Letruska in the Azeri Stakes

[cj]

Originally Posted by PhantomOnTour

Swiss Skydiver may be one of those filly casualties that never recovers from a grueling 3yr old campaign (see Rachel Alexandra & Silverbulletday).
All three ran vs the boys in their 3yr old season.

Rachel - Preakness, Haskell, Woodward
Silverbulletday - Belmont
Swiss Skydiver - Blue Grass, Preakness

It isn't like she didn't win a big race easily to begin her 4yo campaign though, doesn't sound like the other two at all.

[cj]

Originally Posted by GMB@BP

This is a great paragraph of handicapping and something that entirely eludes me when looking at a horses form.

This is something I'm weak in as well but have been trying to use lately. TimeformUS lists lifetime workouts so you can see the pattern before every race a horse has ever run.

[cj]

Originally Posted by classhandicapper

It looks like Beyer had the early dirt races 23 points fast and then assigned a fast 20 for the Swiss Skydiver race. Don't hold me to that, but that's what it looks like based on the data I have. The 101 fit well with his figures going into the race. So I guess you could say "perhaps" the figure should have been 98 instead of 101. I'm not sure that makes a huge difference in what people would have thought of her.

I gave this race a 119 overall initially, am going to give it a deeper look today. I was a bit frazzled yesterday as we had a water leak that caused a large part of our kitchen ceiling to be cut out. Want to look at the day with fresh and clear eyes.

I will say the pace was slow, so very likely final time was impacted at least somewhat by that. Those are the cases where Beyer often upgrades figures. I didn't do that initially, but if I do you will know it as we have the tools to tell you that sort of thing with TimeformUS and we show you the actual final time figure before the adjustment.

[classhandicapper]

Those numbers don’t factor enough to the level of competition IMO.

I'm in your camp.

I think the quality of the competition generally changes the difficult of the trip and impacts the figures horses run. They all have a cracking point, but sometimes you don't know whether the demands of running against better horses will cause the horse to wilt a little, a lot, or reveal it has enough in reserve to handle a faster pace, tougher challenge etc.. and finish almost as well and run a few fifths faster. The latter is usually reserved for champions and lightly raced horses that haven't been fully tested yet. In the end though, they all have their limits and will crack except maybe Secretariat when he was feeling good.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by cj

I gave this race a 119 overall initially, am going to give it a deeper look today. I was a bit frazzled yesterday as we had a water leak that caused a large part of our kitchen ceiling to be cut out. Want to look at the day with fresh and clear eyes.

In that quote I was talking about Swiss Skydiver's previous race in California.

Yesterday it looks like Beyer split the first 4 races from the rest of the card. He has the first 4 races faster than the rest of the card.

[burnsy]

Class I completely agree. There’s a breaking point going up the ladder if you’re not running the best , energy conserving race. That where speed figs get dicey. I look at them . But I’ll be honest , I don’t always. Like this race yesterday. I don’t even know who had what for figs. I’m strictly looking to eliminate chalk. I can’t go against that favorite she’s just too good. So, who the odd man out? Who still has to prove they can hang with the older horses at the top level. Who is hot right now? Letruska ran huge at the track. The way I bet , care less about numbers......off odds and circumstances, Swiss is the toss. That’s my point. Two horse race billed as one of the two was wrong

[cj]

Originally Posted by classhandicapper

In that quote I was talking about Swiss Skydiver's previous race in California.

Yesterday it looks like Beyer split the first 4 races from the rest of the card. He has the first 4 races faster than the rest of the card.

I already told you elsewhere I DON'T CARE!!!

Yeah, it was a tricky racetrack for sure with drying out dirt and some pretty obvious swings in track speed. I do think the pace made it ever murkier for the Apple Blossom.

[PhantomOnTour]

Originally Posted by cj

It isn't like she didn't win a big race easily to begin her 4yo campaign though, doesn't sound like the other two at all.

She did win a Gr1...I don't follow Cali racing, but from what I've read, that race was fairly weak with quite a few n2x runners. She sat off a slow pace and won in unimpressive time with one of her lowest figs (BRIS).
Yesterday the pace was ordinary (to slow) and she had nothing when the real running began...beaten 6.5 lengths. She did go from Cali to Florida to CD and then Oaklawn between races, but I don't see that as an excuse.

She may not be "done for", but she surely can't handle the top two from yesterday, and i would be wary of her going forward at what will be a very short price (provided Letruska & Monomoy Girl aren't in the field).
We'll find out when she runs again.

Did she run without lasix yesterday? That may be something to consider also. According to the BRIS pp's, the other two were on lasix.

[cj]

Originally Posted by PhantomOnTour

Did she run without lasix yesterday? That may be something to consider also. According to the BRIS pp's, the other two were on lasix.

She did. I was on the record saying it was a dumb decision before the race to give an edge to your opponents for an extra 60k in purse IF she won. It made no sense to me.

But she did run without it in SoCal too. The difference is that nobody else could use it there so it was an even playing field. I had her running pretty fast that day and I don't think it was as weak as many are saying, but I don't think it was a true G1 either.

[MJC922]

This is where you're glad a lot of people ignore weight. Reverse the weight and it's not close at the wire. I only watched the race after the fact. When you need to quicken with the weight relative to your opponent is what can spin wheels and cause over-extension.

If you had to play the race IMO the winner was the horse to play at the odds but you're also lucky to cash, which let's face it is probably more than half the game on a daily basis.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by cj

I already told you elsewhere I DON'T CARE!!!

Yeah, it was a tricky racetrack for sure with drying out dirt and some pretty obvious swings in track speed. I do think the pace made it ever murkier for the Apple Blossom.

I laughed this time too.