There were 70,000 showing up regardless.
There were another 50,000 coming to see him win.
There were 1,000 coming to see bet against, but still hoping to see history.
There are a dozen that pontificate about the fact he scratched a day early before they made their \"score.\"

trackjohn Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> As well as those of us who were betting against
> him!


Nothing personal, but I just can\'t stand it when someone invariably jumps up in situations such as this to make a ridiculous statement about \"missing an opportunity to bet against\".  Everone on this board knows what poor value IHA\'s odds represented in the Belmont, but it doesn\'t make you look smart to lament the \"lost opportunity\" of pushing a couple hundred through the window on other horses. The entire sport is sucking gas and taking shots left and right, so think outside your bubble for 10 seconds.

If you recall, they were seriously talking like they were going to go to the Derby from the Fantasy.  Clearly something was amiss for them to basically park it and not work, then skip the Fantasy and abandon Derby hopes.  That sure isn\'t a lot of work in between.  For what it\'s worth, she\'s dragging her exercise rider around every morning looking like one that\'s wanting more.  Fast but an underlay.

Leparoux has been on Rags

Driving me nuts til I get the seminar and the data for both days.   I just happened to have the Brisnet\'s saved from the BC day that had the spring stats.

Last spring meet at 9f:

15 Races
------Rail--------- 1-3---------4-7---------- 8+
IV----1.04--------- 1.21--------.58-------- 1.75
%Win--13%---------- 16% --------7%---------  17%
I believe the spring was off because of the heavy rains during Derby week, which killed the rail for a stretch.

Fall meet
8 Races
------Rail--------- 1-3---------4-7---------- 8+
IV----2.03--------- 1.02--------1.06-------- .78
%Win--25%---------- 12% --------13%---------  8%

covelj70 Wrote:
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> I have gotten no fewer than 10 calls or messages
> from people today about how great Union Rags
> looked and trained this morning.  A bunch from
> people who were there and then some second hand.
>
> This makes it so tough for me because on one hand,
> he\'s no faster than a bunch of others and I really
> don\'t think he\'s going to get the trip he needs
> (i.e. clean so that he doesn\'t get stopped but not
> too wide).  
>
> On the other hand, last time I ignored some of the
> same people who told me how great he looked was
> when they told me how great Big Brown looked
> before his Derby win.  I stubbornly played against
> him on the bounce theory and the post and
> subsequetly tore up all my tickets.
>
> If he breezes tomorrow like he galloped today,
> this horse will be 4-1 and I just don\'t know what
> to do about that.

Our steam horse worked fast and willingly, but he curiously wore front wraps in his work this am. hmmmmmmmmmmmm

Appreciate your work here.  I\'d be interested to see who it is if you have it handy.  I don\'t mind looking myself, but if you have it handy, please share.  It\'s one thing for the 30-1 + outsiders to backup, but it\'s another for horses among the top 5 betting interests.

Agree that you shouldn\'t put too much emphasis, but it is an interesting exercise, and one that has certainly gained more popularity over the past decade since everyone can now go watch everything on the internet.  15 years ago all you had was word of mouth unless you spent 3 weeks in Louisville, so there is clearly an entirely new audience looking at these things.

Now you obviously can\'t make a slow horse fast enough (except for Giacomo), but with developing 3yo\'s who are prepped differently than 20 years ago, it has become a valuable tool for making judgements positively and negatively when looking to fill out the verticals.  The buzz horses from the rail last year were Shackleford and Animal Kingdom.  I also think of the way Street Sense, Barbaro, and Rachel were unbelievable in their final works, signaling that they were ready to validate themselves.  And remember Bluegrass Cat showing mixed signals on paper, but blossoming right up to Derby Day and making the trifecta go boom.  

On the Negative side, Ice Box and Nehro may have thrown everyone off, but others like Friesan Fire, Dunkirk, and Brother Derek were taking money and not looking the part.

I\'m thinking the obvious comparison to Curlin, who also didn\'t run at 2, and ran very fast, very early at 3.  If I recall, Curlin twice paired around 0, including a 10 length romp in the Ark Derby 3 wks before KD.  He then ran a nice 3rd behind a big Street Sense effort.

They don\'t do dime supers on track on Derby day.  It\'s hard to get the temp tellers to handle an exacta wheel.  If they started taking dime supers, you\'d have to place all your bets before noon.

Call me crazy, but I think they don\'t want Hansen too keen like he was in the Holy Bull.  He\'s already run off once on two week\'s rest, so maybe this is one of those who just does better with more racing.  It was the norm 10 years ago.