Kentucky Derby Beyers are on the wane

[Bullet Plane]

The DRF has an article by Dick Jerardi that Kentucky Derby Beyers are on the wane. There is no real answer to why this is so...but, I'll Have Another has apparently posted one of the slowest Beyers on record... a 101.

You have to go back to Giacomo ( 100) in 2005 to find one that slow.

Another thing that he has noticed is that the horses are not getting faster from 2 year olds to 3 year olds. Hansen and Union Rags are getting the same figures that they got six months ago.

Are the horses really getting slower? Why no development?

Bob Ehalt writing for the Thoroughbred Times as the "Ragozin Insider" has also said that the 2012 group of three-year-olds is not a fast group.

Maybe the best bloodstock has been sold to overseas interests ?

[Tom]

Maybe the numbers need looking at?

[maclr11]

Maybe two year olds are developing earlier, faster and stronger?
They run higher BSF's at 2 then two year olds of old?
Just a theory.

[cj]

All Beyers are on the wane. I was looking at some old pars from early last decade, and even the claimers are down 4 or 5 points from where they were then. I think it has more to do with the methodology than it does the horses.

[sammy the sage]

I disagree...Steriods have been NAILED...that said...still gonna see some crazy/insane stuff till they STOP ITPP...

Funny thou...track records DON'T even generate HIGH figs...wonder why :confused:

[boogaloobboy]

Perhaps horses don't improve between 2 and 3 because no one races them anymore? Just saying.

[Robert Goren]

I don't think good horses are running slower. I think cheap horses are running faster because of performance enhancing drugs. There are many different ways of figuring the modern speed ratings, but at some point they all can all be traced back to par times for certain classes of races. The real gap between the par times of the various class has shrunk because of drugs.

[ArlJim78]

I agree with cj that the decline in numbers is primarily due to a flaw in the methodology.

the lack of development from 2-3 is another story though that you can't explain by methodology. I'm not sure that this is a documented trend. I know that this year in particular it struck me that many of the juvy horses did not show much in the way of development. But is this an aberration or the new norm? I don't know.

[Maximillion]

All Beyers are on the wane. I was looking at some old pars from early last decade, and even the claimers are down 4 or 5 points from where they were then. I think it has more to do with the methodology than it does the horses.


CJ
On your figures how does this derby crop compare to say the last 3 years?

[Valuist]

Hasn't Jerry Brown been making the case that horses are getting faster figs because the surfaces are getting deeper?

[menifee]

Perhaps horses don't improve between 2 and 3 because no one races them anymore? Just saying.

You are exactly right. Name any other sport where an athlete gets better (swimming, racing) by not competing.

[Bullet Plane]

Hasn't Jerry Brown been making the case that horses are getting faster figs because the surfaces are getting deeper?


Kind of....

He is saying that his figures account for the slower, deeper surfaces of today. And that Beyer and Ragozin, have their figures tied to claiming pars, and do not account for the deeper surfaces.
Track superintendant at Churchill for 38 years disputes Brown's claims.

Richard Sowers, the author of Abstract Primer of Thoroughbred Racing, says that sprinters are faster now than before, but not routers. He believes this is the case because Breeders are now breeding for speed.

http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/horse/columns/story?id=1923297

[PhantomOnTour]

Kind of....

He is saying that his figures account for the slower, deeper surfaces of today. And that Beyer and Ragozin, have their figures tied to claiming pars, and do not account for the deeper surfaces.
Track superintendant at Churchill for 38 years disputes Brown's claims.

Richard Sowers, the author of Abstract Primer of Thoroughbred Racing, says that sprinters are faster now than before, but not routers. He believes this is the case because Breeders are now breeding for speed.

http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/horse/columns/story?id=1923297
Bingo

[Greyfox]

Kind of....

He is saying that his figures account for the slower, deeper surfaces of today.

I agree with Sammy the Sage's comment that steroids have been nailed.
Track depth?
Last week at Churchill horses couldn't be too far off the pace for most races to score the win..
That suggests to me that the track wasn't that deep.
I'd need more convincing to buy that argument.

[cj]

Bingo

If it were this simple, why aren't Beyer figures for sprinters increasing, or even staying the same? They have shrunk too.

[Steve R]

All Beyers are on the wane. I was looking at some old pars from early last decade, and even the claimers are down 4 or 5 points from where they were then. I think it has more to do with the methodology than it does the horses.
I disagree. My methodology is quite different and based on fractional AND final time. I have observed the same overall pattern as Beyer although the drop since 1998 is the equivalent of about 2 1/2 Beyer points.

[sammy the sage]

If it were this simple, why aren't Beyer figures for sprinters increasing, or even staying the same? They have shrunk too.

yeah...4 track records at Churchill...on deeper surface :rolleyes: :lol: ...but lower Beyer's...I'm totally :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused:

[cj]

I disagree. My methodology is quite different and based on fractional AND final time. I have observed the same overall pattern as Beyer although the drop since 1998 is the equivalent of about 2 1/2 Beyer points.

So you think all horses are getting slower, even sprinters? I personally find that hard to believe, but it is possible. You could be right, but it is also possible both you and Beyer are making similar mistakes. There is no real way to know.

We are all just making educated guesses. For gamblers, it really doesn't matter. Horses don't last long enough or stay consistent enough over a long enough period. You just don't get any overlap. Secretariat will never race against Affirmed, or Alysheba, or Ghostzapper.

The thinking of the person making variants is largely going to determine how the figures change over time. Regardless of what methodology you use, all figures are subject to inflation as well as deflation depending on the methods used. In any case, since 1998, I would guess Beyer has shrunk at least double what yours have, probably more. Thorograph figures have dropped rapidly (horses are faster), though that seems to have slowed lately. Somebody has to be wrong, and maybe both. Both are smart men that draw different conclusions from the same data.

Making figures is tough enough without the additional burden of worrying about comparing horses from different generations. Even if that is the goal of a figure maker, there will never be any guarantee the figures are accurate.

[Valuist]

Kind of....

He is saying that his figures account for the slower, deeper surfaces of today. And that Beyer and Ragozin, have their figures tied to claiming pars, and do not account for the deeper surfaces.
Track superintendant at Churchill for 38 years disputes Brown's claims.

Richard Sowers, the author of Abstract Primer of Thoroughbred Racing, says that sprinters are faster now than before, but not routers. He believes this is the case because Breeders are now breeding for speed.

http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/horse/columns/story?id=1923297

My next question to Brown would be, have turf figures gotten faster? One can debate whether turf figs are as accurate as dirt figures, but......if the breed was truly getting faster, wouldn't we be seeing higher TG numbers on grass as well?

[classhandicapper]

This is just for the laugh, but a Grade 1 horse is still a Grade 1 horse across the decades for non numeric class handicappers. :)

Seriously, this is a tough issue, as is comparing horses across surfaces.

My feeling based on non numeric observations is that the gap between sprinters and routers is narrowing over time, but I'm not sure from which direction. Probably both.

[cj]

This is just for the laugh, but a Grade 1 horse is still a Grade 1 horse across the decades for non numeric class handicappers. :)

Seriously, this is a tough issue, as is comparing horses across surfaces.

My feeling based on non numeric observations is that the gap between sprinters and routers is narrowing over time, but I'm not sure from which direction. Probably both.

I know you are joking, but if I were aiming to make ratings more historical in nature, I would base any "pars" or times used for comparison on older G1 males, not some arbitrary claiming price.

[PhantomOnTour]

CJ,
Did not mean to duck your question regarding why sprint figs are diminishing (if we're suddenly just breeding for speed).
My answer is: i'm not sure

Horses are slowing down at the route very quickly in the late going. More than they used to.
Are sprints slowing down faster too?

If so, could it be that the sprinters with a lil stamina in them can finish up better after fast splits and/or a tough duel?

[classhandicapper]

I know you are joking, but if I were aiming to make ratings more historical in nature, I would base any "pars" or times used for comparison on older G1 males, not some arbitrary claiming price.

I agree 100%.

Claiming prices and field strength are subject to all sorts of issues of like inflation, changes in purse size because of casinos, costs etc.. But the best horses should be fairly stable unless the breed is improving/deteriorating over time. But even that should be very slow.

If Seattle Slew. Dr Fager etc... were still alive and fertile today, how many people would refuse to breed to them because they thought they were genetically inferior?

I'd guess almost no one.

[JPinMaryland]

Sometimes you run into problems with a variable when it's not be used in the manner it is intended.

In the case of Beyer speed figures, my understanding is they are designed to compare horses racing on different tracks, and under different surface conditions. And not really to compare say average, raw final times across the the years. Perhaps this might be a reason that the BSFs are shrinking?

Also the above mention of basing par figures on certain claiming races could be another source of error.

[keithw84]

In the case of Beyer speed figures, my understanding is they are designed to compare horses racing on different tracks, and under different surface conditions. And not really to compare say average, raw final times across the the years. Perhaps this might be a reason that the BSFs are shrinking?


You might be right... I don't know if BSFs are designed for this purpose or not. BUT, Beyer seems to be using the numbers to compare across generations. After all, he was the one who said he thinks this year's three year olds are a very week crop.

[Hoofless_Wonder]

I think it's quite obvious that top horses of today in the U.S. are not what they were 20+ years ago. The short careers, lack of preps, and suspect breeding of some of the recent KY Derby winners means to me we don't have a "thoroughbred athlete", but rather a chemically-concocted mutant that happens to turn in a peak performance and gets a good trip.

I'd be willing to bet serious money that the timeform or racing post ratings of European, Australian or stakes horses from Hong Kong do not show a similar decline over the same timeframe.

I first started noticing this trend when Cigar was beating up on some very poor older horses in the mid 1990s, and the previous year's triple crown horses were struggling just to make the starting gate. At least that mule turned up sterile (steroids?), so I didn't have to suffer through watching over-hyped cigarettes fail in their races....

[JPinMaryland]

shortened careers is a trend that goes back at least to the 1960s. The average number of starts had gone down in the 60s; the 70s and the 80s and it may still be decreasing.

This is hardly some new trend.

[rastajenk]

I wonder if smaller field sizes are pulling down figures over a period of time.

If one's pars are based on years of data from fields of 9-10 (or more) well-intentioned runners, then he can likely trust the law of averages and the usual deviations he encounters, and make some sense of it all.

But if one is applying the same pars to a field of six, where one scratches and two or three of the remaining ones were heavily hustled to make the race go, maybe the eventual winner is a few lengths slower than what that class and conditions would have produced a few years ago? Seems plausible.

[pandy]

If the Derby Beyers are lower I would think it's because the horses have only raced a few times so they haven't worked up to their higher figures. Years ago the 3yo's came into the Derby with at least twice as many starts as they have now and of course the Beyers were higher.

[PaceAdvantage]

Pandy, your theory really doesn't ring true to me...how do you explain well established older horses RARELY if ever running a figure in the 115-120 range nowadays?

Back in the early 90s, the top horses (especially older males and even some females) of the day would ROUTINELY throw out figures in this range...or maybe I'm looking too fondly on days of yore and this actually didn't happen.

Nowadays, everyone does a double take when a horse even sniffs a 115, let alone anything approaching 120...but this seemed much more common when I was easing myself into the game in the very late 80s and early 90s and even a bit beyond...

[pandy]

I don't disagree that the figures were higher years ago, but it's probably because so many of the top horses either break down now or retire early to breed. Over the past 15 years or so there have been a lot of horses that looked like stars after running a few starts and then they broke down and were never seen again.

I don't think the breed itself is producing slower horses, just more fragile horses that can't run as often as they used to.

[Longshot]

You can make all the adjustments for track conditions you want, but this year's final Derby time of 2:01 4/5 ranks as the 21st fastest among the 138 Derbys.

[RXB]

You can make all the adjustments for track conditions you want, but this year's final Derby time of 2:01 4/5 ranks as the 21st fastest among the 138 Derbys.

And that's exactly why we do make adjustments for track conditions.

[keithw84]

I don't disagree that the figures were higher years ago, but it's probably because so many of the top horses either break down now or retire early to breed. Over the past 15 years or so there have been a lot of horses that looked like stars after running a few starts and then they broke down and were never seen again.

I don't think the breed itself is producing slower horses, just more fragile horses that can't run as often as they used to.

Pandy, I want to make sure I understand you correctly. Are you saying the reason we don't see as many high figures is because of the following:

1. There are as many horses capable of putting up high Beyers as there were, say, 20 years ago, but we don't see the high figures as often because they don't run as often? In other words, you can't put up a high speed figure if you don't run.

2. Horses who could probably put up high figures as 4- and 5-year olds are retired before they get the chance.

[classhandicapper]

If the Derby Beyers are lower I would think it's because the horses have only raced a few times so they haven't worked up to their higher figures. Years ago the 3yo's came into the Derby with at least twice as many starts as they have now and of course the Beyers were higher.

I'm not so sure about this one.

I agree that high quality lightly raced horses tend to improve with seasoning, but if anything, I think the incentive has been to really wind up these young 2YOs and 3YOs quickly so they can win the Derby.

There are very few trainers like Shug, Mott etc.. that really take their time.

There are probably a lot of factors at work (including methodology), but I think breeding speed to speed gets you more speed at the expense of stamina and reserve racing energy.

In this country, we put all the emphasis on who the fastest horse is, but the fastest horse is not necessarily the best horse if the race involves long distances, a deep and tiring surface, a demanding pace and race development etc..