The RaceGoat Index

What each finish is worth

Every finish is scored on two things, then blended into one performance value between 0 and 1:

• Where you placed in the field (60%). Winning a field of 50 scores a full 1.0; finishing last scores 0.0; the middle of the pack lands in between. A race with a single finisher counts as a win.
• How close you ran to the winner (40%). For a fixed-distance race this is the winner's time over yours; for a timed race it is your distance over the winner's. Matching the winner scores 1.0, and the further back you are the lower it goes. When the race format or the finishing marks cannot be read, this part falls back to your placement, so a finish always counts for something sane and never for something wrong.

The two combine as 60% placement plus 40% winner-closeness. Placement carries the larger share because it is available for every result; winner-closeness adds resolution when the marks are readable.

How your finishes combine

Your finishes are pooled into one index with two adjustments that keep the number honest:

• Recent races count more. A finish keeps full credit for its first 2 years, so a current season is never penalized for being a year old. After that grace window its weight halves every 3 years (a decay base of 0.5) on the age beyond the grace: a result from 5 years ago counts about half as much as a fresh one, and one from 8 years ago about a quarter. You are rated on who you are now, not a decade ago.
• A thin record is pulled toward the middle. The index uses a gentle Bayesian shrinkage toward an average of 0.5, worth about 0.75 of a phantom average result. One brilliant finish does not mint a top score off a single race, but a couple of strong results still climb close to their true mark; a deep body of consistent results overwhelms the pull entirely and reaches for the top.

The pooled value, still between 0 and 1, is then scaled onto the 100 to 1000 range. There is a floor of 100: every rated finisher sits at or above it, so nobody who has finished a race ever sees a demoralizing 0. Only a runner with no rated finish shows a dash.

The tiers

The index also carries a tier label, purely as a plain-language band:

A worked example

Say you win a 50-runner race and match the winner's mark (you are the winner). Your placement scores 1.0 and your winner-closeness scores 1.0, so that finish is a perfect 1.0. But it is a single race, so shrinkage still pulls it toward the 0.5 average, just gently: the pooled value lands in the high 0.7s, which on the 100 to 1000 scale is:

Why you might see a dash

The index is built only from finishes RaceGoat can attribute to you on this platform. If you are new here, or your past results have not yet been linked to your runner identity, you will show a dash rather than a number. Nothing is invented to fill the gap. As results and identity links grow, the same math lights more runners up automatically, with no change to how the number is calculated.

Privacy

The index is resolved entirely on our servers from your finish history and your runner identity. A public entrants list shows only the resulting number and, on your profile, its tier. Your identity id, date of birth, and contact details never appear on a public page.