Derby views from a Ragozin user

[big18741]

Ctc

Those Keeneland works are up on their website for everyone to see.

I agree he\'s the Winstar rabbit.If I\'m wrong,what about the neck and kidney sweat on a cool morning? How\'s he gonna look heading to the gate on Saturday?

[TGJB]

There are some interesting \"differences\" between TG and Rags on the Derby horses, and if I get some time I\'ll address them. But on the Blue Grass and Miff\'s point-- it looks like they did the opposite of what Miff thought they did, and it\'s crazy.

What they basically did was to declare (correctly) that it was what we call an \"S. Pace\", a race where the pace is so slow that the final time is affected-- they just can\'t make up the lost time, and the final time is slower than it should have been. In those cases you have to throw out the time and just do the race off the horses figure histories and their relationship at the wire, after taking into account lengths beaten, ground, and weight. That\'s how all the serious figure makers (TG, Beyer, TimeForm) do it.

But here\'s the thing. After declaring the race \"S. Pace\", Ragozin gave two of the horses in the race-- Teuflesberg and Dominican-- big new tops.

How does that work, exactly? You decide the race would have gone faster, so you don\'t use the final time and do it off the horses, but you give 30% of the horses in the race (or more, I only have the ones coming back in the Derby) big new tops? Huh?

What they did, it looks like, was to both declare it S. Pace AND tie it to the next race, which was the one that featured an even crazier pace (1:18:23 6f), which meant you had to adjust it even more. They tied two S. Pace races together, which is completely nuts. The whole point of those S. Paces is that you CAN\'T use the final time.

Having said all that a couple of points. First, given the circumstances of the Blue Grass, when it comes to Street Sense, I wouldn\'t take his figure seriously unless it had been terrible, or huge, for which he would have had to win by ten, which was pretty much impossible under the circumstances. I think it\'s basically irrelevant to reading him whether it\'s a forward move, backward move, or pair.

Second, despite the differences in our figures and Len\'s, it looks like users of both data will be playing mostly the same group of horses, unfortunately. At least I would be-- from the comments of some posters here I\'m wondering if they are looking at the same sheets I\'m looking at for the seminar.

[miff]

TGJB,

Don\'t exactly know how Beyer/Hopkins handled the race but they have it slower than Rags(translated) with mainly regressions.Have not seen TG BG figs yet.

Your excellent point on the new Sheet tops just highlights the sometimes total disregard for what happens really on the track, on occasion. Of course anyone who follows the game could see that 30% of the runners in the BG ran their BEST race ever.I\'d put that square box you sometimes use to denote a race to difficult to evaluate before having the moxey to suggest that any BG runner ran a new top, thats playing God.


Anyone using the BG figs as part of a \"pattern\" read is taking an enormous leap of faith, imo.The BG was a nice leisurely workout with a quick finish for the top 5.

Mike

[Michael D.]

TGJB Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There are some interesting \"differences\" between
> TG and Rags on the Derby horses, and if I get some
> time I\'ll address them. But on the Blue Grass and
> Miff\'s point-- it looks like they did the opposite
> of what Miff thought they did, and it\'s crazy.
>
> What they basically did was to declare (correctly)
> that it was what we call an \"S. Pace\", a race
> where the pace is so slow that the final time is
> affected-- they just can\'t make up the lost time,
> and the final time is slower than it should have
> been. In those cases you have to throw out the
> time and just do the race off the horses histories
> and their relationship at the wire, after taking
> into account lengths beaten, ground, and weight.
> That\'s how all the serious figure makers (TG,
> Beyer, TimeForm) do it.
>
> But here\'s the thing. After declaring the race \"S.
> Pace\", Ragozin gave two of the horses in the
> race-- Teuflesberg and Dominican-- big new tops.
>
> How does that work, exactly? You decide the race
> would have gone faster, so you don\'t use the final
> time and do it off the horses, but you give 30% of
> the horses in the race (or more, I only have the
> ones coming back in the Derby) big new tops? Huh?
>
> What they did, it looks like, was to both declare
> it S. Pace AND tie it to the next race, which was
> the one that featured an even crazier pace
> (1:18:23 6f), which meant you had to adjust it
> even more. They tied two S. Pace races together,
> which is completely nuts. The whole point of those
> S. Paces is that you CAN\'T use the final time.
>
> Having said all that a couple of points. First,
> given the circumstances of the Blue Grass, when it
> comes to Street Sense, I wouldn\'t take his figure
> seriously unless it had been terrible, or huge,
> for which he would have had to win by ten, which
> was pretty much impossible under the
> circumstances. I think it\'s basically irrelevant
> to reading him whether it\'s a forward move,
> backward move, or pair.
>
> Second, despite the differences in our figures and
> Len\'s, it looks like users of both data will be
> playing mostly the same group of horses,
> unfortunately. At least I would be-- from the
> comments of some posters here I\'m wondering if
> they are looking at the same sheets I\'m looking at
> for the seminar.


Jerry, when you adjust a slow paced race with a perfect trip speed horse on the front end, that horse often gets a figure better than he deserves. Teuf got the perfect trip in the BG - he was alone on the lead and gave it all he had for the final 3/8th of a mile or so (drifting out late). Teuf could not have run any faster. But as we all know, if you adjust any, you have to adjust them all. When you adjust the figures for the ones that could have run faster if their jocks had let them, you are forced to sacrifice the figure of the speed horse (ie he gets an adjustment when he does not deserve one).

I have no idea how fast the BG went. I am not putting much emphasis on the figure, from any source. If Teuf does not run well in the Derby, I will not use that as evidence that Ragozin got the figure wrong though. I will focus on the other runners from that race to come to any conclusions (if that is even possible).

[dpatent]

Without knowing whether the Ragozin or TG Bluegrass # is \"right\" I do agree that the number is largely irrelevant for SS.  Had he slightly regressed on Ragozin I would have virtually the same opinion.  He finished fast last year and came out running two pretty good numbers this year.

The issue now for me, thanks to Toppled\'s posts, is whether he wants 10f.  If not then I smell some huge prices.

[TGJB]

Miff-- Having taken another look, there\'s a very good chance they also gave a big new top to close-up 6th place finisher Time Squared as well, since I had to give him a new top myself or else give everyone else terrible numbers. That would make 3 of the 7 runners getting new tops on Ragozin in a \"S. Pace\" race.

[fkach]

Miff,

\"Don\'t exactly know how Beyer/Hopkins handled the race but they have it slower than Rags(translated) with mainly regressions.\"

As far as I know, the Beyer team has never had a policy on this issue.

In the past, they would usually upgrade the speed figure for a \"slow paced race\" and assign a figure based on the horses\' PPs and their relationship at the finish. Sometimes they did not though. That lack of consistency was a problem.

However, ever since Randy Moss started making pace figures for the DRF (he also makes the Beyer figures for some circuits), they seem to have stopped upgrading as many slow paced races. They just give out the slow figure.

It would appear there may have been some kind of pace related policy implemented when the pace figures became available. Perhaps because both they and handicappers now have the information required to subjectively determine what, if any impact, a slow pace had on the figures for EACH horse seperately, they don\'t feel compelled to adjust them anymore. They may also just be identifying slow paced races vs. track speed change issues better now because they have pace figures to work with.

I do not know, but I have noticed at least some difference even if I missed some races.

[Michael D.]

dpatent Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Without knowing whether the Ragozin or TG
> Bluegrass # is \"right\" I do agree that the number
> is largely irrelevant for SS.  Had he slightly
> regressed on Ragozin I would have virtually the
> same opinion.  He finished fast last year and came
> out running two pretty good numbers this year.
>
> The issue now for me, thanks to Toppled\'s posts,
> is whether he wants 10f.  If not then I smell some
> huge prices.


I guess you could argue that SS might not want 10f. He has had his share of horses run by him in the final 1/16th. His BC win looked like Arazi\'s CD win, and we all know how badly that colt flattened out six months later (at odds on). I certainly wouldn\'t make that prediction based on breeding though. He\'s by a horse than could run forever (and one that loved CD), and has as many stamina influences on the bottom of his pedigree as you are going to find these days.

[fkach]

Perhaps the RAG\'s \"secret formula\" for slow paced races does not apply to the race as a whole, but to the individual horses based on their own fractions. That could make for some interesting conversation because the figures could/would have no relationship to the actual finish.

[fkach]

In these very slow paced races I tend to seperate the horses based on how they finished \"relative to each other\" because the speed figure almost can\'t be representative for some of the horses. By that standard, horses like Dominican and Street Sense look terrific and Teuflesberg looks terrible even though they all finished fairly close together. Great Hunter also looks OK if you assume he would have finished in the photo. Even Zanjero doesn\'t look too bad.  He saved ground relative to the others, but you have to wonder how much that ground loss took out of the other horses considering they were all walking around the track. It\'s possible that only the ground loss in the latter part of the second turn really mattered much because everyone was still fresh and they were all flying. Losing ground at that point almost certainly was a disadvantage.

[TGJB]

Michael-- in the case of actual \"S. Pace\" races (as opposed to a race with slow but not extreme fractions where we DO use the final time), I am very conscious of NOT giving out new tops in the situation you mentioned. As a general rule, once you adjust for ground loss, it comes out okay without having to give the frontrunner a new top. And it did in the Blue Grass-- it held together well, as you can see from the 5 that are in the Derby/Oaks package.

[miff]

TGJB,

I do not pay too much attention to data I believe is very doubtful,at best.Reality is, the BG only caused me concern about SS,and not his fig.

He cocked his ass end inward(looking at the grandstand),did not run past horses with his big run,got run down by a horse behind him, and finished on his wrong lead.The explanation that he just does not like poly seems very reasonable though in light of his last work at CD last week, called phenominal by a veteran clocker I respect.


Mike

[davidrex]

fkach,

If Randy Moss is so good,how come he was traded for a 4th round draft pick?!

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

Pletcher could convince WinStar Cowtowns best chance is a speed pop even though he really doesn\'t think its Cow\'s best chance. Pletcher is obviously NOT a stand up guy so that is possible. How probable is your guess. This is a 1.5 million dollar horse and WinStar is a big client for Pletcher. He plays with their best interests and they will take their well bred horses elsewhere. Thats my read upon it, everyone is free to make their own reads. I don\'t think Jara is a speed pop jockey either unless they tell him to \"go baby go\". Cowtown is two generations removed on the sire side from Danzig and three from Mr. Prospector. On the female side hes two removed from Storm Cat. I like the slightly watered down influence, but the horse obviously has speed to use if they wish to use it.

Part of winning the Derby involves visualizing the race. Maybe Cow does blaze away. Maybe he doesn\'t.

big18741 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Ctc
>
> Those Keeneland works are up on their website for
> everyone to see.
>
> I agree he\'s the Winstar rabbit.If I\'m wrong,what
> about the neck and kidney sweat on a cool morning?
> How\'s he gonna look heading to the gate on
> Saturday?

[big18741]

On another Pletcher note-Scat Daddy worked in bar shoes FWIW.