Ask The Experts

Forgot my cardinal rule for handicapping in the slop. Go with the horses with references to water in the name. $928 exacta. Anyone else pick up on this?  Anyone for a game of darts?

Notwithstanding the excellent ride by Borel, in the current atmosphere one might be wondering about a horse with little to recommend him on paper, with a trainer possessing a single victory to his name this year, and owned by a veterinarian. I sincerely hope he\'s legit, there\'s no evidence to the contrary. The story is better than \"Casey\'s Shadow\", though I fail to see the resemblance between Wooley and Walter Matthau.  I also hope they took plenty of blood samples for future analyses.

Mike-

As far as I can tell, the Equix concept is about trying to match phenotypes. That is, it is based on matching physical measurements of sires and dams. Since you are much more likely to have considerably more physical variation at the lower levels of the breeding industry, I do not doubt that applying some standardized practices to equine breeding would improve horses with poor pedrigrees. While Alm claims to have seen just this, it has nothing to do with sex-influenced genetic selection.

With the Maktooms, you only have to look at the extent of their breeding operations to see the understanding that they have of this game. It is purely a numbers game. They understand that it is the combination of ability on the background of genetic merit. And since it is very difficult to get a handle on genetic merit (at least until there are a lot of progeny racing), they are buying up the best racehorses, sending high quality mares to them, and letting them perform. And if they have a basis of many hundreds of the best racing animals,including access to the best mares, then they are able to maximize the chances of breeding the best racing animals.

The poker analogy is correct. Except that the Sheik and his brothers have the wherewithal to buy Big Slick on every deal.

Bit-

Thanks for the reference. It will take me a few days to go over it, but I will go over it. The paper also has some interesting citations (no pun intended) that I will also get a look at. On first glance, it looks like a well-written paper. The main premise is that mtDNA, being responsible for some genes involved in respiration, may be responsible for female-dominated stamina traits. But given that there are literally hundreds of genes involved in these processes, the influence of other chromosomes is likely much larger. Nonetheless, without having examined it in detail I\'ll withold judgment.

While the paper does make it possible for someone with the right lab tools to examine the genotype (the actual DNA sequence) of these genes, unless you have a piece of Better Than Honour\'s DNA (virtually any tissue, or in the case of mtDNA, hair would work), it would be impossible to determine a genotype. Perhaps you could genotype by descent, but that would assume that you had the DNA sequences of his parents. I am interested in this area, and I do have a lab capable of this kind of work. But the biggest hurdle is to identify naturally occurring genetic variants that confer advantages at different race distances. I do, in fact, believe that this is possible. We already know some of the genes involved. Regarding the current discussion, few of them are mitochondrial. But clearly it would be possible to identify breeding stock and progeny with advantageous genotypes. But the critical factor is knowing which genes to examine, and perservering and being lucky enough to find a variant that really matters.

All that being said, remember that genetics is only part of racing ability. Think of it as genetics just providing a basis- a predisposition. Environmental factors are likely as important- things like maternal care, early experiences, injuries, just about everything that goes into bringing an animal to the races. I am sure you can name many full sibs to great horses but were lousy racehorses. There is still an element of chance in it all.

First, to take one race as a sample is simply not valid. Do it over 1000 races and apply some real statistics to the results and see what you have.

But that is a moot point. Let\'s say that a one race sample is in fact valid. You state that Alm\'s position is supported by the fact that you have observed that the maternal grandsires have a higher AWD (using an arbitrary cutoff point-  this is why you need a much larger sample size- you don\'t really know if 7.4 is different from 7.0, or that both fall within the margin of error and therefore are not different). But Alm\'s main point is that stamina is inherited through the female, through a sex-linked mode of inheritance. There is absolutely no evidence for this. This implies that the genes responsible can only be located on the X chromosome, and no other. That is a preposterous assumption and that is why I asked for the reference-  show me the study so we can all look at it, and if it is valid science I will take my hat off to him. But until those studies are done and show convincing results,it is all just speculation, and not at all supported by what we know, based on the genome projects in various species, about which genes are located on which chromosomes.  

Another reason that the observation could be refuted is to ask whether you have really done a carefully controlled comparison of the maternal grandsires versus the sires that you checked out. After all, most of the grandsires will have had many more and older crops. Young sires would not be expected to have very high AWDs, since they likely don\'t have many foal crops that have raced through maturity, and so would not have had many opportunities to compete in longer races. So there are a lot of factors that have to be controlled for in order to make such a comparison.  You might also want to see if what you have observed in this small sample is any different than what you might find in a much larger randomly selected population.

Show me some real evidence. Or at least a good scientific paper to support the position. That is all I ask.

Alm-

With all due respect, as a scientist with knowledge of the subject, I find your statements regarding parental influences on progeny performance are simply a bunch of hogwash. How about the moon sign during the conception period? The evidence is just as good. If, as you say, there are legitimate scientific studies from Australia that support your statements, please post the references so we can all be informed of this truly important information on equine genetics.

That sound you hear is Gregor Mendel turning over in his grave.

Thanks