[Music] hi everyone Matthew to sanis here with nirra bets here with your handicapping 101 tutorial on class make sure to like this video And subscribe to The Nair bets YouTube channel these tutorial videos are a great way for beginners to get a little bit better acquainted with the sport and for those of you who are a little bit more experienced just to get a brief freshening today we're talking about class and this is helpful to understand different classifications of horse racing so that you can understand where horses are coming from and how to adjust for
understanding different classes at different tracks Etc well in order to understand classifications you need to understand the different categories of races that exist in horse racing so when we talk about class there are four main components of races in the sport Maiden races claiming races allowance races and stakes races all horses that have yet to win a race are considered maidens therefore they run in Maiden races in rare exceptions horses that are maidens can run in other types of races but generally speaking you need to have won a race before running in these other classifications
so Maiden races are simply for horses that have yet to win a race horses that have won a race are not allowed to participate in Maiden races now there are classifications obviously within Maiden races a lot of times you can look at this by purse size so how much money is the maiden race worth there are some Maiden races that are worth $120,000 or more there are some mid races that are worth $5,000 there's a lot of variation here and typically that tells you something about the caliber of racing the quality of the horses involved
Etc there's also multiple classifications within Maiden races in terms of Maiden special weight versus Maiden claiming Maiden special weight are what we think of as the top tier Maiden horses okay these are the horses that are running in the summer at Saratoga in the spring at Keelan these are the races that people have an eye on for your future Kentucky Derby prospects and the really exciting Young Horses in the sport they're also the maiden claiming races now the designation here is that any horse running in those races could get claimed by another trainer and ownership
group obviously if you're a trainer running a horse in a maiden claiming race you run the risk of losing that horse to someone else who puts in claim therefore generally speaking the best horses are never exposed to the claiming ranks within the maiden areas so your best horses are running in your maiden special weights the horses that maybe are not showing quite as much are run in the maiden claiming categories It's Not Unusual to see Maiden claiming horses go on to very good careers but it is something just to keep in mind in terms of
that designation now once a horse is broken and madeen it can go into one of three different different areas claiming erases allowance rases and Stakes rases your claiming erases are your lowest level where as as I outlined earlier you're exposing the horse to potentially get claimed by someone else there are optional claiming erases and these are an important designation optional claiming erases gives the trainers and ownership groups an opportunity not to put the horse in for a claiming tag as we refer to it as and you can see that designation in the past performances about
whether or not there's a claiming price next to the horse's name if there isn't then they're protecting that horse from claim there is then the horse is obviously potentially an opportunity to get claimed and again much like maiden special weight there's a lot of variation within claiming based upon price there are $100,000 claiming races there are also $5,000 claiming races so if you can claim a horse for $100,000 those are actually pretty highlevel horses Meanwhile your $5,000 claimers are probably not going to be achieving quite as much and running at a lower level and at
some of the smaller tracks allowance horses is the next level up these are horses that are protected from claim and this is where you often will find younger horses who are ascending and may eventually become Stakes caliber horses later in their careers but these are races that have some classifications on them and again can vary in terms of purse size the one thing is these are horses that are protected from the claim and generally speaking are your higher caliber horses obviously you have your Stakes level competition as your highest level but it varies from listed
Stakes to grade three grade two and grade one being your highest caliber of racing so let's talk a little bit more about class within this element of horse racing and the fact that class moves are common obviously once a horse breaks its Maiden it's going to have to move up in class to another caliber of race but that said there are still class mve that happen after a horse breaks its Maiden that horses can move up from claiming to allowance level competition from allowance to Stakes level competition and vice versa they can also move down
in class from Stakes to allowance to claiming depending on how good their form is and depending on whether they're on an upward trajectory or a more downward trajectory in their careers so that's something to keep in mind when you're looking at your past performances what level of race has horses been run running at is the race level of the day that they're running changed is it going up down what's the class move or they staying at roughly the same level then it's also important to understand that horses will vary their class based upon their track
and their level of competition there are lower level tracks and top tier tracks a horse may very well be quite accomplished at a lower level track but may struggle to run against similar classification at a higher level track what do I mean by that an allowance horse at a lower level track May struggle to run at a higher level track in against allowance competition just up here in New York for instance if a horse is an allowance level horse at fingerlakes they may struggle to run against allowance level competition at Saratoga so it's something to
keep in mind that class can vary from track to track so let's take a couple of examples of this and this is one that is a classic example of changing tracks and class movement this is the horse Jeff Fafa who ran in 2023 in the fall and summer up in Canada at of caboa and Century downs and you'll notice when you look at the bottom of his past performances that he was running exceptionally well up at a caboa and Century Downs he won three straight races at a caboa against optional claiming and allowance company and
then he won a Stakes race at Century Downs after that Stakes Victory he was transferred to a new owner and new trainer Rob atress who then ran the horse at New York but this is a massive movement in terms of tracks going from smaller tracks in Canada to one of the Premier circuits in naira and New York and so this horse goes from running in Stakes level competition in Canada to running in the grade three Bold Ruler and the horse not surprisingly does not run particular particularly well finishes seventh that day then you see the
horse step into claiming 50,000 level competition and then optional claiming competition and then eventually claiming 32,000 level competition so this is a horse that had been running against optional claiming allowance and Stakes competition in Canada and ultimately ended up running against claiming competition in New York again class can vary by what track you're at and not surprisingly this horse went back to Canada went back to a cinoa ran against optional claiming company and ran very very well and was actually just in a Stakes race recently so this is an example of class varying by track
so you always have to keep that in mind when you see a a horse moving from a smaller tier track to a bigger track and understanding those class moves could have quite an impact well let's look at a horse staying at the same track and in the same circuit but varying by class so this horse gut feeling is a great example of a horse that is very good at one level of classification but struggles at another so if you look at this horse's past performances when this horse runs against claiming level competition you see this
horse does exceptionally well going back to the very bottom of the past performances in November 2023 winning against claiming 25,000 level competition winning against claiming 16,000 level competition winning again against claiming 16 and then finishing fourth against claiming 20 however notice the starter allowance level races that this horse has run in between those efforts six by seventh lengths seventh by 11 lengths seventh by 11 lengths again so this is a classic example of a horse that's moving up against allowance company at times but simply not stacking up when this horse drops down to claiming competition
looks very very tough so that's something to keep in mind when you look at horses like this understand if this horse is running in an bance race then you're probably not going to want to bet this horse this horses running an a claiming race very formidable at that level finally younger horses have upward Mobility younger horses see huge improvements from race to race and so it's not uncommon to see horses moving up in class repeatedly throughout their careers until they reach a point at which they're no longer successful at that point the trainer usually either
levels off or maybe takes a slight step backwards and in terms of their classification and where they're running so this is a Chad Brown horse over subscribed who broke its Maiden against Maiden special weight competition at Tampa Bay Downs and then stepped up quite a bit from a miden special weight $32,000 race to an optional claiming $80,000 race where the horse finished second and encountered quite a bit of trouble on that particular trip Brown had a lot of confidence in this horse and moved this horse up again against Stakes competition in his third start her
third start so let's see how that actually ended up playing out and what you see here is the end of this race and the number nine horse over subscribed is starting to make a very strong move on the outside as your runaway front runner manga starts to Tire late here comes over subscribed for Chad Brown zooming up on the outside flavian Pratt in the irons and ultimately that horse gets the Victory and wins a Stakes race in only her third start that's a prime example of a horse that has yet to run her best race
and as a result is continually moving up in class until she reaches a point where she may no longer be successful at that point Brown the trainer might take a step back or level off and see if she's able to be successful if she gets a little bit more experience running at that level so what are some things to keep in mind when we're talking about class one is understanding how it varies by track and understanding what level of racing allowance level optional claiming claiming level is and understanding that it will vary depending on the
quality of races taking place at the different tracks when you're looking at tracks like Santa Anita Churchill Downs Saratoga Gulfstream Park generally speaking those are pretty comparable they're all your top tier tracks but then you get into secondary tracks and tertiary tracks and you get into smaller tracks like Pen National and Laurel Park and perhaps even Charlestown or cinoa or Prairie Meadows and you get into smaller tracks and those horses when they step up into the tier one tracks May struggle if they stay at the same classification level may need to take a slight step
back just depending on the circumstances and the level of quality of the horse you also want to look at how results vary by class just as we showed that horse gut feeling earlier that is a horse that is very successful at one LEL of racing really struggles when the horse has to step up in class you see this across different classifications there are some horses who are great allowance level horses but when they step up the stakes competition they're not as good it's even true within the graded Stakes company you can see coures that have
multiple graded Stakes wins grade three or grade two but when they step up to grade one they're not quite up to that level yet so they really struggle so understanding where a horse slots and where they're most effective is a really key element in handicapping and understanding the class Dynamic and then understanding that younger horses obviously have the opportunity to move up and down in terms of class that they might be very precocious early in their careers might be capable of running really well as two-year-olds or young three-year-olds and then maybe they level off whereas
other horses might continually get better the more they run and continually move up in class so younger horses moving up in class give them a shot because sometimes you get really really good odds on those types of horses another thing to keep in mind is that horses that are claimed and are suddenly running for a new barn and new trainer can sometimes see upward class movement that trainers can sometimes make a difference in terms of how they're training the horse the style of racing that they're going to perhaps the surface that they're running on the
distance that they're running at and they can make some changes that might unlock something for that horse and you can see horses improve significantly when they change barns doesn't always happen but it is something to make note of and there are certain trainers who tend to be very successful at getting the best out of their horses after they get claimed into a new barn so something just to keep in mind when considering class I hope everybody found this video tutorial helpful make sure to check out the rest of our tutorials on speed figures on form
and on Pace my name is Matthew Dan sanis wishing you a great and prosperous day at the races and reminding you that it's now post time
