A
A/E (Actual over Expected)
Actual wins divided by the wins the market expected.
Expected wins are the sum of each runner's implied chance from its Betfair Starting Price (a 3/1 shot contributes 0.25). Betfair SP is used rather than the bookmakers' Industry SP because it carries no built-in margin — on Industry SP a runner with no edge at all would score about 0.85 rather than 1.00, which makes "beat the market" impossible to read at a glance. An A/E of 1.0 means the selections won exactly as often as the market predicted; above 1.0 means they beat it — the hallmark of a genuinely profitable angle rather than one that just backed short prices. Shown for every System Builder back-test alongside Impact Value and chi-squared. A/E and Impact Value are not the same measure: A/E compares wins against the market, IV compares them against chance.
Draw IV
How well a particular stall has performed at a course and trip, against its fair share by chance.
Take every flat race at that course, race type and distance over the previous five years, and compare how often the horses drawn in this stall won with how often they would have won by chance alone. 1.0 is exactly par; above 1.0 means the stall wins more than its share. It is computed strictly from racing before the race in question, so it is safe both for back-testing and for today’s card. Jumps runners have no draw, so the figure is blank for them. When a horse is withdrawn before the off, the stalls close up on the track and the surviving runners’ draws are renumbered live — so a runner’s stall (and its Draw IV) can change during the day, and always matches the stall it will actually break from and the draw the official result will record. A high Draw IV is not the same as an edge — see Impact Value; the market usually prices a known draw bias in.
Draw × Pace IV
Whether horses drawn in this half and ridden this way actually win here.
The sharpest of the draw-and-pace figures, because it tests the combination rather than either part alone. It only counts past races with a field size close to today’s — a low draw in a six-runner race is a different proposition from a low draw in sixteen — and is deliberately left blank where that sample is too thin to mean anything. Flat racing only. Available on the racecard and as a System Builder filter and breakdown.
Pace IV
Whether the way a horse is usually ridden tends to win at today’s course and trip.
Horses tend to be ridden a certain way — making the running, racing handily, or held up for a late run. Pace IV takes that habit from the horse’s last ten runs, weighted towards the most recent, and asks how that style has fared at this course, race type and distance. It is blended: a horse that leads 38% of the time is credited with 38% of the front-runner’s figure, not all of it. Because it is built from previous runs it is known before the race, but it describes a habit rather than a guarantee — a jockey can always change tactics. Roughly 7% of flat runners have no running-style history at all and a further 19% only one to three runs, so it is worth checking the sample before trusting the figure.
Tactical Score
Draw IV and Pace IV combined into one number.
Weighted towards the draw at sprint distances up to seven furlongs, where the stalls matter most, and towards the pace beyond that. Over jumps there is no draw, so it is simply the Pace IV. Above 1.0 means both the stall and the horse’s usual running style point the same way.
A/W (All-Weather)
Synthetic racing surfaces used year-round at six UK and Irish courses.
All-Weather racing runs on either Polytrack (Kempton, Lingfield, Chelmsford City, Dundalk) or Tapeta (Newcastle, Southwell, Wolverhampton). Going is described as Standard or Slow, rather than the turf scale of Hard through Heavy.
Ask RaceMetrics RaceMetrics
AI-powered natural language query tool that answers racing questions in plain English.
Built on 25+ years of Proform Racing data. Type a question like "best UK trainers on heavy ground in handicap chases" or "trainer/jockey combinations with positive ROI in Class 3 hurdles" and get back sortable tables and charts. Daily query limits vary by subscription tier from 5 to 100 per day.
Auto-build Premium
System Builder tool that builds a betting system toward a stated goal, one proven rule at a time.
State a goal — for example "Betfair SP ROI of at least 5%, keeping at least 500 runs" — and Auto-build runs Goal Seek repeatedly, adding the best rule each round until it reaches the target or cannot safely go further. Every step is holdout-guarded: it trains on the older data, tests each candidate rule on the held-out final 12 months, and only keeps rules that hold up out-of-sample. When the best remaining rules only work in the training data it stops and says so — a deliberate refusal to hand over an over-fitted system. The finished draft loads into the builder for review; nothing is applied automatically. Requires a Proform Premium subscription.
B
Beaten Favourite (BF)
A horse that started as the favourite but did not win the race.
Often considered a positive form line for the next race — if the market thought it was best and it underperformed, it may go off a bigger price next time out. RaceMetrics tags these with a BF history badge in At-a-Glance view.
BHA (British Horseracing Authority)
The official governing and regulatory body of British horse racing.
The BHA publishes Official Ratings (ORs) used for handicapping, sets the rules of racing, and licences horses, trainers, jockeys and owners.
BOG (Best Odds Guaranteed)
A bookmaker concession that pays out at the higher of the price taken or the Starting Price.
If you back a horse at 6/1 and it starts at 8/1, you get paid at 8/1. If it shortens, you keep your original 6/1. RaceMetrics' Tips dashboard tracks "Breakfast BOG" and "Morning BOG" P/L variants.
BSP (Betfair Starting Price)
The official starting price published by the Betfair exchange at the off.
Calculated from money matched in the seconds before the race. Used as the standard reference price for P/L calculations on RaceMetrics — exchange-driven, fair, after a typical 2% commission deduction.
Bumper
A National Hunt Flat (NHF) race — a flat race for jumps-bred horses with no obstacles.
Used to introduce future hurdlers and chasers to racecourse experience. Race type 5 in RaceMetrics' classification.
C
Chase (Steeplechase)
National Hunt race over fences (steeplechase obstacles).
Race type 3 in RaceMetrics. Fences are larger and more solid than hurdles. Distances typically range from 2 miles to 4 miles 4 furlongs.
Class 1 to 6
UK race classification scale where Class 1 is the highest and Class 6 is the lowest.
Class 1 includes Group 1, 2 and 3 races, Listed flat races, the top National Hunt Grade 1, 2 and 3 events, and some handicaps. Classes 2-6 are tiers of most handicaps with rating bands, novices, maidens, etc. RaceMetrics' filters and pattern conditions use the same 1-6 scale throughout.
Combined Score RaceMetrics
RaceMetrics' weighted average of six connection ratings — Owner 20%, Trainer 20%, Jockey 20%, Dam 18%, Sire 12%, Damsire 10%.
The horse's own rating (H) is shown separately, not included in the Combined Score. Historically the highest Combined Score in a race wins 22.97% of the time — 2.15 times the rate you'd expect from random selection. Elite Combined Scores (1600+) have a 43.75% strike rate.
Connections
The collective term for the people and bloodlines associated with a horse — Trainer, Jockey, Owner, Sire, Dam, Damsire.
RaceMetrics rates all six connection types separately, plus the horse itself, giving seven distinct rating profiles per runner.
Course Winner (C)
A horse that has previously won at the same course.
Shown as a C history badge in RaceMetrics' At-a-Glance view. Course form is one of the strongest historical predictors, particularly at unusual or undulating tracks like Cheltenham, Goodwood and Epsom.
Course & Distance Winner (CD)
A horse that has previously won at the same course over the same distance.
Shown as a CD badge, which overrides C and D. The strongest form indicator of the four standard history badges.
Course Direction
Whether a racecourse turns left-handed (anticlockwise) or right-handed (clockwise) from the runner's perspective.
Used as a pattern condition for horses that prefer one direction over the other. Most UK left-handed courses include Ascot (round course), Goodwood, Epsom (downhill section).
D
Dam
A horse's female parent (mother).
RaceMetrics tracks every dam in the database with full progeny statistics, rating history and profitable angles. Dam quality particularly influences stamina, temperament and ability on testing ground.
Damsire
The sire of a horse's dam — i.e. the horse's maternal grandfather.
Often a strong indicator of stamina, jumping ability and surface preference, because broodmare sires shape physical type as much as direct sires do. RaceMetrics rates damsires by the cumulative performance of their daughters' offspring.
Distance DNA Premium
A trip-suitability verdict built from a horse's stride cadence compared with winning horses at the distances it has been running.
Winners' cadence falls in a clean staircase as trips get longer (about 2.39 strides/sec at 5–6f down to 2.15 at 2m+). A horse galloping with a markedly slower cadence than the winners at its raced trips profiles as built for further; a quicker cadence suggests sharper trips. Shown as a card on horse profiles with the winners' cadence curve. Needs at least 3 measured stride runs. Available with Proform Premium plus the TPD Sectionals Add-On.
Distance Winner (D)
A horse that has previously won over the same distance, at any course.
Shown as a D history badge. Less specific than CD (Course & Distance) but useful for stamina assessment.
Draw
The stall number from which a horse starts a flat race.
Drawn 1 is closest to the inside rail. Some courses heavily favour high or low draws over certain distances — for example, big-field handicaps at Chester favour low draws because of the tight turns. RaceMetrics' Draw & Pace tool (Enterprise) maps these biases.
DSLR (Days Since Last Run)
The number of days between a horse's last race and the upcoming one.
Used for fitness assessment. Common windows: under 14 days (recent racing), 15-28 days (typical), 29-90 days (mid-break), 90+ days (extended absence). Trainer-specific DSLR patterns are a common profitable angle on RaceMetrics.
E
Each-Way (E/W)
A bet split equally between Win and Place outcomes.
A £10 each-way bet is £10 to win plus £10 to place — total stake £20. UK industry place terms vary by field size and race type: 1st-2nd at 1/4 odds in 5-7 runner races, 1st-3rd at 1/5 odds in 8+ runner non-handicaps, 1st-3rd at 1/4 odds in 12-15 runner handicaps, and 1st-4th at 1/4 odds in 16+ runner handicaps. Individual bookmakers often enhance these on bigger races.
Elite Rating RaceMetrics
A RaceMetrics rating of 1600 or higher, indicating top-tier performance.
Elite participants (horses or connections) historically win 43.75% of races they enter when topping the Combined Score — 3.54 times random chance. Full RaceMetrics scale: 1500 average, 1550+ strong, 1600+ elite.
F
Field Size
The number of declared runners in a race.
Used as a pattern condition. Smaller fields (4-6 runners) favour favourites; large handicap fields (16+) are more random and reward outsiders. RaceMetrics shows field size on every racecard and in profile breakdowns.
Flat Racing
Racing on the level — no jumps. Includes both turf and All-Weather.
Race types 1 (Turf Flat) and 2 (All-Weather) in RaceMetrics' classification. UK turf flat runs roughly April to October; All-Weather year-round.
First-Season Sire
A stallion whose first crop of offspring is racing for the first time — also called a freshman sire.
A stallion's first foals reach the track as two-year-olds several years after he retires from racing, so a first-season sire has no progeny record for punters or the market to work from. That uncertainty is why the angle is followed: prices are set with less information than usual.
When a sire's first crop arrives depends on when he retired, not on his age — a horse retired after his three-year-old season has his first runners when he is seven, a year later and it is eight, and one who raced on to five nearer nine. RaceMetrics therefore counts crops from when a sire's progeny actually began running. In the System Builder the First-Season Sire filter matches the first crop exactly, and Sire's Crop Number lets you select the first, second or later crops.
Form Expert RaceMetrics
RaceMetrics' historical performance analysis tool showing strike rates filtered by going, class, distance, field size and race type for every runner in a race.
Switch between all seven participant types (Horse, Trainer, Jockey, Owner, Sire, Dam, Damsire), match the current race's conditions in one click, and toggle between Win, Win & Place, and PRB (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) modes.
Form String
A horse's most recent finishing positions, read right to left (most recent on the right).
Positions 1-9 shown as a single digit; 0 = 10th or worse; F = Fell; U = Unseated; P = Pulled Up; R = Refused or Ran Out; B = Brought Down; S = Slipped Up. Year breaks shown as a dash ("-") or slash ("/").
Form Temperature
A 0–100 score of how hot or cold a trainer's or jockey's last two weeks have been, measured against their own five-season strike rate.
Shown as small coloured pills next to trainer and jockey names on racecards. The last 14 days' record is put through a binomial percentile test against the yard's own benchmark, so big and small stables compare fairly: 95 or higher means a fortnight that good comes up by luck fewer than 1 time in 20 (hot, red pill); 5 or lower is the same on the quiet side (cold, blue pill). Scores between 25 and 75 are normal variance and show no pill. Hovering a pill — or pressing and holding it on a phone — reveals the fortnight's record, the benchmark and the luck odds. It measures how unusual the recent run is, not betting value — hot yards win more often, but the market largely prices that in.
Frontier Premium
System Builder tool that sweeps one numeric rule across a ladder of values and charts bet volume against return at every step.
Most systems have one number doing the heavy lifting — odds under 8, a rating rank of 3, a field of at most 12. Frontier asks why that number: pick the rule and it re-runs the whole back-test once per value (up to 12, tightest first), charting the trade-off between how many bets you get and what they return, with a rule-off point showing the same system with the rule removed entirely. The shape of the curve is the diagnostic — a smooth slope means the edge fades gently and the threshold is a preference; a sudden cliff means one value is carrying the whole result, a classic over-fitting warning worth a robustness check. Click Use on any row to set the rule to that value. Requires a Proform Premium subscription.
FSP% (Finishing Speed Percentage) Premium
A horse's speed from a point in the race to the finish, measured as a percentage of its own average speed for the whole race — not the field's.
So 100% means that closing run matched the horse's own race average; above 100% it was travelling faster than its own average, below it was slowing. Whether the finishing speed was actually good is judged against the race's par — a ground-adjusted benchmark shown above each column that varies by section, typically falling into the high 90s by the line as horses naturally slow. A horse can read below 100% yet still beat par. Available with a Proform Premium subscription plus the TPD Sectionals Add-On.
Full of Running Premium
A flag for a beaten horse that crossed the line with clear energy in reserve: a top-2 run-out speed in the field and a faster-than-par finish.
Run-out speed is measured two seconds after the line. Beaten horses with this profile never had a hard race — historically they win about 16% of the time next start against a 10% baseline for all other beaten horses. Flagged runs show as a "FoR LTO" badge on racecards and a chip on the horse's profile until the horse runs again. Available with Proform Premium plus the TPD Sectionals Add-On.
G
Gate Speed Score Premium
A 0–100 percentile of how quickly a horse breaks from the stalls, measured from its times to reach 10mph.
Built from tracking data over the horse's last five measured runs (a score of 100 = the fastest starters in training). Fast-gate horses reach the front two early roughly twice as often as slow-gate horses, so the score feeds the Predicted Running Styles model and appears as the "Gate" column on racecards. Available with a Proform Premium subscription plus the TPD Sectionals Add-On.
Goal Seek Premium
System Builder tool that finds the single best rule to add to a betting system for a chosen target.
Pick a target — A/E, Betfair SP ROI, win strike rate or profit per run — and Goal Seek scans the system's breakdown dimensions for the one rule that would lift that target the most. Every suggestion is significance-checked (chi-squared) so a fluke line from a small sample is not promoted as an improvement, and each carries a one-click robustness check against the last 12 months. Apply a rule and re-run to find the next improvement on the now-tighter system. Adding rules shrinks the sample, so the guidance is one or two strong suggestions rather than ten weak ones. Requires a Proform Premium subscription.
Going
The firmness of the racing surface, scaled from Hard (driest) through to Heavy (wettest).
Turf scale: Hard, Firm, Good to Firm, Good, Good to Soft, Soft, Heavy. All-Weather uses Standard or Slow. The going strongly affects horses' performance and is one of the primary pattern-matching conditions on RaceMetrics. Some courses publish "official going" (pre-race) and "actual going" (post-race) — Proform Premium users can toggle Form Expert to use the actual going for more accurate historical analysis.
H
Handicap
A race in which horses carry different weights based on their Official Rating, designed to equalise winning chances.
Higher-rated horses carry more weight; lower-rated horses carry less. The BHA handicapper assigns ratings based on performance. RaceMetrics' filters distinguish handicaps from non-handicaps in every analysis, because the betting dynamics and form patterns are very different.
Headgear
Equipment fitted to a horse's head, typically to aid concentration or steering.
Common types: Blinkers (B), Visor (V), Cheekpieces (P), Hood (H), Tongue Tie (T), Eyeshield (E). In At-a-Glance and racecard views, a "1" indicator shown in bold marks the first time that equipment is fitted — often a strong angle when paired with a new trainer or returning from a break.
HHI (Herfindahl-Hirschman Index) RaceMetrics
A measure of race predictability borrowed from economics, where it measures market concentration.
Each runner's odds are converted to implied probabilities, normalised to remove the overround (bookmaker margin), and the squares of each probability are summed. RaceMetrics displays an HHI band on every race: Wide Open (under 0.15) — very competitive, no clear favourite; Competitive (0.15-0.25); Moderate (0.25-0.40) — market has clear preferences; Concentrated (0.40-0.60) — strong favourite present; Dominant (over 0.60) — heavy favourite, very predictable race.
Horse Rating (H) RaceMetrics
A horse's own RaceMetrics rating, shown standalone in the H column.
1500 is average, 1550+ strong, 1600+ elite. Updated after every race. Crucially, the H rating is not included in the Combined Score calculation — the Combined Score is the weighted average of the six connection ratings only.
HP Dots (High Performer) RaceMetrics
Six dots representing the six connection ratings — each filled gold if that connection is rated 1550 or higher.
A horse with 5-6 filled dots has elite connections across the board. A horse with 0 filled dots has below-average connections. Shown on every racecard and A-Z runners view as a quick visual quality check.
Hurdle
National Hunt race over hurdles — smaller, flexible obstacles versus the larger fences in chases.
Race type 4 in RaceMetrics. Hurdle distances typically range from 2 miles to 3 miles 1 furlong.
I
Impact Value (IV)
Actual wins divided by expected wins, given field sizes — a measure of how much a participant outperforms random chance.
1.0x = average (random chance); 1.5x = good (wins 50% more often than expected); 2.0x = strong (wins twice as often); 3.0x+ = exceptional. RaceMetrics' What Wins tool ranks profitable angles by IV across 11 filter combinations.
In-Running (IR)
Betting that takes place while the race is underway.
Prices change second-by-second based on positions and how horses are travelling. RaceMetrics records each run's In-Running High and In-Running Low — the highest and lowest Betfair prices matched during the race — plus the percentage each sits above or below Betfair SP. A horse that traded 90%+ below its BSP in-running usually came very close to winning; one whose low never dipped below BSP was never travelling like a winner.
These fields appear on horse form lines (via the Columns chooser) and in the System Builder's filters, breakdowns and run listings for RaceMetrics Pro / Proform Premium subscribers. Ask RaceMetrics also includes In-Running price-pattern recipes for analysing trading angles.
ISP (Industry Starting Price)
The official Starting Price published by traditional bookmakers, derived from on-course prices at the off.
Used for level-stakes P/L on RaceMetrics. Differs from BSP (Betfair's exchange SP), which is typically higher because there is no bookmaker margin built in.
J
Jockey Claim
A weight allowance — typically 3lb, 5lb or 7lb — for inexperienced jockeys (apprentices on the flat, conditional jockeys over jumps).
Shown next to the jockey name on racecards as a number in brackets (e.g. "J. Smith (3)" = 3lb claim). The horse carries less weight as a result, which can be a meaningful edge in tight handicaps.
L
Laytown
An Irish racecourse on a sandy beach in County Meath — the only beach racing in Europe under official rules.
One meeting per year, typically in September. Treated as its own surface ("Laytown") in RaceMetrics' pattern engine, distinct from Polytrack and Tapeta.
M
Maiden
A horse that has never won a race, or a race restricted to such horses.
Common entry-level races for two- and three-year-olds. A "maiden auction" is a maiden race restricted to horses bought below a certain price at auction as yearlings.
Morning Price
A bookmaker price published in the morning of race day, after the breakfast lay-out.
One of three price columns on RaceMetrics' racecards: Evening (previous night), Breakfast (early morning), Morning (just before the race). Movements between these three prices reveal market confidence and "steamer" patterns.
My Ratings
A RaceMetrics feature letting Proform Premium members define their own weight-adjusted handicap ratings, computed automatically for every runner in every race.
The member chooses a pounds-per-length scale (by race type, going and distance); each performance is then rated from the class par, the weight carried relative to the winner, and the beaten distance converted to pounds on that scale. Ratings cover the member's whole recent history on activation and update with every new result, appearing as a sortable "My" column on racecards. Traditional versions of this calculation must be done by hand one race at a time; My Ratings applies one consistent anchoring rule so figures are comparable across courses, classes and seasons.
N
NHF (National Hunt Flat)
A flat race on a National Hunt card — for jumps-bred horses with no obstacles.
Race type 5 on RaceMetrics. Also called a "bumper". See Bumper.
Non-Runner (NR)
A horse that has been declared but withdrawn before the race.
RaceMetrics publishes a daily Non-Runners page grouped by course with real-time notifications. Common reasons: ground change (declared on Good, raced on Heavy), unsuitable conditions, vet's certificate.
O
Official Rating (OR)
The handicap rating assigned to each horse by the BHA handicapper.
The primary scale used to allocate weights in handicap races. A horse rated 80 carries 8lb more than a horse rated 72 in the same handicap. Ratings are reassessed after every race based on performance against expectations. RaceMetrics shows the current OR alongside its own H rating for direct comparison.
Overround
The bookmaker's profit margin built into a market — the amount by which all implied probabilities sum to more than 100%.
A 110% market has 10% overround. Bigger fields and lower-grade races usually carry higher overrounds. RaceMetrics removes the overround when calculating HHI by normalising probabilities to sum to exactly 100%.
Owner
The registered owner of a racehorse.
Owners pay training fees, entry fees and other costs. RaceMetrics tracks owners as one of the seven connection types — top owners (Godolphin, Coolmore, JP McManus) tend to have strong rating profiles because of the quality of horses they buy.
P
Pace (Running Style)
A horse's preferred running style — front-runner, prominent, stalker, mid-division, closer, or held-up.
RaceMetrics' Predicted Running Styles (Proform Premium) analyses up to 10 prior races with decay weighting to forecast how a horse will be ridden — showing predicted style, historical runs count, early position average and late position average.
Pattern RaceMetrics
A saved set of conditions (e.g. "Trainer X + Soft going + Class 4 handicaps") that triggers an alert when a runner matches.
Patterns are created from profile pages when you identify a profitable angle. Each pattern captures active filters: specific participant, course/type, distance range, class/type, going conditions, price range. Tier limits: Free 5, Basic 10, Standard 50, Expert 250, Enterprise 1,000.
Penalty
Extra weight added to a horse for recent eligible wins, on top of its handicap rating.
Usually 3lb-7lb in handicaps; common in conditions races (e.g. "5lb penalty for winners of a Group 3 in the last six months"). Shown on the racecard as a Penalty flag.
Place
A finishing position that pays out under each-way terms — typically 1st, 2nd or 3rd, expanding to 4th in large handicaps.
Contextual definition on RaceMetrics: top 2 for 5-7 runners, top 3 for 8-15, top 4 for 16+. Used as a Show Mode in Form Expert (Win, Win & Place, PRB).
Polytrack
A synthetic racing surface used at Kempton, Lingfield, Chelmsford City and Dundalk.
Wax-coated silica sand. Going is described as Standard or Slow. Distinct from Tapeta in how horses perform — many horses have a clear preference for one synthetic surface over the other.
PRB (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) RaceMetrics
The proportion of opponents a horse finishes ahead of, calculated as (field_size − finishing_position) / (field_size − 1) × 100.
A horse finishing 3rd of 10 has a PRB of (10−3)/9 = 77.8%. PRB is a more granular alternative to win/place strike rates: a horse that consistently runs in the top half of fields will show a high PRB even with few outright wins. Non-finishers (Fell, Pulled Up, etc.) score 0%. Used as a Show Mode in Form Expert.
Predicted Running Styles Premium
Every runner in an upcoming race classified Front Runner, Prominent, Mid-Division or Held Up from its sectional history.
Analyses up to the last 10 races with sectional data using decay weighting (recent runs count more), anchored strictly to races run before the race being viewed, with non-runners excluded. Shows the predicted style plus early and late position averages.
Profit/Loss (P/L)
Theoretical profit or loss to £1 level stakes at Betfair Starting Price (BSP).
A standardised value measure that removes the subjectivity of which bookmaker price to use. RaceMetrics displays Win P/L, Place P/L, ROI and average Win BSP on every profile. The RaceMetrics Tips dashboard tracks six staking methods: BF Win, ISP, BF Place, Evening, Breakfast BOG and Morning BOG.
R
RaceMetrics Rating RaceMetrics
A proprietary Elo-style performance rating updated after every race, tracking form over time for all seven connection types.
1500 is the average baseline; 1550+ indicates a consistent above-average performer; 1600+ is elite. Ratings are recalculated based on finishing position relative to expectations, quality of opposition, and race conditions. See how ratings work.
Random Win %
The probability of picking the winner by selecting one runner at random — simply 1 divided by field size.
Used as the baseline against which Combined Score and Impact Value are measured. A statement like "the highest Combined Score wins 2.15× random" means it wins 2.15 times more often than chance would predict given the field sizes.
RM7 (RaceMetrics 7) RaceMetrics
A free weekly skill-based competition where users pick seven participants within a 10,500-point budget.
Open to all registered users (no purchase or subscription required). Tuesday to Sunday. Cash prizes: 1st £25, 2nd £15, 3rd £10. Score = total rating change across the seven picks. Cross-contamination rule: cannot pick a horse and any of its direct connections (trainer, sire, dam, damsire, or owner) to prevent one runner counting multiple times.
RM Tip RaceMetrics
A daily horse selection from RaceMetrics' proprietary tipping model, published each morning around 7:45am.
Marked with an amber "RM Tip" badge on racecards. Available to Basic subscribers and above; free-tier users see the performance dashboard but the picks are blurred. Performance dashboard (visible to all users) tracks six staking methods including BF Win, ISP, BF Place, Evening, Breakfast BOG and Morning BOG.
RPR (Racing Post Rating)
Racing Post's proprietary post-race performance figure.
Assigned to each runner after a race based on the result, the weight carried, the time relative to standard, the going, and the strength of the field. Top horses typically rate 130-180+ on RPR, versus 1600+ on RaceMetrics' 1500-anchored scale and 100-140+ on the BHA's Official Rating. Widely cited in UK form study but not numerically comparable to other rating systems — each uses a different scale and methodology.
S
Sectionals Premium
Split-time and positional data captured during a race, broken down by furlong.
Includes section times, finishing speed (FSP%), positions gained or lost, top speed (mph), stride length and frequency. Requires a Proform Premium subscription plus the TPD Sectionals Add-On. Available on RaceMetrics with 13 analysis tabs.
Sire
A horse's male parent (father).
The most-studied bloodline connection — sires shape stamina, surface preference, jumping aptitude and class ceiling. RaceMetrics rates sires by the cumulative performance of their progeny.
SP (Starting Price)
The official price of a horse at the moment the race begins.
Calculated from on-course bookmakers (ISP) or the Betfair exchange (BSP). The reference price for P/L calculations because it is the only universally-published, post-hoc verifiable price.
Speed Rating (SR)
A figure derived from a horse's time in a race relative to par, adjusted for conditions.
RaceMetrics surfaces Proform's Speed Rating in inline form lines and the At-a-Glance view (TS column shows the highest SR in the last year). Different from RaceMetrics' own form rating, which weights opposition and class rather than raw time.
Surface
The racing surface — Turf, Polytrack, Tapeta, or Laytown (beach sand).
Derived from race type and course on RaceMetrics. Surface preference is one of the strongest individual horse characteristics — many horses are clear specialists on one surface and underperform on others.
System Builder Premium
Betting-system back-tester rebuilt from Proform's professional desktop software.
Define a system from 90 filters — race conditions, horse attributes (including course/distance-winner and beaten-favourite career counts), ratings (by value or rank within the race), market, connections and last-time-out form — starting from 25 one-click template angles if you wish, with a live count of matching runs as you build. Back-tests cover every UK and Irish result since 2018 and return a full report in one pass: P/L and ROI at Industry SP and Betfair SP, Impact Value, A/E and chi-squared significance, an equity curve, longest winning/losing streaks with maximum drawdown, and 209 breakdown dimensions with CSV export. The Grid view breaks a system down by two dimensions at once — every trainer down the side against race class across the top, for instance — with the cell figure selectable and a minimum-runs floor so thin samples are greyed rather than read as results. A Holdout Check re-tests the final 12 months separately, and saved systems track their real record since the day they were saved. The Qualifiers view then applies the system's pre-race conditions to today's or tomorrow's declared runners. Requires a Proform Premium subscription.
T
Tapeta
A synthetic racing surface used at Newcastle, Southwell and Wolverhampton.
Sand-rubber-wax composite, distinct from Polytrack. Going described as Standard or Slow. Wolverhampton switched from Polytrack to Tapeta in 2014.
Topspeed (TS)
A horse's highest Proform speed rating recorded in the last 12 months.
Shown in the At-a-Glance view and inline form lines on RaceMetrics. A raw-time-based measure that complements the class-and-opposition-weighted RaceMetrics rating — the two tell different stories about a horse's form.
Trainer
The licensed individual responsible for preparing a horse to race.
One of the seven connection types tracked by RaceMetrics. Trainer form is highly cyclical — RaceMetrics' Biggest Movers leaderboards track 7-, 14-, 28-, 56- and 90-day form changes.
Trainer Form (Hot Trainer)
How well a trainer's yard is performing over a recent window — typically the last 14 days.
Stable form comes in waves, driven by yard health, seasonal targets and campaign planning, so a "hot trainer" — one winning well above their normal strike rate — is a widely used positive signal. RaceMetrics publishes a free daily Trainers in Form table (14-day and 7-day windows with strike rates, level-stakes P/L and today's runners), and the System Builder offers trainer 14-day and 28-day form filters for back-testing.
Trim Premium
System Builder tool that re-tests a system with each rule removed and says which rules to drop, loosen, keep or bin as redundant.
The mirror image of Goal Seek: instead of suggesting rules to add, Trim takes each rule already in the system, re-runs the back-test with that rule removed, and reports what it is really contributing. Four verdicts — Drop (the runners it excludes actually carry an edge, so removing it improves your target), Loosen (it barely moves the target, so it is a volume lever you can relax), Keep (load-bearing; removing it genuinely weakens the target), and Redundant (it excludes nothing your other rules do not already). Cutting a rule marked Drop and re-running often produces a leaner system that makes more from more bets, with a bigger sample behind every figure. Each suggestion carries a one-click robustness check against the last 12 months. Requires a Proform Premium subscription.
Turf
Natural grass — the surface of all UK Flat and National Hunt racing other than All-Weather.
Going scaled Hard to Heavy depending on rainfall and watering. Race types 1 (Flat), 3 (Chase), 4 (Hurdle) and 5 (NHF) all run on turf in RaceMetrics' classification.
W
What Wins (Pattern Discovery) RaceMetrics
Pattern discovery tool that finds profitable betting angles by analysing Impact Value across 11 filter combinations.
For any participant (horse, trainer, jockey, sire, dam, damsire, owner), it ranks combinations of Going, Class, Course, Distance and Field Size by IV. Click any pattern to apply it to Form Expert with the participant type and conditions auto-set. Available on Basic tier and above.