Ask The Experts

No not really. 2006 was fast and so was 2007 Derby. This is why Calvin has historically done so well at CD. There is often a golden rail. Except when there\'s a bad rail! He will test it Friday and then we will know.

JB you\'re exactly right.  The Preakness is consistently the most formful race of the year to the Derby form run 14 days prior. These horses run the race of their life at a distance too far and come right back and do it again in 2 weeks sometimes with even higher figs.  The new shooters generally don\'t make an impact. How can that be?  Why don\'t the Derby horses bounce to the moon?  

IMO it\'s because we\'ve all forgotten what the old time trainers knew - when you get a horse right you run them.  I have horses in England and I can assure you they have not forgotten it there. When horses win they often run right back in 2-14 days.  Why?  Because if you wait too long they go out of form. We call it \"bouncing\" or \"reacting\" but what we\'re really talking about is form cycles. Of course many horses do react to a big fig but it\'s NOT immediate. Look at the Keeneland meet.  The \"repeater\" angle has been tried and true for decades. There were 3 in one day including the Lexington stakes this past meet.

The reason the Preakness is so formful is if you run them back quick enough they don\'t bounce. And that\'s why there are so few Triple Crown winners. They can\'t hold that form for 5 weeks.  If you want more Triple crown winners run them over a shorter time period - say 7 and then 14 days.

Now you will probably point out that many Derby winners don\'t run new tops. It would be interesting to see of Derby starters who run new tops and go back in the Preakness how many bounce. I think you\'ll see a lot of pair-ups.  My unscientific observation is that when you run them quick they run the same.

bloodline

i think they have amnesia. the old track at SA was a killing field like Churchill is now for instance.

Jerry,

A couple observations - 1) these horses still won 38% and were 1-2 64%. As a rule they still fire. Be interesting to see $2 ROI. 2) The 14 days rest horses were a small sample of 6 and excluding Barbaro had 2 Pairs or 33%. Won 2 of 6, 33%.  

Despite the fact it comes 14 days after a grueling race at a distance too far this early for 3 year olds, the Preakness is one of the most formful big races year after year.  Funny Cide, Smarty, War Emblem, Street Sense (without CD rail bias) Big Brown all fired huge - top or no top. After all we\'re trying to pick winners not new tops.

Its always been that way.  The Derby form rules the Preakness 14 days later.  How can this be reconciled to bounce theory? IMO horses are very often much less likely to bounce or X out on 7-14 days rest than 4-5 weeks. Why? Because they haven\'t gone out of form yet. By Belmont time they are very often over the top in the Derby form cycle and thats why its so hard to win the Triple Crown. When the old timers got a horse right and they \"topped\' what did they do?  They got the condition book out and tried to find a race in 7 days and run them back quick when they were \"right\".  Horses go in and out of form and in the old days they would just keep running them so it was easier to see. What you are doing with TG is graphically demonstrating 2 maxims trainers have known forever - hard race and form cycles.  

For tomorrow that points to PON for me. He should run back to his 2nd best Derby fig unless you are right about 2nd time dirt regress.  The old turf to dirt shoot the wad angle. MTB was aided by insane (and i think undersestimated on this site) CD rail bias. As for the filly she should run well too but totally diferent pace scenario will make it a lot tougher for her. Also I believe BD is a sprinter duck out of water here. IMHO.

Bob