Guys,
One round of preps left. How about an early opinion as to the most likely winner of the derby. JB, about this time last year you liked War Pass. How about a redemption pick :)
Well, I do have an opinion on TGJB or TGAB.
I don\'t have much of an opinion on specific horses yet, but I\'ll say a couple of things. First of all, the winner is extremely unlikely to come from the Win And You\'re In prep in England Wednesday. We\'re going to put sheets for that one in the ROTW later today or tomorrow, and start giving away data for all the UK races starting this weekend, through, the end of April. After that we will be charging.
The last 3 Derbies have all gone neg 2 or better, and there is no reason to think this one won\'t. This means that those who had a top slower than 5 or so at two are being asked to do a whole lot of developing in a very short time. Big Brown only had a 7 top, but he also only ran once, it was on grass, and that figure was Dutrow-free.
Very few horses have won the Derby off a backward move. Smarty did, but a) he was able to do it withought even running a top, and b) he had established a very strong 2yo top (zero). Without going back and looking at all of them, I think Monarchos was the only other one, and a complete outlier-- slow 2yo top, and off a backward move. And he was one and done after the Derby.
So without the last figure you can\'t tell too much. I will be looking for horses that have a good 2yo top, and move forward to or pair up a good but not extreme figure going in.
TGJB Wrote:
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> This means that those who had a top slower than 5
> or so at two are being asked to do a whole lot of
> developing in a very short time.
> So without the last figure you can\'t tell too
> much. I will be looking for horses that have a
> good 2yo top, and move forward to or pair up a
> good but not extreme figure going in.
Assumng the early projections on Fresian Fires fig for last Sat are correct Larry Jones has his work cut out for him. The 6 top at two puts him in that too much development category and now with the next round of preps coming up being on surfaces such as Synthetic or at Oaklawn where OF will still be........
If I was him I would be going to straight to the CD backstretch and wait......
Which brings up the question of what you do with backward moves on synth... whole different story. That could actually be the best of all possible worlds.
YEah, the TGJB or TGAB call is an easy one. For figure making it is TGJB but for handicapping it is TGAB. TGAB has given out a $95 horse at the Saratoga seminar, I haven\'t seen that from his boss.......
Hypothetical question. If Quality Road runs well in the Fla Derby, maybe not another negative 3, but maybe a negative 1, which would then give him 5 weeks into the Derby. Would you consider the negative 3 \"too fast\", which it normally would be, but off of the \"0\" as a 2-year old top, it is only a 3 point forward move. It would seem a small regression would set him up for maybe a move back to the negative 3.
Also, would the fact he only had 1 race at 2 bother you as far as foundation/racing experience goes?
I am starting to believe that if this horse runs a nice race in the Florida Derby, he is the horse to beat the first Saturday in May.
Depending on the definition of \"giving out,\" I think I gave out one longer than that in the last race one day last summer. First time starter, gave me two of the three pick 5\'s and the pick 3, only tickets I cashed the whole weekend, still made a lot of money. Kinda like what Roger did the second day of the SA contest.
The one race at two would not bother me. The five weeks would be a plus, but I would have to get a pretty good price to play off the huge figure, 0-2, and it\'s hard to see how that could happen if he runs another negative figure.
One thing I will be watching closely is to see how move-up guys are doing at CD the first few days of the meet with the \"new rules\".
Drugs on/off, synth to dirt, enough variables for everybody?
Jimmy Jerkens is in the \"move up\" category? Not sure I would agree with that, but then again I haven\'t analyzed the data that closely.
I will hold off on thinking Quality Road is the horse to beat until after the Florida Derby.
Somewhere on this board, I thought I read that Dunkirk was given a \"0\" by the \"other guys\". If true, that is quite a disparity between the figuremakers for Dunkirk. Have to watch how that plays out.
I was making a general comment, not one about J Jerkens. Dunkirk got around a zero on ours.
Yes, I know what you gave Dunkirk (i bought the derby futures package), and the word was that Rags gave him a 0, which means he has Dunkirk quite a bit faster. Off of memory, was that day at Gulfstream quirky or solid?
It was the only 2 turn race, I don\'t remember there being much of an issue. Jake and/or Len posted that it wasn\'t as fast as a zero on theirs, no idea what they gave it.
Rags originally gave Dunkirk a zero( equal to a neg -3 1/2 TG) but they changed to a 1 or 2, I heard.If you watch the Dunkirk replay and see what happens to him on the first turn(ground loss) it\'s hard to believe he won.
There are some major differences already between the fig makers on quite a few derby horses.
Mike
TGJB Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well, I do have an opinion on TGJB or TGAB.
>
> I don\'t have much of an opinion on specific horses
> yet, but I\'ll say a couple of things. First of
> all, the winner is extremely unlikely to come from
> the Win And You\'re In prep in England Wednesday.
> We\'re going to put sheets for that one in the ROTW
> later today or tomorrow, and start giving away
> data for all the UK races starting this weekend,
> through, the end of April. After that we will be
> charging.
Anybody know anything about Close Alliance? By Gone West, out of an AP Indy full to Aptitude. 3rd dam produced \'O Gold and Coastal. \'12\' first out last year. Kempton race 1st start this year.
> The last 3 Derbies have all gone neg 2 or better,
> and there is no reason to think this one won\'t.
> This means that those who had a top slower than 5
> or so at two are being asked to do a whole lot of
> developing in a very short time. Big Brown only
> had a 7 top, but he also only ran once, it was on
> grass, and that figure was Dutrow-free.
>
> Very few horses have won the Derby off a backward
> move. Smarty did, but a) he was able to do it
> withought even running a top, and b) he had
> established a very strong 2yo top (zero). Without
> going back and looking at all of them, I think
> Monarchos was the only other one, and a complete
> outlier-- slow 2yo top, and off a backward move.
> And he was one and done after the Derby.
>
> So without the last figure you can\'t tell too
> much. I will be looking for horses that have a
> good 2yo top, and move forward to or pair up a
> good but not extreme figure going in.
Given the needed profile you spelled out, do you think Chris Block is giving up too soon on Giant Oak? Granted he needs to find a spot to pick up some serious money to even make the Derby, but assuming he did, it seems if you give excuses for the 2 races this year to date (op-/traffic and slop), if he could get back to his 2yr old top (which was at CD) in his next race (and maybe he just came close, dont know), would it not seem he might have a chance?
If he didn\'t get PAST his 2yo top by his third 3yo start I would view him pretty negatively. So he would have to thread the needle-- run better than that, but not so fast as to knock himself out. His 2yo top is strong enough to put him in the picture if he does that.
Sounds like Jones is considering waiting the 7 weeks until the Derby before running again. This would be pruduent. How long was the gap for Hard Spun after the Turfway race, 6 weeks? He seemed to do okay.
A guess work move over to Synthetic then back to Dirt would be a recipe for disaster in my book.
Athletes are Athletes they are conditioned to win. Physically you may be able to gear a horse down but how do you tell him mentally he wasn\'t meant to win.
I want somebody leaving the gate full of energy and confidence and ready to go kick everybodies ass.......
Hard Spun ran TP on Mar 24, then the Derby on May 5. About 41/42 days I think.
Came out to 6 weeks on my calculator. And I did it three times.
Jones has built in excuses. The Wood is too soon, The BG is on Synthetic and what if his horse hates it and runs last. The Lexington too close and also on Synthetic.
Might not be a bad idea for the Tesio at Laurel to beef up the purse, get Graded and run the same day as the BG and Ark Derby.
Be a logical spot for FF.
TGJB,
So without the last figure you can\'t tell too much. I will be looking for horses that have a good 2yo top, and move forward to or pair up a good but not extreme figure going in
With the prelim data on RA doesn\'t she fit the bill?
mjs
Oddly enough, even though this crop of 3 year olds seems much better than last years crop at this point, not too many of them ran very fast as 2 year olds.
Alot of them left themselves alot of work to do.
The only ones that really check ALL of the boxes in terms of being able to get to a 2 negative without improving so much from their 2 year old top that they could be in trouble of going backwards are:
Quality Road
Old Fashioned, and
Rachael Alexandra
There is a group of others that fit some of the parameters but who are more questionable for various reasons, including:
Dunkirk (no 2 year old form)
West Side Bernie (probably the most likely to fit the \"rules\" of this group)
Silver City (distance issues and probably off the trail)
Giant Oak (connections saying likely off the trail)
Pamplemouse (work to do to get to 2 neg but good pattern and possible poly/dirt \"jump\" candidate)
Pioneer of the Nile (Mott says better on turf/poly than dirt, opposite of I Want Revenge)
Beethoven (running against speed bias at GP and a bit slow as a 2 year old but hard to knock this one too much)
Chocolate Candy (eligible to be right there if he jumps poly to dirt but how are we to know that?)
Imperial Council (needs to show up in the wood but he fits alot of the criteria)
Cove,
Everything has changed. The guidelines and parameters are a really good place to start to sift thru the confusion but......
2YO form is not what it used to be. Look at Curlin and Big Brown.
Others like Smarty Jones and Hard Spun started very late and developed quickly at secondary levels of competition. Phil Park, Aqeduct Inner Dirt. Monarchos only ran once at 2 and was not a real threat.
Also I do not want to be sounding like I am leading the Dunkirk Fan Club but a trainer like Pletcher may have realized with the Unbridled Songs starting to early compounds the soundness issues they have. So maybe he waited.
Now he is up against the clock, but it is what it is......
You could add Quality Road to that list. One maiden race on Turkey Day Weekend is not exactly a Rock Solid 2YO base.
Even though this horse is extremely talented and REALLY fast.
Street Sense went dirt/poly/dirt and it worked out okay.
Jerry, the trainer had an idea what he was doing in the BG because he had used the same angle the year before in the Lanes End Futurity then the BC Juvy.
He just followed the same formula.
Jones doesn\'t have that luxury.