mixing surfaces

[shoelessjoe]

I was going over a race yesterday with a buddy of mine talking about picking pacelines.It was a 6.5 furlong dirt race at Philly and he was considering using lines from polytrack,turf and off tracks.I told him it was best not to use these type of pacelines on today's race.Anybody have any thoughts on this.

[Norm]

In general, I agree with you that speed ratings / race patterns on polycrap tracks have no value for handicapping dirt races. However, I've observed that a few trainers have learned how to use these poly-races to prepare a horse for a big effort on dirt, especially the front-running type. A dirt-based front-runner that struggles to stay with the top three on poly and fades, will show good strength when returning to dirt. It is not true, however, that a poly based front runner will do well on dirt unless he has already demonstrated an affinity for it. The old horseman's adage, "horses for courses" is still true.