Three Blind Mice...

[NoCarolinaTony]

Miff,

Hey It\'s not that I don\'t like anti-poly posters. I think it can be played with a little bit of change in the handicapping. Long time top notch handicappers are doing well. I\'m sure if you didn\'t close your mind to it, you\'d do well too.

TG figs hold up very well on Poly and seem to transfer well Dirt to Poly and Poly to dirt.

I take a little umbrage to the black-balling of poly as a whole, and try to present the other point view becasue the poly haters are screaming louder and another opinion needs to be heard. I don\'t believe it\'s total garbage, and totally disagree it robs the fast for the slow at all. I think stamina is making a comeback. Is poly as fast as dirt, obviously no. Is the racing better than on dirt, I guess it\'s a matter of opinion.

Otherwise, I have absolutely nothing against you personally at all.

I\'ll just keep quiet on the subject from here on out and let those who wish to complain (which most posters seem to prefer to do here anyway) have at it.

After Saratoga (be there closing weekend) I\'ll take a month off from live wagering and then head to Kee in October and followed by the Breeders Cup at my old stomping grounds Monmouth.

Maybe a beer at Siro\'s or at the Travers bar.

See ya there.

NC Tony

[SoCalMan2]

Anybody care to explain the \"decision\" in the Adirondack?

Apparently, a horse can be declared a non-starter if it gets an \"unfair start\" in the opinion of the stewards.  I had never hear this before.  I have seen non-starters be declared when when the gate does not open or when the ass\'t starter does not let go of the reins.  However, in this case, the filly reared and got off to an extremely poor start.

In my opinion, this ended up halving all of my pick 6 consolation payoffs and pick 4 payoffs.  I have lots enormous amounts of money on horses who have gotten off to bad starts and have never gotten such a refund.

How do the stewards draw the line between a bad start and an unfair start?  This just seems completely absurd.  Horses rear at the start all the time....why was the Adirondack different?

[PapaChach]

I guess this is as good a place as any to ask...what the eff is going on w/the gate crew at the Spa this year? I acknowledge that the memory can be selective but it seems as though they have had a real problem getting races to break cleanly this year. The number of gate scratches, late scratches, ran for purse money only, etc., seems to have skyrocketed this year. Is this just a statistical anomaly or is there some sort of ineptitude involved? Anybody got any \"inside info\" on this?

[Street Sense]

PapaChach Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I guess this is as good a place as any to
> ask...what the eff is going on w/the gate crew at
> the Spa this year? I acknowledge that the
> memory can be selective but it seems as though
> they have had a real problem getting races to
> break cleanly this year. The number of gate
> scratches, late scratches, ran for purse money
> only, etc., seems to have skyrocketed this year.
> Is this just a statistical anomaly or is there
> some sort of ineptitude involved? Anybody got any
> \"inside info\" on this?


Supposedly a lot of new gate crew workers who lack in experience.  You\'re not imagining things.

[RICH]

I\'m no expert, but it looked like the starter kept holding on when the gates open. It looked like the horse wanted to go, but couldn\'t.

[miff]

The gate crew problem at NYRA tracks goes back before the SPA meet. Bruce Johnstone, former trainer was hired by NYRA months ago to take over various duties including the gate crew.Retirements and resignations have left an inexperienced crew to say the least. There have been meetings with the horsemen recently about this problem with all parties working together on this very serious problem.Management is looking at the problem day by day.

The problem does go back to NYRA\'S money woes and should have been addressed some time ago.In light of the problem, So Cal, the stewards are refunding the players at ANY sign of a gate crew error/problem and more so than in the past.The p4/p6 prices were slaughtered because of the double winners of the 8th.

The three blind mice are sensitive to the gate crew problem and also have been making lots of \"insufficient\" calls on foul claims, so far(rare takedowns).I guess I\'d rather they do it this way until it gets fixed, otherwise you could get screwed out of a chance for a big score if a gate crew guy compromises the chance of a horse you need.


Mike

[PapaChach]

thanks for the info miff and street sense. at least it sounds like nyra acknowledges there\'s a problem, hopefully they get it straightened out.