First time synthetic

[aceriley63]

I hate to redboard, but there may be a learning opportunity here. I scored a heavy Win bet on Facts Matter in the last at Golden Gate on Sunday. He won and paid $15.20, a nice \"get well\" bet for me. To be honest, the reason I bet him was that I met the original owner at Angels Stadium in my season tickets section before his debut and he advised me this was a promising colt. This was back in 2017. I followed the horse for a while and maybe bet him lightly a few times, and then he descended into the claiming ranks, getting claimed a couple of times. I stopped tracking him but on Sunday he\'d been off for quite a while after several claiming wins but then a miserable performance on the No Cal fair circuit. Sunday he was going first time synthetic with very competitive numbers on dirt previously, running off this layoff for a pretty successful trainer that had claimed him back. My score was blind luck because I remembered the horse from meeting his owner in a fleeting moment at an MLB game; but the pattern might be something to take note of?

[Edgorman]

I have also had much success betting horses three years after meeting the owner.
It’s a great angle.

[TempletonPeck]

If my memory serves me, JB discussed something similar in a seminar for one of the SA Breeders\' Cups ages ago, the \"Poly Pop,\" I think.

The gist, from what (little!) I remember, was about what you describe: a horse who runs frequently on dirt sometimes jumps forward in their first try on an artificial surface. Can\'t recall more detail, sorry.

Try the 2008 or 2009 BC seminar.

[billk5300s]

Being in the Chicago area I’ve used to dirt to poly angle along with horses for courses.  Some horses love poly.  If Rivelli is training them they don’t even need to like poly, they’ll still run negative numbers at 3/5.

[TGJB]

It happens more often going in the other direction, probably because we breed dirt horses.

[TempletonPeck]

Now I\'m really glad I put in the caveats about my memory!

[bluechip21]

2018 Belmont Stakes - Gronkowski got the poly pop. Between the \"poly pop\", the 6-9 exacta, and being a patriots fan... to this day I still can\'t figure out why I didnt bet that exacta.