Honor Code returns on Saturday at Aqueduct

[ILovetheInner]

Originally Posted by Tom

Now its a grade one.

True, that.

[098poi]

Originally Posted by cj

Much easier to judge horses by losses which is what makes undefeated horses very tough to assess.

Excellent point! Worth remembering.

[foregoforever]

Originally Posted by the little guy

So, the DRF opinion on speed figures, including Beyers, is that the numbers are "clearly highly suspect."

I think he meant that some prominent people are "clearly highly suspect".

[Tall One]

Originally Posted by horses4courses

The Clark is next Friday.

Shug is old school, which is to his credit.
Honor Code, imo, is likely to head to Gulfstream,
have another prep in January, and aim for the Donn.

HC will probably head to S Florida like the majority of Shug's horses do every year. Thought HC made a nice move down the lane, and definitely got some seasoning with his return effort. This horse could do some big things next year.

[Robert Fischer]

Originally Posted by horses4courses

Shug is old school, which is to his credit.
Honor Code, imo, is likely to head to Gulfstream,
have another prep in January, and aim for the Donn.

Logical.
February 7th 2015.

Once this horse gets into peak condition, it will actually be easier at 2 turns.

He'll be closer to the pace. Less dependent on the setup in most cases.

I think it gets lost in the hype here, that he got a very good trip in his allowance comeback race.

-The field was very spread out initially and the Scuderi horse got pressured up front by the long-shot. They all kind of bunched up into the turn trying to get into position to tackle the leaders. At That point, Castellano had wisely yet to commit, and continued to patiently guide Honor Code in the 3path. The field entered the stretch and leaders had flattened out, and Maleeh tried to slip through while Monster Mash was being asked outside, and all Honor Code had to do, was be Honor Code.

This is Lanes Ends 'Last Great A.P. INDY'.

The goal is to get that 2-turn grade I, and promote his value as a sire as much as possible.

He's certainly a beautiful animal, he's got good fundamentals. Will be fun to watch him as 4yo.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by the little guy

So, the DRF opinion on speed figures, including Beyers, is that the numbers are "clearly highly suspect."

Gotcha.

First off, let's get one thing straight. When I speak here or anywhere else I am speaking as a horse player the way I have for a long time on this and other forums. The DRF speaks for itself. So cut the BS. You know better.

Now let's look at the facts.

It's a fact that Jerry Brown has had horses getting faster over the years. He defends that position.

It's a fact that over the same period Ragozin has had horses generally flat with a little spike during what Friedman calls the "steroid" era.

It's a fact that Beyer figures have been shrinking at the highest levels in recent years (perhaps due to steroids becoming illegal)

There are theories about the use of steroids, illegal drug use, better nutrition and training methods, tying figures to PARs, breeding etc.. that various people have used to account for figure drift over and above the difficulty in keeping them flat as a matter of process.

But none of that accounts for why all the leading figure makers disagree. Without question that means that controlling for long term figure drift is an issue. Since I (and no one else I know) can prove who has it right (if anyone) it seems preposterous to make comparisons between horses that ran 10, 20, or more years ago and today based on any set of figures. The horses, the conditions, the drugs (legal an illegal) have changed and it's tough for every figure maker to cope with drift. But smart people make such comparisons all the time. I find it annoying.

I also find it annoying when smart people compare baseball players from different eras on batting average. Wait a minute, they know better in baseball and stopped doing that. Only in racing do people still do that.

[cj]

Beyer Speed Chart:

Honor Code 6.5f 1:17.33 93
Readthebyline 7f 1:23.85 92

Beyer Speed Figure

Honor Code 106
Readthebyline 98

I split variants plenty of times myself, but I don't see it here.

[Tom]

Funny how he got that number.....here's the whole day.
Looks like a pretty straight-forward day. I would love to the the explanation of this one.

Getting the DRF Winner's Books and charting the Beyers like this is well worth it - I find more than a few like this. I just am not impressed with Honor Code at all yet. Two wins of slow paced and now a very ordinary allowance race. When he does something to talk about, let me know.

[Stillriledup]

Originally Posted by burnsy

Of course, that was not a great field. You won't know about this horse until he runs in stakes. This is where horse racing is akin to boxing. It's easy to beat the "set up" heals to bolster a record. This is something people get burned by all the time and they never learn from it. They see a name horse win impressively and he's the "talent" of the universe.....goes into a race with equals or better, gets overbet because prior efforts look so good and gets buried. Just like that local boxer with a 12-0 record, he goes out of town, fights someone decent and its lights out, living on easy street is over. Many times in boxing its the beginning of the end for a career when it happens. In horse racing, they get exposed for how good they really are and tear up those tickets at short odds. People go gaga over these horses way before they earn it. It took this horse practically a year to win. Maybe he's not an example of that but beating lesser really is not a good way to evaluate talent. Hell, I can't beat MJ either but I can beat Grandpa Joe seven freakin days a week. In any sport you don't prove your mettle until you face your equals. One of my favorite "bet against" deals is a horse at short odds moving up because everyone thinks they are great. Does it work every time? No....but it works good enough. Still plenty to prove IMO. I read one jack ass that had this horse winning the Triple Crown, the Travers and the BC Classic if he didn't get hurt. I am so happy that people like that bet this game. I think they actually believe themselves when they say it too. It does matter who you beat, once you meet someone better than that.

First of all, "Grandpa Joe" is really Kyrie Irving in a disguise, so you wouldn't be able to beat him.

Secondly, i agree that you don't prove your meddle until you actually face someone who's good, my philosophy is to not downgrade a horse because he beat nothing, i would only downgrade based on visually inspecting the horse and trying to determine that horse's talent, even some of the best horses of all time have raced in suspect fields on occasion, and it wasn't their fault, so i wasn't going to downgrade a special horse because of that. There are other ways to downgrade for me, and looking at who a horse beat isn't one of them most of the time.

The one time i would downgrade a horse at least slightly is if that horse seemed to have to work very hard to beat a horse i know stinks. That's when i'll use competition lines a little bit, but most times, i'm just going on the video of the individual and not worrying about what's behind him.