HORSE RACING 101 MAKING SENSE OF WHAT'S GOING ON AT THE TRACK.

Byline: Kevin Modesti Staff Writer

When Miami Herald funnyman Dave Barry wrote a column about a rare trip to the track a couple of years ago, he might have spoken for everyone who ventured into the strange world of horse racing for the first time without a tour guide and a translator.

Barry, like most novices, was confused by the Daily Racing Form and its pages and pages of arcane phrases and numbers. ``The so-called Racing Form in fact has nothing to do with racing,'' he concluded. ``It's a means by which espionage agents send each other messages in secret code.''

Barry quoted the ``gibberish'' in a handicapping column: ``Magic Way has the highest Beyer in the field, which is a nice starting point at the maiden level.'' Come again - in English?

For racing executives, it isn't funny.

As they try to restore their sport's popularity, they're often reminded that one obstacle is its jargon, its sheer complexity, its image as an insider's game. The intricacy that prompts diehard horseplayers to praise it as the world's most challenging gambling game also causes novices to throw up their hands in confusion.

The problem is particularly acute in weeks like this, when the newspaper and television buildup to Saturday's Kentucky Derby will give horse racing its broadest exposure of the year. What will the sport gain if a reader is enticed by a profile of a great jockey, only to be intimidated by some reference in paragraph 14 to ``Dosage'' or a ``5-furlong breeze'' or a ``Beyer figure''?

So, increasingly, the racing industry is attacking the problem, seeking to educate newcomers to the track - or, at least, make it easier for them to learn on their own.

An example: Santa Anita Park in Arcadia held free ``beginners' seminars'' every day during the racing season that ended Monday. Groups of 20 to 60 people heard staff handicapper Bill Downes explain the basics of terminology, the types of races, how to read the track program, how to place a bet and how to watch a race.

Santa Anita also offered lessons in deciphering the Daily Racing Form.

``Whenever I explain about the exacta part-wheel and the trifecta box, the newcomers area like, `Whoa! What is that?' I tell them, if you really are a newcomer, keep things simple, go with win, place and show (bets), exactas and daily doubles. The tris and triples (can wait).''

Another example: At Hollywood Park in Inglewood, which opened a 65-day season Friday night, the track program now includes a full page of simplified analysis for each race, aimed at what president Rick Baedeker calls ``new or intermediate patrons.''

But how many new patrons would understand this commentary on Miss Pixie, a filly who ran third as a longshot in Friday's featured Senorita Stakes? ``Popped and stopped in Arkansas; tough post and meets other speed; bred on top to handle turf,'' it read. ``Keeps pace red hot.''

Assuming the newcomer wasn't put off by that, he could have bet on Miss Pixie at one of the ``new bettors' windows'' - with tellers presumably selected for their patience - Hollywood Park has dotted throughout the facility.

``I've always told people who come to the track for the first time, it's not necessary to know how to handicap, you can still have a good time, and have a chance of winning, by picking names or numbers or colors,'' said Allen Gutterman, Hollywood Park's vice president for marketing. ``The game would be a lot healthier if more members of the public came out and just had a good time.

``A lot of people find (the racetrack) because they have a gambling gene. But I'd be out of business if I had to depend on that.'' Hence the effort to educate.

This doesn't seem to be necessary in other sports. Not that baseball and football aren't complicated; try explaining the infield fly rule to an Englishman. But in other sports, fans don't feel obligated to participate by trying to bet on the winners.

As American society moves farther from the soil, people may feel less familiar with horses. As newspapers and magazines have shrunk their racing coverage - mirroring declines in track attendance in the era of simulcast wagering - people may be less comfortable with racing vernacular.

And as the spread of casinos and lotteries has siphoned away casual gamblers, what's left at racetracks are studious handicappers whom the general public might consider unbeatable.

``I can cash a bet and say, `Twenty minutes of handicapping are responsible for that winner.' It's very satisfying,'' Gutterman said. ``But it takes an investment of time.''

Teaching potential fans to pick winners - or enjoy the intellectual challenge of trying - is a goal of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association. Among the organization's first projects in 1998 was the distribution of a ``pocket wagering guide'' in 3.5 million copies of Sports Illustrated magazine.

This week in Louisville, home of the Kentucky Derby, the NTRA plans to unveil a marketing tour called ``The NTRA Racing Experience,'' a tractor-trailer that will crisscross the country carrying interactive displays ranging from jockey profiles to a ``you ride the horse'' virtual-reality feature.

Also, the NTRA will begin distributing Playbill-style fan guides at major races like the Kentucky Derby.

``You'll have 150,000 people at Churchill Downs, and maybe 50,000 of them are horseplayers. One-hundred thousand are novice or barely above novice,'' said Eric Wing, an NTRA spokesman. ``These (magazines) are not designed to crowd out the track program in any way. In fact, part of it tells you to refer to the program to make informed bets. But it will tell you how to watch a race, the different kinds of bets, what to say at the (betting) window, etc.

``Fan education is so key. It's one thing to run television ads and make the sport look exciting. But if people see that ad and come to the track and feel befuddled, what have you accomplished?''

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW

1. Because racetrack gamblers compete not against the ``house'' or against an expert's point spread but against each other under the so-called parimutuel system, it's possible to turn a profit in the long run if you're smarter than the crowd.

2. Track officials aim to present competitive races by grouping horses of comparable ability - or, at least, similar credentials. Thus, female horses and young horses invariably run against horses of the same gender and age; winless horses (maidens) invariably run against other winless horses; horses with a single victory often run together, and so on.

3. As a rule of thumb, the larger the purse, the more important the race and the better the horses. Championship-level and other high-quality races come with names - like the ``Santa Anita Handicap'' or the ``Hollywood Futurity.''

4. In the simplest terms, handicappers assess a horse's chances of winning based on 1) his overall ability (judged by the quality of horses he has defeated, how fast he has run, and his pedigree); 2) his apparent fitness (his recent performances, his physical appearance, his trainer's reputation); and 3) his suitability to today's race (depending on the distance, running surface, likely pace, etc.)

5. Mostly, handicapping is a matter of interpreting the data in the Daily Racing Form, whose ``past performance'' charts provide information in about two dozen categories for each horse - more than you'll learn about a shortstop by reading his stat box in the average major-league media guide.

6. Better to have a good horse with a bad jockey than a good jockey with a bad horse. The most important person in a horse's life is not the jockey but the trainer, who is responsible for keeping him in shape and choosing his races (though a domineering owner is eligible to overrule the trainer).

7. Because of their pedigrees and training, horses vary significantly in their affinity for races of different distances and running surfaces. Only a horse of rare versatility could compete in both the three-quarter-mile Breeders' Cup Sprint and the 1 1/2-mile Belmont Stakes. Cigar, twice Horse of the Year in the 1990s, won once in 11 races on turf but won 18 times in 22 races on dirt tracks.

8. Horses can begin racing at age 2, when they're the equivalent of human teen-agers, and tend to keep getting faster up to age 4 as they mature physically and mentally. The winner of the Kentucky Derby, restricted to 3-year-olds and held in May, probably won't be the fastest horse in the country at his moment of glory.

9. The ``best'' horse - the betting favorite - wins about 33 percent of the time. Blame bad luck on the track, the tendency of horses to go off form without announcing it, and the fact handicapping is an inexact science.

10. When a horse seems to speed up in order to pass his opponents in a thrilling stretch run, that's usually an optical illusion. In most cases he's taking advantage of opponents who are weakening faster than he is. In a typical three-quarter-mile race, the first quarter is run in 22 seconds, the second in 23, the third in 24-25.

11. Highlights of the racing calendar: preparation of 3-year-olds in the winter and spring for the Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday in May; the Triple Crown races (Derby, Preakness, Belmont Stakes) in May and June; debuts of precocious 2-year-olds in the summer and fall; initial clashes between top 3-year-olds and older horses in the fall; preparation of horses of all ages and specialties for the Breeders' Cup races in October or November.

12. Most of the above applies solely to thoroughbred races. There are also quarterhorse races (mostly a quarter-mile or less) and harness races (the ones in which the horses pull little buggies). Thoroughbreds, quarterhorses and standardbreds (harness horses) are entirely different breeds.

- Kevin Modesti

CHALKBOARD DEFINED

Bug boy: Apprentice rider, so-called for the asterisks that mark his horses' reduced weight assignments.

Dogs up: Indicates that pylons protect inner portion of track during workouts.

Washy: Sweaty (i.e., a nervous horse).

Dosage: A numerical description of a horse's pedigree.

Beyer figure: A speed rating calculated by the method attributed to Washington Post turf writer Andrew Beyer.

1:42 3/5: A race clocking expressed in the traditional fifths of a second. (Hundredths finally are in vogue.)

Furlong: One-eighth of a mile.

Godolphin Barb: One of the three stallions from whom all thoroughbreds are descended.

Gelding: Castrated male horse.

Pacer, trotter: The two types of harness horses, referring to their gaits.

5-furlong breeze: Moderately vigorous five-eighths-mile workout.

Race shape: Description of the pace of a race - fast early and slow late, vice-versa or something in between.

Pinhead: The losing jockey you just bet on.

Exacta, quinella, trifecta: Single-race wagers in which you try to pick the top finishers 1-2 in order; 1-2 in either order; or 1-2-3 in order.

Daily double, pick-three, pick-six: Multirace wagers in which you try to pick two, three or six winners in a row.

Morning line: The track's prediction of the actual odds (which are determined by the wagering).

Pinhooker: A horse buyer who intends to re-sell at a profit.

Stud book: The registry of pedigreed thoroughbreds.

Track bias: Tendency of a racing surface to favor one type of horse, usually front-runners or big finishers.

- Kevin Modesti

CAPTION(S):

drawing; box

Drawing: no caption (Horse standing by chalkboard with racing terms)

Illustration by Jorge Irribarren/Daily News

Box: What you should know/Chalkboard defined (see text)