How Far Back Should You Go When Rating a Horse?

Recorded October 2025 for Cox Plate's Final Dance + Two MAX BETS (Class Is King). Any figures mentioned are from that time.

I keep coming back to class, because class horses returning from group company keep turning up well backed and winning. Private Eye was one of them. The cleanest example I have looked at lately is Riverlino in Saturday's 1,600 metre race at Caulfield. But working through his ratings opened up two questions I still wrestle with every time I build a number: which distances belong in a rating, and how far back into a horse's career you should go.

The class edge on this one is large

The race strength measure tells the story quickly. Riverlino comes out of the Caulfield Guineas and out of the Golden Rose. That gives him a race strength figure of 91, against 83 and 81 for the next two. So he is eight points clear of the second best on that measure, Firmois, and the other runners are coming out of listed grade. Eight points of race strength on a Saturday is a big gap. My own class speed weight rating has him at 90, seven points above I Hope A at 83. He has drawn barrier one, Nash can hunt forward, and I expect him to sit third or fourth on the fence.

Where do you draw the line on distance

Saturday's race is over a mile. The Caulfield Guineas was 1,400 metres, so that run sits close enough. The trouble starts further back. Riverlino has ratings from runs at 1,200 and 1,100 metres, and some of those sprint numbers look strong. A 129 last 200, a 103, a 100. Are they relevant to a mile? Should they go into an algorithm, or should they be ignored? If you throw them out, you are left with the numbers over 1,600, and those are a fair bit lower. That is a real decision, not a technicality. It changes the rating you end up with.

Tempo moves the numbers you are comparing

Sectionals make this even harder, because tempo pushes them around. In the Golden Rose he produced an 82 last 600. Then that regressed back to a 53 off a hot tempo. The early 600s in the Caulfield Guineas were fast, and Riverlino himself went 1:11.1 and settled fifth, which tells me he is showing a bit more pace than he used to. If they go fast early, they come home slower late. If they go slow early, they come home quicker. Riverlino has a 112, a 109 and another 112 last 600, but those came off slow to solid tempos, and over 1,200 and 1,100 metres. So you are not comparing like with like unless you account for how the race was run.

How far back do you go

The second question is the harder one. Do you only use this preparation, on the basis that it reflects the horse as it is now, or do you go back into the earlier career runs and use everything you have? More data gives you a bigger sample. It also drags in a horse that may have been a different animal at the time.

I have not settled either question, so I will keep putting them up for debate. If you rate horses yourself, work out where you draw your own distance line and how many preparations you include, and be consistent about it. I would like to hear how you handle it.

Every race on the card, rated, with Kingsley's selections and the speed maps behind them. Your first day is free, no card needed.

More from Kingsley

• How to Check If an Overseas Horse Can Handle a Fast Pace
• Why Long Shots Can Show a Better Return With Fewer Winners
• How a Cruising and Acceleration Rating Works in Race Analysis

From the full video: Cox Plate's Final Dance + Two MAX BETS (Class Is King)

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