Wood Memorial

[jbelfior]

Been a while since the Wood produced a Derby winner. That may change this year.


Good Luck,
Joe B

[Tavasco]

Which one Joe?

I\'d just like to find a horse which might be able to put two races together in succession.

[TGJB]

That race is going to come up very fast.

[Furious Pete]

It has probably at least produced the favorite. It could prove hard to get any value out of him though, but we\'ll see. AD second choice I guess by now, and then there\'s a bunch of hopefuls behind there again.

I must say I really look forward to this one, it will be an extraordinary betting race!

[jimbo66]

Tavasco,

If you are considering betting any Wood horse besides the winner, you must not have watched the race.

Easily the most impressive prep of the year.

The question will be if \"fast\" is \"too fast\".

For those that mistakenly thought the Florida Derby day was a speed favoring track, please review today\'s Aqueduct results.  THAT was a speed favoring track.  

Now that said, Irish War Cry broke a tad slow, let a fast horse in Battalion Runner get an easy lead, while IWC was a bit wide on the first turn.  He approached the front runner with a wide trip, again wide on the second turn, under a hand ride and then pulled away in the stretch.

3.5 lengths from 1st to 2nd and 3.5 lengths from 2nd to 3rd.  

A fast race against the clock and an easy win by a horse who was 3w/2w.

Dam side breeding to run all day.  Trained by a man who has won the Derby.

There is your Derby favorite.

Figure out if he will bounce off the \"negative 2 or 3\" that he ran today.

Jim

[Tavasco]

Jimbo, I should never have posted what I did. Several issues:

1. The board needs a delete button, so that when I put my foot in my mouth I can hide my mistakes. Others may have occasion also. To Joe B my apology.

2. My first thought was the lackluster performance of horses going on to Kentucky from the wood. Invariably they have good numbers which are good for nothing. As in here we go again.

3. My other thought was the winner\'s last race in FL the FOY? It was a major flop and so, without knowing what caused it last time its fair to conclude the horse is very capable of bouncing and that was before TGJB noted the race was very fast!

So, like you mentioned I appreciate his trainer in general as well as having won the roses.

I\'m so prejudiced against Wood graduates, It hadn\'t occurred to me that this years winner might be the Derby favorite. Which I now realize is to my benefit.

Not that I\'m confident about any of the qualifiers except those from Dubai and mox nix they won\'t be there I suppose. The two Tampa prospects go down in flames @ Kee to a SoCal maiden and the better one (arguably) runs in the Arkansas Derby.

So for the NY fans, a horse to get excited about, sure won\'t fault his race I\'ll be looking for a Derby prospect that will not be one of the 1/2 dozen that will be trying to win at the first call.

For those (many) with futures bets I am especially happy. Good Luck.

[BitPlayer]

Preliminary Beyer is only 101.  Timeform US actually has Irap (pace-adjusted) faster than Irish War Cry.

I figure IWC was only about 3.5 TG points faster than Cloud Computing.  Hard for me to believe that Cloud Computing went forward.

[jbelfior]

Unless something runs away and hides in Arkansas next week,the Fl Derby winner will more than likely be the public choice.

Good Luck,
Joe B

[TGJB]

Jimbo-- speaking of bouncing, my only future win bet was Miss Sky Warrior at 55-1 or so. Now what...

[Furious Pete]

You could be right, but we\'ll see. Draw will be important too, but Pletcher factor and wise guy-money could well have Irish War Cry as the post time favorite IMO. Haven\'t seen the TG-figures yet for neither AD or IWC though.

[ajkreider]

The problem race for the day seems like the Excelsior.  If IWC gets in the negative 2 range, then Send It In gets what, a neg 4 or 5, even with the lesser weight?  And Tu Brutus gets a big negative number as well.  It fits if the show horse gets his usual 3 (7 in a row!), but still - a five year old now a competitor for Arrogate?

[jerry]

Favorite, yes. Winner? The question remains, what happened at GP?

[TGJB]

No idea yet about wind or possible changing track speed, but the older horses were carrying a lot less weight than the 3 yos. Still will clearly come up very big.

Unless the track was slowing down there were an awful lot of Xs in the Gazelle...like all but one.

[FrankD.]

Send it in 119 Beyer.

[jimbo66]

AJ,

I don\'t see it as a problem.

If I look at the Excelsior then the Carter which followed and then the Wood, I think the raw times might suggest the track slowed down.

Secondly, Send It In ran huge.  Those are older horses with established form and numbers.  There was a 15 length back gap to 3rd.  That figure has to be very very  big, and yes, it will be an outlier on his sheet.  But that happens.  

Let\'s see what TGJB comes up with for the Wood.  I will stick with ~negative 2 as my guess.