Mutuel Interests: Introduction

The one topic in horse racing that never seems to go away is CAW (Computer Assisted Wagering) teams. The topic is complex and has been written about throughout the industry over the years. This series of blog posts is an attempt to explain this for non-technical horseplayers and discuss where the industry can go from here. Can this problem be solved? Have we passed a point of no return?

I have spent time building two products within the horse racing industry, Backstretch and Contest Jockey, neither of which still exist today. I have experimented with modeling over the years, largely unsuccessfully. I have had the opportunity to experience a lot of the technology in the horse racing industry at one time or another over the years and to say it has been frustrating would be an understatement.

David O’Rourke, NYRA’s chief executive officer and president, was quoted in [Trying to Stifle CAW ‘Trade Secrets’ in Court while at the Same Time Rolling Out Help for Small-Scale Horseplayers])https://www.thoroughbreddailynews.com/trying-to-stifle-caw-trade-secrets-in-court-while-at-the-same-time-rolling-out-help-for-small-scale-horseplayers/) coming to the defense of retail horseplayers. This is not groundbreaking, NYRA has been experimenting with many changes in recent years to level the playing field. This has been a common tactic in the industry and the talking points haven’t really evolved.

“I think this is the beginning of a very interesting journey for the sport. Sometimes it takes an inflection point, and I think the inflection point was definitely met this [past] year in terms of the feedback that we were getting from our core retail players,” O’Rourke said.

To say there’s been a single inflection point is an understatement. The horse racing industry has a long list of inflection points and we are getting really good at ignoring these inflection points.

There are two parallel tracks I think the horse racing industry should take. Limiting CAW benefits is clearly one the industry has already focused on quite a bit. This comes with some unintended impacts that no one really likes to talk about. If we simply just limit the CAW teams, they will just find another way to do what it is they are trying to do. The other important track here is enabling the retail horse player with more capabilities and access to data. These are not mutually exclusive and both should be worked on at the same time. David O’Rourke has stated publicly that NYRA is working on a live odds feed that matches what CAW teams have access to, but this still isn’t something that is available yet.

Throughout this series of blog posts I will work through many areas in more detail covering everything from what are CAW teams, how do they function and what do they have access to. Additionally, talking through data access and what goes into modeling horse racing as well as rebates and how all of this impacts the type of play that a retail horseplayer should target.

The first post in the series is available here, and dives into the background on what a CAW team is and the different levels of access into tote systems as well as data access. None of this is necessarily new information, this has been written about frequently over the years. I will reference deeper dives on all these topics as appropriate throughout.

I welcome any feedback or comments on anything I write here, healthy conversation and debate contribute meaningfully to change in the industry. There are many good ideas out there on how to improve horse racing, now is the time the conversation needs to become loud enough to start forcing the change we all know is desperately needed.

Stay tuned for more.