The crunch time came for our David Hayes betting test in the wake of last year's spring carnival. The stable experienced an extremely poor run and placed the 6-Point Divisor Test under great strain.
For the month November 26 to December 26, the stable's winners were few and far between, even though there were many runners, and the profits made in the test's initial foray went straight out the window.
So bad was the run, in fact, that our team decided to end the test at December 26 and adopt a new tack-bet the Hayes stable only at major racing carnivals. In this way, they reasoned, the Hayes team was likely to be at its best, with its very best horses running.
The test has now been resumed from the Moonee Valley meeting on January 26 (William Reid Stakes day) and will be continued through this particular part of the Melbourne racing period. We should, then, see a better performance-providing the stable can repeat some of the enormous successes it enjoyed last season.
Our first test, details of which were published on pages 4 and 5 of the January P.P.M., went from November 7 to November 24 and ended up with a handsome profit of $632.60, or 54.58 per cent on actual turnover. This was a fine performance from just six winners.
The winners did come when the test went into Stage 2, but they didn't happen regularly enough, and when they did the prices were not good enough to sustain profits. By Boxing Day, the profit had evaporated, to be replaced by a worrying $472 loss.
In the April issue of P.P.M., we'll have an update (results only) of the David Hayes test. This update will be in Brian Blackwell's Final Word column.
By Richard Hartley Jnr
PRACTICAL PUNTING - MARCH 1991