Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10  

Past – Present – Future  

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 The tools of the past still matter, even as racing analysis moves toward a more data‑driven future. 

 Plante and Scott refined traditional form analysis for Australian punters. Even those who never followed their methods closely absorbed a great deal simply by listening, reading, and spending time with the form guide.  

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 Today’s Benchmark Programming & Handicapping system has simplified class and made races easier to grade, giving punters a more direct way to compare one field with another. That practical, hands‑on style of analysis remains open to everyone — while some punters still feel excluded by digital speed ratings that can appear to belong to an insiders’ world.  

 

 From Plante to O’Sullivan — The Evolution of Ratings  

 Rem Plante’s The Rating Bureau (launched in the 1960s as Plante and Associates) has continued to evolve with new technology. The Rating Bureau later partnered with analyst Dan O’Sullivan, whose Weight‑for‑Age (WFA) Performance Ratings were released in software form by 2015. 

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 The Next Edge: Biomechanics and Beyond 

 Form analysis won’t end here. Punters will always chase an edge, and the next edge is already forming. 

Three years later, The Daily Racing Form — publisher of the Beyer Speed Figures — added BreezeFigs to its online services, giving bettors an edge when assessing unraced or lightly raced horses.  

BreezeFigs took track‑watching to a new level, especially in juvenile races. The edge comes from digital measures of: 

 

 AI and the Future of Form  

 From Australia to around the world and back again, whatever comes next in form analysis, digital technology will be front and center. 

 

 But the analogue weight‑and‑class approach championed by Rem Plante and refined by Don Scott will remain accessible to everyone.   

 

 Traditional fundamentals still matter while adding cotempory measures:  

• class  

• weight  

• track and surface suitability  

• race position  

• tempo. 

• margins 

 

Add the Generic Flat Turf Time (GFTT), and punters can make better calls on tempo and finishing times. Repeatedly recording those figures — and their margins to GFTT, track by track — deepens that understanding. 

 

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