Jimbo,
Good post.
The tough part this year is that 3 of the 4 fast ones come in off huge new tops and such horses have bounced at a very high rate in past derbies (see a previous post on the topic which would indicate that a 40% chance of bouncing may be much too low) so the \"all 4 of them bounce\" in the Derby outcome is not as improbable as it may seem.
In the past, you could usually assume the winner (and probably the exacta and trifecta) would come out of the top 4 or 5 fastest horses that did not come into the Derby off a big new top in their final prep (Charismatic and Proud Citizen were the 2 exceptions since 1997 that ran well in the Derby off a big jump).
This year, so many had huge final preps and they are so much faster than the rest that it becomes very murky.
As seems to be the case every year in the new millennium, we are once again in uncharted territory for the Derby.
It definitely seems like the top trainers have been purposely trying to save the best effort for Derby day this year (much more so than in the past) with lighter campaigns and very few big efforts in Feb/March. Note that the big final-prep efforts have all been with horses that either urgently needed graded earnings to be assured of making the Derby (e.g., Bandini, Bellamy Road, Greeley\'s Galaxy and Coined Silver) or had to prove they were still sharp and worthy of running in the Derby (i.e., Afleet Alex after his dismal Rebel and supposed lung infection and even Don\'t Get Mad in the Derby Trial on Saturday.)
One interesting contrarian angle worth considering this year is that all of these horses ran their big race one race too soon but that several others that had already punched their ticket to the Derby BEFORE their final prep (and therefore may not have been fully cranked) might return the favor on Derby Day. Some obvious horses on that list could include High Fly, High Limit and Sun King and maybe a few others. If they were not fully cranked then and they are fully cranked on Derby day, why shouldn\'t they be able to turn the tables on Derby day and make the same sort of jump the others may have made one race too early?
High Limit is the most intriguing of the 3 to me. I was surprised when Frankel chose the Blue Grass over the Wood as HL\'s final prep given the short 3-week timing to the Derby. Why would a trainer who has always valued good timing make such a move? It did not make sense to me but just maybe it was because he was not looking for anything near a peak effort in the BG and was treating it strictly as a prep for the Derby. A prep where he could train at CD and not have to ship back and forth out of state and get a nice tightener and pick up a tidy check and maybe even still win – keep in mind that if Bandini had run in the Fla Derby as planned, then High Limit would have been an easy winner in the BG and would be heading into the Derby undefeated and as one of the favorites.
I am not predicting that High Limit or one of the others will jump up in the Derby or even that the trainers/owners in question could have been so patient and single-minded as to send their horses out in prestigious and rich graded prep races significantly less than fully-cranked (seems unlikely) but, what if they did?...it is an interesting angle to ponder.
Good luck.
Chris
