The Wood

[pgsheets]

It\'s been awhile since I\'ve posted here, but all the talk about this weekends\' preps has got my blood starting to boil. This will likely be lenghty.

Does the term perfect trip mean anything to anyone with regards to Master David ?  Lets see, he saves ground the entire trip, sits 5th behind a 4 horse duel into the turn, waits for an opening on the rail and gets lucky when Value plus backs out, he twice bumps a resurgent Eddington ( more on him later )once outside the 1/16th and again just inside, and is then fortunate that the wire shows up in time.  Improvement 2nd back off the gap in Louisville ? Don\'t bet on it.

Now Tapit.
Last from the start, he saves ground first turn,  advances easily to be 7th while 4 wide into the turn, angles down to the 2-3 path midway on the turn, is steadied briefly inside the 1/16 pole and is up in time.  To correct the person who claims he was not hit inside the 1/16 pole,  please watch the race and have all 10 fingers ready to count whips inside the 1/16.  Only in the last 2-3 jumps does Ramon put it away.  Pretty dreamy in my book.  Was the rail especially good that day ? Perhaps, but Tapits\' race is the classic case of a closer getting it all his way and looking brilliant while doing it.

Eddington was clearly the superior animal in this year\'s Wood.
Breaking alertly and 3-4 wide into and throughout the 1st turn, Eddi moved into the 47 half and advanced 4 wide the entire turn.   His 24 second quarter mile getting him to 3/4\'s in 1:11 3/5 was accomplished running as wide as possible.  (Jerry was effectively repeating his losing ride aboard Cigar in the Breeder\'s Cup at Woodbine.) Bailey did get him to change leads earlier than in his MSW and Alw1x wins. Did anyone else notice that uppon reaching the 1/8 pole and having changed leads 4 strides prior, Bailey hit him just once left handed until they reached the 1/16 pole.  That\'s 1/16 of a mile without asking for his best.  During that time, MD rallied under furious right and left hand whipping to gain a half length lead on Eddington.  Upon seeing Tapit looming large to his right, Bailey began to hit Eddi right handed and the horse cut the margin to a nose at the wire.  I\'m betting that TGB will have the best fig for Eddi and from any other means of evaluating the race, pace, trip, etc, Eddington was best.
Now, all I need is to get the rats that don\'t belong to not enter : Action This Day, Minister Eric, St. Averil, Birdstone, etc.
If he\'s in, he wins.
Also, track variants and conditions aside,  all three races had similiar pace scenarios and similiar final times.  Was Lion Heart or Smarty Jones 4 wide the entire length of both turns ? Were they part of multiple horse duels ?  As for TCE, he clearly benefitted from an excessively fast early race and actually was dropped down to the rail midway on the far turn.  Lion Heart ran the best race.
I\'m I wrong, or was SJ\'s -3 the fastest early 3 year old number ever recorded ? Am I the only one who thinks he may have trouble jogging a 1 1/4 miles after that Rebel effort coupled with his Arkansa win.
Finally, Borego was unable to make up any real ground on the staggering leader. Borego\'s final 3/8\'s was in a less than earthshattering 37 3/5\'s considering he too saved ground throughout.  The extra 1/4 is the last thing he wants.  No threat at CD.

Thanks for your time.

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

I always enjoy reading a trip handicappers perspective of a race and yours was insightful and interesting. I have to assume that you have been looking at replays. Where are you viewing them?

The other point you seem to be making is that J.D. ain\'t the magician everyone seems to think he is. I\'ll vouch for that.

Regards

CtC



Post Edited (04-13-04 14:32)

[pgsheets]

I have them on tape.  The past 3 are available at DRF.com but the size is small and detail is difficult to decipher.
I\'m actually a sheet guy for many years, Rag in the 80\'s and 90\'s, TG for the past 3 or so. I have made a concerted effort this to spend time actually handicapping races and studying results.
I became a huge Eddington watching his races.
My significant Pool 3 wager looks in serious jepoardy.  I believe due in most part to Bailey and his over confidence and what appeared to be a desire to save horse. Great move.  Never did like him much.

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

Sorry about your future, I know about taking it on the chin in those. He may yet get in. I hope he does. He\'s a big beautiful horse with a nice long and balanced stride and he does give you the impression, even in defeat, that he\'s got plenty of gas left in the tank.

I think the graded earnings threshold kind of snuck up on the trainers this year. At least with everyone but TGJB...lol

If anyone is poised to hit the future bet its TGJB. He has the best figures and has them immediately. He has the statistics for how a sires offspring develope from 2 to 3 to 4 and he keeps the records of the mares that throw these foals and he knows if the thrown foals were precocious at 2 and how they developed at 3 and 4. And he knows his patterns after years of pouring over them. Plus he\'s a good handicapper. But he should be the king of the future bet and I\'m fairly sure he is.

I may reconsider my futures betting. I\'ll never go in the co-mingle pool again, but I don\'t think I can compete with T-Graph on this. Hell, I know I can\'t.

CtC

[pgsheets]

He is some kind of gorgeous. Maybe too big right now for his own good.  I think he\'s a monster waiting to happen.
I did some digging on his pedigree and found that he has the magical mare Somethingroyal appearing on BOTH sides of his dam, Fashion Star, five generations back.
His 2nd dam is Miss Ivor who is the daughter of Sir Ivor who is the son of Sir Gaylord. Sir Gaylord is out of Somethingroyal which makes him a half, of course, to Secretariat.  
Eddington\'s dam is the daughter of Chief\'s Crown.  CC is out of Six Crowns who is a daughter of Secretariat.
Eddington is destined for greatness

[Michael D.]

hey phil,
great post on eddy. i was absolutely positive that eddy would fly right by VP in the stretch in the wood (despite being a huge jr/pletcher fan). i was pretty sure i knew what MD was going to do (and he did it), and i was a bit confused about Tap, but i didn\'t think he had the class the battle eddy. even after losing my bet, i still think eddy was by far the best horse in the race. you hit it perfect: the horse left at least two or three lengths on the race track. i blame henning a bit more than bailey (and come on, let\'s not all talk about the cigar BC loss, while ignoring the few wins bailey had on that animal before that). i\'m not sure how the horse would have reacted if bailey had started wacking him right after he changed leads (which didn\'t come that easy again, you will be able to see it better when kentuckyderby.com gets the race on line). the horse might have gone right back to his original lead. this is all stuff henning needs to get worked out in the morning. i mean, the guy has had a ton of talent in his barn over the lest few years, and he never seems to get the most out of it...... was just looking at the list, and i think eddy has a decent chance to get in. just need baffert to take one of his three pigs out of the mix, one or two of the speedballs to defect, and no new faces coming out of the kee race this saturday. i think the two best horses, RHT and eddy, just might slip in. good luck with the futures bet. i was all over eddy at 19-1, then he slipped to 16-1, and finally closes at 13-1 (so i just passed). if he gets in, i guess he is around 8-1 to 10-1, so think the bet might still work out.

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

pgsheets wrote:

> He is some kind of gorgeous. Maybe too big right now for his
> own good.  I think he\'s a monster waiting to happen.
> I did some digging on his pedigree and found that he has the
> magical mare Somethingroyal appearing on BOTH sides of his dam,
> Fashion Star, five generations back.
> His 2nd dam is Miss Ivor who is the daughter of Sir Ivor who is
> the son of Sir Gaylord. Sir Gaylord is out of Somethingroyal
> which makes him a half, of course, to Secretariat.  
> Eddington\'s dam is the daughter of Chief\'s Crown.  CC is out of
> Six Crowns who is a daughter of Secretariat.
> Eddington is destined for greatness

I believe in studying pedigree also, once the horse has shown he can run. You probably already know of this site. In the chance you don\'t here it is:

http://www.pedigreequery.com/index.php?query_type=horse&search_bar=horse&h=EDDINGTON3&g=5&inbred=Standard&x2=n&pedloggedin=0

All the pedigree in the \"Family Tree\" is linkable. If you want an extended view of a particular branch in the tree, you just click on the name of the ancestor. The other invaluable feature is the \"Reports\" drop down menu on the top left of horse pedigree. The drop down has a \"Progeny\" option. If you click on it you will get a rundown of the \"get\" of that particular horse. I find this a good tool for scrutinizing a horses dam and what she\'s already produced. You can run it for a sire too and get an extensive list.

Fashion Star is remotely familiar to me. Did Vinnie Blengs train her? I don\'t know why I think that? But the horse has good blood in it. Even the direct tail female that is argueably weaker has Your Host and Limelight which are sources of some stamina.

I always thought a lot of Six Crowns. Thats a powerful punch there. Two Triple Crowns...lol Baffert had one of hers named Tribunal who you may recall. He just couldn\'t quite get over the hump is all.

[pgsheets]

Thanks.
I can\'t imagine anyone having better coverage than what I\'ve seen, but I will look.
I must have watched his previous 4 races over 20 times each.  I even got to counting bushes at GP to gage the timing of the lead changes. 10 bushes from the finish line ( the 13th bush from the line is the 1/8 pole ) in his defeat to Shaniko, 9 bushes in his MSW win, 8 bushes in his ALW1x win,  no change in the Gotham.  When he changed that early in the Wood, I was sure he would win.  Bailey did wait 4 strides after the change to hit him once.  I think he thought he had a top 2 placing wrapped up, but under any circumstance, a 1/16 of a mile ( actually 1 full stride short of a 1/16 ) in a crucial Grade 1 is a long time to go  It looked as though Eddi was waiting for a cue to keep going. Notice him finishing well up through the wire. I simply don\'t see any other horse finishing his last 1/8 the way I think Eddi will.
The head-on replay also shows the bumping incidents that cost him momentum.  Watch closely just outside the 1/16,  you\'ll see the horse making up ground, hesitate slightly, start rolling again, only to hesitate once more just inside the pole, start rolling by and the wire comes.

[pgsheets]

Yes, she was Blengs.  A 92 foal, she was more of a grass horse I think.

[pgsheets]

Thanks for the link.  I wasn\'t familiar with the site,  but will visit often now.
No more digging into this book and that....

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

no problem

one other thing I like to look at is at the top of the page for a horse you will see something that looks like the letter \"I\" within a circle. I think that stands for \"Information\". Click on it and you\'ll get a summary. The other icon is picture of the particular horse.

whats really kewl is you can trace all the way back to the Byerley Turk, Goldolphin Arabian and the other who I forget. Its kind of a kick.

Heres one for stamina adherents..\"St. Simon\" Undefeated, untied, un scored upon. 10 starts, 10 wins. 3 at over 2.5 miles...lol  He probably couldn\'t win a Derby today. But I\'d be willing to bet none of todays runners could beat him at 20 marks. http://www.pedigreequery.com/index.php?query_type=horse&search_bar=horse&h=ST+SIMON

CtC



Post Edited (04-13-04 16:29)