Talent alone doesn\'t win the Derby. Never has, never will. It takes talent AND foundation, both physical and mental.

A lot of truly talented horses have tried the Derby off three or four lifetime starts: Curlin, Indian Charlie, Congaree, Medaglia d\'Oro, High Limit, Flower Alley, Stephen Got Even, Air Forbes One, Showing Up, etc.

It\'s a pretty impressive list.

And yet none of them could pull it off.

That long, long run down the Churchill backstretch -- coupled with a full field of 20, plus 150,000 screaming people -- demands so much from a horse, takes so much stamina to endure the frenzy of it all. It\'s a very strange and unusual dynamic, and one that I believe requires more foundation than Big Brown could possibly have. I\'ll have no trouble tossing him from the win spot come Derby day.

\"Use the Derby to try and get lucky, you can bet on a 3-1 shot anytime. Try and crush the race. REALLY crush it.\"

Very well said.

Thanks for sharing your findings, Richie.

And thanks to Alm for the biomechanics stuff. Very interesting.

For the record, I\'m not saying Adriano is gonna win the Derby -- I just think it\'s too soon to say he can\'t handle the dirt, given his breeding and youth.

\"I do not care what figure Adriano gets if you try and tell me a horse beaten 20 lengths in the FOY is a Derby contender then all of the above made you delirious.\"

For what it\'s worth, Adriano washed out very badly in the paddock prior to the Fountain of Youth and was rank early the race, his only dirt effort, which took place on an unseasonably warm day. Couple that with the fact that no horse has won from the 12-hole at Gulfstream going 9F, and it\'s not impossible to discard the effort. Truth is, this horse is regally bred for old-fashioned dirt: AP Indy on top, Mr. Prospector dam on the bottom, with a great grand dam who won the Santa Anita Oaks, plus maternal bloodlines that trace back to Bet Twice. What\'s more, Adriano is a May foal -- in other words, a very young 3-year-old -- so he has every right to show further improvement in the coming weeks.

I guess I\'m delirious.

\"It appears you believe winning big races as a trainer is the only entitlement
for anyone to utter greatness upon the essence?\"

I believe that the cream tends to rise to the top in racing, just as it does in other sports. I\'m sure there are exceptions; for all I know, there might be a truly \"great\" trainer at Les Bois Park who\'s just never gotten his/her hands on serious horseflesh and who perhaps doesn\'t have the ambition or people skills to lure ultra-rich owners who can invest in grade A prospects.

But generally speaking, I think great trainers win great races.

Again, just my opinion.

\"Kinda a stretch to compare Street Sense to Harlan\'s Holiday isn\'t it?\"

I think most of us would agree that Street Sense was the superior animal. I was simply talking about getting a horse to peak -- and McPeek definitely didn\'t get Harlan\'s Holiday to peak in the KY Derby; the T-Graph numbers show that he peaked prior to the run for the roses.

\"WP has never done anything other than go wire to wire on a loose lead. He\'s never been behind horses, inside or between horses, banged around hard in traffic, dueled with another quality speed, forced very wide on the first turn going for the lead from an outside post etc...

So what Zito is betting is that giving him all these super easy prep races against extremely weak competition is better than having him ready for that moment in the Derby when he\'s likely to be asked to do several things for the very first time.\"

***

Well said. And we saw how well that worked with he of the 120 Beyer, Bellamy Road.

Interesting questions regarding how we measure greatness, and I appreciate the thought you put into them.

One thing to consider re. horse racing is that there\'s not just one playing field -- there are many. Whereas American baseball has the MLB, basketball has the NBA, and football has the NFL, thoroughbred horseracing has many \"leagues\" -- everything from Breeders Cup races to $2K claimers, Saratoga to Portland Meadows. Which means, it seems to me, that you have to consider both quality and quantity when defining greatness in this game, and that there\'s more to greatness than pure statistics.

Case in point: Russell Baze is the all-time-winningest jockey. But is he the greatest jockey of all time?

Dale Baird is the winningest trainer. Is HE the greatest?

For my money, the very best trainers are the ones who know how to squeeze the proverbial lemon in such a way that they consistently get their horses to peak when they want them to peak -- or in T-Graph parlance, run new tops or pair up -- in the biggest races in the world, when the pressure is intense and the prize enormous. I\'m talking about races like the KY Derby and the Arc.

Compare, for instance, Carl Nafzger\'s handling of Street Sense last year with Ken McPeek\'s handling of Harlan\'s Holiday in 2002. In Nafzger\'s case, he conditioned and managed his charge in such a way that the colt was ready for his best on the first Saturday of May. McPeek, on the other hand, brought an over-the-top hoss to Churchill, having already squeezed Harlan dry in the prep races. That, to me, is the difference between a good trainer and a great trainer.

But again, that\'s just my view, and I respect that others won\'t necessarily agree with me.

Good luck to you.

Lance

\"If someone wants to know who are the great trainers they need only to check the record book for victories and win percentage.\"

So if we\'re applying this logic, would this make Scott Lake and Rick Dutrow  better trainers than Charlie Whittingham and Richard Mandella?

The latter two can\'t approach the win percentages of Lake and Dutrow.

Mike, I think the era of the \"super trainer\" has diminished the importance of serious horsemanship, as has the watering-down effect of super-rich races (Delta Jackpot, anyone?) all over the country.

That said, my opinion that guys like Mott, Drysdale, Shug, etc. are the \"best\" trainers is based on years of observation, years of witnessing their ability to develop a horse and prime him/her for a peak performance when it matters most. Look, for instance, at their Breeders Cup records. (The Breeders Cup is a good example for this discussion, both because it\'s a rich target on a pre-determined date and because surveillance and testing are at their highest.) Shug has 9 wins from 49 tries; almost half his runners have hit the board. Mandella: 6 wins from 26 tries. Drysdale: 6 wins from 33 tries.

My point is this: When these guys have really good horses, they know how to train these animals to get them to peak when it matters most. And when they have mediocre or slow stock, they only win mediocre or slowly run races. A trainer -- at least an oats-and-hay trainer -- can\'t make an animal run any faster than genetics allow, but he CAN control the training regimen such that an animal performs at his very best for a certain race.

That\'s just my opinion, of course. I\'m sure there are flaws in my logic (my wife usually thinks there are) -- but I\'m just telling you how I see it. I\'m more than willing to read and consider wildly different opinions.

Thanks,
Lance

\"It is comical that some believe that a trainer can actually gear a horse up or down when he/she wishes,like with an off/on switch.\"

Tell that to the ghost of Charlie Whittingham.

Maybe I\'m old school and you find my view \"comical,\" but I\'m of the mind that the very best trainers, the oats-and-hay hard boots -- guys like Drysdale, Mott, Nafzger and Mandella -- are indeed capable of getting horses to \"peak\" when they want them to...if things go as planned (weather, injuries, etc.).

Certainly, horses\' form cycles go up and down. But by modulating a horse\'s training regimen, I absolutely believe that a top-flight trainer can condition his charge in such a way that he is ready for his best performance on a designated date. It\'s no different than a human athlete training, say, for a weight-lifting competition. You would structure your workout program over a period of time in such a way that you are ready to lift maximum weight on the day of the competition.

I\'m well invested in this hoss, too -- and I\'m disappointed by the change in plans, because it means he\'ll be heading to Churchill with only four lifetime starts. It seems that every year, some trainer or owner decides that talent is more important than experience and sends a highly regarded colt to the Derby with fewer than five career starts. And every year, the same thing happens: no roses.

Curlin, Indian Charlie, Congaree, Medaglia d\'Oro, High Limit, Flower Alley, Stephen Got Even, Tapit, Air Forbes One, Showing Up, etc.

It\'s a pretty impressive list.

My belief is that when you can count a horses\'s starts on one hand, every race does indeed count and does indeed build foundation and experience, both physically and mentally. I bet this horse in the futures based on a five-race prep schedule. I have the utmost respect for Jerry, and I don\'t know how to answer the interesting question he posed (\"if he ran twice, what two figures would you like to see on his sheet going into the Derby?\"), but I still think Denis needs two more races prior to the Derby. Truthfully, I wish now that I\'d never played him. C\'est la vie.

After his win in the Forego, Baffert said, "I don't think he's a (Breeders' Cup) Sprint horse. Three-quarters might be too short for him. We're just going to absorb this and take it in.\"

And yet here he is, the favorite for the BC Sprint.

People will argue that Midnight Lute was home free after 6F in the Forego -- which is absolutely true -- but that race was run like a 7F race, with moderate early splits and that long run down the backstretch. I\'m betting that a shorter run down the backstretch, faster early fractions and a full field will beat the heavy fave in this year\'s race -- just as these factors conspired to beat other low-priced, come-from-behind 7F types like Birdonawire, Aldebaran, Rubiano, etc.

Glad you enjoyed it, Miff. Youtube is actually a surprisingly good resource for dredging up old racing videos.

\"Once again on the check I have absolutely no idea what you\'re talking about.\"

It\'s when Dave Johnson comments about SS being \"in tight quarters.\" It looks to me like PVal snatches SS back. Maybe not. Whatever the case, you\'re right -- great race, two great horses. We all see the world through our own eyes, which is one of the fun things about racing: my opinion/analysis versus yours...let\'s bet on it.

Have a good week.