from DRF this am:
\"Casino Drive worked five furlongs in 1:12.52 over the main track. Because it was so slow, the work will not be recorded by Equibase as an official move. Nobutaka Tada, the racing manager for the colt\'s connections, said he canceled plans for a faster breeze after jockey Yoshi Aoki told him the horse didn\'t need it. Aoki was on Casino Drive\'s back for a 30-minute walk before the breeze.\"
- they cancelled a planned work because the exerise rider said he didn\'t need it? what is going on? Since when doesn\'t a horse with 2 lifetime races and no published works since his last race not need a breeze before going 1 1/2m ?
If we assume that Big Brown won\'t be his best on Belmont Day (understand many don\'t agree with that but let\'s just assume that for a second), there are four horses who have previously run 0\'s; Casino Drive, Tale of Ekati, Macho and Denis of Cork. A 0 or slightly better could win the race IF BB goes backward from the Preakness.
However, out of those 4, 3 of them make me very nervous. Tagg didn\'t hide his displeasure for TOE\'s bad work the other day, Casino Drive hasn\'t breezed and is being hadled in an odd manner as per this mornings report and Macho is running his 3rd race in 6 weeks, only slightly better than the reasons I am concerend about BB.
So, that leaves Denis of Cork as the only horse in the race that has a relatively good number coming in that doesn\'t have question marks about a) his spacing between races, and/or b) his recent works as a sign of how he is coming into the race.
Thougths?
When I first saw the 1:12 I was sure it was for six furlongs and thought, hmmm that wasn\'t bad until I read the whole story. Very strange indeed. Its almost like the \'0\' took a little someting out of him and he\'s being treated with kid gloves.
I think DOC has the best chance to make your wish come true, but I think the race shape is going to hurt him.