The Beyers is the best indicator of which horse is best, at least the day before a race. Its value is less for regulars at a particcular track because they have an established "form" and assuming they will run to their best potential each time, straight "times" will yeild more or less the same results s the Beyers. This is partly because the regulars often run every 7 days or 14 days but end up running with the same group of horses or same competition. Where Beyers is most useful is for shippers, horses that have been running at an out of town track typically stakes horses. Although most people don't have access to the pars at the other tracks there are clues such as how do the regulars at those track perform, does the shipper have multiple races to evaluate and how do the track records at the other tracks compare to the track you're at. There used to be a chart in the DRF that listed most US tracks and the records at all the various distances. If you assume that the records establish a benchmark between the tracks you can assume that the differances will prevail in the individual performances of horses that have raced at different tracks. That approach could be used for MOW in 1919 and 1920 if you have the research. I was using that information before Beyers wrote his book and it worked on occasion but usually for horses moving from western tracks to the eastern ones. The part of Beyers I never quite got was how he adjusted for the season, summer, winter etc. How a horse performs in October is not a great indicator of what it will do in June.
For one, I was more than happy to give up my pet techniques in favor of Beyers. I hope you can share your findings when you're ready,
