consistency. In one example a horse drops in class 3 times and is out of form. In the same race another horse does the same and is in form. Ok, there is a subtle difference, but that difference is other peoples opinion. We don't know how informed, or who's opinion that was. In one of the next examples that same scenario about opinion, is ignored.

The other question is, if you paper trade or just watch the race. How do you ever learn how to make these decision's of when to put the money down? There is a very big difference when there is no pressure. You could watch the races for 6 months, get it right 80% of the time, start with the money and it all goes wrong again. I would say don't bet unless you are happy to put your biggest stake on it. That would cut out the I THINK that will win attitude, until the real bets come along.

Someone asked how did I do at Doncaster, I didn't have a bet. I very seldom bet if there is an inspection, or horses are pulled out of the meeting. I did have a very good look at Capitano Corelli, and had already decided against him. He looked a big gangly baby, who had never raced in that class, or on that going. This is not hind sight, I did post to a forum before the race saying just that.

Be Lucky

While I truly have the greatest of respect for yourself and others who have spent countless hours trying to fathom VDW, the phrase " Once you've found it, you'll wonder how on earth you could miss it", hardly serves as the springboard to a doctorate course of study, does it?

Johnd

Perhaps it depends on what you believe VDW meant by "it". He might, of course, have meant "the VDW approach" as an operational whole, or just an important sub-set, such as what elsewhere he referred to as the "missing link".

Mtoto,

We can never be sure that our interpretations of VDW’s methods are 100% correct. However, like I said in my post it is my opinion that we need to be HAPPY/satisfied with our interpretation before the money goes down.

With regards to Prominent King and Beacon Light, it is these situations where VDW’s method of form reading, the way I understand it, will give a clearer picture than any other method that I’ve come across. Most would have seen Beacon Light as a big danger to PK, just as many saw Burrough Hill Lad as the winner in the 86 KG when up against Wayward Lad, but not VDW.

‘Once you’ve found it you’ll wonder how on earth you could miss it’, to me is clearly stating that the answer that most have asked at some stage, or are still asking, is a simple and logical one. There is nothing in that statement to suggest otherwise.

Ignoring everything else, how many form horses are in there in the 240f?

Barney,

Just the One,and therefore the class/form horse, and a decent bet in my mind.

thought you might say that.

How do you see it?

chat?

bandos looks placed to win to me.
what do you think?

on my way

Barney, I'm lost as to where the chat room is?

can you not get in?

scroll to the top of this page.

its on every page now.


just above the "emotcions" banner

To anyone that noticed the deliberate mistake in my post to Mtoto, well done! For those that didn't 86 should read 85 with regards to the KG.

Turned out a good price that for a one horse race.

Hi Barney,

Yes, the price was good and available throughout in the ring. I nibbled away at it during the morning thinking that there would be money for Courage Under Fire during the show, but in the end there was no need.