PICKING winners in horse-racing is known as handicapping. It is the art of selecting winners, using all the information and statistics available. It is more of an art or skill as opposed to a science.

In handicapping races and choosing winners, a number of factors come into play. These factors usually include past performance, distance of race, weight, exercise reports if any, conditions of race and post position referred to as the draw.

There are many systems that punters use, in addition to the factors already mentioned, to include the speed racing/speed variance system which seems to be the most well known and appreciated worldwide.

None of the systems used by the so-called experts are foolproof. If it were so, only favourites would win races, thus rendering the sport dull and boring. The allure of outsiders — horses way off the favourite’s position — winning races would be rendered nebulous if the various systems for choosing winners prevailed in all instances.

There is another factor which many racehorse system users forget: The horse is an animal with blood running in its veins. They are subjected to almost all of the vagaries of life which humans have to endure. They can catch a cold, they can get injured, they can have an off day, they can be friendly and they can be very hard to handle.

So all the signs might be in place, the numbers all add to victory, the weight is right, the draw is good, the exercise reports are brilliant, and the distance is perfect, yet on the day when the race is run, the horse simply does not perform as anticipated; the ‘soup’ then becomes a mixture of cement and sand.

When this undoubted truth occurs punters ‘bawl’ and speak from their pockets rather than trying to figure what went wrong. Yes, there are cases where a well-backed horse is ‘pulled-up’ and it is obvious that a winning effort was not sought.

In such cases, the authorities of racing have the authority to investigate as they seek to defend the rights of the betting public. They are unscrupulous persons in the sport of racing as in almost every sphere of life.

Choosing or picking a winner is therefore fraught with a number of uncertainties which the most accurate rating system can never calculate. All these systems must therefore be viewed as a guide to action in the pursuit of finding winners. These various systems are certainly not the be all and end all for choosing winners. They, however, provide a fairly accurate guide for punters to follow and are usually very stimulating to read calculate in the determination of winners.

In the process of choosing winners, some persons do not even think about using a system. These persons rely on intuition and other such factors. Nothing at all wrong with that, but maybe, just maybe, winning percentages will be increased using one of the systems.

What are the accepted percentages? Across many sports the percentages differ. For horse racing, the accepted winning percentage for choosing winners has been loosely established at 33 1/3, that is, if you can spot three winners from nine races you are doing well, with very well being five from nine, or even five from 10.

After deciding who the winning horses are, the next task is to bet correctly using the right combinations or even a one horse to win. The overwhelming majority of seasoned bettors agree on one thing — never bet on all races on offer, unless you have the strength of cash to do so. They claim it is always better trying to find two to three races where belief is strongest to have a flutter.

However, if you decide to punt, always remember that you are not going to get it right all the time. Prepare and accept this absolute precondition of racing and enjoy the sport.