Derby Reflections / Moving Forward

[mjellish]

There\'s been some questions about track maintenance and weather at the Derby.  As far as track maintenance goes, they floated the track for races 1-4.  Between races 4 and 5 they switched to harrowing the track right after a race, then sealing it again before the horses came out from the paddock for the next races.  They repeated this process off and on during the rest of the day and if I am remembering it right through all the bourbon I think they just sealed it between at least 1 of the later races, no harrowing.  The rain stopped about an hour before the derby and the weather actually broke heading into the race, with the sun beginning to peak out.  There was a steady wind for most of the day that went mostly with the horses on the backstretch and against them down the stretch.  Before the Derby, however, this wind abruptly died down as the weather broke, but there were still gusts that continued just as strongly in the same direction as before.

The rail looked pretty bad on Friday.  It also didn\'t seem very good on Saturday, but I think that is a little misleading.  Calvin is the only jock who actually seems to get his horses right down on the rail.  Most of the other riders are actually at least 1/2 path out from where he rides.  Not sure if that makes a difference or not.  But watch Calvin\'s ride on Super Saver and Atta Boy Roy and then compare these to the other jocks.  You will see the difference.

Regardless, as far as the race itself goes, Super Saver got a dream trip from Calvin in the derby.  And I was wrong about SS not getting the 1 1/4.  He seemed to get it just fine although he got passed on the gallop out by PDP.  PDP also got a pretty good trip as far as saving ground goes.  Ice Box got stopped cold twice, had to alter course one other time and was much wider than the above two.  He showed pretty good athleticism to regain his momentum quickly and keep coming.  I wouldn\'t be surprised if Ice Box comes back with the best TG fig in the race.  If he goes in the Preakness he\'s going to take a lot of money based on the trip he had, which has been well publicized.  He\'s not changing leads though, and he used to.  This would seem to indicate to me that something isn\'t quite right with him.  Word I heard from three different people before the race was that Ice Box was hurt, but he sure didn\'t run like it.  My clocker loved his work but hated his gallops, so I had mixed opinions about this horse heading into the race.  LAL had a horrible trip and I think it\'s safe to say that this race is pretty much a toss for him.  He did well to get up for 6th, but these bad trips are beginning to be a habit for him.  

Heading into the race, I figured the pace would be quick enough to ensure that no horse went wire to wire and this would help set up the mid-pack stalkers and closers.  After Lucky drew the rail, the way I handicapped the race I made either Paddy or Devil May Care the most likely winners.  I rated Ice Box, Lucky and Awesome Act as second best with a slight chance to win.  When handicapping any race I\'m always trying to play the percentages, and given the way he ran in the ARK derby and what I knew about him I didn\'t think Super Saver would get the 1 1/4 or win.  But I knew the horse was doing better than he ever had been, he seemed to really like Churchill, and after he drew so well, and especially after I saw Calvin bring Atta Boy Roy home, I gave SS a decent a chance to hit the board.  So I decided to include him in my plays, but I did not elevate him to the status of Win Candidate.  I gave him about the same chance as Sidney, whom I thought had a shot for a minor award as long as he rated and handled the soup.  I rated Mission Impazzible about an equal chance as those two given the way he was working and that he had the right stalking style.  I also decided that given the early pace projection just about any closer would have a chance of grinding up into the super or the bottom spot of the tri.  So I threw DK and MMFM into a group that included DUB and STV, as well as American Lion (fastest horse) and Discretely Mine (should have handled the slop and had a sheet that said he had a chance to improve).  The only stone cold tosses for me were therefore CON,LOD,NP,JB,HBK & BT.  

I hit the Woodford the race before when I keyed General Quarters in 1st and 2nd position in some $20 Tri\'s, so I upped my bet a bit on the Derby and bet it like this:

$300 Tri PDP,DMC/PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA =$1800
$200 Tri PDP,DMC/PDP,DMC/MI,SS,SC =$1200
$100 Tri PDP,DMC/PDP,DMC/DUB,AL,STV,DM,DK,MMFM =$1200
$200 Tri PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/PDP,DMC =$1200
$100 Tri PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/LAL,IB,AA =$1200
$50  Tri PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/MI,SS,SC =$900
$30  Tri PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/DUB,AL,STV,DM,DK,MMFM =$1080
$10  Super PDP,DMC/PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/LAL,IB,AA =$120
$5   Super PDP,DMC/PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/MI,SS,SC,DUB,AL,STV,DM,DK,MMFM =$270
$5   Super PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA =$60
$2   Super PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/PDP,DMC/MI,SS,SC,DUB,AL,STV,DM,DK,MMFM =$108
$5   Super PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/LAL,IB,AA/PDP,DMC,LAL,IB,AA =$120
$3   Super PDP,DMC/LAL,IB,AA/LAL,IB,AA/MI,SS,SC,DUB,AL,STV,DM,DK,MMFM =$324

SAVER $100 EX LAL,IB,AA/PDP,DMC =$600


As you can see, I completely missed the race.  Classic example of right horses, wrong order.  Although I have to say that it\'s almost better for me that Super Saver won because if you take him out of it I may have lost out on a good chunk of money when IB got up to nip PDP on the wire.

Congrats to all that liked Super Saver and bet him with enough gusto to win a chunk of change.  I really thought he was an underlay based on what I thought his actual chances of winning were, but there\'s nothing wrong with cashing on an $18 horse.  And maybe it\'s just me but I thought almost EVERY horse in this race seemed to go off as an underlay to win unless you liked AL at better than 20-1 as the fastest horse.  I was really surprised that PDP went off as low as 12-1 because I didn\'t think he was that easy of a horse to dope out.  I really liked him and was expecting to get 20-1 or so.

Tough weekend for me overall.  I went 2/5 on Oaks day.  I hit a win bet on Danzon in the 5th and cashed a $20 Tri bet for $7900 when I keyed Asphalt in the American.  Then I blew all that and then some on the Oaks when I keyed Jody Slew at a bazillion to one in the Oaks to take 1st, 2nd, 3rd in the Tri, and I bet $1000 to win on her although I had singled her on a $10 Pick 4 ticket that was alive as well (boy that was fun though).

Anxious to see what the figs come back at for the Preakness.  Historically a horse like SS with good tactical speed usually runs well at Pimlico and sometimes even moves forward, but I don\'t think any of these stand out well enough to make up for a bad draw or bad race set up.  Should be fun to handicap and debate on the board.

Again, congrats to Sek, Cov and everyone else I heard give a strong endorsement to SS on this board.

[Ill-bred]

I also keyed on Paddy 1st-2nd.

Given my belief that IB actually was best on the day, I cannot complain about the narrow miss.

But what is your take on Paddy\'s subtle trouble and how much it cost him at the wire?

I am still on board this horse.

[mjellish]

I dunno what my take is on Paddy and his trouble.  

My take on trouble in general is that it is ok to make up an excuse for a horse now and again because of trouble, but the good ones usually still find a way to win.  When they don\'t, I begin to downgrade them (see Dublin).

Given that this was a 20 horse field and Paddy made it to the inside from the 10 post and saved a lot of ground, I think that offsets whatever trouble he had moving into the stretch.  I don\'t think you could have hoped for a much better trip than he got.  As I said, SS got a perfect trip.  And given that, I\'m not convinced Paddy would have caught SS.  I think IB would have caught him, but the early pace set him perfect for his late run, and we don\'t really know how SS would have responded if he was headed in deep stretch.  My hope would be that they skip the Preakness and try Paddy in the Belmont.

[jack72906]

My only regret on the day was picking horses that ran from wide PPs. Even though I had questions about SS I still keyed him over MI, DMC, AA, and even Dean\'s Kitten. This was a change from my original selections that I posted.

I wanted to take out any speed horses or horses that looked like they needed to be close to win. I know that SS showed this running style, but I figured that Calvin and the fact that he won over the strip along with all of the other percentages in his favor would trump that. At least I was right about one thing.

I was completely wrong about Ice Box. He looked like he shut down in the FLa Derby gallop and over the past 8-10 years only 2 horses have run new tops in the Derby with 6 weeks rest. That was enough for me to toss. Should have reconsidered based on post position.

I figured POP to be up close in a similar style to his run in the Bluegrass so he surprised me a bit even though I knew he had been training well.

What happened to Awesome Act?? He got a clean break and LePeroux sent him to the rail after that he was so far out of it I wasn\'t able to see what happened.

Gotta love the races! Pleasant Prince in the Preakness??

[MonmouthGuy]

AA came out of the race lame.

http://www.thoroughbredtimes.com/racing-news/2010/May/04/Awesome-Act-lame-after-Kentucky-Derby.aspx

[Uncle Buck]

Just curious Mr Jellish. Do you hyperventilate as they\'re going into the gate? Just looking at your wagers makes me hyperventilate. I would hate the be the count room master when you hit one of those. MERCY!

[mjellish]

No, I don\'t hyperventilate.  I hoped to win the derby this year but I didn\'t expect to.  I told the group I was with I thought I had a 20% chance to cash.  But that\'s how I play this race.  I draw a couple of hard lines in the sand and bet my opinions as strongly as I can.  I may only hit once or twice a decade, but when I hit it is usually big.  I figure I can invest 10k a year, be right once every 15 years and still be way up.  I\'ve actually done much better than that, so while it is always disappointing not to win I don\'t let it discourage me in the least.  You can beat the derby, but you can\'t win it every year.  And you don\'t have to bet a ton of money to do it.  You just have to scale your bets correctly.  What I do is layout a spreadsheet with my contenders and the combos I want to play.  I then try to project what those tri\'s will pay, come up with my budget and layout the bets accordingly while keeping in mind which horses and combos I like more.  What I like more is both a function of how likely I think something is to come in AND what I think it is going to pay.

That\'s something that doesn\'t get talked about a lot on this board, but how you structure a bet is often as important as how you handicap a race.  I\'ve seen some good handicappers lose a lot of money simply because they couldn\'t figure out how structure their bets.  Some people spread out by betting many combinations hoping to increase their chances to cash something.  They are in effect hedging with a lot of bets.  My father was one of these people.  He usually couldn\'t tell me if he\'d won or lost the Kentucky Derby until about 1/2 hour after the results were posted and he had checked his tickets 3 or 4 times.  Some people cash a ticket but still wind up losing money a lot of money.  

This is why I never make show bets, especially on longshots or pattern plays.  Pattern handicapping is one of the best leads to great longshot plays, but when you bet them to show you are really minimizing your return.  You can in effect bet that same horse to show by playing them on the bottom of the Tri\'s and get a much better return.  So rather than bet $1,000 to show, I would be betting $300 to win and then keying that horse up and down in the Tri\'s, heavier with the contenders but also with the ALL button if I really liked the horse.  I can almost guarantee a better return that way than by betting show.  Same thing with Place bets on longshots.  You can almost always get a better a return by betting win and hedging underneath in the EX pool.  The only exception to this would be when there is a heavy favorite and a bridge jumper involved, such as with Rachel this past weekend.  I went down to the paddock to look at her and she looked great.  I noticed at that time that roughly 90% of a large show pool was bet on her.  If I would have thought she may run off the board I would have considered a show bet on someone else because it would actually pay more to show than to win.  I bet nothing on that race because I just wanted to see how Rachel ran.

So again, no I don\'t hyperventilate when I lay down a bet.  I kiss that money goodbye and I have no problem losing when I know I am mostly swinging all or nothing.  I move on to the next opportunity, and I know the ones I hit more than cover the loses.  But that\'s just me.

[Uncle Buck]

That\'s some useful insight - thanks for sharing. The problem I encounter with the Derby each year is I get out of my normal routine which is to closely scrutinize the post parade and how a horse looks before loading. It\'s a major tool in my handicapping and it can\'t be pulled off on Derby Day, especially when at the track.

You\'re dead on about structuring the bets and spreading so far as to hedge. I\'m guilty of that on occaision. I would say my most consistent play is $200 across for me on a value play as well as pick 3\'s and 4\'s. Exotics are easy to get caught up in with the racy payouts. If I play exotic single race wagers they\'re usually exactas 2x4 for the large play and a 4x2 saver. It\'s usually all I can get my head around:-). I guess I just spread and hedged again with that exacta play:-)

[Silver Charm]

\"The whole field looked like an underlay\" I like that comment because as I looked at the tote I felt the same way.

Super Savor no doubt was short on odds. Coming off a hanging loss and 0-2 on the year one would ask why he was favored most of the pre-wagering. The flip side is who else looked that much better. Several unproven Synthetic mavens in the race and others who had not run in 6 wks also.

Super Savor had run a Top at the track at Two. Had essentially paired that Top twice this year and drawn perfectly for his style. He probably should have been more like 10-1 and maybe the Borel money accounted for some of the discount. 3 Derbies in 4 yrs. That\'s Hartack like.

On Oaks Day I was told Awesome Acts connections were not even bothering to show up. Toss.

When I visited the \"The King\" in the paddock before Rachels race I asked about Dublin and he was even quicker to remind me that he had one in the Oaks. A single on every Oaks Derby Double ticket and a win bet. At the quarter pole I started gripping the binoculars a little tighter. At the 8th pole they were dropped and the shouting began. No avail.

Baffy stopped and chatted with group on Oaks Day and said the rule was be nice to everybody so Lucky could maybe be Lucky. After he drew the one hole every third word began with F and little old ladies were being stepped on. Baffy is a good guy and Lucky is a good horse. But I only said good. Post and trip was going to mean everything here and became only a small use.

Dale Romans godfather came by and said don\'t toss Paddy. Which I promply did. Grass synthetic type may have moved up on the off. My mistake.

Jockey Agent Ronnie Eubanks on Friday said I may be crazy but I think my guy (Rosario) and his horse Make Music For Me can make some noise. He came from dead last to close out a $202K Super. Being fat dumb and stupid is no way to go thru life.

Frank Lyons on Friday night at a Derby Eve Party was asked who he liked and uttered 10 words. 6 began with F and the other 4 were Sydneys Candy and Awesome Act. See previous comments about post and stay at home owners.

As I moved to position myself to watch the race I walked by Ky Legend John Wall with my dad and said \"we gotta get a picture\". Loaded with all this info I squeezed out the winner and Exacta. As the race ended I walked by Wall who flashed his tickets to his group and \"I nailed it\".

I went to stand in line to cash my tickets. Wall was taken inside to cash his.........

[jbelfior]

Scratching my head as to why anyone would be interested in who Frankie Lyons liked except, perhaps, to put a line through it.

Only Christina Olivares keeps me watching TVG.


Good Luck,
Joe B.

[sekrah]

Super Saver an underlay?  I laugh-out-loud as I read these posts.   The horse has two extra wins on his resume if he doesn\'t spot Line of David 4 pounds and Odysseus & Schoolyard Dreams 6 pounds, and he goes off at his true odds of 7/2 instead of 8-1.

Throw in Borel, how he looked training, and a very likely 1w1w trip, This horse towered over the rest of the field as a clear-cut standout to me.

[Boscar Obarra]

You have to ask the question, if they run the race 9 times , does he only win once or less.

 I think the answer is obvious, even if after the fact.

  There were any number of horses in there that would not win once in 100 runnings, yet were 25-35 to one.

 With so many underlays, chances are a few were too high, not only SS.

[sekrah]

You have to ask the question, if they run the race 9 times , does he only win once or less

The answer is an emphatic NO.

Given the post positions as they were, the way the horses were training, and the way the horses were coming into the race, he wins atleast 3 out of 9 IMO.

Last 13 Derby Winners in Preakness: 7 winners, 3 seconds.  All 3 seconds were beaten by horses who didn\'t run in the Derby.  Rachel, Curlin, Red Bullet.

I still read stuff here and other sites about what a massive underlay Mine That Bird was in the Derby.. yet he went ahead in the Preakness and beat every single other three year old colt that was sent after him by trainers licking their chops.  Just because it doesn\'t jive with your handicapping method, style, or whatever, doesn\'t mean it was an underlay.  It\'s just amazing how well these luckbox Derby winners like MTB, Funny Cide, War Emblem, Charismatic do in the Preakness huh?  Luck.  That\'s all that it is.  There is some randomness in horse racing but it\'s nowhere near the randomness you might see in a baseball game for instance where batters have little control over balls in play.   If the horse is fit, and faster for the distance than the other horses, and has a running style and jockey that will keep him out of trouble, he stands a pretty damn good chance of winning the race.  It\'s not a whole lot more complicated than that.  

Stuff can happen during that race that prevents him from winning but who is going to have more trouble during the race?  Let\'s say we have two horses of equal talent. Which one stands a better chance of winning?   Horse #1 stalking close to the pace, with a jockey who will go where no other jockey will go or Horse #2, a deep closer that has to rely on sharp fractions so the front-end breaks down as well as pass 19 other horses?     So who exactly wins the 8 other races here sir?     The deep closers who are significantly more likely to encounter more trouble than the very fit, very fast stalker?   The deep closers who have absolutely no chance if the pace comes up L :23.4/48.1/1:12.3?   Ridiculous.  Ice Box doesn\'t even hit the stinking board with those fractions, just like he couldn\'t get by Jackson Bend and Aikenite in the Fountain of Youth when he spotted them 5 lengths on the back stretch while they were lopping along up near the front.  The 1997 (Silver Charm), 1999 (Charismatic), and 2002 (War Emblem)  Derbies were so slow, the closers had virtually NO CHANCE,   Super Saver\'s running style can win that Derby under almost any variable of early race pace.

Super Saver wins that race only 1 time out of 9?    Absolutely 100% absurdity.

[mjellish]

Boy, I dunno about this.  If Ice Box gets a better trip I say he gives Super Saver a pretty good run for his money, and IB went of at higher odds.  Who knows what LAL would have done with a clean trip.  

Like I said, there\'s nothing wrong with cashing on an $18 horse.  But his morning line odds were 15-1.  I think he was 35-1 in the final futures pool.  He wound up at 8-1, and he got a perfect trip.  Not trying to take anything away from SS, and I agree that good horses make their own trips to a certain extent, but how many times out of 100 do you think SS gets a perfect trip and Ice Box gets stopped like he did?

Overall this is a pretty weak bunch so far and there\'s not a lot that separates many of them.  At 8-1, IMO, SS was an underlay.

[MonmouthGuy]

I am happy you hit the race.  Many others on this board did, too, however, you might want to tone down your posts.  They are abrasive and aggressive and a real turn off to many.  Last week you were \"shouting\" at me when I told you that SS would not go off higher than 8-1, and now you are again acting like a \"know it all.\"  Please be more respectful.  It is very possible that Super Savor didn\'t get the best figure in the race, yet he wins it 33% of the time??  8-1 on that horse in a 20 horse fields may not have been an underlay, but it was certainly far from generous, and, except for the super, the exotics were also a marginal return on investment from a risk perspective.