Track bias. Professional punters call it an opportunity. Casual punters call it a curse. And most racecourse managers place it in the same file as Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny - something that gets a lot of airplay but doesn't really exist.
But ask John Size and Shane Dye about track bias and they will point to yesterday's winning double with My Favourite and Palette Natural as living proof of what can be achieved if you know what to look for.
Yesterday's A+3 course did not play as a uniform strip. The inside ground where the turf is thinner and more sandy was definitely providing greater resistance. And the more densely turfed strip down the centre was undoubtedly riding faster.
New Zealand-born Dye is a past master at making an accurate early judgment of track bias and then charting an appropriate navigational gameplan. And although he is equally at home on horses of all dispositions, there is little doubt the last-to-first swoop is Dye's signature tune.
Size once did a stint as a professional form analyst in Sydney in order to better understand the academic side of horse racing. So, like Dye, he will pick up a bias or racing pattern earlier than most.
'My Favourite was simply a case of a horse who found his class and he was ridden to suit the bias,' Size explained. 'He needs all favours to win and with the track playing that way, he got them.