Race 3 Del Mar 7/26: Admiral Jaxon Jobbed TWICE!

[Thomas Roulston]

In addition to being impeded by the starter, Admiral Jaxon's connections were denied 5th purse money after he rallied for that placing.

I'm all for declaring horses non-starters pari-mutuelly in these scenarios - but there is absolutely no rationale for doing it in the purse as well.

And that's not my only beef in this race: A run-up of 220 feet? Why not call it 1 mile and 70 yards, with a run-up of 10 feet?

[elhelmete]

Never seen anything like that.

I was sitting with a group of seasoned, hard core horseplayers and none of them had ever seen anything like that.

The starter springs the gates and the assistant is still standing on the track surface, his back to the gate, directly in front of the horse who was only about 3/4 in the stall to begin with. Lucky nobody got hurt.

I had the horse in my pick 5. Didn't have the fave.

[Fingal]

I've seen a couple left behind when the gates opened, but never when someone is walking in.

Afterwards TVG showed both a close up off the head on where the assistant didn't even get up on the ledge inside the gate & then the behind the gate view as the horse was walking in.

Del Mar has a new starter in John Lopez filling in for Jay Slender who has had surgery & may be back by the end of the meet.

http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/jul/11/del-mar-lopez-starter-slender/