We need to be careful about applying statistics to Orb

[SoCalMan2]

covelj70 Wrote:
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> I totally appreciate that you aee considering all
> angles but since you are, you have to think about
> the fact that his 2 neg was at a mile and a
> sixteenth and he may not want those extra panels.
>
>
> I know JB doesn\'t distinguish between the 1 1/16
> and 1 3/16ths but I sure do
>
> Orb\'s 2 negatives were at 1 1/8th and 1 1/4.  That
> means alot relative to how I think about the
> figures

I am not so sure how you decide that Itsmyluckyday is distance challenged. He did run a \"1\" going 9 full panels after a 9 week layoff.  Yes, his derby figure stank, but his number stank every step of the way...I cannot say his derby issue was the distance.  If you look at his sheet, and ignore his turf and muddy races and the bullring race, you all of a sudden have a horse who runs all his best races routing.  Maybe you are right that he is distance challenged, I am not a student of pedigree.  But looking at his sheet, there is not enough evidence to me to say he has distance issues.  However, it is possible that his big figs did knock him out and this is just too soon to get back to there.

[covelj70]

I certainly don\'t know for sure if the distance is the issue and it could be the big figure that knocked him out but I believe that there is a big difference in a 1 1/16 and 1 1/8 let alone 1 3/16th and those extra panel(s) seperate alot of horses.

He\'s a tremendously talented horse so he may be able to run a \"1\" going  1 1/8th even though that\'s not his best game but nothing he\'s done to this point suggests that he will run his best figure going this long.  

Again, anything can happen and it\'s absolutely great to consider every angle for a longshot against a heavy heavy fav so like Vito, you are doing what I probably should be doing more of in this case but I just don\'t see anything in what this horse has done in his longer races to suggest that he\'s going to run the best race of his life at this distance on Saturday and that\'s what it would take to win

[SoCalMan2]

covelj70 Wrote:
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> I certainly don\'t know for sure if the distance is
> the issue and it could be the big figure that
> knocked him out but I believe that there is a big
> difference in a 1 1/16 and 1 1/8 let alone 1
> 3/16th and those extra panel(s) seperate alot of
> horses.
>
> He\'s a tremendously talented horse so he may be
> able to run a \"1\" going  1 1/8th even though
> that\'s not his best game but nothing he\'s done to
> this point suggests that he will run his best
> figure going this long.  
>
> Again, anything can happen and it\'s absolutely
> great to consider every angle for a longshot
> against a heavy heavy fav so like Vito, you are
> doing what I probably should be doing more of in
> this case but I just don\'t see anything in what
> this horse has done in his longer races to suggest
> that he\'s going to run the best race of his life
> at this distance on Saturday and that\'s what it
> would take to win


When you say best race of his life, are you suggesting he needs to run a NEW top to have a chance?  The way I see it, this horse has already run two figures good enough to win.  He doesn\'t have to run a new top....he just needs to get back to where he was.  To me, there is a big difference in that respect. I think it is definitely better than 50% chance that Orb goes backwards (and I do not think Vito\'s estimation of 70% is unreasonable).  A big problem I have is there is still a reasonable chance that he goes backwards but still runs well enough to win.  The allure of Itsmyluckyday is that if he can return to where he was, then Orb has much less breathing room for how far he can go back and still win.

I take all your points about distance, and Itsmyluckyday may well prove the distance is an issue.  I am just saying it is not proven yet (and I see evidence suggesting he might handle the distance) and if there is enough price there, it may be worth the risk.

[covelj70]

SoCal,

All totally valid and thoughtful points and they may well wind up making you very wealthy on Saturday night!

when I am able to see a horse physically, I gauge their likelihood of bouncing not by the numbers but my eye and absolutely nothing I see here says this guy will bounce but that\'s why they put them in the gate, there\'s every chance that my view is way off here.

btw, great discussions on this board this week, this is all great stuff.

funny that the pre-preakness chatter is so much better than the pre-derby chatter but I ain\'t complaining.

thanks again for all of the great thoughts

[SoCalMan2]

On TGI -- Lawyer Ron is a full point better over a mile than under a mile. Itsmyluckyday definitely has a bigger spread than that (although in fairness, he has not run a sprint since he was a baby). This TGI is one piece of evidence suggesting at least the top half of Itsmyluckyday\'s pedigree is not distance challenged.

[Perfect Drift]

I don\'t think the FuPeg comparison is usable here.  Pimlico was an off track that day, which is currently being used as an excuse for other horses in the 2013 Derby. You could just as easily argue he was beaten by the track and trip:

Pinched back at the start, was kept to the outside while going five wide into the first turn, raced in the middle of the pack while well off the rail along the backstretch, continued five wide while making a mild move when asked for run midway on the turn, drifted in a bit nearing the 3/16 pole, then weakened a bit while holding for the place.

Thorogaph has him 5w5w just like the chart and he only regressed 3/4 point.

[mjellish]

Lawyer Ron still a young sire.  Small sample.  Can\'t really say one way or the other yet, although I have a sneaky suspicion that his offspring will be more the miler type than the classic distance type.  If I am remembering correctly I think Lawyer Ron once worked a mile in 1:33 and change, which is pretty much unheard of.

Orb in the #1 post.  They, meaning the racing gods or whatever, never make it easy.  He may not be in his comfort zone early even with 2 speed horses breaking right outside of him.  

On the plus side he handled the 1 post in the FOY just fine, and he handled being in tight on the first turn and getting shuffled back in his ALWN1X race and still came on much better than most do at Gulfstream at 1 1/8th.  But if he gets race ridden here you never know...

[antonico]

Don\'t think Allday was with the Red Bullet team.

Steve Allday gave a local radio interview years ago for the Churchill Downs Radio Network, via telephone, not long before the controversy surrounding his clients began to surface. In that interview he did say he came from a harness racing background as a vet, and had no designs to move into the thoroughbred world. He hails from Southern Ohio, and was still living there at the time of this interview. His very first venture into caring for thoroughbreds was in 1993 - and the very first thoroughbred trainer to hire him was....Neil Drysdale. Allday stated that the very first thoroughbred he worked on was Hollywood Wildcat, owned by Irv & Marge Cowan, whose 3 year old season was a kind of scorched earth devastation of fillies in Southern California. Further into the interview he said that in the winter of 1999/2000, Drysdale called him and told him he had two horses he thought were good enough to be Derby type horses and he needed Allday\'s help to get them to Churchill Downs: Fusaichi Pegasus and War Chant (also owned by the Cowans and was actually a son of Hollywood Wildcat, ironically enough). That they did so well in the run-up to that year\'s Derby is now history. I don\'t know where you get the information that Allday was with the Stronach team at that time (he certainly was a couple of years earlier when Pat Byrne had all the Stronach horses), but it seems he had moved on by the time of Red Bullet. It seems as though Allday was in cahoots with Pat Byrne specifically, who took over as personal Stronach trainer in 1998 after Byrne had his spectacular 1997 with Favorite Trick and Countess Diana. But Red Bullet was not trained by Byrne - he was trained by Joe Orseno. Byrne had parted ways with Stronach well before then, and evidently Allday also deserted Stronach then too. So according to Allday himself, his association at that time was with his old friend Drysdale, seeing as they went back a few years before that. To the issue at hand, Drysdale apparently held on to Allday all through 2000. After Fusaichi Pegasus was syndicated for a huge sum, War Chant began to get his act together that fall. That strecth run of his to land the 2000 BC Mile is something I don\'t think I\'ve seen anything match it, and it no doubt had the Allday Assistance behind it. If I\'m not far off on the timeline, it was shortly after the close of 2000 (no one stays with Drysdale long, given how difficult his personality is reputed to be), Allday turned up at Frankel\'s barn - and apparently they had a long arrangement together. But all that said, Allday basically tells it that he was in the Drysdale camp at the time of Fusaichi Pegasus\'s run through that year\'s Triple Crown.

I don\'t know if an internet search will turn up that interview again, but it\'s worth a listen if anyone finds it.