Question for the database people

[Valuist]

Any way to run numbers on the following?

A horse who's never run over Polytrack before with Tomlinson numbers of 300 or greater for both turf and wet tracks. The one problem I see is that in the "record at track" box for TP, it also includes the horse's performance over the old dirt track, as well as over the Polytrack.

[Tom]

I can't help you - don't have "tommies" in my db.
But mising races over two totally different surfaces is absurd!

[tahoesid]

If your database has the results of all the TP races and you knew when the Polytrack was put in you could check all horses with the numbers you want and see if they ever ran after that date at TP. Just one way.

[Valuist]

So far, the results have been encouraging. I've found about 20 horses, including a few last night who fit. There's been 4 winners, including a 30-1 shot. There was a winner last night, as Ocean Current upset the 3-5 chalk. The angle ran second and third in the feature last night. There's a few that fit tonight:

1st: Trulymadlydeeply, Philip R
4th: Shawnee Dancer
5th: Geri's Book, Captain Hays
6th: EZ Event
7th: Flirtini, Mason's Gold, Lemhi Lightning
9th: Aroarable
10th: Zaccai, Chain of Miracles

[Valuist]

I can't help you - don't have "tommies" in my db.
But mising races over two totally different surfaces is absurd!

Not absurd at all. Polytrack isn't really dirt and it isn't really turf. Its sort of somewhere in between. When they started it up a year ago, the TVG hosts kept talking about the turf breeding affect. They weren't exactly right, but they weren't completely wrong either. After playing it last September and all last winter, several bloodlines appeared to do well on it: the Storm Cat line (see Tholl's thread from several months ago) which includes Cateinus, the Danzig line does well, and Gone West has done well. There's several others but what does Storm Cat, Danzig and Gone West breeding all have in common? Their offspring are adept at handling BOTH turf and dirt. It makes sense that versatile stallion line would handle a different surface that's somewhere in between dirt and grass.

[Tom]

What I meant was mixing races over dirt and poly - no reason, other than laziness or incompetence to do this. Seperate records fro each surface is the only acceptable way to report.

[46zilzal]

From my limited experience with Woodbine alone, I am getting the impression that Poly is not the "equalizing" surface that Beyer thought it might be........

The energy balances have not changed that much since it's inception and that says a lot. I want to see what happens when it gets cold in Toronto. My bet is that it will continue to play early, just not to the extent it did historically.

[Valuist]

What I meant was mixing races over dirt and poly - no reason, other than laziness or incompetence to do this. Seperate records fro each surface is the only acceptable way to report.

This is all about horses who've never previously run over the Polytrack. I'm trying to see if this is an accurate barometer at predicting who will handle it and who won't. The sample size is still small but is encouraging.

Zilzal- I think Beyer was basing his thoughts on the previous TP results. I haven't followed WO at all but Turfway has not been especially speed favoring since the new surface was installed.