i love Justify, but he is a big time bet against on Belmont day

[Spalding No!]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

Since when has a middle move into a hot pace in the Sunland Derby been indicative of a runaway victory in the Kentucky Derby?

Since 2009 apparently. Call it the "Curse of Mine That Bird".

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

The Belmont exemplifies why this game is so difficult to beat. Even if you start out with the courageous move of crossing out the odds-on favorite...your handicapping work is just beginning. Theoretically, once you eliminate the odds-on choice from the top spot...you should be on profitable ground no matter WHICH of the remaining horses you choose to wager on. But I've never quite seen this theory being proven to my satisfaction...

My own experience is that if I think the favorite is flawed, they still win often enough to not make the rest of the field easy pickings. I still have to come up with some positive value oriented opinion among the rest (which of course is not easy).

I think Justify is the most likely winner. I just know from experience the public tends to go way overboard on these Triple Crown prospects. So I try to get involved in some way if I have any opinions.

[LemonSoupKid]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

The Belmont exemplifies why this game is so difficult to beat. Even if you start out with the courageous move of crossing out the odds-on favorite...your handicapping work is just beginning. Theoretically, once you eliminate the odds-on choice from the top spot...you should be on profitable ground no matter WHICH of the remaining horses you choose to wager on. But I've never quite seen this theory being proven to my satisfaction...

Too many choices to attract attention and at 20% vig roughly, brutally hard most times

[clicknow]

Originally Posted by Spalding No!

So all you had to go on was his 2 Sunland races, which, as you pointed out, were better than they looked. The problem with his form was the massive jump in class from those races to the Kentucky Derby. Basically, he was almost as much an X-factor as Animal Kingdom was prior to his Derby victory.

Unless you're the kind of handicapper who gives "extra points" to multi-surface runners, like Lava Man, Einstein, Awesome Gem, Sidney's Candy, Fanny Freud, Evening Jewel, Tizqueena, Zardana (who beat Rachel Alexandra@FG), Zenyatta, Mine That Bird, etc.

"Can run on anything", to me, denotes a superior athlete who will do what they do w/out excuses as to surfaces.

And yeah, MTB was never quite right in VIR due to needing throat surgery, and didn't seem to ever be the same after he had it. How that is different from a singer who has had something "go wrong" with their biology I don't know, but it's a very real situation and not something I would hold against a horse (as I think about some truly good horses who have had physical problems ruin their careers or even result in their breakdowns on the track).

[dilanesp]

Originally Posted by clicknow

Unless you're the kind of handicapper who gives "extra points" to multi-surface runners, like Lava Man, Einstein, Awesome Gem, Sidney's Candy, Fanny Freud, Evening Jewel, Tizqueena, Zardana (who beat Rachel Alexandra@FG), Zenyatta, Mine That Bird, etc.

"Can run on anything", to me, denotes a superior athlete who will do what they do w/out excuses as to surfaces.

And yeah, MTB was never quite right in VIR due to needing throat surgery, and didn't seem to ever be the same after he had it. How that is different from a singer who has had something "go wrong" with their biology I don't know, but it's a very real situation and not something I would hold against a horse (as I think about some truly good horses who have had physical problems ruin their careers or even result in their breakdowns on the track).

Round Table and Riva Ridge famously hated off tracks. I wouldn't bet against either of them on a surface they liked.

[clicknow]

Originally Posted by dilanesp

Round Table and Riva Ridge famously hated off tracks.

I consider off tracks to be different from surface distinctions that include omni surface stars, i.e. can run on turf, AW, dirt. Off tracks is a whole 'nother distinction.

[clicknow]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

Don't think I've ever heard a horse breathing that hard after a race on TV...Justify was totally spent after this race, IMO...

Actually, this doesn't indicate that he was spent.

Reading over the years about equine physiology, and basically:

Post-exercise respiratory rate not a reliable indicator of fitness. The respiratory tract is an important avenue for heat loss in the horse and following exercise is related to the horse’s body temperature.......this is why they douse horses with water to perform whole-body cooling since that is the kind of high recovery cooling a horse needs after a race.

The thing that handicappers will never know, and it's a real shame since there are so many measurement tools out there, is that unless the trainer is doing high-tech (hopefully they are?) monitoring ----- like Mike De Kock did with Mubtaajih and all his other horses (V02, lactate thresholds, heart rate/recovery heart rates, red cell volume or lactate thresholds, or whatever the heck he was measuring with his software because he could not be all over the world at the same time and these reports got sent to his desktop so he could plan next phase of training for the horse) there is no way for the handicapper to *GUESS* what these readings are before or after a race.

Heavy breathing is actually not one of the bad signs, as it turns out. It may indicate effort, which also isn't a bad sign.

Just not an exact correspondence with the human athlete.

[dilanesp]

Originally Posted by clicknow

I consider off tracks to be different from surface distinctions that include omni surface stars, i.e. can run on turf, AW, dirt. Off tracks is a whole 'nother distinction.

Cigar hated grass. You didn't want to bet against him on dirt.

[papillon]

Originally Posted by cj

The guy is just trolling at this point.

I absolutely am not.

That's all of you've got, right? Anybody questions your subjective "reality" and they're a troll? Call in Pace Advantage because CJ got his feelings hurt, better ban 'em.

Justify's times are franking each other and your explanations to deny that keep racking up "buts." Occam is slitting his wrists with his razor right now. You still want to say beating Bolt, slayer of NW2 Solomini, hasn't won a race since September Bolt, is a feat? Is a measure of anything? You really want to claim that the clusterf*ck that was this year's derby is indicative of anything, other than that the 2-3 path were the only place to be unless you were Bravazo, who is a complete mystery?

Is Jerry Brown trolling? Beyer? Bris? All the regulars at TG?

You know what they say to Justify groupies like you CJ over at TG? People can never handle that a champion can be ordinary and unremarkable.

There is a really serious accusation I could lay at your feet, and given that you refuse to adjust your pace figures for the Preakness even a smidge, despite three of the four jocks, who crossed the line within a length of Justify saying the pace was slow, and that both Tenfold's jock and Bravazo's said they were on Justify's hip from the half on, despite the chart's "5 lengths back pulled out of its ass notation," coupled with your obsession with calling anyone who refuses to use your particular figures "trolls," is beginning to seem right on the money.

Question: Why should anyone take a grown man seriously, whose profession is to ostensibly offer objective appraisals of horse performances to aid in gamblers' fortune telling, who after the Derby immediately runs to the internet to mock some silly person? Any chance I would take you seriously was killed after that. In most professions, it would get you fired.

Why are you so invested in this proping up this horse's stud value, because right now that is all you are doing?

And yeah, I realize Pace Advantage is going to boot me for this.


PS: The jokeys are trolls? Liars? Dellusional?

All hail CJ master of the PaceAdvantage echo chamber.

[NY BRED]

one point about Justify and the competition;

it would appear from pace/speed figures that Justify's Preakness win
was his slowest race to date.

I think most of us would agree a muddy/sloppy surface presents zero issue
to Justify.

That said, on 5/29, 10 days after the Preakness win, Justify breezed 46.4,
fastest work of 43 horses.

Regardless of who those other horses were,their class etc.., this maintenance
work, followed by a 5fg work at Churchill of 101.2 (9th of 15 other horses),
signals to me Justify is more than ready to face his competition;


one last fact; aside from Gronkowski, none of his competition has ever won
carrying 126 lbs, and this import has won with 135 lbs.

I always toss competition from overseas, would hate to be wrong
on this one, and still maintain Justify wins this race.

[dilanesp]

Originally Posted by NY BRED

one point about Justify and the competition;

it would appear from pace/speed figures that Justify's Preakness win
was his slowest race to date.

I think most of us would agree a muddy/sloppy surface presents zero issue
to Justify.

That said, on 5/29, 10 days after the Preakness win, Justify breezed 46.4,
fastest work of 43 horses.

Regardless of who those other horses were,their class etc.., this maintenance
work, followed by a 5fg work at Churchill of 101.2 (9th of 15 other horses),
signals to me Justify is more than ready to face his competition;


one last fact; aside from Gronkowski, none of his competition has ever won
carrying 126 lbs, and this import has won with 135 lbs.

I always toss competition from overseas, would hate to be wrong
on this one, and still maintain Justify wins this race.

It's not impossible. Go and Go came over from Ireland and won the race.

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by clicknow

Actually, this doesn't indicate that he was spent.

Reading over the years about equine physiology, and basically:

Post-exercise respiratory rate not a reliable indicator of fitness. The respiratory tract is an important avenue for heat loss in the horse and following exercise is related to the horse’s body temperature.......this is why they douse horses with water to perform whole-body cooling since that is the kind of high recovery cooling a horse needs after a race.

The thing that handicappers will never know, and it's a real shame since there are so many measurement tools out there, is that unless the trainer is doing high-tech (hopefully they are?) monitoring ----- like Mike De Kock did with Mubtaajih and all his other horses (V02, lactate thresholds, heart rate/recovery heart rates, red cell volume or lactate thresholds, or whatever the heck he was measuring with his software because he could not be all over the world at the same time and these reports got sent to his desktop so he could plan next phase of training for the horse) there is no way for the handicapper to *GUESS* what these readings are before or after a race.

Heavy breathing is actually not one of the bad signs, as it turns out. It may indicate effort, which also isn't a bad sign.

Just not an exact correspondence with the human athlete.

Interesting. THANK YOU for that. Good stuff.

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by papillon

I absolutely am not.

That's all of you've got, right? Anybody questions your subjective "reality" and they're a troll? Call in Pace Advantage because CJ got his feelings hurt, better ban 'em.

Name the last person banned from the horse racing section of this board...

****ing fantasy land some of you live in with all this banning bullshit. Hell, I didn't even ban Denny...

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by papillon

And yeah, I realize Pace Advantage is going to boot me for this.

L U L Z

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by papillon

PS: The jokeys are trolls? Liars? Dellusional?

In some cases, this would definitely be the trifecta.

Keep slaying it papillon...