I just don’t seem to get this game. Whenever I work a horse it seems to go backwards. I can’t find a suitable race for any of my horses–maybe I bought unsuitable horses, but the race classes they are eligible for a few and far between. And how do I work out the suitable preferances for previously unraced horses–are the 2 horses I received on joining sprinters or stayers, and do they prefer dirt or turf. The comments I get from the track riders for any horse are simply confusing–would be nice to get some feedback that gives some idea on how I could best place them to advantage.
Working your horse will cost it energy, so expect your horse’s energy ratings to drop afterwards. Fitness WILL go up, but often it doesn’t go up a noticeable amount. Both Energy and Fitness have random error built in, so they’ll fluctuate every single time you check on them.
The race your horse qualifies for is the minimum race it can enter (ie if it says your horse is eligible for NW1 then you can enter any race that’s a NW1 or higher). There’s a schedule search function you can use to look for specific races you’re interested in.
Rider comments are almost guaranteed to be wrong until you get a comment about the jockey knowing the horse well. For instance, at the moment, if a jockey tells me my horse loves it’s current equipment, I basically assume that that’s the wrong equipment. Sprinting/staying preferences can be determined by racing the horse, as well as where in the pack the horse likes to run. Basically pick low level and/or cheap races and just try stuff out.
Also, to raise your horse’s relationship with their jockey without having them completely exhausted each day, you can do very “easy” workouts…all of my horses walk, jog, or canter 1/2-1 mile about 5 times a week (I think I have the 2yos walking/jogging, and the 3yo+ jogging/cantering)…it’s enough to maintain fitness in an already fit horse, easy enough that most horses won’t get injured too often or become exhausted, and yet (because of this) you can do several workouts a week and thus allow your horse to get to know jockeys better.
With frequent workouts like that, you can keep a log of how the horse does, and fiddle with dirt/turf and equipment more than if you were breezing your horse every week. If you have a horribly unfit horse, you can obviously add in a breeze every few days/week (as horse energy permits) to sharpen your horse up some more.
As Andrea said, with unraced horses it’s easiest to just take whatever low-level race works for your horse (maiden, NW1, NW2, etc) that costs the least (shipping/entry-fee wise). Best case scenario, your horse wins and earns you lots of money…worst case scenario, your horse tanks and you know more about it (and your horse gets fitter in the process 
).
wow guys this has really helped me out too! Last season i very very rarely used the workouts just because most of my horses raced often and didnt need it. This years, however they all need to be worked out. So this thread has really helped me in the strategy department. 
Thanks folks. Basically I’m going to ease up on all my horses (have a few runners this week) and start from scratch. Slowly building their fitness and energy up, and hopefully there will be some races available for them. In future will stick to purchasing lightly raced Maiden/Starter Allowance horses–unfortunately am fairly low on funds, so it may take a long time to build up a nice stable (taxes 2 days after joining, and shipping fees take their toll).
Maybe there should be a reduction on taxes and shipping costs for new stables until they are able to get established.
For the record, Newbies do get a break on taxes their first time around.
Realise that–just that having started the game on the 31st December meant paying tax of $10,000 that day
Hmm… I really learned a lot from Shanthi’s post. But, will working your horse 5 days a week lower its natural energy a lot? I’m still trying to get into the NE flow and understand it better. Or is it a good thing to do, working your horse almost everyday? It sounds like it.
Horses’ NE goes down in proportion to how hard they work…if you jog your horse 1/2 mile every day, it’s going to get tired (mentally) a lot slower than if you were breezing it 1/2 mile every day. So yes, working your horse out every day will lower NE, but probably not as much as if you were breezing it twice a week instead.
(late reaction)
Oh, great. Thanks, Shanthi. I’ll keep that in mind.