Nathan Hart

I was just given a heads up to check out Eric Andreoli's work on predicting the Little 500. Eric's the Wayne Winston of the Little 500.

Here's a link to the full post which is a must read for any Little 500 enthusiast.

Basically, Andreoli used statistical analysis of historical spring series results and their relation to race results. To quote from his blog:

A regression of historical data reveals that 67% of the race outcome can be explained by ITT times, team pursuit times, and qualification times. The ITT time of the team's fastest rider and the team pursuit time were the most significant variables to explain race outcome...The model can predict a team's race time to within 177 seconds. The expected race times are assumed to be normally distributed. This assumptions allows for simulation of 1000 iterations using the standard error of 177. This revealed each team's chances of winning as listed above.

Easy-to-understand stuff, right?

Here's his odds of winning for the 2010 men's race. Maybe the Cutters aren't the favorite?

  1. Phi Delta Theta (24.5 percent)

  2. Cutters (18.3 percent)

  3. Phi Kappa Psi (16.8 percent)

  4. Phi Gamma Delta (11.5 percent)

  5. Sigma Chi (7.4 percent)

  6. Black Key Bulls (6.0 percent)

  7. Gray Goat Cycling (3.1 percent)

  8. Delta Tau Delta (2.8 percent)

  9. Delta Upsilon (2.4 percent)

Andreoli said the top five teams in that model fit within the standard error of the model and "thus have a shot to win".

But really, it's cool stuff. There's a whole lot more in the post. You should check it out.

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