.. that all the credit will go to D.Wayne Lukas when all the credit shoud go to Ms. LeRoux (sic)for STOPPING Azeri when she did. A brilliant move!!!!!!! Thanks for saving a great horse!!!
Yes you can add one more Horse of the Year to The Kings training resume. I\'m sure she will race next at Churchill Downs on Ky Oaks Day--terrible thing for racing isn\'t it. Her name will sure look good on his Board that sits on the side of the Kings personal barn at CD, right next to all his Ky Derby and KY Oaks winners.
At least The King waited until she actually won a race before being given all the credit he so rightfully deserves. Unlike Baffert who had War Emblem in his barn for a week, had yet to even run for him, and declared the horse HIS Best Training Job Yet.
Incidentally I think you Baffert lovers out there can tear up those WimbleDONE Derby Futures tickets. We will see what happens next week with (a)Constipate and (b)Pukkin. The thought of either one of those winning and immediately being declared the Derby Favorite like WimbleDONE was, makes me feel like, well you pick between A or B.
Silver\'s right. I\'m not a D Wayne fan but let\'s be honest, most of us expected her to crash and burn today. Why not just give him his due for a great training job? IMHO this ranks as one of the best turnaround jobs of his career. Let\'s hope she holds together long enough on take on the boys.
He was hit bad and listing heavily to the dusty street, but he got off a snap shot and came up with a big one. But lets be real she really isn\'t his horse and I still have to wonder if she\'d been in his care all along whether she\'d even be running today. I tend to think not. The other thing is Laura thought she had some issues. It may just have been that Azeri was so good to Laura she decided it was time to retire her. Course, thats not really Laura\'s decision to make. But I do know that if Azeri really does have some issues D.Wayne is just the guy to break down a horse over them and with any kind of poor luck it will do much more than end her career.
As for his nickname...I\'m not sure a monarch nick is appropriate at this point. With those sunglasses I think \"The Actor\" might be more accurate. Remember James Coburn in the HBO flick \"DUEL\". Thats the kind of character Lukas has more in common with.
What about these preps? No one wants to stand up and say \"I\'m the one\"...lol I\'ve picked a very tough year to try and win my third Derby in a row. If I can do it I\'ll need a commendation of some kind. I think a nick change showing honor would be in order...something along the lines of \"Chuckles the Magnificent Clown\"...lol I looked real hard at Castledale I had a funny feeling but I couldn\'t bet him to win. I thought I saw distance limitation. I wound up not betting and its a good thing. I probably wouldn\'t have bet him with Imperialism.
And what about Pollard\'s Vision? That race doesn\'t look bad to me. I remember another Carson City that could go some ground...Flying Chevron. Least I think he was a Carson City.
Lastly, that obviously wasn\'t Wimbledon or St. Averil\'s race whether they can run a good one on May 1st with that last under their belt is the question. They went in 1:49 and change Dynever went in 1:48 and could have carved half a second off that.
CtC
Post Edited (04-03-04 21:53)
Great Post.
Hopefully I\'ll see you next week. Not you CTC, though maybe one of these days, who knows.
Seriously.
And for those of you who think Catalins post is a plant, not true haven\'t seen or talked with Catalin in at least six weeks (which is way to long)--since Pittsburgh was at Gulfstream.
Post Edited (04-03-04 21:48)
You guys just will not admit that women are better trainers.........
i think that was wimbledon\'s race. dosage around 5.0...... he\'s not going a real strong 9f yet, probably never..... RHT only ran about a length or so slower than dynever, and dynever is certainly one of the best older horses around (2nd or 3rd best???). don\'t give on RHT yet, although if 20 owners want to go to the derby, the DQ probably cost him a spot (in graded stks money earned).
Dynever went wide for home too. He would have beat the S.A. Derby field by 6-8 lengths. Rock Hard raised his game, but Wimbledon and St. Averil ran 1:51:14 and 1:51:34 respectively. That certainly wasn\'t their race. Castledale won and Imperialism has a stride you just can\'t interrupt, so I\'m not sure the results of the S.A. Derby reveal as much as one might hope. Actually I believe it further clouds the picture. The early consensus was the West Coasters weren\'t up to the others. Its been intersting and the sorting out has been educational.
The Derby outcome is very much in doubt. To this point it reminds me of 1974 when none of the propects rose above in the preps. It was a 23 horse field that year.
What I\'m fearing right now is that Read the Footnotes or Friends Lake wins this thing on the train up. If they do...the preps next year are gonna get even more hard to guage...lol
P.S. Revisiting the Castledale issue, I\'m due for a reprimand. He was by an Arc winner who was out of an Alydar mare. His dam sire won at 12 marks. I knew the dam sire part I got lost on the European part of the breeding. I think I would have pulled the trigger had I studied the pedigree pre race.
CtC
Post Edited (04-04-04 09:59)
Silver Charm I hope your correct about Lukas running Azeri next on Ky Oaks Day, because that means most likely she will face Sightseek and Frankel WHO WILL CRUSH THE BOTH OF THEM.
I have said before Lukas is finished and is going down the toilet, and quite frankly Silver Charm, I hope he takes YOU WITH HIM.
Post Edited (04-04-04 14:45)
Kimmel Factor wrote:
> Silver Charm I hope your correct about Lukas running Azeri next
> on Ky Oaks Day, because that means most likely she will face
> Sightseek and Frankel WHO WILL CRUSH THE BOTH OF THEM.
>
> I have said before Lukas is finished and is going down the
> toilet, and quite frankly Silver Charm, I hope he takes YOU
> WITH HIM.
>
lol...I don\'t think Silver Charm really likes Da Coach...I think he just likes to stir the pot. Da Coach had his run though...you gotta give him credit for having the coconuts to bluff and bluster his way to the top and never give a thought to the all the money he burned along the way. For the most part the people in this game that win Derbys in the new \"Buy em and win it\" era have money to burn and Lukas realized it. He tapped into it cause it was there. If he was an attorney he\'d of been a divorce lawyer sucking on the pain of his clients. The money is there and it has to be divied up and thats where he accels. It was a numbers game for him and thats why he always pointed to the money won. He knew where he was talent wise. I could have trained as many Juvenile winners with his horseflesh.
You do have to give him a certain amount of credit for the four Derby winners. He did break three of them down on the track, but he also won it four times so that counts for something. I don\'t think he can play the crank on em all til the soundest and fastest survive the training. He just doesn\'t have the numbers anymore. I\'m still afraid of him, but I realize for every good horse he had he bought ten that didn\'t pan out. Now he doesn\'t have the clients to buy the dozen. He\'s gonna have to do it the old fashioned way, but he\'s still got Overbrook to my knowledge and they breed good horses there.
CtC
D Wayne does his best work when he acts as a TRAINER and not as a CEO. One of his problems has been spreading himself too thin and having to rely on his assistants (who seem to change every few years) to do the training (see Baffert). When he decides to really train a horse hands-on (Tabasco Cat, Thunder Gulch, Cat Thief, Azeri, etc.) he really can a horse around. As Mall suggested to me maybe he\'ll be the king of the reclamation projects.
But I\'d still love to figure out why EVERY other horse is his barn is running way off their tops.
That\'s two in a row SA Derby for Mullins. How do you play him Derby Day?
Post Edited (04-04-04 21:19)
i have been a fan of friends lake since last year, but take a look at Ats from last year or two years ago...... looks like the exact same horse. think a late run for 4th or 5th is in the cards............. i agree with you, dynever could have won that race by open lengths, but if you look at the charts he didn\'t run that much faster than RHT...... good luck.....