Watchmaker: Lack of honest paces frustrates bettors
http://www.drf.com/news/watchmaker-l...trates-bettors
ELMONT, N. Y. – Horseplayers are prone to endless frustrations, from onerous takeouts to odd betting menus, and short fields to uninspiring cards, to name just a few. But nothing is getting the goat of horseplayers more these days than races that look like they will have honest paces devolving into paceless processions.
If you can’t depend on Horse B to go up and keep Horse A honest on the front end like he’s supposed to, then how do you handicap? When this happens, how can racing distinguish itself as an intellectual form of gambling?
This comes to mind after Saturday’s Belmont Derby. Oscar Performance won the Belmont Derby, which itself was not a surprise. Oscar Performance is a good horse. He won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf last fall, and won it honestly. But Oscar Performance also turned in two dud performances to begin this year, and then won the Pennine Ridge in his most recent start, which may or may not have been the rebound many trumpeted it to be. It was difficult to tell for sure considering Oscar Performance was allowed a walking, uncontested lead in that race. In other words, the jury was still out on the 2017 version of Oscar Performance.
thought this was interesting:
"It is valuable information to know when one speed horse will not challenge another early, and it is damaging to the game when that valuable information is kept to only a few select insiders."
