10-22-2020, 05:15 AM
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#17
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Registered User
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 4,520
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Spalding No!
I'm still waiting for the graded stakes committee to downgrade this to a Grade 2. There isn't really a mile division anyways. There are only 2 other Grade 1 miles the rest of the year and one is run 5 months before the BC and the other one is after the BC (when the BC is supposed to be the championship event).
The race at best serves as a springboard to up-and-coming types (Gun Runner, Accelerate, Liam's Map, City of Light), a prime opportunity for Grade 2/Grade 3 types (Dakota Phone, Tapizar, Furtherst Land), or a last ditch effort for horses on the downward slope (Dortmund, Discreet Cat, Omaha Beach).
At worse it takes away from the BC Sprint and the Classic (and even the turf Mile when it ran on synthetics).
The sad part is, horses retire partially on the strength of the win (Liam's Map, City of Light).
At any rate, in addition to this dreaded trend of training "up to the BC", what's with these Thanksgiving weekend races suddenly becoming alternatives to running in the BC (as opposed to running in both)?
I would think if Art Collector showed any form in the Dirt Mile they would run him back in the Clark, Cigar Mile, or Hollywood Derby.
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City of light was not a grade 2 horse.
The dirt mile should remain a grade one.
Allan
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