NYRA Using Waigr to Put AI Technology in Patrons' Hands

One of the industry's biggest hot button topics this year has been the impact of computer-assisted wagering on pari-mutuel pools in Thoroughbred racing.

A focal point arrived on Kentucky Derby (G1) day when the Churchill Downs Stakes (G1) saw CAW money pour in at the last second on the victorious T O Elvis  and his odds plummeted from 12-1 to 5-1.

Across the industry, the New York Racing Association has been a leader in establishing guardrails to prevent CAWs from flooding mutuel pools in the final moments before the race. In 2021, NYRA blocked CAWs from sending in wagers at a speed of six per second or more in the final two minutes before post time on win bets. In February, it expanded the block on all other bets to a minute before post time, a move that impacted handle but allows the average patron, instead of the computer players, to have a final say before pools close.

On some key weekends, NYRA has even seen an overall increase in handle despite declines in CAW handle. It's a positive sign as NYRA tries a different approach. 

Now NYRA is taking another big step toward leveling the wagering playing field for its retail wagering customers. It is teaming with Waigr, a company founded by former New York Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association president Joe Appelbaum and a team of technologists and sports analytics experts, to give both experienced handicappers and $2 bettors some of the same wagering tools CAW players possess.

Waigr uses AI-powered technology to blend a myriad of handicapping information, angles, statistics, and live odds—just to name a fraction of its data collection—to create wagering options.

At the moment, Waigr selections and betting strategies are available on the NYRA Bets app. Some of its plays are offered on NYRA's daily Fox Sports telecasts, and by late summer Appelbaum hopes to unveil the next step: the ability to create wagers that include innovative features such as keying or ignoring certain horses that can be crafted within a player's bankroll.

Down the road, as the product evolves, Waigr also will be able to send in those bets through a NYRA Bets account in the blink of an eye.

"It's bringing AI into the regular consumer's hands. It's democratizing wagering in terms of algorithmic wagering. It's like the ultimate version of CliffsNotes," said NYRA CEO and president Dave O'Rourke. "It has the ability to help a casual player or a sophisticated handicapper. If you're looking for a quick idea and an explanation of that, or if you're looking to onboard people into our game, I think this is a very powerful tool for that."

Waigr has been in development for the past few years, with Appelbaum and his team using a sample group of NYRA Bets customers. Over time, they have added every possible bit of information they could access.

"The CAW people don't need our help. This is for the regular folks," Appelbaum said. "We're trying to create new statistics all the time. We've leaned on lessons from other sports. How many wins to expect from a trainer over a certain amount of time? Are they or the jockeys hot or cold? We are not using any commercial data, but we generate a lot of our own statistics from a vast array of past performances. Everything imaginable we use."

The Waigr selections already have generated some noteworthy winners. On Belmont Stakes (G1) day, it gave out the Pick 6 and the Pick 4 ending in the final leg of the Triple Crown, paying $9,640.39 and $350.08, respectively.

But it's the ticket-making ability that ultimately could put Waigr over the top. Especially since the tickets can be customized by the players to fit their needs and desires.

"There's nothing even close to this. We're trying to guide you to make better decisions. So we want to know your risk preferences. We want to understand what horses you might like or not like. We want to know what your budget is," Appelbaum said. "While some people might construct three or four tickets, if you give us a budget of say $100, we will produce 30 different tickets, all based on the themes you give us. The critical part is that in time we can execute those strategies in real time, meaning we know how to queue them into the tote system in a quick amount of time without breaking any of NYRA's guardrails."

O'Rourke sees a great benefit in the way Waigr and AI technology can help a newcomer learn the intricacies of handicapping and give even more information and expertise to veteran players.

"If you could sit next to a great handicapper all day, you're going to learn quite a bit. Now how do you package that? With where technology is at, we have an opportunity to do that for our handicapping products. This is an attempt in that space," he said. "There's a big opportunity here to simplify the entry from a gambling standpoint into our skill game of handicapping. I know there is a steep learning curve, because I went through it, and this is a cheat code in terms of getting this information distilled to the consumer. There are simple aspects, like the picks we are putting on our TV shows all the way up to ticket-making. It can become much more advanced. There's a lot to play with here."

O'Rourke said Waigr will have an increased presence on NYRA platforms as the year goes on.

"It will be evolutionary rather than one big drop," he said.

More information can be found at waigr.com and to view a small slice of the data they are using, fans can see the betting trends on NYRA races from 2021 through May 10 at waigrlabs.com.

"The thing with machine-learning, and CAWs are doing this, no one is sitting there saying just look at that horse's last race Beyer Speed Figure. You are throwing dozens, if not hundreds, of parameters into this program and we are trying to find things that correlate to success," said Appelbaum, a disciple of the work pioneered by Bill Benter in using computer software for wagering analysis. "The computer gives weight to everything, and what is important is we use that to decide what to give more or less importance. We are searching for new things all the time."

Like the weather, a lot of people are talking about CAWs, but NYRA, to its credit, is trying to do something about the problems they have spawned.

"I think it's pretty obvious with where technology is at that AI could have a significant place in our wagering world and we're going to start iterating our products," O'Rourke said. "Will the first version be the last for us? No. There could be failures along the path, but Waigr is a very, very interesting addition for us and our patrons."