Where would we be without easy to access race replays? I’m sure I’m not alone when I say that I can easily spend hours at YouTube watching replays just for fun. But they’re not all fun and games, they’re a vital handicapping tool and have the potential to help market the game.

Since I only came on the scene in 2007, I queried my fellow r2-ers for their insights. Dean had this to share:

Replays are interesting to me, since I used them as a kid and growing up: 1990′s standing at the track watching the replay center races and waiting for a race you wanted to watch, or having to get there early to watch yesterdays races – hilarious. When the racing channels came aboard we would tape the races and that was our replay center.

I can only remember RaceReplays.com as the main source of replays when I first started playing and fellow r2-er Jessica confirms that she had an account as early as 2004. NYRA also used to embed their stakes races from RaceReplays.com into their site (now they have a direct log in which seems less useful).

As far as ADWs are concerned, I had a BrisBet account and don’t recall their replays however Jessica confirmed that they existed but were a pain to use. I’m happy to note that over the past 2-3 years that replays have exploded down the stretch, if you will.

Replays are standard fare for ADWs, and I can only assume some do it better than others.

Twinspires has two ways access them:

1) via track/date/horse search using the incredible TwinSpires TV:

2) via the race card’s program:

Youbet also has an extensive replay library as does TVG and Xpressbet.

While filed under Handicapping Software for the purposes of our countdown, DRF’s Formulator also has embedded replays which makes for some incredible ease of use.

Recent interesting and welcome additions to the replay arena are Thoroughbred Times and Blood Horse. Thoroughbred Times focuses on stakes but Blood Horse has an excellent extensive archive that also includes Non-Graded Stakes, Allowance/Optional Claiming, Maiden Special Weights and Maiden Claiming.

The replays are only one component of the archive that also features order of finish, payouts and pedigree information. They get extra points for having a dedicated Twitter feed (@BH_RaceResults) that automatically kicks out results.

The proliferation of race replays has not only been crucial for a handicappers, it’s also an excellent way for potential and/or new fans to connect with racing. Folks like Partymanners and CF1970, who have digitized their own personal replay collections, are squarely responsible for part of my racing self-education!

Tracks and such have followed suit with Churchill leading the way by adding what seems like all of their race replays from 2006 to the present. Hollywood Park has their stakes races both current and historical while NYRA, NTRA and Breeders’ Cup all make great use YouTube.

Easily accessed AND embeddable race replays have allowed for radically increased exposure to racing. Bloggers post races on their sites and fans post races on their profile pages at social media sites such as Facebook. For every racing fan who posts a race on their Facebook profile, N more people are more likely to see that race (where N is equal to the number of their contacts)… that’s some nice visibility.

And lastly, as a fervent iPhone user, I also enjoy NTRA & Breeders’ Cup replays as podcasts. Podcasts may seem pointless with a web enabled phone but they’re much higher quality than YouTube.

Not only are they useful as racing Prozac, they come in handy as a one-on-one gorilla marketing tool. I’ve been able to easily show friends and potential fans such thrilling races as Rachel Alexandra’s Preakness as we stand on a street corner or are grabbing a bite. Now if someone would just get Zenyatta’s Classic uploaded I would have all the high points of the year in my pocket, and if that’s not innovative I don’t know what is.

Panelists Comments

“When YouTube hit the web around mid-decade, everyone knew the web would never be the same. Video sharing was impossible (slow & clunky) to deal with before YouTube and the proliferation of Flash players. Sure HD is great but to get that souped up race car we had to start with the Model T. Having replays on the web, at the push of a button, changed *everything*.” – o_crunk

Horseplayers have many laments: Takeout rates are too high, data costs too much, and stewards rarely explain their calls. And then there’s the frustrating problem of late odds changes, particularly those last-minute odds drops in which a horse enters the gate at 2-1 and leaves it at 6-5.

While conditional wagering can’t save handicappers from the fickle fluctuations of the tote in the final seconds before a race, the technology does give players significant control over the conditions under which bets are made. Introduced by Premier Turf Club in 2007 and now available through TwinSpires, Youbet and other ADWs, conditional wagering allows bettors to select the horses they want to play and the minimum odds they’ll accept well in advance of the time wagers are placed by the system, which can be anywhere from 45 seconds to post to several minutes out. If the minimum isn’t available, the bet isn’t made.

“You’ll never have to wait around again for a specific race to ensure you get a fair price on a runner you want to back. This will end the cries of, ‘If I knew that 6-to-1 morning line horse was going to pay $30, I would have played him,’” Premier Turf Club CEO Ian Meyers told the Thoroughbred Times when the feature launched.

Those cries can still be heard, but conditional wagering surely has freed many horseplayers wagering through a number of ADWs from tote-watching and worry about underlays or missed opportunities. The idea seems simple in retrospect; implemented, it’s one of the most bettor-friendly innovations of the past decade.