COCO BELLE ...

[JohnTChance]

John Sadler\'s 2 yr. old filly, COCO BELLE, a second-time starter who had run a fast ThoroGraph 7 first out, was a scratch in Saturday\'s Landaluce to go in yesterday\'s easier Maiden Special Weight race at Hollywood Park, where she was 3-5. And she lost! She was nipped late after having the lead all to herself with no excuses. Beaten by OUTOFTHEPAST, a second-timer who had run a 19 in her debut. Apparently, Sadler\'s filly [predictably IMHO] regressed second time off her fast debut, just as Baffert\'s THRU N\' THROUGH backed up off her fast 5 in the Landaluce.

Two points here:

1) Had COCO BELLE run in the Landaluce, we\'re all richer here because PINATA would have been higher odds.

2) I haven\'t been paying close attention to the ThoroGraph vs. Ragozin challenge thing going on, but my essential point here is that a any kind of \"mechanical\" comparison challenge based on fastest last figure DOES NOT WORK! Saturday\'s Landaluce is clear example of why. Any valid comparison must have a human element interpolating the figures for it to have any real meaning.

JohnTChance

[brokerstip]

JohnT,

Sadler\'s 2yo was beat by the Matlow the Magician.
Richard popped Dr. Katz (or something like that) the prior day at 30-1 to start off the Pick 6
He also struck in the second race on 7/2  with King of the Roxy  11-1. That was a 2yo sprint.

I agree with you that CB could have been anticiapted to regress and, also, that  that Matlow is very proficient in those spots.  
 
Since most of the forum\'s discussions center around \'name\' trainers (Pletch, Frankel, Lukas etc.), I thought this was a good time to bring up one of the more obscure names.

Bob

[TGJB]

John-- first of all, the study isn\'t based on fastest last figure, and second of all, if you read the previous posts on this subject you\'ll get responses to why it IS a good test, in the long run.

The Landaluce might very well be a good example of why the study WILL work. The question is not who we had as fastest going in-- we both unoubtedly had Baffert\'s filly fastest. But when you ranked the fillies in order based on the criteria (last 3 figures, throw out worst, average other 2, in this case using only the one figure for Pinata), which side would have had Pinata ranked higher? We had her second fastest, and if Len had her ranked lower, the point for that race would go to us.

[imallin]

\'one number\' fillies who run their eyeballs out first time out are great bet-againsts next time. Coco Belle and the Baffert filly were both visually spectacular in that start. They just ran too hard. In their credit, both of them came back and raced well and still lost.

Personally, i look for a filly 2nd time starter who has a bad line first time out but made a middle move or something and faded. Speed and fade or sometimes they\'ll get off a beat slow and rush up and fade.