Does she need to win the Distaff on dirt to win this division?
Watchmaker has her number one in his pole and yet she has never run on dirt. Some of what she has been beating got beat up pretty bad in the Beldame.
Some day the Breeders\' Cup or the Graded Stakes Committee will hire a professional handicapper or group of handicappers to keep ratings in pounds on our best horses and nobody will even bother to read Watchmaker.
Barry,
I think you are being a little tough on Watchmaker. He was always a big fan of Lawyer Ron and looks like the kind of guy who back in college always had the best stash.
The issue with Nashoba\'s Key is she just won a good Grade One ON GRASS preceded by some good wins on Synythetic/Polytrack.
Your horse Unbridled Belle faced much tougher on Sunday in the Beldame, won a very big race in the Delaware Hcp and the second in the Personal Ensign was not too bad either.
So if Nashoba\'s Key goes in the Distaff Turf and wins does she win both Eclipse Awards for Older Females. The dirt and grass divisions even though she never actually raced on dirt.
This would be the second year in a row where an Eclipse was awarded to someone who did their best work on a surface other than dirt. Last year it was Wait A While.
This type of vote could be just another extension of the power struggle that is going on where the powers that be that rammed in Polytrack/Synthetic instantly anoint the surface as a replacement for dirt racing in all phases and categories.
When almost any pedigree handicapper or even the horses will tell you it isn\'t.
If you don\'t believe me just ask Lawyer Ron...........
Silver Charm
Are you considering the Euros (Peeping Fawn)? Seems like a big leap to give the F&M Turf to Nashoba\'s Key.
Wrongly:
I think I ask you every year-- where to go to find out about Euro BC runners?
NTRA BC site very good but I haven\'t seen mention of Euros.
Nashoba\'s Key is HANDS DOWN the leader of the older female division.
Perhaps Barry Irwin may want to respond to that.
And if there are any other DRF personnel left that Jerry hasn\'t banned Mike Watchmaker for that matter..............
Richie
I\'m sure there\'s other sites but I often read http://www.sportinglife.com/racing/news/
and the anti-post for odds
http://www.oddschecker.com/horse-racing/ante-post-racing/flat/prix-de-l-arc-de-triomphe
Just for the record, as far as I know I have only banned one DRF guy, and it was for some really nasty behaviour done not for the benefit of DRF, but for Ragozin. I certainly would not ban Mike Watchmaker. After all, he has the good stash.
In addition to sporting life have found these two useful at times -
Racing Post (http://www.racingpost.co.uk) (can get replays for fairly cheap)
globeform (http://www.globeform.com) (a lot of sales pitches on the site but some worthy items).
Well... Nashoba\'s Key is pretty fast; and she is the leader of the west coast fillies/mares, but you can\'t be a national leader when you\'ve never run a race outside of SoCal. Come fly 3,000 miles to MTH and win a 3-turn 11f race against East Coast & Euros, then we\'re talking about a champion. At this point, she\'s nothing more than a Sky Beauty or Manistique.
Wrongly Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Silver Charm
>
> Are you considering the Euros (Peeping Fawn)?
> Seems like a big leap to give the F&M Turf to
> Nashoba\'s Key.
The Filly and Mare Turf lost some of its international appeal earlier this week when Irish trainer Aidan O\'Brien said that Peeping Fawn was unlikely to start for the rest of the year. A winner of four Group 1 races this year, she was considered a leading candidate for the Prix de l\'Arc de Triomphe against males in Paris on Oct. 7.
Silver Charm, fyi, in virtually every major racing country, Champions are decided by the official handicapper of The Jockey Club, not by some guy that may have had an excellent \'stache in junior college.
Rankings and rating are too important to the industry to be entrusted to a journalist or newspaper handicapper.
There is a science to this stuff that requires many man hours and a guy in Watchmaker\'s position simply has neither the time nor the tools for the trade.
Silver Charm, you keep making the mistake of thinking that I am posting in this thread because I have something to do with a leading filly. That is not my interest.
Watchmaker baits people like you guys in a misguided attempt to generate readership by purposely making absurd selections. He has done it for years. Don\'t take the guy too seriously and stop being so gullible.
Everyone said the same thing about Azeri in 2002, and she destroyed the Distaff field at Arlington.
I agree that Nashoba\'s Key (and pretty much everyone else in most divisions) needs to prove herself on Breeders\' Cup day, but that doesn\'t change the fact that she is the current leader of the division.
I never understood this nonsense about horses needing to ship to prove themselves. If a horse is running in Grade 1 races, then that\'s the most you could ask them to do.
Agree N Key is top older filly right now but the so called grade 1 runners in Cali are the most common bunch in years, most divisions.
Barry,
When have the NTWA, racing secretaries, and Daily Racing (the voting bodies for the Eclipse Awards) gotten it wrong recently?
Favorite Trick winning Horse of the Year in 1997 is the last travesty that comes to mind, but maybe you feel otherwise.
I don\'t mind the system here (disclosure: I am an Eclipse Award voter). The people who observe racing as their profession vote on the best. That seems logical to me.
Everyone would have been out of touch. Azeri had already shipped and won the Apple Blossom at Oaklawn in April of 2002... which she again won in 2003 AND 2004 and also won the Spinster at Keeneland.
EJXD2 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Everyone said the same thing about Azeri in 2002,
> and she destroyed the Distaff field at Arlington.
>
> I agree that Nashoba\'s Key (and pretty much
> everyone else in most divisions) needs to prove
> herself on Breeders\' Cup day, but that doesn\'t
> change the fact that she is the current leader of
> the division.
>
> I never understood this nonsense about horses
> needing to ship to prove themselves. If a horse is
> running in Grade 1 races, then that\'s the most you
> could ask them to do.
In every country in the civilized world of racing, handicaps are regularly produced. At year\'s end, the Champion is decided by which horses are weighted atop their divisions.
Even more importantly than determing the Champions themselves is the ability to be able to compare horses by how many pounds superior they are to their competition.
We don\'t have this in America and it is a disservice to owners and especially to breeders.
Funny story: when I worked at the Thoroughbred of California magazine in the early 1970s, a guy named Alan Magerman stopped by the library. He owned a fast sprinter named George Lewis.
In those days, in the DRF, the voters used to have their names listed with their one-two-three selections in each division.
Magerman looked at the page, turned to a friend and said \"Hey look at this. This guy here voted for my horse for Champion sprinter--and I don\'t even know him!\"
Barry,
Competition NOT Opinions should settle these Championships.
Nashoba\'s Key by running on Turf instead of Dirt now has forfeited the opportunity to win everything and instead finish the year with NOTHING!!
Au contrere mon ami, if Miss Key wins the BC, she could sweep EVERYTHING. I include HOY under certain circumstances. This is 2007 my friend, completely new rules and new categories. Open up your mind.
Barry,
Simple question. Why is Polytrack considered an extension of dirt racing and yet not considered an extension of turf racing when it comes to these voting categories.
If any horse or mare rattles off four quality wins on poly/synthetic why is she placed at the top of the division or near the top in a category that has nothing to do with the turf category. And yet this same animal is nowhere to be found in the turf category.
Who defined this?
Or is this like the installation of Polytrack/Synthetic. They are making it up or figuring it out as they go along.................
The answer is that Poly was meant to be a substitute for dirt, but we all know that \"Poly\" (not all synthetics) is probably actually closer to turf than dirt. The industry doesn\'t want to admit that. Since handicappers/gamblers don\'t care about anything other than profit, we are generally trying to deal with reality.