Flightline vs. Candy Ride-Pacific Classic

[thetripleclowns]

The Triple Clowns compare the Pacific Classic races of undefeated Flightline (2022) and undefeated Candy Ride (2003).

What are your thoughts?

https://youtu.be/UWktd3VNbD0

[GMB@BP]

Flightline by a handful of lengths. Candy Ride was really good but this horse is better.

[the little guy]

Flightline by a handful of lengths. Candy Ride was really good but this horse is better.

It's actually a decent analogy and a helluva lot closer than most think. Certainly better than comparing him to Secretariat.

[GMB@BP]

It's actually a decent analogy and a helluva lot closer than most think. Certainly better than comparing him to Secretariat.

Comparing him to Secretariat is always going to be foolish at this stage, it might not be if he runs a bunch more, he appears to run at a level that has not been seen in a long time.

On straight figures he is rated with say Gentleman but if I am betting I feel like he beats that horse and its not all that close.

Candy Ride was very good, he was a few lengths better than MDO, who was a really good horse, I think this horse drowns MDO at 10F.

[the little guy]

Comparing him to Secretariat is always going to be foolish at this stage, it might not be if he runs a bunch more, he appears to run at a level that has not been seen in a long time.

On straight figures he is rated with say Gentleman but if I am betting I feel like he beats that horse and its not all that close.

Candy Ride was very good, he was a few lengths better than MDO, who was a really good horse, I think this horse drowns MDO at 10F.

The argument that Medaglia D'Oro was not a 10F horse is BADLY flawed. His BC Classic, when he lost to Pleasantly Perfect, was a brilliant effort given the pace. Was Flightline better? I don't know. He ran one amazing race. Medaglia D'Oro had a long and great career.

[GMB@BP]

The argument that Medaglia D'Oro was not a 10F horse is BADLY flawed. His BC Classic, when he lost to Pleasantly Perfect, was a brilliant effort given the pace. Was Flightline better? I don't know. He ran one amazing race. Medaglia D'Oro had a long and great career.

thats a fair statement at this stage...trying to project a little bit to make the comparisons.

of course raw talent and accomplishment are two different things.

[Spalding No!]

The argument that Medaglia D'Oro was not a 10F horse is BADLY flawed. His BC Classic, when he lost to Pleasantly Perfect, was a brilliant effort given the pace. Was Flightline better? I don't know. He ran one amazing race. Medaglia D'Oro had a long and great career.
Candy Ride hounding and putting away Medaglia D'Oro, Medaglia D'Oro stride-for-stride with Congaree, Gentleman holding off Skip Away, Skip Away dusting Formal Gold and vice versa.

These races pale in comparison to Flightline running away from Extra Hope (and Baby Yoda).

It'll be hilarious when Life is Good wins the Woodward by open lengths and Laurel River wins the Awesome Again by a pole and both opt for the BC Undercard Mile.

I guess there's always Happy Saver...

[GMB@BP]

Candy Ride hounding and putting away Medaglia D'Oro, Medaglia D'Oro stride-for-stride with Congaree, Gentleman holding off Skip Away, Skip Away dusting Formal Gold and vice versa.

These races pale in comparison to Flightline running away from Extra Hope (and Baby Yoda).

It'll be hilarious when Life is Good wins the Woodward by open lengths and Laurel River wins the Awesome Again by a pole and both opt for the BC Undercard Mile.

I guess there's always Happy Saver...

there is no reason to do that with Life is Good. I can see it with Laurel River. I was in the paddock for the Pat O Brian and that horse looks so good I had to bet him (redboard I know) and how a horse looks is not something I usually do.

[the little guy]

Candy Ride hounding and putting away Medaglia D'Oro, Medaglia D'Oro stride-for-stride with Congaree, Gentleman holding off Skip Away, Skip Away dusting Formal Gold and vice versa.

These races pale in comparison to Flightline running away from Extra Hope (and Baby Yoda).

It'll be hilarious when Life is Good wins the Woodward by open lengths and Laurel River wins the Awesome Again by a pole and both opt for the BC Undercard Mile.

I guess there's always Happy Saver...

Life is Good will retire before he runs in the Mile again. I guess there's an argument he will train up to the Classic, in the hopes that Flightline doesn't make it, and then come up with a race day injury to avoid losing. However, my guess is he runs in the Classic...and loses.

[KirisClown]

Candy Ride never did a thing wrong. He did run away from Medaglia D'oro, who is an hour better than anyone Flightline has ever beaten. I read a post in an insane asylum forum saying Flightline is possibly the best horse ever. The hype is a little nauseating.

https://i.postimg.cc/MHvp8BPJ/Screenshot-20220908-234942-Drive.jpg

[GMB@BP]

Candy Ride never did a thing wrong. He did run away from Medaglia D'oro, who is an hour better than anyone Flightline has ever beaten. I read a post in an insane asylum forum saying Flightline is possibly the best horse ever. The hype is a little nauseating.

https://i.postimg.cc/MHvp8BPJ/Screenshot-20220908-234942-Drive.jpg

shiny new object syndrome...but he is really good.

[proximity]

What are your thoughts?


https://www.equibase.com/profiles/Results.cfm?type=Stakes&stkid=1834

idk if equibase changed the number but contrary to the video (around the 4:00 min mark) they have a 128 for flightline, who also ran the raw time without lasix.

[westernmassbob]

I noticed the similarities right away with the tiny field sizes. These races should have a minimum of 8 starters. IMO the wins seem less impressive with the field sizes. Nonetheless two very good horses.

[Andy Asaro]

Flightline would smoke Candy Ride and Candy Ride was an outstanding horse. Saw him run in person a couple of times.

Other than number of races at this point he is easily comparable in ability to Secretariat or any other horse in history. He wasn't close to being all out in the Pacific Classic and they say he will probably race next year and we'll see what happens.

[classhandicapper]

Life Is Good is running in the Woodward.

I so hope they meet in the Classic because I think LIG is the faster horse. That sets up an interesting test. Flightline has a tendency to pull. I want to see if he can try to engage LIG early and if successful get the 10F comfortably.

[Andy Asaro]

Life Is Good is running in the Woodward.

I so hope they meet in the Classic because I think LIG is the faster horse. That sets up an interesting test. Flightline has a tendency to pull. I want to see if he can try to engage LIG early and if successful get the 10F comfortably.

I doubt he wants to be on LIG's hip early and I don't think it matters. At a mile and one quarter he'll be passing him early in the stretch. I think the connections of LIG have to consider running out of the money against Flightline. Unless they don't care about the money they should go in the mile IMO

[classhandicapper]

Top horses have shrunk about 5-6 points on the Beyer scale since the time of Candy Ride, gotten way faster on Thorograph, and stayed about the same on Ragozin.

I know the theory and goal is to use figures to compare horses across generations, but imo they are laughably inaccurate. The best figure makers can barely agree on last week, let alone last week vs 20 years ago. And that's not a knock.

I think the kind of comparisons Spalding No! is doing are way more appropriate for generational comparisons of top older horses than figures as long as you are very familiar with the horses in specific races, the trips, biases, (which he always is) and have some kind of metrics for margins and finishing positions (like what does winning by 19 lengths against weaker mean relative to winning by 5 against much stronger etc..)

[classhandicapper]

I doubt he wants to be on LIG's hip early and I don't think it matters. At a mile and one quarter he'll be passing him early in the stretch. I think the connections of LIG have to consider running out of the money against Flightline. Unless they don't care about the money they should go in the mile IMO

What they want and what Flightline wants may be two different things. He sits behind a horse, but he still pulls early. That's why I think it could be a good test for him. He may engage early even if that's not the plan.

LIG doesn't look like he wants 10F to begin with. Even if he can get it he'd have to outrun Flightline and then still stay the 10F. That seems like a really tough task. I'm not sure what I would do with LIG. I'd probably go in the Classic and live with the result. I don't think a loss will hurt that much.

[Andy Asaro]

What they want and what Flightline wants may be two different things. He sits behind a horse, but he still pulls early. That's why I think it could be a good test for him. He may engage early even if that's not the plan.

LIG doesn't look like he wants 10F to begin with. Even if he can get it he'd have to outrun Flightline and then still stay the 10F. That seems like a really tough task. I'm not sure what I would do with LIG. I'd probably go in the Classic and live with the result. I don't think a loss will hurt that much.

I agree that he's gonna do what he wants but he took the lead in the backstretch in the Pacific Classic with an inferior horse on the lead. It will take him a couple more furlongs to pass LIG IMO

[classhandicapper]

I agree that he's gonna do what he wants but he took the lead in the backstretch in the Pacific Classic with an inferior horse on the lead. It will take him a couple more furlongs to pass LIG IMO

Agreed, but if he's pulling to go faster because he want to get to LIG, that's the kind of thing I want to see. I want to see him working hard to run with or at least chase a very fast horse on a honest track and then see what he has left late regardless if LIG throws in the towel into the stretch.

[Andy Asaro]

Agreed, but if he's pulling to go faster because he want to get to LIG, that's the kind of thing I want to see. I want to see him working hard to run with or at least chase a very fast horse on a honest track and then see what he has left late regardless if LIG throws in the towel into the stretch.

They have no good reason to run hard early against LIG.

[classhandicapper]

They have no good reason to run hard early against LIG.

I agree, but you are missing the point or at least my hope. It may not be up to Pratt and the connections. It may be up to Flightline what Flightline does. ;)

[jocko699]

I agree, but you are missing the point or at least my hope. It may not be up to Pratt and the connections. It may be up to Flightline what Flightline does. ;)

Flightline would be fine either way. He is much more talented than LIG.

[elhelmete]

I noticed the similarities right away with the tiny field sizes. These races should have a minimum of 8 starters. IMO the wins seem less impressive with the field sizes. Nonetheless two very good horses.

Yeah I know, those small fields really make the 1973 Preakness and Belmont look like ham-and-egg races.

FFS....

And you'd be the first one to denigrate the race competition if it had 6 contenders and 3 no-hopers.

[castaway01]

Yeah I know, those small fields really make the 1973 Preakness and Belmont look like ham-and-egg races.

FFS....

And you'd be the first one to denigrate the race competition if it had 6 contenders and 3 no-hopers.

While horses not running as often as they used to and leaving us to guess their "greatness" based on a 4-race campaign is mostly definitely a 2000s issue, people should check the field sizes most of the 1970s legends faced in their best performances. Memory can be deceiving.

Of course someone will say "no one wanted to face them". Well okay, same thing now.

[Andy Asaro]

I agree, but you are missing the point or at least my hope. It may not be up to Pratt and the connections. It may be up to Flightline what Flightline does. ;)

I get what you mean, I just don't think he needs to pull to the lead early for any reason. And he's shown he can relax early

[Spalding No!]

They have no good reason to run hard early against LIG.
Flightline is close to being a runoff. And whatever attempts to teach the horse to relax or settle go out the window when they fly in his jockey to work him or breeze him from the starting gate.

The only glimmer of a willingness to rate in hand came in the Met Mile. Prat panicked when the horse broke a step slow (as the horse did in the Malibu) and sent Flightline up for the lead but got squeezed back. Still in panic mode, he regrouped and sent him again but then wisely took hold as he probably realized the futility of trying to engage Speaker's Corner at that point (by the way, a trumped up Speaker's Corner who was a stand in for Life is Good and had the latter's attributes projected on to him undeservedly). Flightline seemed to respond to the restraint fairly well, but ultimately the pace was so fast that Prat was still able to give Flightline his head back almost immediately anyways.

Had the Met Mile been a longer race with a slower early pace, it's possible Flightline would resent being throttled down and been rank or otherwise fought his rider. In the Pacific Classic while chasing an outclassed, non-frontrunner past his prime (Extra Hope), Flightline clearly dragged Prat to the lead very early on the backstretch. He is not "push button" and certainly cannot be placed anywhere in a race the way standouts like Candy Ride and Beholder (who each won the Pacific Classic just as impressively as Flightline) could be.

Therefore what Flightline does early against Life is Good will depend on what Life is Good is doing. I don't recall if they ever tried to get Life is Good to settle early, he certainly was sent in the Pegasus despite the prospect of engaging Knicks Go. At 10 furlongs, Life is Good and Flightline will most likely be eyeball-to-eyeball on the backstretch and not the latter rating kindly off the former's flank. It may well take Flightline a "couple more furlongs" to put away Life is Good. No horse has that sort of reserve capacity. If Flightline still dominates in that sort of pace scenario it will be because hopeless horses like Dynamic One, Happy Saver, Stilleto Boy, and Express Train are the only ones that are in a position to capitalize and not because he has more ability than Secretariat or Spectacular Bid.

Let's hope Epicenter's impressive and ruthless procession in the Travers was a sign he is improving leaps and bounds and that Olympiad's Whitney was a throwout race for some inexplicable reason. Maybe Baffert's ego will compel him to put Laurel River on a fast track to the BC Classic.

Hell, I'll even take the Euro bridesmaid Mishriff as a worthy foe to validate Flightline's actual greatness as opposed to the Washington Generals-like CA older horse corps he got to toy with last weekend.

[BarchCapper]

Other than number of races at this point he is easily comparable in ability to Secretariat or any other horse in history. He wasn't close to being all out in the Pacific Classic and they say he will probably race next year and we'll see what happens.

Number of races AND surfaces! Unless he wins some graded stakes on the turf he'll always come up short against Secretariat (and John Henry, and Kelso, etc.) in my book. Let's see him on the grass, on an off track, etc. Doing it ALL is what defines "ALL-time great" ability for me. Some will agree, others won't, and that's fine.

[the little guy]

Flightline is remarkably good, and if he ran a few more races like the Pacific Classic, I would say he's a great horse. However, when Arrogate won the Travers, he won by over 14 lengths and ran a 124 Beyer, a fairly comparable effort to Flightline the other day. When he made his next start, he ran a terrific race to win narrowly, and run a similar figure. But, he didn't have the same "wow" factor as the competition got significantly tougher. There may well not be a California Chrome in this year's BC, but there will be a much more talented speed horse ( assuming Life is Good runs ) than Flightline just faced, who also has the stamina to at least be a nuisance until midstretch, and a rapidly improving 3YO who suits the race tactically. I'm not knocking Flightline, and think he will prove VERY hard to beat in the Classic, but blowout wins over overmatched rivals sometimes makes people go a bit overboard.

[jocko699]

Flightline is remarkably good, and if he ran a few more races like the Pacific Classic, I would say he's a great horse. However, when Arrogate won the Travers, he won by over 14 lengths and ran a 124 Beyer, a fairly comparable effort to Flightline the other day. When he made his next start, he ran a terrific race to win narrowly, and run a similar figure. But, he didn't have the same "wow" factor as the competition got significantly tougher. There may well not be a California Chrome in this year's BC, but there will be a much more talented speed horse ( assuming Life is Good runs ) than Flightline just faced, who also has the stamina to at least be a nuisance until midstretch, and a rapidly improving 3YO who suits the race tactically. I'm not knocking Flightline, and think he will prove VERY hard to beat in the Classic, but blowout wins over overmatched rivals sometimes makes people go a bit overboard.

And sometimes we don't.

[classhandicapper]

Hell, I'll even take the Euro bridesmaid Mishriff as a worthy foe to validate Flightline's actual greatness as opposed to the Washington Generals-like CA older horse corps he got to toy with last weekend.

I hear and agree with everything you are saying, but you can only beat who they put in front of you. Beating an admittedly subpar Pacific Classic field (as historic PC fields go) doesn't "prove" greatness, except he did it by 19+ lengths with something left. That's a hint. On my well researched and tested non time based numbers it's a very strong hint (132 on Beyer scale and for reference Arrogate's Travers got a 124 which was a whopper). I'm almost as interested in how much the track may have helped him as I am in what's going to happen if he takes actual Grade 1 heat early. I might be crazy enough to try to beat him anyway.

[elhelmete]

While horses not running as often as they used to and leaving us to guess their "greatness" based on a 4-race campaign is mostly definitely a 2000s issue, people should check the field sizes most of the 1970s legends faced in their best performances. Memory can be deceiving.

Of course someone will say "no one wanted to face them". Well okay, same thing now.

Egg zackaly
Look at Candy Ride's PPs...in Argentina field sizes of 11-11-15
in the US 6-5-4

[Tom]

I hear and agree with everything you are saying, but you can only beat who they put in front of you.

I don't know how many they could put in front of Flightlinr, but I'm pretty sure they have put another 19-1/4 BEHIND him!:)


btw, I hear they other horses on track are calling him Frightline.

[zico20]

Number of races AND surfaces! Unless he wins some graded stakes on the turf he'll always come up short against Secretariat (and John Henry, and Kelso, etc.) in my book. Let's see him on the grass, on an off track, etc. Doing it ALL is what defines "ALL-time great" ability for me. Some will agree, others won't, and that's fine.

I agree with you 100% but I would like to add one thing to your post. I can't consider a horse one of the all time greats unless they run say 10 times in 8 months and win most or all of them. The truly great horses didn't need months between races to perform to their best.

[cj]

I agree with you 100% but I would like to add one thing to your post. I can't consider a horse one of the all time greats unless they run say 10 times in 8 months and win most or all of them. The truly great horses didn't need months between races to perform to their best.

I can't argue with that sentiment, but as the game stands now the book is closed. Nobody will ever again meet that criteria unless the game changes again.

[GMB@BP]

I can't argue with that sentiment, but as the game stands now the book is closed. Nobody will ever again meet that criteria unless the game changes again.

sad sport that there will never be another all time great.

[BarchCapper]

I can't argue with that sentiment, but as the game stands now the book is closed. Nobody will ever again meet that criteria unless the game changes again.

We just need Norman "Lynn" Cash to get a hold of a good, sound one!!!!!