These hcap plots your talking about mate, there where people in place including me to stop this happening and horse where either penalised with rating or got removed if there was time. The rules we went on is if you had a 7f horse you could race at 6f and 1m. With longer distance horses this was put to 2f, so if you had 1m2f horse it could run at 1m and 1m4f. Riches implement of 3 runs before you get a hcap mark l think is one of the best changes for this game

Lets say you have a horse that says on breeding its best distance is 10f but in fact it runs best at 12f. On your rules I could run this horse over 8f and then 12f. Is this correct.
Better would be you must stay within 1 furlongs of its first run in a maiden. So if you run it over 8f in the maiden its maximum distance should be 9f and its minimum 7f. A tighter range would be much better in my humble opinion.
Not much room for handicap cheating.
It would also be much easier for stewards to remove horses that don't follow the rules.

When you upload the horses and your putting in its distance you don't put in its preferred distance on breeding you put in its distance based on its CK form. I have a horse on breeding its a 10f horses but its my best 5f-6f horses.

That doesn't solve the problem MWesty suggested.
A four furlong spread is too much at any distance.

Regarding your horse If you ran it in a 6 furlong maiden then it would be eligible for a 5f race and vice versa. But not seven furlongs if its first run was over 5f. Under my suggestion that would be a fair system.

rivers -- if you have a 5f horse to upload to the league, you dont want to be running it in a 7f race as it will get stuffed. so you would set its ideal distance to 5f , and maybe you would give it a go in a 6f race if you wanted to race it.

if your ideal distance is 6f then yeah, you could run it a furlong either side as it may be ale to stay on past some beaten horses over 5f, or kick for home and hold on over 7f. but a steward would see if you put a 5f animal in a 7f race just to get it a low mark to win a 5f handicap. the loophole would appear to be giving a false preferred distance i.e. put a 5f horse as a 6f distance, run it over 7 so it gets stuffed and then putting it to 5f. the three race rule is therefore good as it gives a chance to look deeper and further into the potential/ability of the animal and the pattern of entries before giving a handicap mark.

maybe someone could correct me if the above doesnt make much sense

if the schedules are either not changing or recieveing only minor changes, then i think the addition of the 3 race rule, and a new system of uploading/retiring in balance with a set stable size means that the upcoming league is going to be good to be involved in. and hopefully it will commence soon. although im not looking forward to having to trial all my nhc wannabies!!!

Okay lets say I have a genuine 5f horse.
I state that it is a 6f horse and put it into a 7f maiden knowing it will get stuffed. I do this again for second and third maidens. After I get a handicap mark I then put it into a 5f handicap race which is still only 1 furlong below my stated preference. It wins easily. Am I breaking any rules, as I am only 1 furlong either side on the face of it. Under my system if I had intentions to run it in a 5f race I would have to run it over 6f maximum or I would be breaking a rule. (I couldn't drop it 2f from 7f). Under league rules I could run it over 7f and then drop it back to 5f if I state the horses best distance is 6f.
It is indeed a loophole that needs to be addressed. The three race rule has had no effect whatsoever.

Your way sounds good rivers, some trainer want most of there horses to be running every week and your way could reduce field sizes which would be good also.

Second example I have a very good 8f horse.
I declare it as a seven furlong horse.
I run it over 6f in three maidens. I then should not be allowed to run over 8f because it is two furlongs away from its runs in maiden races.
It is a bad loophole and will definitely be exploited.

Strange that the league hasn't even started yet and there's already talk of how to manipulate it!

but if you did that then maybe the stewards would say - why have you ran it 3 times over 7f to enter it into a 5f handicap??

again tho, i think maybe westy is the best person to answer this question

the last season (half season as it was) was my first so im not really that experienced in that sort of thing. i did find thought that some of my horses distances in the league were different than in my ck due to a faster pace in the league. for example one of my milers ended up being better over 7f.

yeah i like your idea aswell rivers!!

but with middle distance horses, you will find u have a horse whose ideal is 1m3f. however there arent many 1m3f races in the league, so you will want to run them over either 1m2f or 1m4f!! your way would stop horses from being able to do this!! so maybe 1f from their maidens up to a mile, and 2f from maidens over further would be fair

As chief handicapper and steward for the league last season what Rivers is proposing is spot on. It would make it very easy to police.
Its a great idea that really needs to be put into the league. Okay back to Civilization V.

Last season I had a good 12f filly who could beat me Oaks runner up at certain tracks over 12f but I couldn't get her to win over 12f, I entered her in a 14f race and she won, she carried 9-4 so it wasn't a handicap plot.

So if you ran over 12f in a maiden you would still be eligible to run in a 14f race with the two furlong swing for longer distances, provided you didn't run over 11f previous. It would make people run their horse over the correct distance just in case their best distance was just either side of that.