Forecast Price
A pre-race estimate of the SP, published by Timeform or the racing media. The TrapStats model uses forecast price (not post-finish SP) for forward selection decisions.
A forecast price is a pre-race estimate of what the SP is likely to be when the race goes off. Timeform publishes a Forecast for every UK race, listing forecast prices for each dog based on form, market reads and historical baselines.
Why forecast vs SP matters: the SP is post-finish information — it's set after the off. A model that uses SP as its decision price is technically using future information (a temporal leak). TrapStats' Denis live tracker uses forecast price as the decision price and stores it as back_price_at_placement. Every recorded selection shows that its price_source = "timeform_forecast".
Honest analysis: when we look at win-rate by forecast price band on settled selections, we see the expected pattern: <3.5 lost ~94 units, ≥3.5 won ~53 units, at a roughly flat ~28% empirical win rate. This is the foundation of the denis_safety_min_price=3.5 floor. These are simulated paper results, not betting advice.
Outside TrapStats, treat the forecast as a directional signal — actual on-course prices drift, especially on lightly-traded long shots.