Always Bet The Colts?

[Shammy Davis]

Interesting study.

http://www.the-aps.org/press/conference/horse.htm

[dublino]

I particularly liked this line.......

whereas humans do not select their own mates based solely on running ability

[Shammy Davis]

http://www.slate.com/id/2250100

[dublino]

As I am a drunken soccermom I am offended at this line....

"many scholars have linked the division of labor between the sexes in modern man to performance differences, arguing that hunting requires men's strength and speed more than other food-collecting tasks."

Maybe Louis can confirm this?

Parity between the sexes isn't limited to horses. Among racing pigeons, males are only 2 percent faster than females.

I wonder if inbreeding patterns induce more speed?

[Daisy Jal Dastur]

As I am a drunken soccermom I am offended at this line....

"many scholars have linked the division of labor between the sexes in modern man to performance differences, arguing that hunting requires men's strength and speed more than other food-collecting tasks."

Maybe Louis can confirm this?

Parity between the sexes isn't limited to horses. Among racing pigeons, males are only 2 percent faster than females.

I wonder if inbreeding patterns induce more speed?

Hehe... good one, Dublino!

Interesting, though... considering that the best races horses in North American and Europe are females!

[Toccet02]

I particularly liked this line.......

whereas humans do not select their own mates based solely on running ability

yeah, but it's a big part of the decision nevertheless . . .

[Shammy Davis]

Dublino posted:

As I am a drunken soccermom . . .

You are apparently misspelling your screen name. It should be spelled D..U..B..L..I..N..A.

[xfactor fan]

While it is not PC to admit, there are differences between the sexes at least in humans. Some are obvious like increased muscle mass, others are more subtle like ability to communicate.

However what most folks don't remember is that the range of abilities is a bell curve. Yes on the top end of the bell curve, a male may be stronger (or faster or whatever) than the top female. But that applies only to the very small top %.

So lets say the top 2% of males are better that all females. That means that the top 2% of females are going to be better than 98% of all of the rest of the males.

[Shammy Davis]

Xfactor posted:

. . .So lets say the top 2% of males are better that all females. That means that the top 2% of females are going to be better than 98% of all of the rest of the males.

[kimberley mine]

So lets say the top 2% of males are better that all females. That means that the top 2% of females are going to be better than 98% of all of the rest of the males.

There is an important corollary to this observation: the bell curve is fantastic when we are looking at populations, but so inaccurate as to be useless when assessing individuals. It's like trying to apply body mass index rules to NFL linebackers--those men are huge and heavy, and thus will have a very high BMI, but under no other definition are they morbidly obese.

Thus, when you are looking at an individual race card, with both fillies and colts in the race, go with individual form rather than overall breed trends.

[Shammy Davis]

KM: I had forgotten I had posted this. Interesting discussion, but it doesn't help my argument that ZEN should be horse of the year. I made the argument that she was mare, but according to the conclusions of this link, the percentage of difference in speed between mares and colts is about 1%.

I'll keep this information underwraps while I make my argument for ZEN's HOY. No one reads the Handicapping Board anyway.

[kimberley mine]

Hey, Shammy, no worries, the people who are most likely to raise hackles over that observation are the ones who self-admittedly don't understand statistics anyway.

In effect, one race where all the runners are at the same level is a very narrow "slice" of that bell curve, and it's statistically impossible to say that the female horses in that slice are faster or slower than the male horses. And because a race field is small--not more than 15 on a good day--you can't project observations about that one field back onto the overall bell curve and have it make any sense at all. This is true regardless of whether the race is the Arlington Million or it's a $20,000 Arlington allowance.

Personally I wish they would give Goldikova HOTY, but that's about as likely to happen as me winning the Kentucky Derby. I passed out of age-restricted races long ago.....