Ask The Experts
General Category => Ask the Experts => Topic started by: spa on June 02, 2006, 09:27:06 PM
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ROTW ?
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It\'s going to be a Sunday race and will be up sometime this afternoon.
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looking for freebies again, oops?
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Looking for winners.....
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Nice call TG on the ROTW + the aquisition of Royal Cheer . The 2 longshot\'s are the only 2 you\'d hate to lose to in that race .
I like Royal Cheer + Galileo\'s Star + Harriett Lane all to run new tops today and again in their next couple starts before Breeders Cup ...
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From the analysis:
\"Grass horses simply
aren’t set back by big efforts, as Barbaro was by his huge Derby\"
That is a real \"Stretch Armstrong\" type reach there. To say a horse bounced when he broke down after about a furlong is just crazy.
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Beyer,
Get used to it, it\'s required TG dogma.Horses are only set back or break down because of prior huge efforts. Not even close.
Mike
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Miff--
1-- I did NOT say they ONLY break down after big efforts.
2-- Again-- I believe that big efforts cause physical discomfort (like that you feel the next day if you play ball after not doing so for a while, or exercise more than usual), and a horse will change his mechanics slightly to get off something that doesn\'t feel good. When you are dealing with something this big moving this fast and landing on an area this small, the impact is huge (there have been studies that show the pounds per square inch is something truly crazy), and anything less than optimum mechanics can cause real trouble. Again, my analogy is to a pitcher adjusting his delivery because something hurts, and blowing his arm out (Zambrano recently comes to mind).
This, by the way, is why trainers don\'t want to buy horses with bad stride mechanics-- they are more susceptible to injury.
Incidentally, when you see a horse miss a race because of a hoof bruise, check out how often it is coming off a big effort. Same theory.
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Even if I give that it is possible the horse broke down due to a set back from his fast race, it is stated like it is a certainty in the analysis. That is way over the top in my opinion.
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There\'s a difference between horse\'s who are set back and horse\'s who break down . Whether it\'s a huge , good or an average effort (s) in question , the key is to see it coming in advance and sometime\'s you can . This is definately Jerry\'s department but , there are possibly an infinate number of variable\'s and factors at play here ( I can think of a few ) in Barbaro\'s personal circumstances - just to name one horse ...
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Bey-- time to do some homework. Go through this section of the site for the period leading up to the Preakness, and find the study of the 31 3yos we found that ran neg 1 or better in the spring. See how many stayed healthy afterwards, then tell me I\'m over the top. And keep in mind we brought this up BEFORE the race.
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Jerry,
Your study did not take in a host of other facts.Now regarding \"staying healthy afterwards\" I can name many 3yr old pre -june runners that went bad, lame et al after running very slow figs on your product.
Horses do not have to be coming off huge efforts to \"stay healthy afterwards.\" That happens to your opinion, which if studied throughout the entire population of runners would challenge the findings of your original study.
Mike
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Miff-- tell you what. Why don\'t you take a random selection of 31 dirt stake 3yos, and lets see how many more starts they make this year compared to those 31 that ran neg 1 or better. My suggestion would be to use all the ones that ran on the Preakness and Belmont cards and in the Lone Star Derby that have not run that fast-- you keep track.
Yes, there are always individual circumstances (like the short rest off the huge effort for Barbaro, another factor that made this much more likely than usual). But those factors will wash out in a group study-- that\'s why we do things that way.
We hope to have abn interesting study at some point on a related issue as well.
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Way to tough for me.....I\'m going for FTL.
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I know the study to which you refer. It still doesn\'t change my opinion that to state as fact that Barbaro was set back/injured because of his Derby is in serious question. There is no way to know one way or the other. Is it more likely? Sure. That is all I have to say, I won\'t prolong this any further.
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JB A horse can get a hoof bruise jogging or galloping. Are you saying the hoof bruise is the \"reason\" given by the connections to hide the fact, but that the previous taxing effort is really the culprit. Thanks BBB.
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No, I\'m saying the bruise CAN be (as opposed to is) the result of a change in mechanics, which can be the result of stress caused by a big effort.
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On this subject views and opinions of author-handicapper Steve Davidowitz .
May 27, 2006. . .Barbaro is doing quite well all things considered and there is not much more that can be said about what occurred at Pimlico last Saturday, but I was bothered by the essence of a note that was sent to me via E-mail that suggested that ‘Sheet’ handicappers were saying on their public forums that essentially Barbaro had bounced—severely to be sure—but as many of the adherents to ‘Sheet Theory’ had predicted.
Did Barbaro suffer a severe bounce?
Should there be changes in the Triple Crown?
I was appalled and wrote the following reply to the gentleman about many of my concerns over this line of thinking.
The sheet players can be so arrogant. Most had the Derby all wrong and now they take credit for a severe bounce I guess, suggesting that is part of what happened to Barbaro? Arrogance and somewhat distasteful.
The Sheet Gurus and their followers conveniently forget the many horses who outperform their \'bounce\' expectations. Many times over.
Bounces do occur, but far less predictably than they would have you believe or can be supported by fact, circumstantial or otherwise.
I do have respect for the art of making and reading ‘form patterns’ and the Sheet Format is a wonderful way of presenting said patterns. But the Sheet Gurus and their followers are intellectually dishonest about weight, track bias and the changing nature of tracks conditions on a single card and the changing, living nature of all performance patterns.
Among other things, they never bother to explain how horses 15 years ago regularly ran more often and achieved peak performances in spite of their present notions, or how many subtle changes are occurring in the present and future sense. (I also question the way the numbers keep getting faster and faster when that seems more of a drift rather than an actual fact. I see a parallel in Baseball. For example Sandy Koufax threw in the 98-100 mph range in the 1970\'s and ALL starting pitchers worked on three days rest and pitched many more complete games to boot. Meanwhile Secretariat, Dr. Fager, Damascus, Buckpasser and many others in the 1970\'s ran faster than the usual high class stakes winner today who seems to automatically earn a minus (Sheet) number, two or three times a year in ultra short careers despite the limited numbers of well spaced starts).
Who is to say that a change of routine will not catch on and change things in another direction? Who is to say that The Sheet Gurus really have any handle on how that change will occur before other good players using other techniques see it.
Sheet pattern analysis has taken on the trappings of a religion and like all religions, the priests sometimes are corrupted by the business of preaching their version of the gospel--and they do make money off of their followers.
Moreover, sheet pattern analysis in the hands of one player means one possible outcome or set of percentages vs another completely different set of probabilities by another. The same is true with any approach to pre-race guess-timation, or handicapping theory.
Wish they were not so dogmatic while claiming to be so flexible.
Wish they would not use the word \'bounce\' to explain all their right guesses and wish they would simply admit from time to time that they have no more clues why some things happen as anyone else.
Afleet Alex thrived on the short time between races and stumbled as bad as a horse can stumble and went on to win the 2005 Preakness and bury the Belmont field. Dozens and dozens of examples can be found in the recent past at all levels of racing while a like number can be found to support the dogma.
Stumbles and broken bones can occur without a precipitous reason.
The Triple Crown always has been hard on horses and has been hard to win. But in my opinion, the problem with it has nothing to do with its time frame layout.
If they really want to change the Triple Crown, they could make it mandatory for horses in the race to be on the track grounds for a minimum of six days where each horse could be observed in training by track vets and by the press and the clockers every day. I can\'t tell you how many horses revealed themselves \'in the old days\' and still reveal themselves at Churchill Downs for Derby week, where the majority of horses do still show up to train.
If they want to properly alter the Triple Crown, they should go back 6-9 months and change what happens in the important 2 yr old races.
The Breeders\' Cup Juvenile should be the first race at 1-1/16 miles in the country.
The Hopeful should be 6-1/2, the Futurity 7 and the Champagne 1-mile. The Arlington Futurity one mile, The Norfolk one mile.
The first 1-1/8 mile 3 yr old prep stakes should be the last series of 3 yr old prep stakes in Florida and California, (New York, Illinois and Arkansas have it right).
The distances of the major 2 yr old stakes is one of the key pressure points on young horses that weakens---not strengthens---the breed.
Horses need foundation races as 2 yr olds, skipping them all and starting out at 3 is an unattractive alternative for a Triple Crown horse, but running in those longer and more competitive 2 yr old races as presently constituted can be career shortening, as the pressure on all good 2 yr olds increases with the longer distances and monster purses so early in their careers.
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Miff-- skimmed it quickly, if I have time tomorrow I might deal with this stuff (yet again). More importantly, where did this appear?
And he certainly didn\'t write to me, or if he did I didn\'t get it.
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Jerry,
Davidowitz was commenting to one of his followers who informed him about postings at this and other sites.There was no shot at TG,imo, but a more general comment about the usual diverse opinions/theories that float througout the TG/Rags world.
Mike
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The section of Miff\'s post containing Davidowitz\'s comments on 2yo campaigns and the Breeders Cup Juvenile seems not to have drawn any comments. His points strike me as good ones. It may not be a coincidence that no BC Juvenile winner has won the Derby.