What to you look for in turf sprints?

[CincyHorseplayer]

After having much of the attitude of dread toward turf sprints as many of you share much to my surprise the last few years I have learned that handicapping them like turf routes the same basic skill sets win. Don't be put off by the distances. You don't want a horse stranded by his running style nor a frontrunner who is not at least a top 3 closer. I too think Belmont's turf sprints are unique and frustrate me many times. But places like Gulfstream and Keeneland in 5 and 5.5 sprints have proved consistently bettor friendly. My opinion of course.

[cj]

Image fixed here.

[Lose The Juice]

Originally Posted by Lose The Juice

Anything out of the dam To Marquet, and to a lesser extent, most Generazio horses, period.

Disco Partner just blasted home in 34.31 to win his seasonal, 7f on turf, first start for Clement, 5 wide around the field.

[CincyHorseplayer]

Originally Posted by Lose The Juice

Disco Partner just blasted home in 34.31 to win his seasonal, 7f on turf, first start for Clement, 5 wide around the field.

Dude that was impressive! I am rarely wowed. That was bigtime!

[ultracapper]

Originally Posted by HalvOnHorseracing

1. Turf breeding is important. Once.

2. Horses can usually last longer on the grass than the dirt.

3. Fast horses on the dirt are usually running a more stressful pace than turf sprinters. More often a fast dirt horse switching to the turf is safe to bet. Sprints are too short for turf breeding to be a big factor, and besides great turf horses usually do the "slow early, fast late" and a sprint may not give them the best chance to show their best pace/style.

4. Speed and pace are important no mater what the surface.

5. Especially at BEL and SAR, depending on rain and watering and the depth of the grass, the track can favor a particular style.

6. Class in turf racing is a critical factor no matter what the distance.

Absolutely. The absolute first place to start when handicapping any turf race.

[Lose The Juice]

So turf firsters never win, right?

Chad Brown and Christophe Clement (among untold others) would be amused to learn of this factoid.

"Class," meanwhile, is a rather nebulous concept, to put it mildly.

[ultracapper]

Originally Posted by Lose The Juice

So turf firsters never win, right?

Chad Brown and Christophe Clement (among untold others) would be amused to learn of this factoid.

"Class," meanwhile, is a rather nebulous concept, to put it mildly.

Oh gosh, you got me, darn. I'm sure Clement and Brown would be stunned into orbit if they heard there are exceptions to every rule.

Great post bud. You're just piling them up like firewood.


Everybody, FTS win, so therefore throw out every handicapping rule you've ever learned. Lose the Juice has spoken.

[ultracapper]

So, Lose the Juice, where should we start? And remember, there better not be any exceptions to the rule.

[Lose The Juice]

Perhaps you can share some insights along the lines of "bet horses that is GOOD, and don't bet horse'S that is bad!"

That seems to sum it up succinctly, right?

[whodoyoulike]

Originally Posted by Lose The Juice

So turf firsters never win, right?

Chad Brown and Christophe Clement (among untold others) would be amused to learn of this factoid.

"Class," meanwhile, is a rather nebulous concept, to put it mildly.

Hopefully, you should be able to know it when you see it.

[ultracapper]

Originally Posted by Lose The Juice

Perhaps you can share some insights along the lines of "bet horses that is GOOD, and don't bet horse'S that is bad!"

That seems to sum it up succinctly, right?

And we're all certain you can succinctly explain how you determine which horse is Good, and which horse is Bad.

[Lose The Juice]

First of all, who is this "we?"

Secondly, the post you purported to address was pointedly sarcastic, a fact that flew way over your head.

Finally, if you will read up in the thread, you will see that I have given rather specific details about betting turf sprints, none having anything to do with "class", however you might define that in the racing context.

Was Monzante an auto-bet in low claimers because he'd once won a G1?

"Class" in an MSW or a NW1.... what? Yearling prices?

[Baron Star Gregg]

Originally Posted by NorCalGreg

LOL...I'm unable to respond because I got a warning for my previous post....which isn't as bad as the full-blown demerit. I can't afford to get banned.

I need another dollar played so I could get the $25 freebie at Horse Tourney....so I played in the $2 beginner game---and LOST!

But I did get the $25 credit 💉

I really don't play turf races....but do know speed is boss...that's why BSG's response was a little surprising. Especially turf sprints

First let me say that I do not normally play New York tracks. With that out of the way I'll say that I had nothing but problems with turf sprints playing pedigree, class, race shape, trainer angles etc. until I remembered a conversation I had with our trainer when he talked about a patient ride being just as important short as it is long on the grass. I was surprised too. I have since achieved a comfortable level of success with turf sprints by examining the final fraction under similar conditions with all of the usual caveats. It's worth the time to look into it.

[kingfin66]

Originally Posted by Todaysracingdigest

With Belmont opening their meet on Friday, April 28, it is time for an influx of turf sprints!

I first look at trainer and jockey stats to see how they have done in the past with turf sprints. Then I look if the horse has any turf sprint experience.

One of my favorite angles are turf routers who try a turf sprint for the first time. They seem to run well a majority of the time (Remember Bobby's Kitten?)

I an not sure if you are referring to Belmont turf sprints specifically or turf sprints in general. The structure of Belmont turf sprints are very different from every other track since you see them on the turf course and inner turf course and at 6 furlongs and 7 furlongs.

I don't think that you can generalize how to handicap turf sprints in general as some here have done. They all play differently and are subject to track biases.

Here is an example. I looked at 5f turf sprints at Tampa for the 5/1/16 - 4/30/17. The predominant factor in the information that I looked at (Betmix Angler) shows that 50 % of all turf sprints are won by horses ranked first in turf earnings (11/22 with a 1.91 ROI). This sparked my curiosity so I looked at the previous year as well and the result held in that turf earnings were the best factor (16/34 with a 1.69 ROI).

At Gulfstream, 5 furlong turf sprints are run much more often. The top factor is best speed last 3 races, but the win % and ROI are much lower (83/310 with a 0.945 ROI).

Looking at all 5 furlong turf sprints for all tracks during the past month, the best factor is Avg. Speed Last 3 Races. The results for this factor are 21/56 with an ROI of 1.20.

This is interesting stuff and I love playing around with it. From the work you can develop various spot plays isolating in on track, distance, surface all the way down to class and age of the horses in the race.

[Lose The Juice]

At NYRA tracks over the last 5 years, regardless of the configuration of any particular oval, the workings of that elusive quality designated as "class" (n2x eligible Portmagee beat the stuffing out of turf sprint SW Fair Point in today's sprint stake, but I digress...), or the alignment of the planets, the facts are relatively straightforward.

Turf sprint wins, by trainer:

Clement 66
Rice 63
Chad 45

It's then down somewhat to Bruce Brown, at 36 (probably many if not most in NY-bred thingies), then to George Weaver at 29, Bill Mott at 26, Gary Contessa at 25, and Mike Maker at 24.

Clement and Chad Brown have notoriously high win percentages in these races; Rice and most of the others, less so.