A 97 beyer. And late money.

[jimbo66]

I don\'t remember a slower derby fig from the beyer guys.  Hard to argue based on the raw times and the esrlier dirt races.   Also tough to think so many horses ran so poorly.   Wonder if the track changed in the 2 hours netween dirt races or do we really have that bad of a 3 year old crop.  Lots of fast ones did miss the race.  Tough call.

Saw that candy boy went off at 9-1 after being 16-1 as they loaded.  In a 20 million dollar win pool, that is some late action.

[vagrant]

Two hours and 39 minutes elapsed between the Churchill Downs Stakes and the Derby. It was a warm and very windy day. I was on the backside and it was sandstorm at times. I don\'t recall seeing or hearing water trucks after the Woodford Reserve. The Derby was run on an unusually dry, loose track.

[sekrah]

Beyer ought to be embarrassed to be using variants of any other races to use to compute the Derby here.

[miff]

Vag,

The NBC feed showed a water truck and harrowing in between. The last dirt route somewhat disputes that the track slowed dramatically.

Unless there were unusual headwind gusts during the derby, it looks a bit slow. Having said that, with ground and a scale weight adj the fig stillage be in the TG 0 range for the winner depending on how JB sees the 2nd, 3rd, 4th place finishers mainly.

Ton of X\'s,maybe winner and second horse, for sure, with tops.

Mike

[sekrah]

1 1/16 vs 1 1/4 isnt even comparable when there\'s a stiff headwind.

[vagrant]

That makes sense, Mike. The backside is so crowded & hectic the hour before Derby that it\'s hard to see & hear what\'s happening on the track. Especially with wind gusts rattling your eardrums.

Interesting that the last race was run in fairly normal fashion. Maybe these horses are just slow. Or maybe the track was such that the longer you ran, the more effort it required.

[vagrant]

I suppose it\'s possible that the XL grandstand could cause the wind to swirl on the track, but the wind itself was gusting such that horses ran into a headwind on the 1st turn and a tailwind on the 2nd. It blew steadily in that direction, from barns to spires, all afternoon.

[miff]

Vag,

All reasonable explanations.Bottom line was so many did not show up, a few rough trips, the winner showed up with his usual race and no one was better yesterday.

Mike

[TGJB]

Mike-- any idea how long before the Derby they watered?

Wind can effect not just time, but moisture content. With that much time between races that probably matters more.

[vagrant]

Yep. That\'s about all there is to it. Tactical speed freed CC from the traffic problems that hurt others. And unlike the other speedsters, he can finish.

[mjellish]

On the surface 97 seems like a ridiculously slow Beyer figure.  I would think Commanding Curve ran his best race to date.  And when you factor in ground loss and weight he had to go forward.

Hats off to the winner.  He made his own trip, got exactly the trip that he wanted and ran his race.  When they came out of the first turn I was yelling at the screen for Samraat to get over and try to squeeze Chrome or at least put his nose in front and try to put Chrome between horses.  He didn\'t.  

Halfway down the backstretch I figured the race was more or less over unless Chrome quit for some reason.  All I wound up with was a $12 Tri Saver bet, and after taxes I only got back .76 on the dollar for now.

Just.... missed....  again....

[miff]

Definitely saw it, no idea when except after Wise Dan ran

[jumpnthefire]

There was a 20-25 mph headwind in the stretch ...

[smalltimer]

Mjellish, that\'s exactly what I told my wife when Chrome moved up inside of Samraat.  Chrome may have still just outfinished everyone, but he\'d have gotten hung up a little longer, it could of been real interesting with Curve running late.

[Ill-bred]

We did the walk-over about 10 minutes after Wise Dan\'s race, and I remember a water truck passed us by the wire. It was quite a bit of time before the Derby.