Curious Presentation of Past Performance Data

Change in convention or lack of data integrity?

Large datasets have errors. Such is a fact even as db admins try, and largely succeed, to minimize such. Finding real world examples of wrong data in past performances happens…almost never.¹ Finding a mistake in the PPs is like coming upon a precious jewel where least expected. These are not just rare, these are good luck.

Usually when you think there is an error, there is none. After a closer look usually that which appeared wrong has an explanation consistent with past performance data presentation conventions.

In the past when a bug rides a stake, no notation exists indicating the jock is an apprentice, as the weight break is disallowed in stakes races. The superscript suffix indicates the impost allowance subtracted from the impost assigned had a journeyman rider been named. Since no subtraction occurs, no superscript is presented. At least that’s how it used to be. In this race, the third on the Penn Mile undercard, such is not so. Has DRF changed their convention such to indicate that the rider still has the bug, even though no weight allowance is allowed? Or is this a rare good luck fuck up?

Note the conditions. Older fillies and mares are assigned weight of 124, and non-winners of $18k twice in 2024–2025 get a 2lb allowance, ignoring claiming races. That’s where Corrina falls, as she won that li’l optional claimer at Parx when not in for the tag two back last summer. The impost as printed is correct. I don’t have the encyclopedic knowledge of who still has the bug these days for such to stand out when I see a bug named on an entry in a stake (without the superscript) to confirm this is an error, yet if the convention has changed confirming such should be quite easy. That superscript sticks out like a sore thumb, yeah? If I note such in the future I hope to alert readers here.

¹As regular readers will recall, stupid-fake-world is wrong almost always, though let’s ignore such here, other to say FUCK STUPID FAKE WORLD.

Race and data integrity update

This was not a tinhorn post handicapping the race, yet the only mare’s running lines presented happened to win the race. Good on Michael Matz. He trained Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro who went wrong in the Preakness and sadly died the following of year of laminitis. Both Stephen Colbert and I believed he’d be our first Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in ‘78.

What’s peculiar is that Matz had just 27 starts this year. His was never a big national barn, though 27 sounds like he’s pared down. That’s 4.5 starts per month. He had 4 entered on this card, though, three in this race alone. Perhaps he moved his tack and picked up a string of PA breds, as all four are bred in the Keystone.

As for the bug impost allowance controversy, all findings remain inconclusive. Tyler Conner, not the named rider, A Concepcion, rode the winner. This produces more questions than answers. Concepcion was named on one other mount, though that filly scratched out of the Penn Oaks, carded as the fifth. In that race no bug is noted. This is not necessarily in conflict with the presentation in Lyphard. If the mount was left without a rider at the draw after the named journeyman rider’s agent took his rider off to ride another, Concepcion might have been named as an alternate. Yeah, it’s a stake so such shouldn’t matter anyhow, yet if that’s their approach, to note the bug in this way, the superscript might be expected to be absent. Since the bug would not have been claimed on the entry card, no impost allowance can then be claimed at the draw after entries have closed, and the same logic might follow for a rider change at the draw in a stake. This is not that unusual. If I develop a new theory, I might add such here. Anyhow, here’s that scratched horse without the bug notation.