Visionaire seems like an interesting play today

[Barry Irwin]

I know my horse didn\'t deserve to win and I know we got lucky and I know my horse is no good, but please explain to me how this race was a set up, in that the first quarter was just in about :22 2/5 seconds and, although there were several horses in a line, all of the riders had their mounts\' manes in theirlaps?

[congaree1]

Horses that win seem to be knocked often on this board. A few weeks ago
 it was the Whitney winner.

[fkach]

Barry,

I haven\'t analyzed the fractions relative to the rest of the day carefully yet. At first glance they don\'t seem too quick (nor does the final time), but sometimes it\'s about more than just fractions. It\'s about the competitiveness of the pace and race and the track that day.  

Gentleman James, Golden Spikes, and J Be K were the main pacesetters. The former two aren\'t exactly world beaters, but they are pretty darn good horses. They finished last and next to last.  J Be K was the favorite and looked like  a super fast and potential top level sprinter. He stopped pretty badly for him. That\'s probably telling us something about the impact of that pace.

There were other horses in the mix at various times also. I think it was mostly the middle part of the race that was hot. You can see jockeys urging (probably a bit prematurely). That\'s when John Velasquez backed out of it a little with Desert Key (another very fast horse). He hung around better than the others, but also weakned a little late. There was also some bumping among the closers in upper stretch.

I thought this was a very high quality, deep, and competitive sprint for 3YOs. No matter how you slice it, your horse ran very well to win. That was some wide sweep and finish. I just think that with his style he\'s going to need set ups like these to run down other high quality sprinters. That\'s not an insult to him. It\'s a comment on his running style. He\'s terrific.

[fkach]

I wasn\'t knocking him, although Barry took it that way. It\'s just a fact of life that deep closers often make big runs without getting up unless the  quality speed horses are weakened by their efforts.

[miff]

Barry,

A VERY nice win, congrats! but they did \"war\" in 44.3 in front of you. Won\'t be able to say he\'s too slow anymore because he ran the fastest race of his career yesterday, a negative TG fig and a triple digit Beyer.



Mike

[jimbo66]

Miff,

I think the pace was \"par\" for King\'s Bishop.  I wouldn\'t say that Visionaire got a great setup.  Three across for the lead, when two of them are slow rats, through a 22.2 1st quarter is not very fast.  This race has had sub 22 1st quarters.

The problem, from a betting perspective, was that it was very very tough to take 6-1 on Visionaire, using TG figs.   He was 6 points slower than the fastest horse, 3-4 points slower than two other contenders, at least one of which figured to run.  The 10 was also 2 points faster and figured to run.  I think Silver Charm had it right, before the race, when he said 10-1 or better is the right price, because of the depth of the field.  Congrats to Barry and also to those who took the 6-1, because they cashed, but it looked pretty light to me, from a betting standpoint, based on the numbers.

Although, I did get a look at his sheet on the \'other guys\' numbers (after the race) and he looked better there, which may explain his lower odds (as did Colonel John for that matter.)  Oh well, some days are better than others.

[miff]

Jim,

Agree not brutally fast but when several are vying, the impact seems greater than the actual splits.I think the winner got a nice set up and outran his usual by quite a bit.Honestly not a \"price\" guy, if I don\'t like a horse,I don\'t like him at any price.

Regards,
Mike

[fkach]

MIFF,

Have you seen any figures for the King\'s Bishop yet?

The horses that really stood out for me yesterday was Storm Play.  James Jerkens doesn\'t usually have them totally wound up as first time starters.  That was a pretty quick race for a horse that may not have been 100%. He\'s got a lot to prove, but I suspect the best is ahead.

[miff]

Fkach,

They are not officially released and still being tweaked.The problem in the sprints is that the dirt maiden Storm Play ran almost as fast as the KB raw. They will probably conclude the track slowed later in the card esp after that painfully slow Travers.

My guess, the Kings Bishop in the Beyer 107-110 range, TG a neg 2-ish.The Travers fig should be a joke but fig makers wouldn\'t DARE let those slugs run a slow fig, even though they did.


Mike

[slewzapper]

Visionaire 103

Shakis 103

Porte Bonheur 100

Colonel John/Mambo in Seattle 106...seems generous.

[fkach]

miff Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Fkach,
>
> They are not officially released and still being
> tweaked.The problem in the sprints is that the
> dirt maiden Storm Play ran almost as fast as the
> KB raw. They will probably conclude the track
> slowed later in the card esp after that painfully
> slow Travers.
>
> My guess, the Kings Bishop in the Beyer 107-110
> range, TG a neg 2-ish.The Travers fig should be a
> joke but fig makers wouldn\'t DARE let those slugs
> run a slow fig, even though they did.
>
>
> Mike

Thanks.

If the Travers figure doesn\'t fit with the rest of the day, most figure makers are probably going to break it out because it was the only two turn dirt race. Personally, I thought the top two ran well.

I had given some thought to the possibility of the track slowing down, but even if it did the Jerken horse still ran well relative to the first race. The 8th also looked pretty quick. Personally, I think they are likely to overrate the Kings Bishop by building the impact of pace into the track variant and assuming it was a change in track speed. But that\'s another debate I\'ve already had with Beyer that he is well aware of privately. First let\'s see what they assign it. Then we can figure out if there\'s a way to exploit it. ;-)