Watching the tapes

[Josephus]

Spent some time today watching my tapes of the prep races...for what it\'s worth, without looking at any sheet figs, the most impressive visually to me are; FF, POTN, and HMB.  FF was under a snug hold while up on the pace and wasn\'t asked for anything until past the 1/8th pole and then just asked to run a little bit to finish up the last 16th, was never in a drive at any time.  Liked his mile workout, not so sure about his latest, unless Jones figures he\'s just so full of himself, he just has to take some of the edge off. POTN looks full of power in all his races...when he made the lead in the races where he had no competition he just lollygagged and goofed off, his true race was the Robert Lewis....even with QR out he should get a pace to run off of in the Derby. HMB not quite as impressive as the first 2, but he sure looks like the distance is right up his alley, and he makes a big move...if he hits some seams he could be very tough.  

Ones I don\'t like visually are; IWR and Dunkirk.  Not impressed at all with the Wood, IWR was 5 to 6 lengths off of very slow fractions until the stretch and should have finished the way he did, as the rest of the field was so weak... I thought the Gotham was a joke. no pressure on him and nobody else ran a lick.  Dunkirk had a nice burst in the FD, passing a bunch of weak horses but then couldn\'t go on with it with QR, he looked like a tired horse finishing up...I don\'t think he has enough foundation to run a 1 1/4 with good horses.

Agree? Disagree?

[jmetro]

I agree on Hold Me Back, although the pace of the race is shaping up against him he\'ll surely make the same move he\'s made in his prior races this year.  He\'s one of the few that actually had a two turn race on dirt last fall and it wasn\'t that bad imo.  If you watch the replay of the Remsen the jockey, John Velazquez, isn\'t exactly laying the wood to him down the stretch.  Would have been nice if they could have gotten a dirt route in him at Gulfstream but the races he was entered in never filled according to Mott.   His work Sunday showed that he\'ll handle Churchill\'s dirt just fine.

Definitely a one run type horse though and not typical of Desormeaux\'s other Derby winners.  Not sold on him for the win spot but love him underneath in the exotics.

[miff]

Joe,

Agree with your trip view except IWR had to fall down and get up and win to be more impressive from a trip standpoint.He did not beat a runner that day.

Mike

[jack72906]

J,

Why do you feel the pace is shaping up against HMB? It seems the pace will be fairly quick between RR and the 2nd Pletcher horse. Would it not set up for the one run type HMB?

Visually, I thought Musket Man\'s performance in the Tampa Derby was strong. He had nowhere to go until until about the 8th pole. Stuck in traffic and steadied around the far turn, I thought he was done in that race. I didn\'t like hearing the Welsch report on his workout a few days ago, but this one will be tough to throw out of the exotics or even a win. Great pattern too.

[mkram]

Agree on Musket Man.  No bounces in his pattern.  Pattern contains a nice trip tops before the move up in the Illinois Derby.  Look in the archives for 3YO\'s that establish a new top off a paired or trip tops - alot of pairing of the new top/some move forward - Silver Charm, Funny Cide, Fusiachi....

[HP]

I agree with you on some level but check the TGI \"less than 1m/1m and greater\" breakdown.  It\'s hard for me to see this horse improving over that extra furlong.  Musket Man wouldn\'t shock me if he got in the picture but I would be surprised to see him in the winner\'s circle.  HP

[mkram]

Didn\'t Smarty and Funny Cide have similar TGI\'s?

[HP]

Actually I would say no.  I am not a big pedigree guy, but IMHO Yonaguska is vastly inferior to Distorted Humor and Elusive Quality by almost any measure.  While DH and EQ kids do not show improvement on TGI going over a mile...the \"spread\" is lower and both sire so many more stakes winners it\'s hard to mention them in the same breath as Yonaguska.

Also...Smarty Jones was so clearly the fastest horse in his Derby field, and I believe Funny Cide had shown a lot more as a 2yo than Musket Man.

[MonmouthGuy]

I can actually see him running a very similar race to Recapture the Glory, who also trained poorly over the CD strip, but ran well, and could have hit the board with a better trip.

[mkram]

Agreed.  But sometimes there are aberrations.  He could be an outlier as it relates to his pedigree, etc..  It all boils down to the risk/reward quotient.  Good luck this weekend.

[jmetro]

Regal Ransom and Pletcher\'s runner to be named later just give horses like Friesan Fire and I Want Revenge a target to run at.  While they certainly bring speed to the race I don\'t think they will soften up the other early pace type horses.

It would take a Derby similar to Giacomo\'s for Hold Me Back to get up for the win.  I rather see him passing better than half the field with his outside move and catching the 3rd or 4th spot, and at a price of around 20-1 or so you can still get some solid payoffs with the favorites on top.