As a start (repeat: start), here are three columns and a radio interview. I took the columns from the Washington Post, which gets first bite at these apples. The DRF has been known to add some polish later. Indeed, they made a change to the column posted here the other day.
By Andrew Beyer
Friday, November 6, 2009
ARCADIA, CALIF. After Rachel Alexandra dominated much of the U. S. racing season, it is finally Zenyatta\'s moment to take center stage. The 5-year-old mare, who has won all 13 of her races with a powerful late kick, will face males for the first time when she runs Saturday in the Breeders\' Cup Classic.
Zenyatta is the biggest star in two days of racing at Santa Anita that include 14 stake races with more than $25 million in purse money. But there are substantial reasons to doubt that she can beat male rivals as Rachel Alexandra did in the spring and summer.
Trainer John Shirreffs has given Zenyatta an ultra-conservative campaign this season, racing her four times on the synthetic tracks she loves, always against small fields of overmatched fillies and mares. Zenyatta didn\'t blow away this competition, and her speed figures were unexceptional. Her modest winning margins were partly the result of her catch-\'em-at-the-wire style, but nevertheless she has not looked as impressive as she was in her best efforts of 2008. It requires a giant leap of faith to conclude, from her 2009 form, that Zenyatta can beat the Classic field that includes the best U.S. males -- Summer Bird and Quality Road -- and a pair of high-class Europeans. It is preposterous that she is the 5-to-2 morning-line favorite. Zenyatta\'s main advantage is that she has proven herself on synthetic tracks while her principal rivals have not. This is an issue that handicappers will confront in every Breeders\' Cup event on Santa Anita\'s Pro-Ride surface: How do you evaluate horses such as Summer Bird and Quality Road who have never raced on a synthetic track? How do you view European turf specialists running on Pro-Ride?
The 2008 Breeders\' Cup at Santa Anita provided limited but clear evidence with which to answer these questions. Dirt specialists who were unproven on synthetics were unable to win, but turf horses made the transition effectively. The best American filly sprinter, Indian Blessing, was almost unbeatable on dirt and lost to the turf specialist Ventura. Europeans ran 1-2 in the Classic. The major prep races for this year\'s Breeders\' Cup added more support to this premise: On a synthetic track, disregard the dirt runners and respect the turfers. That will be my strategy for the entire Breeders\' Cup.
If the 2009 Classic had been run on dirt, Summer Bird and Quality Road would have been the standouts. On Pro-Ride, I\'m throwing them both out. I\'ll take a stand against Zenyatta. I\'ll throw out all of the males who have been racing well on the California synthetic tracks. (They\'re a mediocre lot; a third-rate European invader beat the Californians in the recent Goodwood Stakes.) That leaves the two European entrants, Rip Van Winkle and Twice Over. Rip Van Winkle won two straight Grade I stakes in England after losing by a length to the continent\'s superstar, See the Stars. He, not Zenyatta, is the class of the Classic field.
The difficulty of comparing horses\' performances on different surfaces, and of comparing European form with U.S. form, makes many of the Breeders\' Cup races very difficult. But at least a couple of them appear clear-cut:
Sprint: Zensational, the California-based front-runner, is a 7-to-5 favorite in the morning line. Many bettors looking for an upset scenario think Zensational could get into a suicidal duel with the speedy Fatal Bullet, and set up the race for one of several stretch-runners in the field.
This popular view of the Sprint is wrong. Fatal Bullet is the fastest and best horse in the field, and he is going to dominate Zensational. Zensational has scored his three stakes victories by getting loose against moderate fields without serious early pressure. In none of them has he run his opening quarter-mile faster than 22 seconds. By contrast, Fatal Bullet has encountered fast front-runners in almost all of his races. Last year he dueled through the first quarter-mile of the Sprint in 21.28 seconds and held to finish second. That was the only time in 10 starts that he has lost a synthetic-track race at 6 1/2 furlongs or less. The Sprint field is traditionally filled with speedsters who produce a destructive fast pace. But some of the country\'s best sprinters have bypassed this event because they are dirt specialists ill-suited to the Santa Anita track. Fatal Bullet won\'t have to work as hard as he usually does to get the lead. I\'ll play him in exactas on top of the stretch-runners Gayego and Capt. Candyman Can.
Dirt Mile: The most formidable milers at Santa Anita this weekend have been entered in the Classic, where they can shoot for a $5 million purse instead of $1 million in the misnamed Dirt Mile. Six of the nine U.S. runners in this event have never won a stakes race on a synthetic track. Against such a weak lineup, Mastercraftsman is a standout.
The Irish runner has faced the best competition in Europe and has won four Grade I stakes; he tuned up for his visit to Santa Anita by winning a race over Polytrack by five lengths. He deserves to be a short-priced favorite, and probably will be. The logical exacta horse is probably Bullsbay, but there will be good value on Furthest Land, who is 2 for 2 on synthetic tracks, who earned a high speed figure in his last start and is 20 to 1 in the morning line.
By Andrew Beyer
Saturday, December 26, 2009
A confrontation between Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta would have generated more attention and excitement than any horse race in years. But because the two great females didn\'t face each other on the track, their fans are now pouring their passions into the debate over which one deserves to be the horse of the year.
With balloting for the Eclipse Awards underway, some voters wish that they were allowed to designate joint champions. But many people on each side of the debate believe that there is only one rightful winner, and they are vociferous in their opinions. Usually, the key question in such debates is the most basic one: Who was the better horse? Who would have won in a head-to-head showdown? I would normally answer this question by judging which horse ran faster.
But the traditional measurements are irrelevant because America\'s two best thoroughbreds excelled on different surfaces. Rachel Alexandra made her reputation on dirt, while Zenyatta raced on California\'s synthetic tracks. If they had faced each other on dirt, the winner probably would have been Rachel Alexandra; on a synthetic track, Zenyatta. So voters must decide which filly had the better 2009 season. There should be no real debate on this question: Rachel Alexandra did.
Her campaign was, in my opinion, the best ever by a U.S.-based filly. The other great fillies of the modern era -- such as Ruffian, Personal Ensign, Lady\'s Secret and Azeri -- made their reputations by dominating members of their own sex but didn\'t distinguish themselves against males. Rachel Alexandra challenged males in three Grade I stakes -- the Preakness, the Haskell Invitational and the Woodward -- and won them all. She trounced Summer Bird, the best male 3-year-old, by six lengths. Overall, she won her eight starts by a combined total of 65 lengths. Zenyatta made five starts, all in her home base of California, and won them by a combined margin of 6 3/4 lengths. She scored four wins against soft filly-and-mare competition before she ended her career by winning the Breeders\' Cup Classic, becoming the first member of her sex to capture America\'s richest race. Her claim to the horse of the year title rests almost entirely on that performance. (The Eclipse Awards honor the best performers in a given year; they are not lifetime achievement awards, so Zenyatta\'s illustrious 2008 season and her 14-for-14 career record are not part of the debate.)
Zenyatta\'s admirers describe her Classic win in extravagant terms. Greg Avioli, president of the Breeders\' Cup, called it \"arguably the greatest performance in the 26-year history of the event.\" This is something of an overstatement. The male synthetic-track specialists behind Zenyatta were an undistinguished group. (Second-rate horses had won the two big California stakes that led up to the Cup.) Moreover, Zenyatta\'s eye-catching last-to-first rally was not an extraordinary feat on a synthetic track that generally favors runners with such a style.
Nevertheless, it was a commendable and historic performance, and fans can reasonably debate whether Zenyatta\'s Classic victory was enough to trump Rachel\'s ambitious campaign and her three Grade I victories over males. However, many of Zenyatta\'s supporters frame a different argument: Zenyatta deserves the title because she won the sport\'s definitive championship event while her rival ducked it. Ray Paulick, the respected editor of the online Paulick Report, supported his choice by declaring: \"Zenyatta showed up and turned in a performance for the ages. Rachel Alexandra remained in her stall, resting on her own historic achievements earlier in the year.\"
It is unfair to accuse owner Jess Jackson of ducking anything. He sought out the toughest possible challenges for Rachel Alexandra, but he drew the line at running her over \"plastic,\" his contemptuous description of the Pro-Ride surface at Santa Anita.
Zenyatta\'s owner, trainer and fans argue that participants in the Breeders\' Cup have to accept the conditions at the track that hosts the event. If the 2009 Cup had been contested over a dirt track, Zenyatta would have been there.
In thoroughbred racing, nobody decrees the races that decide championships. Races take on championship significance when owners and trainers recognize their importance and support them. The Classic is a premier event because running 1 1/4 miles on dirt is regarded as the definitive test of American thoroughbreds. If the Breeders\' Cup organization changed the distance to two miles, nobody would recognize it as a legitimate championship race.
When the Breeders\' Cup chose Santa Anita as its host track for both 2008 and 2009, the organization -- and much of the racing community -- thought the Pro-Ride surface would be a fair test that would allow the best horses to win. This expectation was wrong. (And Jackson was proved right to have had qualms about running his horses there.) In those two Breeders\' Cups, a total of 43 horses ran on the Pro-Ride after making their previous start on dirt. All 43 lost. Horses who were high-class stakes winners on dirt but had no proven form on synthetic surfaces were frequently trounced. There was no correlation between excellence on dirt and excellence on the synthetic track.
The large majority of U.S. horses are bred for dirt and compete principally on dirt in a nation whose racing history has been made on dirt. It is absurd to describe a race as a true championship test when America\'s best dirt runners have little chance to win. Under these conditions, neither Zenyatta\'s win nor Rachel Alexandra\'s absence should keep Rachel from being recognized as the best horse of 2009.
By Andrew Beyer
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 29, 2010; 11:27 PM
LOS ANGELES
Californians have always loved their thoroughbred stars, but no horse in many years has excited them as Zenyatta has. They will roar for her at Hollywood Park on Saturday, when she makes her final appearance in her home state and tries to win her 19th consecutive race.
Zenyatta inspires fierce passions. When she defeated males in the Breeders\' Cup Classic last fall, her fans hailed the performance as one of the best in the history of the event - and maybe in the history of the sport. When the mare subsequently lost the horse of the year title to Rachel Alexandra, her partisans reacted with white-hot anger. The blogosphere is regularly filled with sharp rebukes for anybody who demeans Zenyatta or even suggests she is not one of the greatest racehorses of all time.
Compiling an 18-for-18 career record is an extraordinary feat. Horse races contain so many potential pitfalls that no high-class U. S. horse has put together such a streak since Hindoo in 1881. Nevertheless (at the risk of inflaming the blogosphere), I could not put Zenyatta on a list of all-time great racehorses.
My judgment is based partly on the fact that she has compiled her record by running mostly against moderate female competition - such as the field in Lady\'s Secret Stakes on Saturday. But the main reason for questioning Zenyatta\'s place in history is the fact she is a synthetic-track specialist, albeit the best in the brief history of these surfaces. In my view, it is a dubious distinction to be the poster girl for the surfaces that have robbed the sport here of its unique character.
California once had the most exciting and vibrant racing in the nation, and East vs. West rivalries animated the sport for decades. While California never had the quality of bloodstock that populated the New York tracks, it had something else: speed. The dirt racing strips in the West were fast and speed-favoring, and trainers accordingly honed horses\' speed by training them hard and fast. Jockeys rode aggressive from the gate, and the early pace of races was quicker than in any other racing jurisdiction on the planet. The nature of the game was breathtaking, and fans loved it.
When horses toughened by this style of racing came East, they often ran away from their supposedly classier rivals. Fast horses such as Precisionist, Winning Colors, Sunday Silence, Bayakoa, Criminal Type, Silver Charm and Congaree advertised the virtues of California racing.
When California\'s racing regulators mandated that traditional dirt tracks be replaced by synthetic surfaces as of 2008, they didn\'t anticipate the consequence of their decision, but they essentially legislated speed out of the game. On the new synthetic surfaces, raw speed was not an asset and sometimes was a significant liability.
Jockeys adjusted accordingly. Horses would typically travel at a moderate pace until their acceleration in the stretch decided the race. In the 16 Breeders\' Cups races run over Santa Anita\'s synthetic surface in 2008 and 2009, not a single front-runner wound up in the winner\'s circle, and most races were won by a horse rallying from far behind. Zenyatta\'s ability to unleash an exceptional late burst of speed makes her so potent on synthetic tracks. In the stretch run of the Breeders\' Cup Classic, she flew past some rivals who had distinguished themselves as powerful finishers. But just twice has she ventured outside of California to run on dirt, beating a good field of fillies at Oaklawn Park in 2008 and a weak group there this year.
There is still no evidence she is as potent on dirt as she is on synthetics. Probably she isn\'t; dirt and synthetics are so different that few horses are top-class on both. (The 0-for-43 record of horses making the transition from dirt to synthetics in the Santa Anita Breeders Cups laid to rest the cliche that \"a good horse can run on anything.\")
Most racing fans regret that owner Jerry Moss and trainer John Shirreffs have been so conservative in their management of Zenyatta that they didn\'t give her more opportunities to prove herself on dirt. (If the mare had gone East to confront a below-her-prime Rachel Alexandra this summer, she might have won the Zenyatta vs. Rachel debate once and for all.) However, after Zenyatta\'s final Hollywood appearance, Moss and Shirreffs plan to run her against the nation\'s best males over the dirt at Churchill Downs Nov. 6.
This Breeders\' Cup Classic will be the defining race of her life, and if she wins (or even loses a close one), she can silence all of the skeptics. I doubt that she will. If Zenyatta retires without beating top-class competition on dirt, how will history view her?
A few years from now, the distinction of excelling on synthetic tracks may not mean much. Amid growing disillusionment with synthetics, Santa Anita this fall is replacing its track with dirt. Hollywood Park will eventually be turned into a real-estate development. At that point there will be only two racetracks in the United States, both with short meetings, that offer Grade I or Grade II stakes on synthetic surfaces: Del Mar and Keeneland.
When racing fans of the future look back at the record of a mare who excelled on long-forgotten substances called Pro-Ride and Cushion Track, they are apt to regard Zenyatta as a historical curiosity rather than an all-time great racehorse.
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After 19 consecutive wins, horse racing\'s star Zenyatta came up a head short at the Breeders\' Cup on Saturday. Still, Zenyatta has been called one of the greatest fillies who ever raced. The Washington Post\'s Andy Beyer talks about Zenyatta\'s untimely loss and the future of the American horse racing industry.
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NEAL CONAN, host:
Last week, the great thoroughbred Zenyatta ran for history. In her last race, she put her 19-race winning streak on the line against the best males in the world in the Breeders\' Cup Classic. As usual, the big mare broke slowly out of the gate and seemed to be impossibly far behind before her patented late charge.
(Soundbite of Breeders\' Cup)
Mr. TREVOR DENMAN (Race Track Announcer, ESPN): Zenyatta on the outside. Lookin At Lucky. Blame. Zenyatta, Zenyatta, Zenyatta and Blame, Blame trying to hold on. Blame and Zenyatta. Blame has won it. Zenyatta ran her heart out but had to settle for second.
CONAN: She came up maybe a stride short. Trevor Denman with the call on ESPN. If you watched the race and have questions about her jockey\'s tactics or about the legacy of Zenyatta, give us a call. 800-989-8255. Email us talk@npr.org. You can also join the conversation on our website. That\'s at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION.
Andy Beyer writes about horseracing from time to time in The Washington Post. He created the Beyer Speed Figures you see in the daily racing form and joins us today from his home in Washington. Nice to have you back, Andy.
Mr. ANDY BEYER (Horseracing Columnist, The Washington Post): Hi, Neal.
CONAN: And jockey Mike Smith minced no words, blaming himself for waiting too long to make the charge.
Mr. BEYER: Oh, he was too hard on himself. I don\'t think that there was any real excuse for Zenyatta, and I wouldn\'t second-guess his ride at all. I mean, that\'s her style. She always comes from far behind. And, you know, I mean, any time a horse rallies and just misses, you could always say, gee, the jockey should have moved sooner. I mean...
(Soundbite of laughter)
Mr. BEYER: ...you know, it doesn\'t work that way. She just wasn\'t quite quick enough and - but she just got beaten fair and square.
CONAN: That\'s a bit of a cavalry charge, too, 12 horses in the field.
Mr. BEYER: Right. A horse with that style is always going to have some kind of an issue. If the horse tries to save grand and get through on - toward the inside, he or she is going to, you know, have to pick her way through traffic. If you try to circle the field, you\'re going to lose ground. You know, being a slow, late-running horse just has some built-in disadvantages. I mean, it\'s a remarkable achievement that with that style, Zenyatta won 19 races in a row, but, you know, on dirt and against top-level competition, it\'s a lot harder to do.
CONAN: On dirt, what was the significance of that?
Mr. BEYER: Well, she had ran 17 of her career races on synthetic racetracks in California that - whose nature is fundamentally different from dirt, that racing on the synthetic tracks gives much less of an advantage to speed horses to front-running types than dirt does. And it tends to favor horses with, you know, Zenyatta\'s late-running style. So she was - she had won twice on the dirt against fillies, against lesser competition, but this was a different game from the one she\'d been playing in California.
CONAN: On the other hand, she had also beaten the boys in this race last year?
Mr. BEYER: She had, but that was on her home track, on a synthetic surface. And I think, you know, I felt coming into this race, you know, that she was probably going to be up against trying to make the transition to dirt and, you know, with her style.
Mr. BEYER: She is - got, obviously, that electric style, but also a lot of personality. People really took to her.
Mr. BEYER: She does. She, you know, she really has a presence about her. I mean, she\'s big. She\'s got a - you know, she\'s got a personality. She\'s a ham. You know, after a win, something - you know, her jockey, Mike Smith, would take her in front of the grandstand and she would just kind of, like, bow to the crowd. You know, people loved her.
CONAN: You talked about her legacy. If she had won that race, would she have deserved to be considered among the very greats of all time?
Mr. BEYER: No. You know, when she was winning those 19 races in a row, a lot of people had extrapolated from her ability to, you know, to make these rallies and always get up at the wire, that she could win anything, that she would have been capable of beating the, you know, the best horses who ever lived. This race put her abilities in proper perspective. It was - you know, it was obviously a very good race. But she\'s approximately as good as the winner, Blame, you know, who, you know, who beat her in a photo finish. And no, I don\'t think, you know, anyone would reasonably put Blame on a list of the top 100 horses of all time. So I think that it is proper to rank her as maybe the best or, you know, nearly the best female horse that the U.S. has ever seen. But she doesn\'t rate up there with the greatest males.
CONAN: So up there with the Ruffians and the Rachel Alexandras of the world?
Mr. BEYER: Yes. I mean, you can make - I mean, you could make an argument - an unresolvable argument either way. I mean, personally, I think that Rachel Alexandra, in her top form of last season, would have beaten Zenyatta. But the Zenyatta fans are equally adamant on the subject. We\'ll never know that answer.
CONAN: Well, I saw Ruffian run in - barring injury, I was - I loved her. Came again - you never saw that so often on a horse\'s form, came again - in other words, was passed and then went back and took the lead.
Mr. BEYER: Right. And just in the terms of raw speed, I mean, Ruffian was probably the most gifted of all the fillies and mares. But, you know, she didn\'t beat males the way, you know, Zenyatta and Rachel did. So it\'s not an argument we\'re ever going to get a good answer to.
CONAN: Well, it\'s a nice to have it with you, Andy. Let\'s get some callers in on the argument. Bo\'s calling from Russellville, Arkansas.
BO (Caller): Yes. Can you hear me?
CONAN: Yes. You\'re on the air. Go ahead.
BO: Thank you. I\'ve been following racing for about 40 years. And when I was 14 years old, Secretariat was in his three-year-old year, and he was like my Peyton Manning. So - and on a good day, I think he was the best ever. But I don\'t think the loss Saturday should diminish Zenyatta at all. I mean, she came from so far back against a tremendous field, and she almost got it done. So I think that she deserves a place in history, even though, you know, on - maybe on her best day, she\'s not as good as another horse, but she\'s awful good. And I tell you, it\'s really hard at grade-one level to win 19 races in a row.
CONAN: Grade-one level, that\'s the very top level in horseracing. And, of course, the Breeders\' Cup Classic, I guess, Andy, at the very top of that.
Mr. BEYER: That\'s correct. And I am not putting Zenyatta down. I\'m just saying that the race yesterday - whether she won by a nose or lost by a head, you know, that pretty much defined how good she is. And she\'s a terrific mare. She\'s no Secretariat.
CONAN: Bo, thanks very much for the call. As a member of the horseracing industry, writes Emily in Cincinnati, I just wanted to know if Andy thinks there\'s any chance, now that she\'s lost and has nothing left to prove, that the Mosses will give her a chance to redemption and consider heading to Dubai for the World Cup?
Mr. BEYER: You know, I doubt it. I mean, she is at the end of her six-year-old season. You know, and regrettably, you know, the Mosses and trainer, John Shirreffs have been so conservative in their management of Zenyatta that they -you know, they haven\'t - you know, for whatever reason, they haven\'t taken on, you know, on many - you know, many adventuresome challenges, you know, except for the, you know, the two starts and the Breeders\' Cup this year and last. So it would be - I think it would be a little out of character for them. And I just don\'t see it happening to - with her as a seven-year-old.
CONAN: Don\'s on the line, calling from Milltown in Maryland.
DON (Caller): Hi.
CONAN: Go ahead.
DON: It\'s a pleasure to be on the air with Andy Beyer, and you, too.
(Soundbite of laughter)
DON: I think no matter what happened in that race, with all the fanfare and so forth that\'s been going on over the last two years, that it\'s done a great deal for our sport. It\'s a dying sport in a lot of people\'s eyes, and I\'m afraid that - my home track happens to be Charleston, West Virginia. And if I see a horse that\'s won three in a row, that\'s quite a phenomenon. Winning 19 in a row is quite an accomplishment, even if you\'re talking about Peppers Pride, who raced only against the New Mexico breeds. But I thought it was phenomenal. I thought it was interesting last year when the Eclipse Awards came around between Rachel and Zenyatta. And I think - also, I really enjoyed you, Andrew. I think you must have done well Friday. Your comments in the (unintelligible) were nice.
CONAN: The Eclipse Award, by the way, for the best horses of the year - horses, fillies and colts. Andy Beyer, we were lucky to see her.
Mr. BEYER: Yes. And, you know, she really captured people\'s imagination. You know, I was in California for her final race out there. And - you know, the - I mean, there was just, you know, an electricity, you know, that, you know, ran through the whole racetrack. You know, and the same was true of Rachel Alexandra last year.
You know, some of - I mean, her races, you know, rank as some of the most exciting that I\'ve ever seen. So I think that both of them have shown that, you know, I mean, horseracing still has a pulse, I mean, that, you know, great horses and great races really, you know, really can, you know, get, you know, not only hardcore fans, but, you know, the average general sports fan really captivated. I wish we had more like them.
CONAN: Don, thanks very much for the call. Appreciate it.
DON: Thank you.
CONAN: We\'re talking with Andy Beyer about Zenyatta and horseracing. You\'re listening to TALK OF THE NATION, from NPR News.
And Andy, Don called from Maryland, where he said it seems his sport is dying. I wanted to ask you about another piece you wrote: After a little-noticed -outside the state of Maryland, anyway - a little-noticed result in last Tuesday\'s elections, where the county of Anne Arundel voted to approve a slots casino at a mall, effectively barring it from the racetrack, Laurel, and pretty much, well, transforming the horseracing industry in the state of Maryland.
Mr. BEYER: Well, it\'s - I mean, this is a tough time for the horseracing business. And a lot of racetracks are, you know, are in a position that, you know, that they feel they can\'t make money or even survive, you know, without revenue from slot machines. And that is certainly the case at Laurel. The - you know, I mean, business has really dwindled there. It\'s a money-losing operation. And, I mean, it\'s not that their fate is - was strictly the victim of bad luck. The track has been the victim of a lot of bad management and bad decisions over the years.
But, you know, they\'re not a viable operation anymore. Now, Pimlico is because of the Preakness. And so what is probably going to happen is that Laurel will shut down. They\'ll just have a simulcast facility on that site, and Maryland racing will be shrunk to probably like a two-month meeting at Pimlico that surrounds the Preakness. I mean, it\'s sad, but, I mean, it is just a fact of life of modern racing that there are a lot of tracks that aren\'t viable anymore.
CONAN: If New York and California were the major leagues of horseracing, and just a few years ago, Maryland was AA or AAA.
Mr. BEYER: It certainly was. I mean, Laurel has a 99-year history. I mean, there was a, you know, a time when the - when Laurel\'s great race, the Washington, D.C. International, was known around the world. They had two-year-old races that got, you know, great horses like Secretariat, you know, came to Laurel to run in the fall. And, you know, but the - there\'s just more competition from other tracks, from other forms of gambling. And just a lot of these once-thriving mid-level tracks and even once-thriving upper-level tracks just can\'t compete anymore.
CONAN: Let\'s get one last caller in. This is Sandy(ph), Sandy with us from Columbia, Maryland.
SANDY: Yes. My brother is really the aficionado of racing. He co-owns a number of horses, but - so I got interested because of him and saw Secretariat run his three races to get his Triple Crown. But I don\'t think I\'ve ever been as excited as watching Zenyatta race her races. And if she\'d had two more strides, she would have won.
CONAN: I think maybe one more stride, she would\'ve won. But...
SANDY: Right.
CONAN: ...it was awfully close. She put up a game effort. It was certainly not for want of trying.
SANDY: No. And that\'s why - I think that\'s why she\'s so loved. And I think that women are absolutely behind her because she\'s so big, she\'s so flashy and she comes from behind. And right on that stretch, it\'s just amazing.
CONAN: Plays the same game that was played by the great Cigar or Forego back in the day.
SANDY: Right.
Mr. BEYER: Right. People - you know, racing fans love, you know, two aspects of this game that - Zenyatta embodied one: You know, females racing against males always...
SANDY: Right.
Mr. BEYER: ...excite the racing public. And horses with that style who come from a mile behind, you know, there\'s nothing more exciting. So she put them together, and people loved it.
CONAN: Sandy, thanks very much for the call. And Andy Beyer, as always, thanks for your time.
Mr. BEYER: Good to talk to you, Neal. Bye-bye.
CONAN: Andy Beyer writes about horseracing from time to time in The Washington Post.
Tomorrow, NPR\'s Laura Sullivan on her two-part investigation on how Arizona\'s controversial immigration law was written.
This is NPR News.
Rich,
I didn\'t want to comment as you went back and forth the last few days, because I think I have bored the board here with my opinions of Zenyatta, but what is the point you are making? I read these carefully, and I don\'t come to the conclusion of \"Zenyatta hater\" or \"biased against Zenyatta\".
He feels her speed figures don\'t match up against the all time great male horses, that Rachel, at her prime, on dirt, would have beat her, while Zenyatta would have beat Rachel on synthetic, that last year\'s \"Pro-Ride\" Classic was not up to par with historical BC Classic fields, and that she was roughly on par with Blame, talent wise, and that Blame is not a top 100 all time horse.
I don\'t know, but I have no problem with any of those assertions. I think somebody can reasonably debate the other side of a few of them, I guess, but I don\'t see some huge bias here.
Besides Zenyatta\'s unbelieveable consistency, the other amazing thing about her is her ability to get even some hard core gamblers to \"emote\" when the subject of her skills and all-time placing come up. Many on this board, who I would guess fall into the category of \'hardened gamblers\" have such strong positive opinions of her and get immediately defensive when somebody takes an alternative view of her, it shocks me. We have created this class of horseplayer called \"Zenyatta haters\", which include anybody that takes an alternative view. I guess I hate every horse that beats me, and any horse that I bet on that runs like crap, but not specifically Zenyatta. I am pretty sure Miff and TGJB aren\'t \"zenyatta haters\" either, but I won\'t speak for them.
Funny how we even want to challenge HOTY criteria and say that \"it has never clearly been defined\" to allow this year\'s award to go to Zenyatta. I guess it is correct that the criteria is not specifically stated to preclude this from being \"who has done the most for the sport\", but nobody over the last 20 years has tried to make that the criteria. IT has been who has had the best year. Blame arguably has that criteria in his favor this year.
Jim
Zenyatta isn\'t quite as good as Blame, because she lost by a nose.
So by that same logic, I guess Secratariat isn\'t as good as Onion.
Beyer\'s logic on several points was strange, this being one of them.
Not getting into this all over again, but Beyer makes many statements that are ridiculous.
Yeah, I caught that one too, chalked it up to advancing age.
Another thought, if there\'s no judgment required in hoty voting , then why bother? Plug the years results into a computer program and it will very happily spit out the winner. Save on all the postage and envelopes too.
The thing that stuck out to me was all of the \"you knows\" in the interview transcript. No wonder you never see him on TV.
In the quote I saw (and maybe I missed another) Andy said she was \"approximately as good as\" Blame. Regardless of his or anyone else\'s assessment of the relative ability of those two horses, that\'s a separate question than who should get HOTY, which is not based on just one race, otherwise they would call it Horse Of The Breeders\' Cup Classic.
the scarecrows logic, meaningless.
kensharkey Wrote:
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> the scarecrows logic, meaningless.
Just give it a rest already. JB told you to knock it off. Unless you have something to say, which is doubtful, put a lid on it. What are you, 9??
Beyer wrote:
\"Zenyatta\'s eye-catching last-to-first rally [in the 2009 BC Classic] was not an extraordinary feat on a synthetic track that generally favors runners with such a style.\"
OK, I\'ll start with this: Beyer\'s attempt to devalue this performance on the basis that the racetrack \"generally favors runners\" with Zenyatta\'s running style. Zenyatta came from last to win this race. Zenyatta came from 15 lengths behind to win this race. Can anybody tell me:
1: How many synthetic races were run at SA that meet.
2: How many of them were won from 15 or more lengths behind.
3: How many were won from last place.
4: How in the world this sentence of Beyer\'s ever got past an editor in the first place.
5: How this sentence could still be on the Washington Post website a year later.
It\'s over Johnny, it\'s over.
Jimbo,
My point is to defend my statement that Beyer\'s Zenyatta writing is disgraceful.
I agree with you that you, JB, and Miff do not hate Zenyatta. In fact, Miff has been very nice to Zenyatta on more than one occasion. JB is attached to Rachel, and I don\'t blame him a bit. I would be too.
Oh, one more thing for now:
Beyer:
\"I\'m just saying that the race yesterday - whether she won by a nose or lost by a head, you know, that pretty much defined how good she is.\"
I\'m wondering what JB thinks of \"defining\" 6YO mares in this manner. Seems to me it opens the door to a lot of stuff that should not be happening--including \"defining\" Rachel selectively, or \"defining\" Beyer off of this radio interview.
I think this has migrated from a discussion about \"facts\" buttressing Z\'s case for to one about Beyer\'s writing. Re Andy, picking one line uttered in a live Q and A is of questionable relevance-- try it some time, under the pressure of speaking in public. He probably would have rephrased if he was writing.
As for the articles overall, I found them pretty measured, and in general agree with them. Do I agree with everything? Probably not. Did he get a detail wrong about the races on Pro-Ride? Maybe. Is it really relevant?
\"JB, and Miff do not hate Zenyatta. In fact, Miff has been very nice to Zenyatta on more than one occasion\"
Maybe it\'s me, but I had to laugh at that
JB wrote:
\"He probably would have rephrased if he was writing.\"
Beyer in writing, pre-race:
\"This Breeders\' Cup Classic will be the defining race of her life, and if she wins (or even loses a close one), she can silence all of the skeptics. I doubt that she will. If Zenyatta retires without beating top-class competition on dirt, how will history view her?\"
Zenyatta wins 19 races in a row. She wins 9 Grade Ones in a row. She wins the 2009 Breeders\' Cup Classic. And Beyer says she will be defined in November of her 6YO year by a race in which he believes she will not run well. Meanwhile, Rachel loses several races and, according to Beyer, it is because Rachel, a 4YO, was past her prime. No defining races there.
JB wrote:
\"I think this has migrated from a discussion about \'facts\' buttressing Z\'s case for to one about Beyer\'s writing.\"
No. I said Beyer\'s Zenyatta writing was disgraceful. You asked me to support my view. And I am damned well going to do it. And I am going to keep on doing it until you ask me to stop.
By the way: Want to bet on which one of us has spent more time on the radio?
I spend as little time as possible on the radio. One of the reasons is underscored by Andy\'s words being thrown back at him.
I said virtually the same thing about Z\'s legacy (my word) and this year\'s Classic, here, before the race. It had nothing to do with my own opinion of her, which is based on figures, as I suspect Andy\'s is.
There clearly were defining races for RA, in the sense that they shaped the way the public viewed her-- the Oaks, Preakness, Haskell, and Woodward. And I\'m pretty sure you would agree that if Z had finished fifth in her dirt Classic this year she would be \"defined\" differently by the public.
Zenyatta would have been defined differently had she finished fifth, but only as a sort of truism, since that would be part of the overall record that defines her. I think we both know Beyer was attempting something different there, as in: JB, your record of success notwithstanding, you will be defined by the performance of the NEXT horse you recommend for purchase.
Reading Beyer\'s Zenyatta writing, with its circle-and-pounce style, I keep getting the same thought: This is like a test case of Dostoevsky\'s preoccupation: What would it be like to live in a world in which everything is permitted?
Beyer throws out a bunch of nonsense about the way SA was playing? Oh, OK. I get to do that too, with Blame\'s tracks and Rachel\'s tracks, and EVERYTHING goes, because Beyer was so inaccurate. Beyer defines a 6YO mare by one November race? OK, my turn to define Rachel by her absence in BCs or her losses as a 4YO.
I might be able to make this point to you by quoting you:
JB wrote:
\" Even if you want to say helping racing should matter, show me that Z did that. 60 Minutes? I think they had Pol Pot on there once.\"
A witty line? Yes. But doesn\'t it seem to beg for a reply like the following? \"And wasn\'t Rachel\'s trainer on Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel? I bet that was great for racing.\"
Come on. Last first, RA\'s trainer being on TV wouldn\'t be relevant UNLESS SOMEONE HAD SAID IT WAS, that it was a reason for her to get an award, (or not), as was said about Z. If someone did, show me, and I\'ll argue against them too.
The point about being defined by one start is as correct for Z as for me and anyone else-- if you have enough record of accomplishment, the one start matters less, or not at all. You think Quality Road wasn\'t defined to a large degree by the BC? On pure ability, MEASURABLE the way we measure things here, he towered over Zenyatta and everyone else this year. He won\'t be defined that way, though.
You think RA isn\'t defined to some degree by the losses this year? You think she is seen the same as if she had retired after the Woodward?
In the case of Zenyatta, \"Grade Ones\" is a deceptive term, and you know it. In her entire career, there were four races where she ran against top quality horses, and that\'s giving her the two BC starts in California, where almost all the top horses were compromised by the surface (demonstrably, by how all dirt horses ran on those two days). So yes, she was in a position where this year\'s BC mattered a lot to how she would be viewed, as I said before the race-- and she helped her legacy a lot by running well.
As far as Andy goes, if the best you have in 3 articles is exaggerating or even getting wrong how Pro-Ride was playing, and correlating it with one result, you haven\'t got much. He was even handed and reasonable as far as I\'m concerned, and gave Z her props when she deserved them. And for a guy who makes figures, he must to have had to swallow hard. As a guy who has had to listen to fans of Affirmed and Sunday Silence for years, trust me on that one.
JB wrote:
\"Come on. Last first, RA\'s trainer being on TV wouldn\'t be relevant UNLESS SOMEONE HAD SAID IT WAS, that it was a reason for her to get an award, (or not), as was said about Z. If someone did, show me, and I\'ll argue against them too.\"
You missed the whole point. You don\'t know about the Asmussen Real Sports show? Are you serious? It was a \"supertrainer\" thing.
\"The point about being defined by one start is as correct for Z as for me and anyone else-- if you have enough record of accomplishment, the one start matters less, or not at all.\"
I agree.
\"You think Quality Road wasn\'t defined to a large degree by the BC? On pure ability, MEASURABLE the way we measure things here, he towered over Zenyatta and everyone else this year. He won\'t be defined that way, though.\"
You have discussed figures vs. accomplishment before. I don\'t think we disagree on this--based on what you wrote last time. Alydar won the Triple Crown on Sheets.
\"You think RA isn\'t defined to some degree by the losses this year? You think she is seen the same as if she had retired after the Woodward?\"
Rachel\'s losses are part of the career record that ought to define her, and it\'s the same with Zenyatta. What I object to, and consider disgraceful, is Beyer chucking a BC Classic that was run on a surface he neither understands nor respects, and then setting himself up to hang Zenyatta based on one race. Instead of pulling stunts like this, what he ought to do is get busy admitting that he ruined the historical comparability of his figures by anchoring them to par. Then maybe the Blogosphere, which he keeps whining about, will finally stop making idiotic, baseless comparisons using Beyer figures. Why is Beyer silent on this subject?
\"In the case of Zenyatta, Grade Ones is a deceptive term, and you know it. In her entire career, there were four races where she ran against top quality horses, and that\'s giving her the two BC starts in California, where almost all the top horses were compromised by the surface (demonstrably, by how all dirt horses ran on those two days).\"
If they were giving money away in those races, you should have come and gotten it. This is the stuff of parody. Here is the parody: Let\'s set up a situation in which a bunch of horses are afraid to run against Zenyatta. Then have them go somewhere else and run against each other. Then let them claim that they deserve HOY over Zenyatta because they faced better competition, as indeed they might have.
\"As far as Andy goes, if the best you have in 3 articles is exaggerating or even getting wrong how Pro-Ride was playing, and correlating it with one result, you haven\'t got much. He was even handed and reasonable as far as I\'m concerned,\"
He was disgraceful as far as I\'m concerned. And I\'m just getting started. You challenged me to do this, and I\'m doing it. And of course there is no chance you will agree with me on any of this. That was always a given. You\'ll probably even defend the following sentence of Beyer\'s:
\" In my view, it is a dubious distinction to be the poster girl for the surfaces that have robbed the sport here of its unique character.\"
The \"unique character\" is the speed-favoring quality.
And then Beyer on the radio:
\"And horses with that style who come from a mile behind, you know, there\'s nothing more exciting. So she put them together, and people loved it.\"
Yeah, great stuff. He was looking to get her on anything.
1-- I did get the Asmussen thing, that\'s why I said \"or not\". And it doesn\'t make any difference either way to my point.
2-- Believe me, I wanted to find something to buy and take out to California and run against Z getting weight, but a) it involved finding one that could run on synth, and b) convincing someone ELSE it was a good idea, in an atmosphere of great hype. That the main trainer for my main client was a guy who was on record as hating the stuff made it even tougher. One that was bought FROM one of my guys was Dance To My Tune, who wasn\'t even graded level before we bought her or for us, but who immediately after we sold her ran second in a \"Grade One\" in California, to Zenyatta. Putting her right up there with Rinterval, etc.
As far as part two of that section, let\'s see:
It was pretty tough to say male horses were ducking Z, since she was running against fillies in all starts except the BC for her whole career, unless you are saying someone ducked her in the BC. So that leaves Rachel, who was \"ducking\" her by running on 2 weeks rest in the Preakness, against colts in the Haskell, and against older males in the Woodward, before being stopped on two months before the BC after an eight (8) race campaign by Labor Day, by an owner and trainer who both had PREVIOUSLY taken public positions against synthetics.
(I could make some comments about who actually did some ducking-- both camps this year-- but we are getting far afield).
Anyway, I\'ve said my piece about Andy. If you want to go on about him you can, but my recollection is that the original challenge by Miff was to make a case that Z should be HOTY based on a fact set, or that there was a hole in what Andy said in THAT piece.
Rich,
I hate to detract from the main points of your essay, but a couple of questions.
You say Andy doesn\'t understand or respect synthetics and screwed up the figures. Who do you think got the figures right for synthetics? You can\'t believe TG did either, since Beyer went on record of \"adjusting\" his entire synthetic scale, pushing the top figs higher and the bottom figures lower. As far as I know, TG didn\'t and the \"top\" figs for the best synthetic horses are GENERALLY faster on Beyer than TG, and it would seem your position was that Beyer understated the figures on synthetics (If I am wrong - correct me).
As for who actually \"understands or respects\" synthetics, that is a whole different story. Put me in that group and proud to be part of it. I believe we will look back 20 years from now and this will have been a \"stupid blip\" on the horse racing radar here that went away.
Rich, hard to believe you can credibly talk about how horses ducked Zenyatta, instead of pointing out the extremely careful handling of Zenyatta over the two years. Even some of her most fervant fans on this board were getting frustrated with her campaign this year as she stayed out west AGAIN and even avoided a clearly sub-par Rachel going 1 1/4 at Saratoga, which should have been a race they would have drooled over.
Just curious, are you calling the quality of Andy\'s writing disgraceful, as in the grammatical and literary quality, or are you calling the content of his opinions disgraceful. If it is the former, probably a debate for another board (although I can certainly see THAT point).
Don\'t really want to cut in on this dance, but ...
\"... unless you are saying someone ducked her in the BC\"
Well, I can think of one male champion who may have, and look where it got him. Second again!
Son
You\'re flipping incredible....Jerry Brown doesn\'t need any praise from me, but I would be embarrassed to waste his time in a diatribe like yours...moreover Andy Beyer, for all his faults or strengths, is a ton more important to this business than you will ever be. And probably more of a handicapper than 99% of the people on this board, including you and me. You ought to worship the ground these guys tread on.
Moreover, I am now in the Zenyatta HOY camp...just to shut you up.
Don\'t give up on me yet, Alm. I\'m fixing to have another lobotomy and come back genuflecting.
Male Grade 1 older horses ducked Zenyatta,why?? I\'ve heard it all now.
Mike
P.S.
Al,after reading Rich\'s rambling dance around the \"facts\" or anything that is remotely relevant to what was being debated here(except Beyers grammar perhaps)I absolutely agree that Z should be HOTY,no contest. A compelling argument has been made for her accomplishments and brilliance on the racetrack contrary to what clueless Andy Beyer wrote.
Miff,
I\'m sorry. I have an awful memory, and I simply do not remember writing the things you seem to think I wrote.
Rich,
I do not think that you have come close to making a case that anything Beyer wrote was intentionally disgraceful against Z, in any article.Z fans are super sensitive but never put up or compare race track type pertinent \"stuff\" when glorifying her.
Defending Z as a fan,is one thing, but her record/accomplishments, when picked apart,are nowhere near her overstated west coast press clippings.
Mike
Jimbo wrote:
\"You say Andy doesn\'t understand or respect synthetics and screwed up the figures.\"
I said that Beyer \"ruined the historical comparability of his figures by anchoring them to par.\" This is a point that JB has made 50 times over the years. When you anchor your database to par, as Beyer did years ago, then when it comes to horses as a group, par is what you are going to get. This makes nonsense of attempts to compare, say, Seattle Slew to Rachel Alexandra. Seattle Slew was running at a time when Beyer was having an awful problem with \"figure shrinkage.\" His figures were getting slower by the month, due to faulty projections. He \"solved\" the problem by locking his database to par, which proved to be a slowly opening can of worms. Later, according to his most-recent book, he stopped doing this. But he can\'t ring the bells backwards.
\"Rich, hard to believe you can credibly talk about how horses ducked Zenyatta, instead of pointing out the extremely careful handling of Zenyatta over the two years. Even some of her most fervant fans on this board were getting frustrated with her campaign this year as she stayed out west AGAIN and even avoided a clearly sub-par Rachel going 1 1/4 at Saratoga, which should have been a race they would have drooled over.\"
You are talking about where I was responding to JB\'s comment about the quality of the Grade Ones that Zenyatta won in CA? My point was that Zenyatta was scaring off competition. I believe this was what JB was referring to when he wrote about his own trouble \"convincing someone ELSE it was a good idea [to go to CA and race against Zenyatta], in an atmosphere of great hype.\" Was Zenyatta handled extremely carefully, as you say? Absolutely. But she also stayed healthy and sound and ran off an incredible string of Grade Ones and ran in three BCs and ran in two BC Classics, the last one at the age of six, on her second surface. I look at the way this horse was managed, Jimbo, and I understand people\'s frustration, but what this horse accomplished was flat-out extraordinary, a record for the ages, and this happened under a particular type of real-life management. The management and the record are facts on the ground, facts from an astoundingly magnificent career. Now, the way she COULD have been managed? What would that have produced? Nobody knows for sure, but when I was watching that 6YO mare with that record run in another BC Classic against the boys, I was thinking that there were some human beings (non-cowards, if I may) behind her who had a decent sort of idea what they were doing.
\"Just curious, are you calling the quality of Andy\'s writing disgraceful, as in the grammatical and literary quality, or are you calling the content of his opinions disgraceful. If it is the former, probably a debate for another board (although I can certainly see THAT point).\"
I\'m talking about the content.
Rich,
Agree that what Zenyatta did was incredible in a few regards. Probably almost nobody would disagree that at a minimum her consistency in today\'s age of horses is unheard of and incredible on its own.
Also, I can see the point that with all the adulation she has received and all the fans she has, and all the success she had, how can anybody argue with the way she was managed. But i am stubborn and hard-headed and will forever dislike both Shirreffs and Moss. (I am sure they won\'t lose sleep over that though). Because I have to say I truly don\'t know how great she was and I don\'t think any of us really can know. We can opine a lot and we can use facts/figures as TGJB and others have pointed out, and on those facts, she wasn\'t close to great. 19 out of 20 wins is great. Wouldn\'t it have been nice to see her challenged one or two more times over the two year period, including sometime in 2009 against Rachel Alexander? But unfortunately, the 19 out of 20 is tarnished, when it was accomplished almost exclusively in California, against lame competition and on synthetics. And the big dirt try was a great effort, but a loss, against Blame, who is a very nice horse, but far from great. We are left short a few facts (races) for which to measure her.
Oh well.
First of all, just to be clear, anchoring your figures to pars is indeed a problem, but it plays out differently on different circuits. Not that I want to be giving other figure makers more help (Beyer\'s guys clearly went to school on my presentation at the 2004 DRF Expo), but in California, where they have 5 horse fields made up of lots of Cal breds,using pars will inflate your figures, not the other way around. They will come out too good relative to those at a smaller track which has big fields, a deflated claiming structure (5k bottom ranging up to 30k as opposed to 8k ranging to 62,5k in California), and a steady stream of shippers from other tracks. My guess is that is one reason why Ragozin\'s California figures have been screwed up for years (another has to do with 1 turn/2 turn stuff).
Other than the 2 to 4 (depending on how nice you want to be) races against top horses (one of which she lost), giving Z credit for winning all the others is like giving Pepper\'s Pride credit for beating all those New Mexico breds-- the races were restricted. In Z\'s case, because she did not even run against what has been a weak older male division in California (no reason she couldn\'t have tried the Big Cap, Gold Cup or Pac Classic over the last two years), she was beating truly anemic fields of fillies, on synthetics, and not by much.
You say you disagree with Andy\'s content, but so far you have not made the case. To be clear-- my opinion of Z is based on her figures (ability), which make her one of the better mares to have raced over the last few years, but not as good as Rachel or Goldikova (relative to other grass horses especially), and not close to Ghostzapper and the other top males of this era.
The HOTY debate is another story, it\'s based on accomplishment. If Z had won the Classic I could at least see a case to be made for her, even though (like last year) it would have been a case based entirely on one start. But she didn\'t, and she accomplished absolutely nothing of note in her other starts this year. As far as I\'m concerned the only question is whether Goldikova did enough to unseat Blame-- Zenyatta didn\'t do anything THIS YEAR that should get her votes, let alone match what the other two did.
PDub, Smalltimer, and the rest-- if you want to reply, don\'t just say you disagree, or it\'s a matter of opinion. Make a case.
Fact:
-The 2009 Preakness field wasn\'t very good, RA held off the closing charge of Mine That Bird, a horse that has done absolutely nothing after winning the Derby on an off track
- Beat the same group of \"stellar\" 3YO competition in the Haskell, winning over a sloppy Monmouth surface that promoted speed, beating a bunch of 2nd rate 3YO.
- She beat Macho Again and Bullsbay in the Woodward. Macho Again is a pretty decent horse. Bullsbay was a decent horse.
The Woodward was a great performance.
Why is is that when Zenyatta wins the BC Classic, Ladies Classic, or Apple Blossom the first thing mentioned is the competition or the racetrack surface?? RA wins over a biased surface or runs against second rate horses and NOTHING is mentioned about that. Its all...\"she beat older males, she won a GR1\" etc...
Seems like 2 different standards are being used. And before you start the \"Whats RA got to do with anything\", I\'m making a point of how certain racehorses are perceived.
These performance figures that constantly get mentioned, how many people on this board have ripped up tickets because, on figures, this was the day she was going down?? Several. Yet, despite this figure weakness it never happened until the 2010 Classic. A race that many people on here didn\'t give her ANY chance of even hitting the board, let alone winning, because.........she just didn\'t have the figures to do it. This is another fact.
Yeah, its a TG board. We talk about figures. When the most respected man on this board starts to compare the accomplishments of Zenyatta to Peppers Pride, we\'ve reached the point of being ridiculous.
Have at it boys, and good luck Rich. You\'re never gonna win this discussion.
I would vote for Goldikova, she dusted the best turf milers in the world. Again.
PDub-- \"I\'m making a point about how certain racehorses are perceived\".
You\'re kidding about that, right? Other than by me, have you heard anyone say RA was the best filly of all time, or the best horse of the last 25 years, or any of the other stuff that\'s been out there about Zenyatta?
What I\'m saying JB, is that her races never received the scrutiny that Z\'s races have.
When she won the Preakness or some other races, NOTHING was discussed about competition or racing surfaces. That Preakness field wasn\'t very good. She got FULL credit for doing something that had not been done in around 100 years or so. It was a tremendous performance despite the competition. 13 post, pressing the pace, outstanding. RA is a phenomenal horse, no doubt.
When Zenyatta wins the BC Classic, becoming the first female horse to do so, EVERYTHING was written about track surface and competition. A tough field before the race was relegated to one excuse after another after the race, making it sound like she beat up on ALW horses on a Thursday afternoon. All of a sudden, accomplishing this feat that had never been done before was no big deal.
HOY I really don\'t care about. Anything put to a vote is subject to biases and subjectivity. Its why I view the Pro Football HOF as a joke. Ken Stabler (5 consecutive league championship appearances, 1 SB title), Cliff Branch (3 time SB winner, preeminent deep threat of the 70\'s, stats better than some inducted), and Ray Guy (Greatest punter of all time) are excluded. Bob Griese and Fran Tarkenton are included. James Lofton and Bob Hayes are included. Not that some of these guys aren\'t deserving, but how are they in and the others aren\'t?? Same with any awards show. And the BCS.....but I digress.
First of all, it\'s hard to believe Stabler isn\'t in the HOF, let alone that Bob Hayes is.
I have no idea what you are basing the Preakness bias thing on, but they ran it over the same track they always do, and it\'s often the weakest TC race. What\'s your point? If the issue was, was Rachel\'s Preakness a better performance (or more historical or whatever) than Zenyatta\'s 2009 BC win (or some other individual race) I could see the relevance. But that\'s never been the argument, even when the issue was R vs. Z. It was whether the totality of Rachel\'s 2009 campaign was better than the totality of Zenyatta\'s. I made that case here last year at length and I\'m not interested in making it again. But you are DEAD WRONG about there being no discussion about level of competition. I made the case based not on ability but on accomplishment, and I went into a long and detailed examination of the competition each faced. Look it up.
TGJB,
I already said earlier that Blame deserves to be HOTY. Period. If he wins, it is deserved. If Z gets the nod, people will holler but that\'s tough shit since we\'re not casting any votes here. Far as I\'m concerned any 6 year old mare running against the best male dirt horses available is unheard of. Had Z gotten there, it would have been no contest, but she was beaten by a deserving champion.
Goldikova? I\'ve seen her run twice. Devastating turn of foot. Gonna be back as an older, older mare again. That\'s why I\'m a fan of hers. She\'s the type of animal I can be a fan of cause she doesn\'t close up shop and head to the breeders shed 30 minutes after her last race at age 3 or 4. How could anyone not be a fan of hers? (See the Zenyatta connection?) But as strictly a turf mile specialist? If Z is eliminated because of her affinity for plastic, the same must apply to Goldikova. HOTY, no way.
That\'s my take on the issue.
Have a good one guys.
Z-Fans must be in the holiday spirit already. I thought for sure that TGJB invoking the words \"Pepper\'s Pride\" was going to lead to a backlash of posts, and eventually lead to at least a 30 day ban for P-Dub......
Jim
u mean the scarecorwo?
kensharkey Wrote:
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> u mean the scarecorwo?
Nice spelling genius.
kensharkey Wrote:
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> p-dub is a complete idiot. simple
I guess if I bet on the 13 horse, thinking he would save ground, and then blame my terrible bet on the jockey, that would make me a genius. Got it brainchild.
When P-Dub called Summer Bird a \"second rate 3YO\" he lost all credibility in this discussion IMHO.
Hi Mr Brown- I have a question about your statement. You said that Goldikova was a better horse based on figures than Zenyatta. I was under the assumption, and maybe mistakenly, that synthetic and grass figures were fairly similar given the pace structure of the races and the relative similarities in how the races are run. With that, Goldikova has run one negative figure in her career and Zenyatta has run 12. I know you said in parenthesis especially against other grass horses, but I was wondering how the figures supported that conclusion. I don\'t want to be annoying, and I\'m really tired of the Zenyatta debate, as much of a fan as I am of her, but I found myself trying to figure this statement out looking at the figures and I couldn\'t so I thought that I was missing something. Thanks for your patience.
MonmouthGuy Wrote:
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> When P-Dub called Summer Bird a \"second rate 3YO\"
> he lost all credibility in this discussion IMHO.
So you found one good horse Monmouth. Of course, the slop and speed bias didn\'t help her at all right??
This from the same guy that discredits the Classic field Z won, of course after finding out she won. Nice. I mean, Summer Bird was in that field too. She beat nothing that day, remember??
You questioning someone else\'s credibility. Ok Monmouthsharkey.
Foot-- essentially, Goldikova is faster relative to grass horses than Z is to dirt horses, even with her top in the BC, and relative to the number of races run there are more negative figures run on synth than on grass, by a lot. The synth stuff is irrelevant in this discussion overall, as far as I\'m concerned-- there aren\'t enough top horses who run on it (let alone run well on it) to qualify as a \"division\". Goldikova was taking on and usually beating males in a place where grass racing is it, and everything else is an afterthought.
You are entitled to believe that Zenyatta beats Summer Bird at 10F on dirt. I don\'t.
P Dub wrote:
\"good luck Rich. You\'re never gonna win this discussion.\"
That\'s the whole idea, P Dub. This board presents perfect conditions for us to get a hostile reception. A NY website. Overrepresented by New Yorkers. Sheet handicappers. Moderated by the person who uncovered Rachel. Perfect.
Nietzsche said that you don\'t attack an idea where it\'s weak. You attack an idea where it\'s strong.
And my shrink says that Nietzsche trumps Freud.
I guess Karl Rove read Nietzsche.
Is your shrink the drill sergeant from the commercials?
All I can say about my shrink is that he looks like Judd Hirsch, and every time I enter his office, he runs like Zenyatta.
The main take away from the Beyer writings that were posted at the beginning of this thread is that he hates the syn surfaces.
Hey Rich
I\'ve lived in NYC, LA, New Orleans, Washington DC, LA and Cleveland for substantial periods (2 years plus each place),attended tracks in all of these cities and places and raced at least one horse in all but Washington. My take on Zenyatta isn\'t regional and I would guess I\'ve got you surrounded.
I think the beginning of this thread centered on a complaint that the SoCal boys were too aggressive in promoting her as HOY. My personal take is that I don\'t care if she is selected for this, but I can tell you with unreal passion that the West Coast boys in racing are the biggest adolescents in the game...a few years late in believing they are still important on the scene...they\'ve given it up and have been in a consistent decline for some time now.
Maybe Zenyatta is all they have left.
So, he sorta ambles away slowly, but two turns and a mile later he\'s really moving?
Yes! And then he gets to the lake at the end of the road and literally walks on water. Every day. Walks on water. Indeed, this is what inspired that infamous column from the curmudgeonly Washington Post columnist: \"Zenyatta Can\'t Swim.\"
Alm,
Good to hear from you.
Interesting points. Let\'s see. You give me the worst pro-Zenyatta California guy you can think of, and then I\'ll give you a guy from the Thoroughbred Times who comes from the opposite direction and is such a joke that he should be registered as a ####ing lobbyist.
TGJB: To be clear-- my opinion of Z is based on her figures (ability),
Well, there you go, you\'re wrong right off the bat. Z\'s ability isn\'t defined by your figures or anyone\'s figures. She defied figures because of her racing style. If we ever have another deep closer who manages to succeed at the top level of racing the way Z did, which is doubtful, then you and the other figure guys will be scratching your heads and degrading them again.
Regarding the notion of geographic bias, I\'m from upstate New York where we feel that Finger Lakes is the epicenter of the horse racing universe, and still have not recovered from the snub of Tin Cup Chalice for 2008 HOY.
At some point, there appeared to be a discussion here about the factual basis for a couple of Andy Beyer\'s comments supporting a position he had taken. The overall issue holds my interest only slightly longer than a church meeting, but the question of Beyer\'s cavalier treatment of data, regardless of its import or relevance, is troubling. For better of worse (and what a discussion that would be), Beyer is an iconic figure in the field. As such, his opinions, and supporting references, will be taken to the bank by many. It\'s the weight he, along with JB, Friedman and others, must carry. To base an opinion on hazy impressionistic recall is not good enough, unless qualified as such. If done often enough, he will soon be pontificating to an empty church.
Thanks
She lost.
Rich, your bad memory aside, did you make a post on this thread where you explain why Zenyatta beating nothing in all of 2010 and then losing to Blame means she should get Horse of the Year instead of Blame? I don\'t mean a post about Beyer\'s poor sentence structure, or Rachel Alexandra\'s races last year, or the board\'s NY bias. I mean something about what Zenyatta accomplished on the racetrack in 2010...which is what is being voted on, after all. In all your posts, did you ever actually explain why Zenyatta\'s races this year were superior to Blame\'s? We\'ll leave out Goldikova.
Analizethis wrote:
\"The main take away from the Beyer writings that were posted at the beginning of this thread is that he hates the syn surfaces.\"
This is another thing that I found odd. Beyer paints a picture of what California racing was like when the tracks were real dirt:
\"California once had the most exciting and vibrant racing in the nation\"
\"The dirt racing strips in the West were fast and speed-favoring\"
\"The nature of the game was breathtaking, and fans loved it.\"
\"When California\'s racing regulators mandated that traditional dirt tracks be replaced by synthetic surfaces as of 2008, they didn\'t anticipate the consequence of their decision, but they essentially legislated speed out of the game.\"
OK, something is missing here, and it\'s big:
Does anyone think that California replaced dirt tracks at a time when California racing was the \"most exciting and vibrant\" racing in the country, racing whose nature \"fans loved\"?
Beyer made his first trip to California in 1982, and he still seems to be thinking about 1982.
More important, he\'s taking a shot at California racing regulators without bothering to put in even one word about why they switched to synthetic: THE DEAD HORSES.
How can he write something like this without mentioning the reason for the surface switch? I opposed the surface switch, and we can argue about how well the switch worked, but not mentioning the reason for it is inexcusable. Dead horses were on the cover of mainstream CA newspapers. A scandal was in the making, and people were getting sick. Does this not deserve a mention?
And then there\'s this:
\"In my view, it is a dubious distinction to be the poster girl for the surfaces that have robbed the sport here of its unique character.\"
This \"unique character\" Beyer is talking about, of which the sport has been robbed, robbed in a way that leaves Zenyatta\'s distinction \"dubious\"? He discussed it in his fourth book. Here is Beyer writing about the real-dirt Santa Anita he visited in 1982:
\"The sport seemed as foreign to me as if I were at a track on the moon...I was amazed by the number of fainthearted sprinters who would win at a mile or more--and how the crowd would bet them without any concern for their lack of stamina.\"
Beyer laments the loss of this racetrack. Meanwhile, of Zenyatta\'s 2009 BC Classic victory, Beyer writes:
\"It is absurd to describe a race as a true championship test when America\'s best dirt runners have little chance to win.\"
And he got this column by an editor--a dubious distinction if ever I\'ve seen one.
JMA wrote:
\"Rich, your bad memory aside\"
I wish it were that easy!
\"did you make a post on this thread where you explain why Zenyatta beating nothing in all of 2010 and then losing to Blame means she should get Horse of the Year instead of Blame?\"
No, and I won\'t. I thought Zenyatta deserved HOY in 2009. This year? Blame is a damned good choice. My problem is not with Beyer\'s support of Blame for HOY. My problem is with the WHOLE of Beyer\'s Zenyatta writing. That is why I posted Beyer columns from last year, too.
\" I don\'t mean a post about Beyer\'s poor sentence structure,\"
As I told Jimbo a couple of days ago, my problem is not with the style of Beyer\'s writing. I think Beyer is a good writer in terms of style. My problem is with the content of the whole of his Zenyatta writing.
Funny-- well, I\'m \"wrong\" a lot.....
Pretty sure I didn\'t \"degrade\" Victory Gallop. But yes, deep closers are at a disadvantage because of ground loss-- well, except in those races with small fields Z was running in, where she almost never lost much ground on the turns. Thing is, the ones who accurately measure the effect of ground loss DO KNOW how good those horses are-- and are not.
The distinction I made, which it appears you did not grasp, is between ability (as we measure it here), and accomplishment (winning races, etc.). If you really don\'t get that distinction you shouldn\'t be using our data or any figures to bet, just going by what the horses have accomplished, using the standard pp\'s to come up with that.
As I said last year, when it comes to HOTY and other awards, the decision should be based on accomplishment, not ability. My argument for RA last year wasn\'t based on her being much faster, but on her campaign (accomplishments) being much better.
Here\'s the point some of us are trying to make about Z. She was very good in terms of ability compared to her contemporaries, as were others historically (Personal Ensign, Serena\'s Song, Lady\'s Secret, etc.). But with the exception of PE they weren\'t undefeated or close to it, because they ran in real races, against real horses, and if you do that enough times you can get beat, as did Z. Z ran in just 4 such races (and again, that\'s if you count the two BCs on Pro-Ride, where dirt horses had no shot). She was 3 for 4.
So what we are saying is that she was very good, but the record is deceptive, and the adulation over the top.
\"deep closers are at a disadvantage because of ground loss-- well, except in those races with small fields Z was running in, where she almost never lost much ground on the turns.\"
You need to check this, JB.
Seems to me I watched almost all of them, if there are exceptions they are few. Point me to them.
You haven\'t seen all of Zenyatta\'s races? Do you miss Ingrid Bergman movies too?
Seriously, go to your BC archives and look at the Zenyatta groundloss showing on the sheets. Then compare it to Victory Gallop (whom I picked at random). All I know on VG is the groundloss from 3-21-98 to 11-7-98, but Zenyatta lost more ground than Victory Gallop did.
Just looked it up. Average combined paths for 2 turn races is about 5, probably a little higher in places where there are big fields. She\'s slightly higher (about 5.5 for the 8 starts currently on her sheet including 2 BCs) which would be less than for most deep closers.
VG riders were getting instructions. The ones not named Solis followed them.
Rich,
The \"dead horses\" comment doesn\'t seem to be supported by the facts.
I don\'t have the statistics, but I believe Michael D. or another poster put them up a few months back, this safety of the horses thing has turned out to be bullshit. We have a similar amount of breakdowns, unfortunately.
Since the US decided to use many different types of synthetics and not one, we won\'t really know because there are too many hybrids out there. That is what is wrong with DelMar and what was wrong with Santa Anita. They weren\'t one type of track, but they seemed to be hybrid forms of what they purported to be. Hollywood, Arlington, Keenland and Woodbine seem to be successful with their track surfaces, as well as Turfway. Didn\'t the Jockey Club just come out with a study supporting the statements that there are a lower percentage of fatal/catastrophic breakdowns on synthetic than on dirt? Australia is building a permanent synthetic racing faciity. Dubai is now synthetic. European horsemen say that they are safe and great conditioning and training facilities. This is not a support of them, per se, but I think we have to look at the worldwide success and the successful tracks here in NA also, not just focusing on Santa Anita and DelMar. I certainly would call Santa Anita and DelMar not successful. Both could return to dirt as far as I\'m concerned. But remember, Santa Anita was never considered an East Coast friendly track when it was dirt. And DelMar was always a quirky track, regardless of the surface. There were many problems with both dirt courses.
Jimbo,
My point, as I wrote, was that Beyer should have given the reason for the surface switch.
The reason for the surface switch, as I wrote, was the dead horses.
Beyer should have given the reason, as I wrote, even though there is plenty of room to argue about the results of the switch.
Footlick mentioned a new study. I haven\'t read it. The TT wrote about it:
\"by Frank Angst
\"Horses who raced on a dirt surface in the U.S. during the last two years had an increased chance of a fatal breakdown compared with racing on a synthetic surface based on data released Wednesday by the Jockey Club.\"
http://www.thoroughbredtimes.com/national-news/2010/12/15/synthetic-surfaces-boast-fewer-catastrophic-breakdowns-than-dirt.aspx
Excellent article. Further confirms the rush to synths little more than a knee jerk reaction by the disingenuous clueless clowns running Cali racing.The marginal benefit in fatal breakdowns vs the enormous cost and huge change to the game not justified.The article does not address the concerns of many trainers/owners regarding injuries sustained on the rug that are not prevalent on dirt.
Sadly,not a word about surfaces better protecting jockeys from ending up dead or crippled for life and what could be done to avoid that going forward.
Mike
Most of these places that run synthetics are more likely to have a higher class horses that are less susceptable to breaking down.
There\'s alot more 7+ year old geldings in their 62nd career start at Penn National than
Also-- the synthetic tracks are, by definition, newer (put in more recently) than the old dirt tracks. There are some people who think the problem is with the base of these tracks, which haven\'t been changed or even worked on for years-- not true of the newer tracks. It will be interesting to see the breakdown rate on the new SA dirt. (Of course, I\'m assuming that they looked at the base while they did this, and it\'s Magna, but still...).
http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-racing/videos/watch/836FE575-551B-44F5-BA56-259E03079831
Nice HD coverage of Z\'s recent appearance.
PS I don\'t see anyone asking Andy to parade around.
TGJB wrote:
\"First of all, just to be clear, anchoring your figures to pars is indeed a problem, but it plays out differently on different circuits. Not that I want to be giving other figure makers more help (Beyer\'s guys clearly went to school on my presentation at the 2004 DRF Expo), but in California, where they have 5 horse fields made up of lots of Cal breds,using pars will inflate your figures, not the other way around. They will come out too good relative to those at a smaller track which has big fields, a deflated claiming structure (5k bottom ranging up to 30k as opposed to 8k ranging to 62,5k in California), and a steady stream of shippers from other tracks. My guess is that is one reason why Ragozin\'s California figures have been screwed up for years (another has to do with 1 turn/2 turn stuff).\"
JB,
Leaving Ragozin out of it for just a second, I think that shrinking figures and par times have botched up Beyer\'s across-generations figure comparisons so badly that he should never even mention how a horse from, say, the 1970s compares to recent horses such as Zenyatta in terms of Beyers. In fact, I think the \"Blogosphere\'s\" (Beyer\'s word) tendency toward such comparisons poisons everything, makes people dumber, and is largely responsible for the uphill climb you have with your \"horses getting faster\" argument.
Here is an example. Beyer wrote the following in his review of the recent Secretariat movie:
\"Years later, when my speed-figure methods had matured, I revisited the data from the day of the 1973 Belmont and tried to produce a figure that would relate to my present-day numbers. I calculated that Secretariat had earned a 139, a figure that no horse after him has ever approached.\"
OK, Beyer gives Secretariat\'s Belmont a 139 and Zenyatta\'s 2008 Del Mar race a 108. Ragozin, on the other hand, has Zenyatta\'s 2008 Del Mar race faster than Secretariat\'s Belmont. Meanwhile, people throw these numbers around as if they ought to matter.
Questions for you, JB:
Should Beyer\'s or Ragozin\'s across-generations figures matter to anybody?
Do you think Beyer knows that his old figures should not be compared to his new figures?
How did Beyer \"go to school\" on your DRF Expo?
1-- No.
2-- Don\'t know, but I have found Andy to be intellectually honest. He\'s not invested to the degree the fundamentalists/fanatics on 11th street are.
3-- They started breaking out more races, noticeably, almost immediately.
Beyer in his third book, published in 1983:
\"When I first encountered this problem [of shrinking figures from the projection method] my figures were shrinking so fast that I could barely compare recent races to ones that had been run two months earlier...Fortunately, the remedy for this problem is a simple one...At the end of each month, I review all the results and compare the figure of each race with the par figure for that class. If I find that the races have been run, on the average, one point slower than par, I will retroactively add one point to all my variants and figures for the month.\"
Beyer in his fourth book, published in 1993:
After explaining that he uses the projection method (as opposed to par times) to make figures, he goes on to show a list of par times based on the figures he made using the projection method (so far, so good), and then he writes:
\"These numbers don\'t have any neat starting point...Inflation and changes in the racing economy affect the value of horses; the ability of $10,000 claimers in 1993 isn\'t exactly the same as $10,000 claimers in 1985, and we want our numbers to be useful from a historical as well as a handicapping perspective--to measure, say, how the current Kentucky Derby winner stacks up against Derby winners of the past.\"
Doesn\'t this sound like someone who:
1: Is aware of the historical pars problem?
2: Should know better than to compare old figures to new ones?
If your point is that there are problems with Beyer figures, you are right, but I\'m really not looking to use this space to help them to get better. And we are far afield.
I would much prefer this space was used for something important. Like what\'s wrong with you-know-who\'s figures...
Who needs figures anyway? Just bet Hollendorfer.
OK, how about this? You be nicer to Zenyatta and I\'ll be meaner to Ragozin.
Nice is a relative term. I think I\'ve been at least fair. I think Andy has too, though I get that you disagree.
i dont mean to stir the pot even more but so many people are puttting z in a legendary status but i dont think she would make a top ten list.. I like her but not the way some people are talking about her
Hey, no more of this making nice crap - let\'s have the mental jousting continue. It\'s both entertaining and illuminating.
Lost Cause Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> i dont mean to stir the pot even more but so many
> people are puttting z in a legendary status but i
> dont think she would make a top ten list.. I like
> her but not the way some people are talking about
> her
I don\'t think a horse has to make the top ten of an arbitrary list to be legendary.
I would consider John Henry a legendary horse, but he probably wouldn\'t make a top ten list of greatest horses.
A great horse wouldn\'t necessarily be legendary. Legendary and great aren\'t the same thing.
Coincidentally, John Henry is the horse that pops to mind when I read all the HOTY posts. When he won HOTY in 1984, both Swale and Slew O\' Gold had probably accomplished more on the racetrack tht year, but John Henry was the fan favorite.
And does anyone regret that choice today?