I know that the stats like potential can change but do things like preferred distance and speed/stamina/acceleration change as well? Is it only over the season break that training for things like stamina or agility change things? Can they only get worse in the horse stats or do they get better as well?

I've got a 5 year old mare that was a 1m1f horse but I swear now her natural pace is too fast for that long a race.

Also, does the speed a horse runs at in gallops reflect the speed they'll like in a race? So like I've figured out that 1m2f races stick to around 30-31mph so if a horse does best in a gallop at that pace, should I use that as a way of picking distance? I've got another horse who's breeding indicator says 1m3f but he's running his gallops at 33mph which is too fast for that long a race?

Best performance distance changes with age, as do the vertical bars. And they can be related.

Preferred distance does not and it is genetic. How this plays: A sprinter/miler bred 2yr will have enough stamina bar to do well in 5f first start, assuming it is mature enough to have some speed bar to get up to the pace of the race. A classic 1m2f/1m4f horse probably should start in 6f, and rapidly increase distance as those vertical bars rise with maturity. Training regimen can tweak them some too. The horizontal speed bar seems controlled by genetics only. Once fully mature the horse will be set at its preferred distance genetically. Maturity age seems a hidden stat.

I often wonder about horses with pace/ preferred distance mismatches. Usually though it is my sprinter-bred horse with the speed of an overladen donkey. Though I don't see why the opposite may not hold true. Of course, does the horse have the stamina bar to support the speed at the pace needed for that distance?

Another hidden stat is how well the horse runs at other paces. This is different from the bar that shows how well they take to running off preferred distance. So say a horse likes to run handy. If I am running it shorter distances I need it faster, and may ask the jockey to set the pace. If longer than stamina supports I may ask the jockey to run with the pace (even) or slight hold. So if the horse dislikes running at other distances *and* dislikes running at other than its preferred pace vs pack, then the form drop may be too large to make it work.

So sometimes I have a horse with the stats for one distance and the preference for some other and they take to it well, and sometimes they don't and the jockeys whine at me for making them try. If I get the right pace setting, and the horse handles it, then we are fine. But not all horses will. Just like real, some come from the back ones can do fine with mixed in the pack traffic. And some headstrong speedballs learn to rate .. and some don't.

I do not know how the gallops/trial speed relates to racing in the schedule. I gallop a little but perhaps one of the people who do trials a lot would know, sorry.

Thank you for answering. I'm really loving learning this game but I think the best source of knowledge is the wisdom of experienced players. There is so much depth to it I've even started my own wiki and spreadsheet to track my horses, wins, yearlings, all the stats, and preferred running style.

I have a few more questions to clarify, if that's okay?

1. When you say training regimen can change stats? Is that like the "start/agility" or "speed/stamina emphasis" options? Or running them in different length gallops?

I've got some of those sprinters with low speed. I've also got sprinters with really high speed that just can't keep up in G races. And they've run well enough that now I can't enter them in anything else. Really frustrating to have a 6yo stallion rated 105 because if he could get one group win, I'd retire him to breeding because he's already won $100,000 off of thirds and fourths

2. Is set the pace "force the pace"? I was told that was bad but I can't see any other option for choosing a front runner. It says pacemaker is for wearing the horse out so another horse can win.

3. I've noticed that jockeys seem to be doing this adjusted of placement themselves, since I get "rode in pack" when they rode 2nd the whole way in a pack 10 horses large. When they're not doing stupid stuff like moving all the way to the outside rail because a race is a chute of 5f or pulling a race handy horse up until it's in 6th place back with the closers and then urging it on for the rest of the race to try and make up for it or getting confused by a sharp track and not making a move until 2f out on a closer (I'm using jockey shoutouts to get around that a little)

4. Does battling qualities and finish application change where in the pack the horse is best running or what kind of races I should choose for them? I'm only on my 6th season and I've got some really fast horses (87%) with like 10% battling qualities and 50% finish application who aren't exactly putting out amazing performances. Also, if a horse refuses to settle, even after I've tried all three pacifiers, does that mean I should tell the jockey to let him run further up in the pack just so the jockey isn't constantly holding them back?

5. Last question, if a horse is a front runner, should I be really carefully checking the form book of their races to make sure there aren't other front runners? I've got one who does wonderfully as long as he doesn't have to compete with anyone for pace.

Again, thanks for answering and I'm sorry I took so long to reply - I was a bit sick last week. Starters Orders was good company.

An individual horses preferred distance can change (by small amounts) usually related to training options but this does not change the genetic information it passes on (so the change would not pass on to offspring).

2. Yes, "Force the Pace" is for front-running horses, and Pacemaker is *generally* for setting a fast pace should either your primary horse in the race need it or sometimes if you're going for a track / world record. Believe it or not, there can be horses that genetically prefer the Pacemaker setting.

3. If your horse is of high quality, your jockey may say they ran the horse at "Even Pace" and wind up leading the race wire-to-wire. Sometimes they'll move away from the pack and toward the center of the track due to track conditions, even if you tell them to ride the rail. And sometime they're dumb as a box of rocks and don't follow your orders at all. Some of these things are a function of the jockey's stats (which you can see on the jockey "Apprentice" screen - where you hire and fire jockeys and apprentices).

I worry about Riding ability, Obedience, and then Honesty in that order. When you start a new game you'll usually be able to find a jockey that is maxed out in either all 3 stats or in 2 of the 3 and very high (90+ rating) in the third.

4. No, those bars don't affect what distance / type of race you should run the horse in. Finishing Application is an indicator of how much the horse is willing to battle at the end of the race to win (ie not get lazy in the stretch), and Battling Qualities is a very specific situation where your horse is literally in a dead-heat race down the stretch, and it's ability to pull ahead at the finish line. Enthusiasm also plays a part here, but instead of just in the stretch it's an indicator of how often the horse might just be lazy that day and not run up to its potential. (This "laziness" is different from a Laid Back horse that, in the Paddock before the race, is listed as being a little lazy.)

A horse that continually refuses to settle even with pacifiers is usually a colt. The fix for this is gelding the horse, but that means that you'll the ability to use that horse as a sire. ("Not settle" is the kind of thing that you want to breed out of your lines, so keeping that horse for any reason other than earning money may be a waste of time.)

5. Not really. You could try blinkers, but unless the head lad tells you that the horse may benefit from a pacifier it probably won't help.

1. Yes that is what I meant, and it looks like they can also nudge preferred distance as per someone that knows.

2. Answered.

3. Answered, and what I was using was explicitly using the instructions. Otherwise the jockeys are (most likely) going to try to ride the horse at its preferred pace, and in these cases want the horse to run at a different pace.

4. Answered, plus BQ can be very annoying to breed for. On "not settling", sometimes it is also seems like it is due to the horse not liking "something". Could be what was already mentioned, as well as being green, dislikes the going, foreign course or being asked to race above its class. You can always check the preferred pace by riding the horse yourself, in a gallop if need be.

5. I think a front runner generally needs to be slightly better to succeed than stalker/pack/closers, so yes. If the horse isn't good enough to be the one doing the tiring out, avoid the others. If I can, I run them slightly under class. Another thing I have tried, is if the horse is at least a little flexible on preferred distance (visible stat), run them at 1f (or 2f if long races) shorter than their real preferred distance, still forcing pace, but chose to "go early". Or you could even watch the race and decide if you want to to tap the shout out.

I'm not really one of the best players I think, but happy to share what I *think* I've figured out. These boards have always been helpful to me.

Thank you all for adding your wisdom, I'm writing all these tips down in my wiki, so I can go back to them. I'm using the wiki for terminology and keeping track of things like the best rated jockeys, etc. All the stats are going in my spreadsheet. Is there anything you guys track as you're going through?

I'm super lucky that this season I managed to retain last year's best jockey, so we'll see how that goes. I also got like 20 million dollars from selling reject 2yo's from my breeding barn, which means next season I'll be able to buy a really expensive 1m colt and hope he's got the stats to make him worth it.

I didn't know about the Pacemaker preference on some horses - I've been letting my jockeys figure out the front runners because I didn't know what option to choose

Surprisingly to me, I've actually had some horses continuously get a lazy marker in the paddock and then run really well? Is there any benefit to focusing on breeding laid back horses, since it doesn't make them lazy, so that they don't end up too excitable to actually focus on running? I've just come up with the idea that maybe I should be keeping my small build horses to send straight to breeding, because the tracks on the Australian surface are all really tight; I'm focusing my off-time for horses on getting their agility up if I can as well.

I also didn't know you can breed out the "not settling", so I'm going to take that on board too. I've seen that on nearly every race for one of my stallions, even after gelding him. I knew exactly what the jockey feedback would be just from watching him toss his head all race. Tried all three pacifiers and then even gelded him, didn't change him. Luckily he wasn't a Group winner.

I'm going to have to be more flexible with distance and pace if I can be this season, up until now I've been finding out their running style and a distance where they win or place consistently and then sticking to that their whole life. I did have one horse who was great, he was a solid C7 winner who couldn't win a C6 to save his life, but he always placed or won C7 races. Just had to keep letting him lose a C6 every now and then to keep his rating down.

Oh, another question, sorry I keep coming up with these, is there any benefit to making staff wages higher other than being able to see the paddock? Or having a high staff amount? I've got paddock help on four sure and high grade feed.

I'm curious about that myself. One mouseover tooltip says something about staff buildings increasing morale. But I'm not sure what that actually does. I do find that once I have all the buildings and feed/staff up to high that I seem to get fewer injuries. But I'm not sure what to make of that, or if it is really related.

Anyone know?

If you play training mode where you don’t own the horses on open days your more like to get owners offers if everything is on high. Not seen an impact on trainer/owner game

This has been in the game forever, right back to Stable Masters and I still do the same thing. I ignore it until the money starts rolling in and the cost doesn't matter. I think I need stats on that guy who is supposed to help at the start though because my man is pretty useless.

Oh yeah, I didn't think about the trainer only game. I thought it might just mean that they treat the horses with more care and so it made the horses happier. I guess I got that idea because I did work experience in a racing stable in country Australia and the morale there was, well, not great. It was very eye-opening as an eager and horse-loving 17 year old to hear jockeys tell me not to work with horses if I loved them because if your paycheck relies on them, you start resenting their mistakes. I do understand what they were trying to say much better now, after a decade of experience

The only thing I'm still struggling with a little is judging what a Group race worthy horse is. All mine still have low stats and I celebrate being able to breed a horse with 88% speed, over 70% light green potential, and over 75% extra speed rating all on the same horse. But then they perform pretty average, not usually more than C2s. Then I buy a Group winning horse and check their stats, only to find they've practically got less than 50% on every one. I'm guessing I've just a few more seasons of experimenting to go before I start getting the hang of it.

First of all: nice work on the stats on that horse. That's a good stat base to build on, especially for a Sire.

Second: Stat bars aren't everything. Genetics themselves (under the hood where you can't see them) play a very large role. So if you find a G1 horse that wins a lot and seems to set fast times... even if you breed to him and don't know his stats, and the stats of the horse come out roughly equal to the Dams that breed to him, those horses will, in general, be better than their parents. This is one of the reasons you see top players talk about "getting new blood" into their breeding lines by starting new games and looking for "monster" game-bred Sires. No matter the stat bars, a fast horse is a fast horse.

Thanks! This is a link to an imgur album of my three best ones (none of them have won a Group race yet): https://imgur.com/gallery/ndF1tKb

I just saw this stats vs performance thing in my game last night actually I bought a 2yo colt for $800,000 and when I saw he only had 78% speed, I was a little disappointed. But I decided to enter him in a G3 race because his race time in his maiden was as fast as the times on the race in the diary and... he won it. Comfortably. I still didn't think he'd be G1 worthy because I've had quite a few win a G3 and not be able to get any higher, but I entered him in the G1 Magic Millions 2yo race (Australian schedule) and he blew it out of the water! First 2yo to win any Group race whatsoever, let alone a G1. Now I've just got to cross my fingers he doesn't get worse as a 3yo.

I think I'm seeing it in my sires too - some of my best offspring are coming from the horses that have lower speed but higher potential. I did accidentally do most of last year's crop with a stallion who was a front runner and wouldn't settle for a single race of his career, so last year's were a bit disappointing when they actually raced. Yet, one of my first horses and a G3 winner has turned out two other G3 winners, even though he isn't that impressive stats-wise. This season and last I've had enough money to breed to gamebred sires with high AEI ratings, so here's hoping that pays off.

As for tracking stats, races, offspring, etc, I've started taking screenshots anytime I notice a change and then I have them in a photo browsing app so I can put them in an album and quickly check on my other laptop while I'm playing.

ETA: I'm playing now and I just had a 3yo filly that I didn't even include in the link above win a Group race! A small 6f $100000 purse one but she's my first homebred to win one!
2nd ETA: OMG my first homebred colt just won a G1! Cosily! And it was a big $3mil purse one I saw someone say it's a fantastic feeling and it really is. I thought he wasn't going to be able to do Group races at all when he was 3yo but his potential went up when he turned 4yo.

Congratulations!

Typically, a horse will gain additional potential when they turn 4, and then a slight bump when they turn 5. This is why the potential bar of the horse and how much of that potential has been realized is so important as a Yearling; it doesn't change until 4yo.

In case you aren't aware, a horse *can* (but may not) gain as much as 15% realized potential over its first 5 races, so if the horse's realized potential is within 15% of its potential it'll meet its potential bar when you race it at 2/3 years old, and also meet whatever the 4 and 5 year old bumps provide. Winning races is the best way to make sure you make the 15% but not necessary, and also depends on hidden variables / genetics so it might not make it. If you see a big (like 9-10% jump) after the first race, you should get 15%. If it's less than that it probably won't.

In earlier SO7 builds I did have some horses that seemed to get a bump every year, but haven't seen any recently. Not sure if it's still in the game or has been removed.