Odds Predictions for the Pegasus Cup
The 2nd running of the $16 million Pegasus World Cup takes place later today at Gulfstream Park. As I did with the Breeders Cup, I will use my newly developed betting market rankings for horse racing to make odds predictions for this race. First, here are updated rankings, broken down by the following categories:
I've fixed a few kinks from my prior rankings, and overall I would say these pass a general reasonability test. Compare these rankings to the Watchmaker Watch weekly rankings published at the Daily Racing Form (note that my dataset doesn't know when a horse has been retired, which is why Arrogate and Lady Eli still show up here).
In addition, I have found that these rankings can be used to create odds predictions for any race and that they are almost as accurate (and in some cases, more accurate) as the morning line odds set by expert handicappers.
Here is how my rankings would set the odds for the Pegasus World Cup, and how they compare to the morning line:
As far as order, my rankings are in pretty good agreement with the morning line. We both have Gun Runner as the clear favorite, with Sharp Azteca, West Coast, Collected, and Gunnevera coming in 2-5. However, my rankings are not quite as confident in Gun Runner, and would expect the 2017 Horse of the Year's odds to climb from 4/5 to to 3/2. This field is very strong, and I would argue even stronger than last year's Pegasus Cup, where Arrogate went off at 0.90 odds. 4/5 seems a bit too confident for this field (but I know very little about horse racing).
After the race, I will circle back on the accuracy of these predictions, as well as close the loop on how my Breeders Cup predictions did last year.
- Dirt - Horses that run primarily dirt races of a mile or more
- Turf - Horses than run primarily on the turf
- Sprint - Horses that run races less than a mile
These rankings are based on odds data and results for all North American thoroughbred races run over the past 120 days. Using techniques similar to that for my other betting market rankings, I use multivariate regression to build connections between the races and derive what the market "thinks" are the best horses.
GLA stands for "Generic Lengths Advantage" and is the expected margin of victory (in lengths) over an average North American thoroughbred. So, Gun Runner would be expected to beat Arrogate by about 1.4 lengths in a mile race.
GLA stands for "Generic Lengths Advantage" and is the expected margin of victory (in lengths) over an average North American thoroughbred. So, Gun Runner would be expected to beat Arrogate by about 1.4 lengths in a mile race.
| Dirt Rankings | ||
|---|---|---|
| Horse | rank | GLA |
| Gun Runner | 1 | 45.17 |
| Arrogate | 2 | 43.76 |
| Sharp Azteca | 3 | 43.25 |
| West Coast | 4 | 42.70 |
| Bolt d'Oro | 5 | 41.03 |
| Collected | 6 | 40.48 |
| Practical Joke | 7 | 39.77 |
| Forever Unbridled | 8 | 39.56 |
| Elate | 9 | 39.35 |
| Gunnevera | 10 | 39.14 |
| Abel Tasman | 11 | 38.55 |
| Battle of Midway | 12 | 38.33 |
| Mor Spirit | 13 | 38.11 |
| McKinzie | 14 | 38.10 |
| Twisted Tom | 15 | 37.60 |
| Keen Ice | 16 | 37.55 |
| Paradise Woods | 17 | 37.35 |
| Irap | 18 | 37.18 |
| Backyard Heaven | 19 | 37.14 |
| Awesome Slew | 20 | 36.96 |
| Seymourdini | 21 | 36.52 |
| Good Magic | 22 | 36.48 |
| Stellar Wind | 23 | 36.24 |
| Solomini | 24 | 36.19 |
| Moonshine Memories | 25 | 36.17 |
| Turf Rankings | ||
|---|---|---|
| Horse | rank | GLA |
| Highland Reel (IRE) | 1 | 40.22 |
| Lady Aurelia | 2 | 38.65 |
| Lady Eli | 3 | 38.61 |
| Beach Patrol | 4 | 37.72 |
| World Approval | 5 | 37.35 |
| Rhododendron (IRE) | 6 | 36.69 |
| Disco Partner | 7 | 36.55 |
| Ribchester (IRE) | 8 | 36.22 |
| Marsha (IRE) | 9 | 35.87 |
| Big Handsome | 10 | 35.83 |
| Wuheida (GB) | 11 | 35.26 |
| Talismanic (GB) | 12 | 35.21 |
| Sharp Samurai | 13 | 35.13 |
| Idaho (IRE) | 14 | 34.74 |
| Seventh Heaven (IRE) | 15 | 34.74 |
| Grand Jete (GB) | 16 | 34.60 |
| White Flag | 17 | 34.49 |
| Cambodia | 18 | 34.49 |
| Sadler's Joy | 19 | 34.37 |
| Richard's Boy | 20 | 34.35 |
| Pure Sensation | 21 | 34.26 |
| Decorated Knight (GB) | 22 | 34.23 |
| Zhukova (IRE) | 23 | 34.23 |
| Mo Town | 24 | 34.21 |
| Muqtaser | 25 | 34.21 |
| Sprint Rankings | ||
|---|---|---|
| Horse | rank | GLA |
| Roy H | 1 | 42.45 |
| Imperial Hint | 2 | 42.24 |
| Drefong | 3 | 41.47 |
| El Deal | 4 | 39.61 |
| American Anthem | 5 | 39.42 |
| Mind Your Biscuits | 6 | 38.93 |
| Skye Diamonds | 7 | 38.81 |
| Unique Bella | 8 | 38.70 |
| American Pastime | 9 | 37.52 |
| Ami's Mesa | 10 | 37.46 |
| Ransom the Moon | 11 | 37.32 |
| Coal Front | 12 | 37.04 |
| Carina Mia | 13 | 36.88 |
| Stallwalkin' Dude | 14 | 36.30 |
| Paulassilverlining | 15 | 35.81 |
| Takaful | 16 | 35.28 |
| Pink Lloyd | 17 | 34.96 |
| Montauk | 18 | 34.94 |
| Favorable Outcome | 19 | 34.81 |
| Finley'sluckycharm | 20 | 34.56 |
| Ivan Fallunovalot | 21 | 34.43 |
| Limousine Liberal | 22 | 33.98 |
| Tale of S'avall | 23 | 33.95 |
| Quezon | 24 | 33.92 |
| City of Light | 25 | 33.87 |
I've fixed a few kinks from my prior rankings, and overall I would say these pass a general reasonability test. Compare these rankings to the Watchmaker Watch weekly rankings published at the Daily Racing Form (note that my dataset doesn't know when a horse has been retired, which is why Arrogate and Lady Eli still show up here).
In addition, I have found that these rankings can be used to create odds predictions for any race and that they are almost as accurate (and in some cases, more accurate) as the morning line odds set by expert handicappers.
Here is how my rankings would set the odds for the Pegasus World Cup, and how they compare to the morning line:
| win probability | odds | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Horse | morning line | inpredictable | diff | morning line | inpredictable |
| Gun Runner | 44.9% | 31.6% | -13.4% | 4/5 | 3/2 |
| Sharp Azteca | 11.6% | 20.0% | 8.5% | 6/1 | 3/1 |
| West Coast | 9.0% | 17.6% | 8.6% | 8/1 | 7/2 |
| Collected | 9.0% | 10.4% | 1.4% | 8/1 | 7/1 |
| Gunnevera | 5.1% | 7.6% | 2.5% | 15/1 | 10/1 |
| Stellar Wind | 2.6% | 3.8% | 1.2% | 30/1 | 20/1 |
| War Story | 3.1% | 3.7% | 0.6% | 25/1 | 20/1 |
| Giant Expectations | 2.6% | 2.2% | -0.4% | 30/1 | 35/1 |
| Seeking the Soul | 3.1% | 1.2% | -1.9% | 25/1 | 65/1 |
| Fear the Cowboy | 2.6% | 1.0% | -1.6% | 30/1 | 80/1 |
| Toast of New York | 3.9% | 20/1 | |||
| Singing Bullet | 2.6% | 0.8% | -1.8% | 30/1 | 100/1 |
As far as order, my rankings are in pretty good agreement with the morning line. We both have Gun Runner as the clear favorite, with Sharp Azteca, West Coast, Collected, and Gunnevera coming in 2-5. However, my rankings are not quite as confident in Gun Runner, and would expect the 2017 Horse of the Year's odds to climb from 4/5 to to 3/2. This field is very strong, and I would argue even stronger than last year's Pegasus Cup, where Arrogate went off at 0.90 odds. 4/5 seems a bit too confident for this field (but I know very little about horse racing).
After the race, I will circle back on the accuracy of these predictions, as well as close the loop on how my Breeders Cup predictions did last year.
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