Being Humbled By The BC

Our horse running with his tongue hanging. The Europeans? Did anyone see a tongue? Does Albarado look pissed? Did he ever breeze the horse?

Competing with the Asmussen, Lukas, Pletcher, Zitos of the world seems somehow do-able even as I'm looking at the Jeff Lukas Bloodhorse videos starring Hennig, McGlaughlin, Pletcher et. al., the band of Lukas assistants out there, listening to the them talk, and understanding those fellows have more on the ball personally than I'm seeing from them on the track.

But then we have the Europeans and those TB Times videos of John Ferguson, Detori, Freddy Head, Ralp Beckett, Richard Pegram, and I'm thinking, is John Gosden an Ivy League professor? No. Just a horse trainer. And, never mind Magnier, Tabor, Adain O'Brien will roast in hell for what he did to GW, and Sheik Mohammed. Does it seem to anyone else that the Europeans are on a different level suddenly? Those images of Goldikova and Ravens Pass sprinting by our best like they were tied to a post will stay with me for a while. Suddenly things seem a lot tougher if you're aspiring to make it to the Cup.

It's all ok though. We prefer things other than easy. It's good for me personally to see that somewhere in the world some very able people are running things in horse racing, and, voila, with the advent of the pro-ride it's filtering back this way.

Training:
Thurs. 10/30: resisting the tempation after last night's hard stuff to go again tonight. Off.

Almost November

Handicapping BC races finished and so it's back to the Canterbury Tales for me and good stuff like this:

"Ey! Goddes mercy!" seyd our Hoste tho.
"Now swich a wyf I pray God kepe me fro!
Lo, which sleightes and subtilitees
In wommen been, for ay as bisy as bees
Ben they, us sely men for to deceyve
And from a sothe ever wol they weyve."

"wol" means woe. The man had a sense of humor.

How'd my expert handicapping of the Classic go? Well, I underestimated the Europeans perfectly. And, it looks as if Sheik Mohammed has learned something after all these years, OMG.

The order of finish based purely on number of furlongs trained in the last 45 days and number of works THAT SHOWED would have been:

Curlin
Colonel John
Smooth Air
Champs Elysees
Tiago
Go Between
Fairbanks
Student Council
Casino Drive
the three Europeans

Actual order of finish for the American horses and Casino was:
Tiago
Curlin
Go Between
Colonel John
Smooth Air
Champs Elysees
Fairbanks
Student Council
Casino Drive

The horses that worked very little, Fairbanks, Student Council and Casino Drive, indeed finished up the track whereas the rest was a predictable jumble based on that everyone that finished ahead of Fairbanks all had a close approximation of the same amount of work, ie. there was too little separating them in terms of works from 9/1 to the Cup. E.g. The most was done by Curlin--8 works, 43f. The least by Tiago 6 works, 38f. The fly in the ointment was Champs. for which hopefully Bobby Frankel better have an explanation.

And then there's this interesting photo:


Notice the Midnight Lute above has slightly longer toes on his fronts than hinds. A bit odd compared to what you see given the speed of his race. How'd Doug O'Neil do, coming soon.

Training:
Fri: 10/24 Off. Rain.
Sat. 10/25 each horse trotted 1 mile under tack.
Sun. 10/26: 30 mph winds and 40 degrees. decided on paddock work. 10 minutes rigorous in drying mud.
Mon. 10/27 Nob and myself pussy out on the tack work in cold weather. mutual agreement. This'll look good in January, but in October tack work in this stuff is like diving into a freshly filled swimming pool in July. We again opt for 10 min. rigorous riderless work in drying mud.
Tues. 10/28: After yesterday's fast stuff both trot 1.25 mile under tack with some gallop.
Wed. 10/29: 1.25 miles under tack with significant gallop for each. then riderless speed work in :14s, call it 7f. the last furlong of the planned 8f turned into a fight.

Sires/Broodmare Sires Of 2008 Breeder's Cup Winners

Chester House (Mr. Prospector-Toussad-El Gran Senor) at left in the 2000 Arlington Million Post Parade, which he won.

Without studying and just on cursory glance seems in the Sires lots of Mr. Prospector and Northern Dancer and the Broodmare sires are all over the place. 10 of 14 sires stand for less than $20,000, and top auction sires seem notable by their absence. Abberation or trend?

Stud Fee $25,000 or more

Unbridled Song-Avenue Of Flags
Street Cry-Kris S
Elusive Quality-Lord At War
Dalakhani-Sadlers Wells

Stud Fee $15-20,000

Chester House-Be My Guest
Chester House-Forzando
EDubai-Lost Code

Stud Fee $10,000-14,999.

Tapit-Tarr Road
Belong to Me-Relaunch
Real Quiet-Dehere

Stud Fee less than $10,000

Sahm ($5000)-Quest For Fame
Albert The Great ($4000)-Forty Niner

Stud Fee Unknown or Deceased

Aanaba-Blushing Groom
Cadeaux Generaux-Warning

BC Post Mortems

1. A bit of bravery and contempt for front runners on championship day as most winners break slow from the gate. Or, more to it than that, possibly? Very fast track. Seems as if one could run from the front.

2. What's with the 7f for the filly/mare sprint? Without doubt there's a perfectly logical explanation.

2. Ladies Day I really liked. Instead of "Let's get this over with and get to the real stuff" I was able to sit back and appreciate the girls. The girls tell me there's a lower level of intensity in women's athletics. So, I think, it is with horses, but obviously just as much fun when it's done right.

3. Bringing me to "Goldikova". Wow! Every once in a while, and generally its a filly, you see a burst like that, or, something like that. The sire Anaaba is dead. Too bad!

5. What does a $1,700,000 yearling get you in the Juvenile Colts? Munnings ran like, well...hmm, just another horse.

6. And then Dearest Tricksi running her heart out with her $1000 sire Proud Romeo. I was rooting...

7. I'm avoiding getting carried away with Stardom Bound. Her field faded in front of her.

8. Red Rocks without steroids. Possibly Curlin without steroids?

9. Actually, I think Curlin just got beat, Asmussen bellyaching aside. What would you get had you trained Secretariat most of two years to run 13 second furlongs?

10. The Euros had their horses trained for long sustained sprints, unlike their buddies this side of the Atlantic. Did you notice Raven's Pass right behind Curlin all the way, except RP never ran out of gas, Detori said he conducted a hard work with Raven's Pass one week from the race. Unknown, what that means precisely, but, I'd like to know.

11. Two Eion Harty horses "not responding". What's with that? Is Colonel John looking so good on You Tube but an overhyped morning glory, or, is it again as in the Derby that Harty forgot to dot some of eyes and cross some tees. CJ simply was run much harder, farther and faster than he trained, just like Curlin.

9. Great, great cup days! Amid all the bad news, this is something to build on. Is a "level playing field" good for racing? I think so. There's quite a difference between the Euros being able to avoid dirt and Asmussen and Albarado claiming the pro-ride beat them. Instead of a "grass race" as Asmussen claimed, what I saw was somebody cleaning their clock.

BC 2008

I'm spending so much time watching these great races over and over I'm without time to blog. Come from behind-closer type strategy worked so well in many. Bears looking at. Anyone flabbergasted as me with Midnight Lute and the legacy of Real Quiet, Dehere, Baffert and Pegram? What a stallion prospect!

Also these folks photoed from left, Raven's Pass with short upright pasterns and obviously a heck of a training/riding job. Then, the Mayor of Newmarket with the gold chain, and their majesties Sheik Mohammed and Princess Haya. Congrats!!! The Sheik has arrived in America and is welcome, though I wonder to what degree it was the Princess, who rides, that directed Ravens Pass.


















Training:
Fri: 10/24: Rained again. 7 days out of last 10 and the farm looks like Monmouth last year. Off third day in a row.
Sat. 10/25: sun out and at least we can walk without getting our sox wet. recommencement of tack work as each horse trots-walks one mile.

Is The Track The Thing?

Did the pro-ride favor closers or was it as Garrett Gomez was quoted somewhere that the best horses were running from behind?

I'm suspecting the latter for a couple of reasons. First, though Ventura came from way back in the sprint, none of the other closers were able to gain on either Zaftig or Indian Blessing who were right on the pace all the way around.

Secondly, despite Trevor Denman's pronouncements the pace up front was very fast in most of the races. Did Baffert make a strategic error with Indian Blessing by sending her in a 7F race? Did I overestimate Baffert yesterday? IB was spent by the quarter pole and possibly it had little to do with the track.

Also I was mulling that large horses seemed to be handling things and several smaller horses were struggling. Coincidence? Something with hoof size? Are we seeing perfectly conformed larger horses taking charge?

And, congratulations to this group. Never thought when I was listening to Herb Alpert and his trumpet in the mid 1960's that there'd be a connection to horse racing in 2008 with Alpert/Jerry Moss A & M records and Zenyatta.
You can recall Giacomo, but, Moss and his wife finally got the really big horse. You could say "took long enough." Yet, we know it's other than easy. Congrats!!!

And also kudos to Mike Smith and Shireffs for their race strategy which Smith pulled off flawlessly also with Stardom Bound. I'll be taking a closer look at their methods when I get to PERFORMANCE.

Now, on to today's races and I looked only at the Classic. Does info from Friday and Steve Haskin observing that Tiago looks great and has been galloping change anything? Possibly somebody might try to steal the race upfront. Fairbanks, of course, but maybe Smooth Air and Ravens Pass. Suspect also that that may be the only shot for Henrythenavigator.

As to Tiago, they always look great on light work and good care, which fails to change that this horse has done far less work than some others based on PPs. Enjoy the day, and here are the picks of the real experts:
http://www.ntra.com/content.aspx?type=feature&id=36094

Great Show By The Fillies And Mares...

I sort of liked the format this afternoon. There was something mentally comfortable about watching just fillies and mares.
I also enjoyed the live blogging at Left At The Gate, and am about to look at Paulick. Guess Christopher Paasch learned something since Principle Secret. And how about Tarr Road, sire of My White Corvette, who subsequently foaled Paasch trainee Stardom Bound. Here's the full pedigree:

http://www.bloodhorse.com/NOW/Pedigree/Default.aspx?referenceNumber=7741170

Tarr Road, who'd a thunk. Somewhere I recall the name. 4 foals sell for an average of $1400.00. Which brings me to Maram by Sahm standing somewhere for $5000.00. Translate, they'll do a breeding for a couple of Grover Clevelands and pay your gas to the farm. Tarr Road and Sahm! There is hope!

A few miscellaneous observations that struck me over the afternoon:

Good and questionable training jobs. I bird dog the PPs for what works, what fails to work, and just as I'm considering the demise of Birdbirdistheword there's Dream Empress with the most impressive (to me) performance of the day considering her connections. Questionably trained horses tend to race questionably, but, there's Dream Empress. For what we get more normally we may watch Pure Clan trained by that very nice and jolly man Bob Holthus. 5 breeze/race in 2 months for Pure Clan with the last one eleven days out. That's the farthest out work of any BC horses I'm recalling resulting in PC performing to expectations.

Quite some handicapping as I'll take credit over predicting European performance so far but simultaneously lay an egg with Indian Blessing, who in 20-20 hindsight might have benefited from a slightly more intelligent race strategy. But, who am I to question Bob Baffert?

And finally, Steve Haskin today spotted Tiago galloping the last two days. Shireff kept Giacomo in the barn the last 5 days before the BC. And now this, and there's Zenyatta, which may be enough to reconsider Shireff and his horse overnight. More fun tomorrow. It should be a great day!

Breeder's Cup, Iggy Puglisi And Indian Blessing

I spent 15 minutes handicapping the Classic and another 15 looking at the other races. Would someone in it as I've been and from all angles have any special handicapping insight? We'll see.

The best and most logical training job: Bob Baffert and Indian Blessing. Great minds think alike, and I'd have handled the filly in recent works much the same. Unsurprising that the experienced Baffert probably does the best training of the moment at the upper levels. Look for Indian Blessing to run away with this??? I'm expecting it, even on quick perusal.

There seem to be several other very nice races. This BC to me just has a better feel than in some years. And, with the pro-ride there's less to fear in terms of a breakdown, which provides some comfort to me as I watch.

I spent some specific time on the Classic attempting to sort out the training jobs. In general, let's note it, I've never seen a BC with most of the horses getting this much work. There are, of course, a few remaining East Coast trainers still thinking their horses will win on air instead of conditioning, but these types will as usual get their heads handed back to them. The Europeans will leave this BC--I predict--understanding that they are now actually running against trained horses. I'll be surprised if we see a lot of foreign success today even if that's a bold prediction based on very little solid info.

Now specifically to the Classic. I rated the training jobs based on
1. Number of breeze/races since 9/1, and
2. Total number of furlongs breezed/raced since 9/1.

It turns out the correlation between 1 and 2 above is almost equal, and so I'll just list them once in order of most work to least:

Number of Breezes/Number of Races since 9/1:

8/43f Curlin (some of his Sept. works fail to show so I had to guess.)

8/42f Colonel John (my form fails to show September works, but, we know this horse breezes every 6 days.

6/46 Smooth Air

6/42 Champs Elysees

6/38 Tiago--again, a little guess work as to early Sept.

5/30 Fairbanks

4/21 Student Council

3/18 Casino Drive--there's some evidence CD breezed 5f on Wednesday.

then the Europeans whose work is unknown:
1/8 Ravens Pass
1/10 Duke of Marmalade
2/16 HenryTheNavigator who is interestingly running on lasix.

Here's how I eliminated them:

Smooth Air--no talent, too chunky for the distance, Grade 2 horse, last work too far out (8 days) to maintain top condition.

Tiago--Shireffs problem, he puts the horse under wraps--no galloping--after last work. Assuming this is case, and you are unable to do that and compete at the top. Tiago will fade.
(Edit: Steve Haskins spotted Tiago galloping on track Thurs. and Friday. Still think he's done to little to get ready.)

Fairbanks--Plecher without steroids. More the Grade 2 animal and in lesser physical condition than my picks.

Student Council--lacks speed.

Go Between--need say little more than Mott without steroids. Insufficient work for this horse to compete, per the usual Mott.

The Europeans--I'm doubting their specific training and that Adain O'Brien dares show his face on this side of the Atlantic after what they did to George Washington last year. I sincerely hope his horses finish up the track, and believe they will. Ravens Pass is another matter. See below.

Casino Drive--the Japs will learn you have to do more than walk an hour a day under tack to win the BC Classic.

Bringing us to my Picks:

I'm fairly confident the horses that have done the most work will be there at the end. That would be:

Curlin
Colonel John
Champs Elysees
Ravens Pass is my European wild card.

How will these fare after the 1/8 pole?
Ravens Pass will fade at the end with interesting dynamics for remaining 3. Do it by process of elimination:

First I have to consider the interesting case of Colonel John both by breeding, connections, and talent. Those You Tube videos show a superb breezing job by Iggy Puglisi--here's Iggy:

But, good as Iggy is, do we ask why, going into the BC, Iggy breezes the animal instead of the jock? Sure we have Edgar Prado whose unavailable to them. But, were CJ mine and in particular with this animal and his monster of an efficient stride, think I'd want the race jock on board for those breezes to get in tune.

That's really all CJ has to do, which is to maintain that stride smoothly around the track. I'm doubting that Prado will pick up on this just jumping on the horse, and he'll be without a full appreciation of what he has and how to use it. CJ will fade in the stretch for that reason and that they simply have failed to train CJ for the distance. Eion Hardy, I guess, finally figured out the tongue but shows again himself smart but lacking.

In the end I believe the most conditioned animal will take it. Unsurprising it's Curlin, but look for Champs Elysees to pressure to the wire.

Training:
Thurs. 10/23: raining again. 6 days out of 9 and an unbelievable quagmire. Off.

More Doug O'Neill Stats

Pictured: A Doug O'Neil trainee.

Below are 23 randomly selected Doug O'Neil horses with respect to number of works/races for the whole year 2008. The random selection involves taking the first 23 horses raced after 8/1/08. Non-racing animals were omitted.

Note O'Neil lists 332 total horses on his website, and so I've looked at about 10% of the listed stable. Hopefully we can absorb the trainer's overall methods from this many horses. Additionally, the blog will look at O'Neil's Breeder's Cup contingent by Saturday.

The aim is to look at other than PERFORMANCE. Instead, we seek to find a relation between total number of works/races for each horse over a period of time and whether those horses are injured in the time frame with a goal to calculate how many times per month we'd have to w/r to avoid injury. This stable provides a nice and large sample.

With all the stats available, there are unknowns:

1. What O'Neal does on slow gallop days. O'Neal being similar to Pletcher, you'd guess his horses gallop every other day averaging 1.25 to 1.5 miles, i.e. light slow gallop work. I'd guess also that they lope along in :18s-:20s. The above photo of an O'Neil horse is but one rat, but an obviously unconditioned one indicating the light galloping. But, ultimately, what O'Neil does with off days and how this might figure in is unknown.
2. "Whys and wherefores" with each horse are unknown. The plan and various interruptions we may only guess at.

What did we find with O'Neal?

1. The average of all the horses listed below in terms of how many works/races they had for the year 2008 is: 2.88 over a 30.5 day period.
2. 12 of the 23 horses are still going currently.

I'll look at the Breeders Cup horses tomorrow and summarize soon. Our training below.


The stas

A Lil Dumani

1/14-10/22 Here is a sample calculation which will be abreviated for the rest. A Lil Dumani had 17Breezes + 6 races = 23 works/racesworks/races in 9 months = 274 days. 274 divided by 23 = a work race every 11.9 days on average or 30.5 days divided by 11.9 = 2.56 works/races per month.

Atticus Jack(age 2)

7/7-10/13 9B + 1 race = 10 in 3.33 months = 2.96 race/works/month.

Azul Leon (age 2) --Azul reappears 10/18. Was he hurt or did they decide to give 27 days between fast works? Last prior had been 9/21. Looks as if
Azul gets 1 breezes after 9/21 to Breeder's Cup.

4/7-10/25 12 B + 5R = 17 W/R over 6.6 months = 2.61 w/r/month.

Chief Teddy Bear

5/26-9/24 8 B+ 3R = 11 B/R in 4 months = 2.8 w/r/mo.

Coco M (age 2)

8/1-10/9 3B+ 4R= 7w/r in 2.33 mo. = 3 w/r/mo.

Doggie Bear(age 2)

6/9-10/11 13B+3R= 16w/r in 4 months = 4 w/r/mo.

Good Shot Mally(injured?)

1/16-8/15 11B+ 2R = 13 w/r in 7 months = 1.9 w/r/mo.

If Not For You

4/7-10/12 13B+5R=18 w/r in 6 months = 2.95 w/r/mo.

Justice Is Brief

1/6-8/16 4W+10R=14 w/r in 7.33 months= 1.9w/r/mo.

Laddies Poker

9/3-10/13 5W+1R=6w/r in 1.33 months = 4.41w/r/mo.

Magnific

1/7-9/3 (none between Jan. and May) 13W+2R= 15 w/r in 3 months= 5w/r/mo.

Invisible Edge

5/26-10/9 11W+3R=14w/r in 3.5 months = 4w/r/mo.

Mistical Plan

2/25-8/24 11W+5R=16w/r in 6 months = 2.67w/r/mo.

Mr. Chairman

2/18-10/5 10W+7R=17 w/r in 7.5 months = 2.68w/r/mo. Mr. Chairman, a hard knocking allowance horse has the best record of this bunch. Superb animal. Compare w/r with the stakes filly Mistical Plan. Query whether Mr. C's class might improve e.g. if the speed workload were doubled. Somehow he's survived on light work whereas Mistical plan expired.

Presidential Cause

4/25-9/5 6W+5R=11w/r in 4.33 months =2.51 w/r/mo.

Princess Arjumand(lasted whole year to 8/20. One of the few.)

1/12-8/21 14W+8races= 22 w/r in 7.33 months = 3 w/r/mo.

Raja Daja

8/10-9/17 2W+2R=4w/r/ in 1.33 months = 3 w/r/mo.

Richer Gear

6/16-10/13 10W+3R=13 w/r in 4 months = 3.25 w/r/mo.

Royal Humor

1/30-9/20 (None in April) 9W+8R=17 w/r in 6.66 months =2.54w/r/mo.
Royal Humor breaks maiden after multiple tries, runs one more decent race then falls off the table.

Sandita

6/21-9/8 4W+4R= 8 w/r in 2.66 months = 3 w/r/mo.

Swiss Current (Stakes filly who made it through the year. Zero wins but she survived.)

1/22-9/25 (none in June and July) 15W+9R= 24 w/r in 8 months = 3 w/r/mo.

Tizmet

5/4-8/20 (none in June) 5B+ 4R=9 w/r in 3.5 months = 2.57 w/r/mo.

Yankee Visionary (this probably is a late comer to the barn as he was racing in August, and so info on breezes seems incomplete, so, we'll leave him out of the overall stats.)

9/17-10/1 2B+3R= 5 w/r in 2 months.

Training:
Wed. 10/22: Off. Its raining during training hours, and has been for last 24 hours. probably 2 inches over 24 hours and 5 of last 8 days rain. But, we're ok up to now, and it looks as if dry weather coming.

Who Will Win The BC Classic?

I'm looking at Doug O'Neil's stats in detail and "for the year" for the 28 selected horses. I'll post the interesting results when finished.

Meanwhile, is there a nicer striding horse than Colonel John? All else being equal, may we perhaps separate young horses by the length and height of the reach of their fronts at speed. You will see the difference by comparing the two on this video.

I've long thought CJ the best horse of this year (besides what Big Brown was before the weight gain) in terms of appearance, conformation, athleticism and stride. Makes me want to rush my Raise A Native line mare and my $30,000 bank account straight to Tiznow, or, should I go with Distorted Humor for $300,000 down the shedrow? hmmm....duhhh...

So the question whether CJ can compete with hard knocking older horses off of one(edit: two) race since early May? May we frame the same question as to whether it's possible for CJ stay comfortable in that stride while quickening it beyond what's he's been trained for 6 straight months? My opinion of the trainer appeared 4/29 as follows:

"Flapping tongues, and trainer of the Derby favorite whose hobby is bass fishing. I'm neutral but conflicted about hunting/fishing but, does anyone find something incongruous about an animal trainer--Eion Harty--that enjoys killing fish in his spare time? Forget the Nafzger like job with Colonel John, after the Derby I'm inviting Harty to my place in hope of teaching him how to apply a tongue tie." (Edit 10/22--looks as if they've figured out the tongue.)

and about CJ, here:
http://ratherrapid.blogspot.com/2008/04/x_28.html

Maybe we'll see on 10/25 the correct gaging of the CJ connections.

Training:
Sat. Fast riderless in the mud.
Sun. & Mon. Off.
Tues. Oct 21: Mixture of calamity and the sort of stuff that makes your day. Planned tack work/riderless speed combo w/o started changing in my head as rain drops appeared driving to the farm. Pelting rain as I drove down the driveway. By the time horses transferred from pasture to paddock rain let up a bit, but Art lost a front shoe that had been miraculous held on by 2 nails on one side for two weeks almost immediately. Art removed, and then Rod (riderless) is flashing adult type speed. First time I've seen that, and for this little powerful chunk of a horse this is the sort of thing that keeps you going. Rod over about 10 min: 6x2f as fast as he could go in the light mud. Art: put the shoe back on, it was raining the whole time and muddy by the time he got back out there--about 6 min steady riderless as fast as the conditions allowed. Decent instead of great w/o for Art.

My Trip To Fairmount Park

Traveling over the weekend to Indianapolis to visit a suddenly very ill relative I found myself on I-70 just east of St. Louis in Collinsville, Illinois and driving right by Fairmount Park.

Since Fairmount is on my list of possible destinations I made a short detour off the Interstate to take a look. It had been 20 years since my last visit.

There were about 100 cars in the parking lot in front of the grandstand attending the simulcasts. Given the time which was 6 p.m. Sat. afternoon, this number was a bit of a pleasant surprise. Presume this meant about 200 attendees still there after an afternoon of betting.

I wanted to take a look at the backstretch, and noticed the stable gate off in the distance. I drove up to the guard shack, explained I lacked an Illinois licence, would my Kansas license allow me to make a short tour? The request puzzled the old guard a bit, and then a young fellow appeared out of the shack and said "Hop in my truck. I'll take you around."

This fellow was about 35 years old and he was talkative and very enthusiastic about racing. "Place is kinda run down", he said, though my observation was that Fairmount looked to be a fairly typical older back stretch on quick perusal. Zero humans back there, showing level of horse care on a Saturday evening. About what I've come to expect of horse people.

We went to the ship in barn. "That's were you'd be stalled initially". The barn neat enough though dark and depressing with claustrophobic 12 x 10 stalls painted deep forest green with walls rising about 20 feet. Stall entrances face out into the weather with a porch railing surrounding the shedrow. I was considering this scene with wind and cold blowing in in mid winter.

The guard companion never stopped talking in process volunteered a complete recent history of Fairmount. Apparently the track almost bankrupted and closed in 2000 but was rescued at the last minute when purchased by a fellow whose name I failed to pick up described as a Purina Feeds billionaire now age 77. The guard said this fellow bought Fairmount with a view to having his own training center to train for the Derby. Indeed in the middle of everyting stood one brand new barn nicely equipped with huge stalls -as they looked from the road -stabling the track owner's horses.

I got a good glimpse of the 1 mile dirt oval as we drove off. Looked like a nice racetrack as I was visualizing galloping around it instead of my pasture every morning. I asked the cost of off season boarding at Fairmount. It's free. But, all in all, a depressing stall and barn situation if you're a horse, even though I had trouble getting Fairmount out of my mind as I drove on to Indianapolis as a decent situation and training facility for someone without a big bank roll looking to train a horse.

Fairmount's future prospects? Everyone was buzzing about the Mike Ditka group getting Hawthorne slots. Fairmount gets 15% of slots revenue. I received the impression the track would close without that revenue as Fairmount obviously is presently on lifesupport and another eye opener on the state of horse racing this time in a metro area of 3 million.

Below photos of Fairmount that I googled, starting with trainer John Witthauer explaining state of racing at Fairmount with horses in background. Left click to enlarge.


















Training:
Fri. 10/17: Rained again. both horses were trotted 1 mile under tack over standing water in the pasture after yesterday's tough riderless w/o.
Sat. morning 10/18: Wanted tough w/o prior to my trip. Both horses were galloped riderless on the muddy pasture track. Probably 9 x 3f as fast as conditions allowed. It was another tough w/o. They were steaming at the end.
Sun. 10/19: Off
Mon. 10/20: Off.

Doug O'Neill Stats

O'Neil's website, for reasons unknown, contains a list of recent workouts that is incomplete which omits almost 1/2 of recent workouts. Thus my initially very incorrect impression of O'Neil and my subsequent revision of the prior post. I've figured out now how to extract info from O'Neil's site and in fact all workouts and races for the year are available. O'Neil has too many horses to go through the whole exercise, but, I'll do that with some of the smaller stables.

Here are some summary stats on the 28 O'Neil horses I looked at from 8/15-10/15/08:

Total races in 60 days for 28 horses: 52--the "average" would be that each O'Neil horse races once a month. The stats show that the O'Neil modus operendi is to race every 3 weeks. As you'd expect, they fall a bit short of that and average about once in 30 days. I consider a stable average of racing every horse once a month as decent.

Total breeze/races over 60 days for the 28: 104 which is 3.7 per 60 days per horse or less than 2 per month. This stat is skewered because many horses fail to make it through and quit racing or working out. Thus we need a stat for the horses that made it through, as follows:

Total breeze/races for horses that make it through the period: 12 of 28 horses make it all the way through. These have a total of 64 workout/races which averages 5.33 for the period or 2.66 per month. But, note that this is an average. O'Neil is very inconsistent in his workout pattern--see below.

Number of horses looked at: 28
Number of horses that make it all the way through: 12
Number of horses that fail to make it all the way through: 12
Number of horses that might have made it through, i.e. questionable: 4

Giving the benefit of the doubt 16 made it through and 12 failed. 16/28 = 57%

The four labled "questionable" horses are horses that were there from beginning to late September and then disappear. Since O'Neil tends to give 2-3 weeks off workouts between races these 4 might simply have been in abeyance and will reappear shortly.

Were the 12 horses failing to make it through all injured? Presume that horses racing in August probably will keep racing barring injury. Nevertheless other reasons exist that may keep a horse off the track: Sickness, giving the horse a break, lack of performance, horses in transition, claims, etc.

I think most of the horses failing to make it through probably had some kind of injury over the injury spectrum. All injuries may have been minor causing removal from training for short periods, or catastrophic and permanent. We're without a way to discern this. For the purpose here, I'll be generous in terms of "estimating injury". We want to know what % of horses were DEFINITELY injured.

In this sense I've looked at the 12 possibly injured. I believe 9 out of the 12 in all likelihood suffered some kind of injury in the 2 months. The overall injury percentage over 60 days is thus
32%.

There are also some patterns which show in the schedules. O'Neil appears to like to give two weeks off from hard work after a race. This is extremely consistent. Sometimes he gives 3 weeks off before the horse recommences. For the rest of the time it appears that O'Neil likes to give works/races every 7 days, and that for many horses there is a 2-3 workout pattern every 7 days prior to a race. There are almost zero patterns which show workouts more frequently than every 7 days.

O'Neil however is very inconsistent with this. Horses for reasons unexplainable frequently undergo abnormal (for O'Neil) delays between events. It is more common than uncommon in O'Neils patterns to see a gap of 8,9,10 or more days between workout/races. Why? Could be multiple reasons--rider availability, track schedule, laziness and inattention, etc. The real reasons are unknown to us.

We may summarize thus that O'Neil is hardly the grossly negligent buffoon that I'd supposed on initial incorrect info. In fact O'Neil's stats show him to be a Todd Pletcher like trainer in that he likes to give a significant break from fast works post race--O'Neil 2 weeks, Pletcher 3 week,--and that he "likes" to breeze every 7 days.

But O'Neil has a much less religious pattern than Pletcher. In the Breeder's Cup and TC races where I've followed Pletcher training to the extent possible Pletcher has a set pattern that he follows without fail:

race
three weeks off
3 breezes of 5f in 1:00-1:02 seven days apart
race.

Such consistency is lacking for O'Neil. And, it's noteworthy that for O'Neil such consistency is also lacking with his top drawer stakes horses.

Without talking to O'Neil--and that would be interesting--why he does what he does we can only guess at. I'll look at this next post.

Training:
Tues and Wed 10/15, 10/16 Off due to rain.
Thurs. 10/17: tough conditioning workout after two days off. Its way too muddy for constructive tack work, so, riderless hard workout: 9 x 3f with significant rests as fast as they could motor, which was :15s or slightly slower, but in the mud. They expended a lot of effort, and given the conditions it was a decent day. The two year old is starting to stay with them in terms of toughness, which is encouraging.

Doug O'Neill

Suddenly we have some more guinea pigs txs to the KH comment last post. Though aware, I'd forgotten the trainer websites.

And so, I'll take a look at a few of these as part of the population studies in looking at breezing frequency/injury prevention relationship, a bit tedious perhaps, but also indicative of the importance I attached to frequency of fast work.

A word about my opinions. I'll try as much as possible to mute the editorial comments. This is science supposedly, and each make their own judgments. Occasionally my praise or disdain will seep through usually because the available evidence is overwhelming.

And so, without further adieu, Doug O'Neil. With each one I'll assume information on their websites has been entered correctly and comprehensively. This task is visually challenging, and I may inadvertently missed one here or there. However, I'm without a doubt we get the general picture. We additionally have the quandary of small sample. Yet, given the number of horses looked at, again, believe we can draw conclusions.

This post I'll simply list the horses, and conclude on O'Neil next post. This is the trainer who was just given a crack two year old Square Eddie by his old client Paul Reddam. Also, I forgot I was looking at polytrack, whereas all my assumptions are for dirt. Nevertheless, believe you'll notice the problems.

I looked at 28 O'Neil horses in detail covering the period 8/15-10/15. The racing stats are available for the whole period but the work stats are available only for one month 9/15-10/15.
And please note I chose a RANDOM SAMPLE. I refrained from picking and choosing and simply commenced with the first 24 horses that fit the parameters that began racing 8/15, i.e. the first 24 in a row.

I'd initially started with 4 horses I just picked out and noticed most were not racing. I then decided to look only at racing horses on the premise that most trainers do a decent job preparing for the first race. After racing begins, there's the rub. So, racing horses only. After doing about 10 racers in August I noticed most were 2 year olds or maidens. This also might skew things, and so for the last 10 I looked only at older winners to see how they fared.

I documented each race and work that shows over the period. Here's what I was looking for:
1. Starting 8/15 for the racers--how many of them were still working/racing by 10/15. What thus is the % that probably were injured on the polytrack.
2. How frequently does O'Neil breeze/race. This comes across fairly clearly and the answer is "seldom". The little success O'Neil sees are from horses he tends to work more.

It is unnecessary for you to look in detail at all these horses. But, if you do, you'll see the same patterns that I'll detail next post.

Commencing with racers 8/15/08 to 8/27/08 we follow them through to 10/15/08, works and races. Most races/works are at Delmar and Santa Anita with an occasional at Fairplex and one at Saratoga for a stakes--Mystical Plan--who interestingly and unsurprisingly after she's moved to the dirt is not heard from again.

Doggie Bear:
8/15 Race 8th MC 6f
9/8 49.2
9/14 Race 2d (at Fairplex) MC 6.5f
9/27 Breeze 47.8
10/4 1:08
10/11 Race 8th in MSw 6.5f

Coco M
8/16 Race 5th in 2yr. 5.5f Msw
9/7 Race 4th in Msw 6f Fairplex
9/20 :50
9/27 4f in :50
10/9 Race 8th in a 1 M MC.
Does survive though.

Swiss Current
8/17 Race 5th Soloma Beach Hc 1 mile
8/22 Race4th in TOC Hc 1 3/8 M
9/13 1:05
9/21 Race 2d in a Fairplex Hc at 1 1/16
9/25 6f in 1:16.6 (only post breeze race in 4-8 days I found.) Nothing in next 20 days though.
hmm.

Good Shot Molly
8/15 Race 1st in a 5.5f MC
Disappears thereafter--presume injury

Presidential Cause
8/16 Race 3rd in 6.5 claimer
9/5 Race 2nd in Fairplex 6.5 claimer
Disappears. Presume Injury #2

Justice is Brief
8/16 Race 1st in 1 1/16 allowance
Disapparance #3

Invisible Edge
8/17 Race 9th in 2yr 5.5 MC
9/10 :48
9/17 Race 1st in Fairplex MC
10/5 35.4
10/9 5th in 6f Starter Allowance

Yankee Visionary
8/17 Race 4th 7f claiming
9/5 Scratched
9/17 50.4 The horse now has 1 work in a month.
9/24 48.6
10/1 Race 5th in 6.5f claiming.

Royal Humor
8/17 Race 4th in 6f Msw
9/1 Race 5th in Msw
9/20 :50
Gone

Raja Daja
8/17 Race 4th in 5f MC
9/52.6
9/17 Race 5th in 6f MC
Gone

If Not For You
8/18 Race 4th in 6f MC
9/12 Race 3rd in 6f MC at Fairplex
10/2 48.8
10/12 Race 3rd in 7f

Lightening Diablo
8/18 Race 6th in 6f Starter Allowance
9/10 52.4
9/19 Race 3rd in 6f claiming
10/5 49.8
10/12 Race 9th in 6f claiming
made it through somehow

Magnific
8/18 Race 4th in Msw
9/3 :48
Gone

Rush With Thunder
8/18 Race 1st in 1M claiming
9/1 Race 5th in 1 mile claiming
9/17 4f in 49.6
9/24 Race 10th in 7f claiming

Princess Arjumand
8/20 1:03.2 (that's what it says)
8/21 Race 7th in 6.5f claiming
Gone

Socerers Spell
8/16 50.8
8/23 Race 9th in 6.5f claiming.
9/10 53.8
9/17 4f in 50.8
9/26 Race 4th in 6f claiming
10/16 1:03.2

Chief Teddy Bear
8/23 Race 8th in 4.5f claiming
9/10 51.6
9/17 4f in 47.4
9/24 Race 12th in 6.5f claiming

Sandita
8/23 Race 4th in 6.5 claimer
9/8 Race 2nd in 6.5 claimer
Gone

Mistical Plan
8/24 Race 6th in Balerina Stakes at Saratoga
Gone

Roadside Rest
8/24 Race 3rd in 6f Starter Allowance
9/17 4f in 49.8
9/25 Race 7th in 1 1/16 allowance
nothing in next 20 days

A Lil Dumani
8/17 46.8
8/24 Race 6th in 6f allowance
9/13 50.8
9/20 101.4
9/27 49.6
10/2 Race 1st Starter allowance

Mr. Chairman
8/24 Race 1st 6f allowance
9/21 49.8
9/28 47.9
10/5 Race 1st CA Sprint

Tismet
8/20 1:13.6
8/27 Race 3rd in 1 M claimer
Gone.

Super Freaky
8/28 Race 2d in 1M stake
9/13 48.6
9/20 1:00.6
nothing in next 25 days

Here are the 1st 4 I looked at, but, I'd specifically picked these out:

Atticus Jack
8/20 37.4
8/27 34.8
9/1 49.2
9/8 50.2
9/15 101.4
9/22 59.8
9/29 :59.4
10/5 59.6
10/13 Race 1st in 2yr. maiden claiming.


Laddies Poker
9/3 :48
9:10 1:03.2
9/17 101.4
9/25 1:16.6
10/5 113.6
10/13 Race 9th in 1 mile allowance

Richer Gear
8/17 1:01
8/30 Race 6th in Fairplex 5f allowance
9/18 Race 8th in 6.5f allowance
10/6 36.6
10/13 Race 12th in 5.5f allowance

Azul Leon
8/31 48.8
9/14 49.8
9/21 102.6
9/28 Race 6th in Norfolk.

Training
Wed. 10/16: We take our 2d day in a row off in mud. Chalk this one up to RR. Probably should have trotted under tack.

A Retraction, And On To Trainer Studies

Sherlock continues his work after I note my mistake last post on Big Brown. I termed the heel bulb injury innocous and after posting noticed a different set of photos showing a fairly severe lacertation with possibly exposed laminae . It was a mistake to post they might have gone on with the horse at this time.

So, after these Breeder's cup seguays, its backto injury prevention and breezing frequency on the blog. First up consider available population studies/trainer studies to see how they're doing. We have available at least a rough schematic of the work of several noted trainers and reasonably conjured estimate of injury rates.

As examples, we know from his own training logs what Lukas was doing with his California stable in the late 1980s, and you may find an estimation of the injury rate for that same stable here:

http://ratherrapid.blogspot.com/2007/01/lukas-and-injuries-stats.html

Similarly the blog has traced Mandella's group that is presented in the DVD "On The Muscle", here:
http://ratherrapid.blogspot.com/2007/01/mandella-charts.html

though exactly how often Mandella breezes is somewhat guess work.

And, we have probably enough direct observation of Nick Zito, Dutrow, Eion Harty, Nafzger, Pletcher, and Larry Jones to reach some conclusions.

I'd like to take a brief look at each of these in terms of the frequency of their breezing/racing related to their projected injury rate to see whether this tells us anything, next post.

Training:
Tues. 10/14: Rain and the horses have their scheduled off day between cycles.

Curlin And BB Post Script

For posterity, Curlin's 10/13/08 work at Santa Anita. I enjoyed watching the rider techniques in terms of controlling the horse and getting lead changes particularly initially. Push button horse that gallops easily and strongly. Anyone besides me raise an eyebrow at all of a 3f galloping warmup strictly on the left lead. Unknown how long they trotted before the gallop. Can they get away with this weak a warm up?. Somewhere on this blog it says "no". But, we get the "impression" of an iron horse working, below.


(edit--after this post I saw a different set of BB photos which do show a severe heel bulb lacertation. I was mistaken and fooled by the initial photos I looked at in calling the injury innocous.)I am reasonably certain that Big Brown's retirement--after looking at the Barbara Livingston photos--had little to do with the fairly innocuous heel bulb injury that would have completely dried out in 2-3 days and probably everything with the fact that the horse had his entire hoof wall reconstructed from the quarters all the way around to the back of the heel which during the breeze obviously failed to hold. Though they might have reconstructed it in an hour and put the horse back on the track tomorrow, the fear probably was that the extent of wall damage is so great that it might fail to hold creating a possible wreck in the Breeder's Cup. Looking at the extent of damage, retirement probably was the correct decision.

Ian McKinney killed that hoof wall with equilox, or whatever composite he uses. You simply avoid keeping that much wall covered with composite that long. The composite robs the wall of needed moisture essentially killing the horn, and, in this case obviously preventing growth at the coronary band. That is what appears to have happened to BB.

Training:
Mon. 10/13: Raining. We had wanted to finish the sequence with another nice gallop or riderless fast work. We got neither. Too wet to gallop, and the paddock track was so slippery the best the horses could do was about :15s. However, they were into it, and galloped riderless intermittent for about 15 min. Tough workout with plenty of steam coming off them at the end. 1 inch rain coming next 2 days. Weather havoc continues.

"Oh Shame, Oh Curse, Upon Such Bumpkins..."

(Edit: after this post Iavarone claimed BB breezed barefoot)
MN: Ricky wft?

RD: I can't believe it.! I can't believe it!

MN: Lol. Fathead can't believe it.

RD: You sound pissed.

MN: I am definitely pissed. You and that standardbred farrier thickhead have had 5 months since the Belmont to correct this shoeing job, and, here we go again. How many times have I told you this horse is overstriding?

RD: I just hope Ian McKinley has malpractice insurance.

MN: I just hope you get the mob hit you so richly deserve.

RD: Ha, ha ha. I'm laughing.

MN: Robert N. Clay is laughing.

RD: Seriously MN, wtf. Why do we get so unlucky?

MN: Do you want me to answer that?

RD: Normally, no. But, lay it on me...

MN: Take a look at the photo above of BB foot. What do you see?

RD: I dunno.

MN: As follows:

1. shoe heels too far back of widest point of frog.
2. Shoe heels fail natural inward curve.
2. heels way too high.
3. no toe grabs.

RD: This is too complicated for me.

MN: That's why I love you so. But, give it a try. Take note, Toe grabs on hind + no grabs on front create a dissonance in the stride. Horse has to compensate with every stride to different speed of foot falls front to rear. Get it so far?

RD: Maybe.

MN: Then that standardbred guy McKinley comes in with those experimental Yasha shoes and mucks things up even more.

RD: What do you mean?

MN: Yashas: elevate heels on the rear with a rubber pad underneath no less causes quicker push off from rear than normal--pay attention--and causes faster turnover of the rear.

RD: I fail to get it.

MN: Obviously. Best to take a look at the website. Take a look at the Yashas and see if you really think they're a good shoe.

http://www.tenderhoof.com/splash.asp

MN: Well...

RD: I learned that instead of trying to help a horse, might be better to leave well enough alone...

MN: Duh...

We Call In The Detective

Sherlock was "famous for his intellectual prowess, and is renowned for his skillful use of deductive reasoning while using abductive reasoning (inference to the best explanation) and astute observation to solve difficult cases." Given the importance of our subject and its frequent sad similarity to solving a crime, perhaps Scotland Yard will let us borrow Mr. Holmes for a few posts.

First we ask the good detective what we have available for, really, we'd like to KNOW what is going to happen instead of sending our two year old filly out there to see if she'll break her leg.

I'd expect Mr. Holmes to apply science to criminal investigation, and remind us of our scientific method, if I can recall it:

hypothesis
theorem
investigation
establishment of scientific law or fact

This is specific to general, and we may imagine that for bone remodelling we'd want to look at an individual cannon bone and see precisely what happens over time within the bone structure itself resulting from various exercise protocols.

We may also go general to specific to come up with some ideas. I hinted at this last post in discussing various trainers, and may we term our study of various trainers as similar to "population studies" were we observe the effect of particular phenomena in the general population.

Probably there's 50 other ways to look at this that I'm omitting due to ignorance. However, I think the above methods will suffice, and I'll struggle with them best I can.

First up will be the population studies. Believe we can draw some significant conclusions by closely examine a few of the training programs that have been published, including some of those discussed in the early days of this blog, next post.

Training:
Fri. 10/10: Off

Sat. 10/11: Art: 1.6 miles in :17s. Rod: 1.6 mile trot with 4 short gallop sequences.
Sun. 10/12: After galloping we were planning a riderless 1/2 mile breeze all out. Art: 1.6 miles with about a mile of it in :17s. This smaller (as opposed to small) horse is just recently into :17s, which is clipping along, and it was decided he'd done enough for today. We're hoping to get in another one tomorrow before the rain. Rod: 1.6 miles of which about 1/3 was canter. We did attempt 4 x 2f fast riderless with Rod who was decidedly lazy after his tack work. Got speed work with him "sort of". He'll be good to go again Monday though, if we have dry ground.

Frequency: Available Evidence

"Fortune" said Don Quixote to his squire, as soon as he had seen them, "is arranging matters for us better than we could have hoped. Look there, friend Sancho Panz, where thirty or more monstrous giants rise up, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes..."
"What giants". said Sancho Panza.

Such is the wisdom of Don Quixote, and please avoid dying before reading that book. Goethe expressed this same concept "to able man the world is not inert", and for our horses I term this "controlling the variables", the idea that for our fragile beasts we need to take note of and arrange every little thing.

To avoid tilting at wind mills though, we have to know what we're controlling. Bill, the exercise physiologist, gives an opinion in the comments, last post. Let's look a little closer.

The blog has presumed that bone remodelling requires certain exercise parameters to achieve race appropriate fracture resistance. Two minumus have been concluded:

speed: 12.5 sec/f
distance: 4f

one yet to be determined:

frequency

and, though I've been in racing 20 years, I still will be interested in my conclusions given all the information that is available these days.

First, how do we look at "frequency" and what do we have to take into account.?What information is available? Bill noted the Maryland Shin study, and quite unbelievably that still is the only research study dealing signficantly with the question. This study concerned bucked shins however, and so while shin study may point us in the righ direction, I'm (as of yet) unsure it holds the final word.

And, we have theories and training protocols, of course. The old timers went every three days. Tom Ivers in his own meticulous manner decided on every 4 days. For Ivers the 4 day spacing dealt more with performance as Ivers believed the 4 day spacing to be the point of maximum acquisition for additional fitness for the animal. Best I can recall Ivers dealing with the idea of fracture would be his observation that we are unable to interval train our horses as human athletes due to structure, and that Ivers believed the horse "could go" every 4 days given the foundation provided by Ivers protocol.

Then we have the modern trainers: Zito and Lukas go 9-10 days, Asumussen with Curlin goes every 7 days, Dutrow and Eion Harty every 6 days, Nafzger with Street Sense last year vascilated from 5-7 days for a good long while without any break at all. Pletcher likes every 7 days with long breaks after races.

Thus we do have available to us a considerable circumstantial evidence. Would it help therefore to look at injury records of these various protocols? I'll look at this next post.

Training:

Our aim is to make a race track visit around Nov. 15. We're plagued right now by some engineering problems in replacing the trailer floor as (unbelieveably) after reinstalling the entire floor there is a 1 1/2 inch gap between the wood flooring and the metal supports. My 22 yr. old helper as it turns out made his initial measurements without a ruler causing now a few more RR gray hairs. My three year old could race 45 days from now. However, we'll avoid the effort with just one horse. I suspect the two year old will be coming on line February to March, and the present thought is to try race at Will Rogers Downs (Tulsa) on 2/1/09, weather willing.

This week we reverted more to some riderless fast work as the horses were getting fat and out of shape with the light galloping routine. We'll commence increasing the gallops this next week:

Tues. 10/7: 1/2 inch raing this morn, and we pass on tack work. paddock track barely usable. The horses however are hepped. Riderless speed as fast as they could motor in the mud. Lots of huffing and puffing they did about 3f between stops for about ten min. nice conditioning work for both.
Wed. 10/8: Art: Easy day after yesterday's hard stuff. 1 mile trot. Rod: 1 mile trot.
Thurs. 10/9 Nob is awol. Riderless at near max speed. 4 x 2f. Total volume is close to 3 miles with runs in and out of heats + warm up and warm down. The two year old suddenly is looking good whereas formerly he'd been very lazy and reluctant to extend himself.
Fri. 10/10: Off

Safe Minimums For Breezing Frequency

Consider the thought processes and gulf that exists between a trainer as Preston Burch and your local conventional, one breezing horses to the max and the other hardly ever breezing, much less galloping. Putting together a training regimen for your athletes provides but a specific example of general elevated logic and educated common sense, a perspective, can we agree, that's controversial. We have one trainer breezing/racing 10 times a month, another breezing 1-3 times a month. What is going on?

The blog has covered Burch extensively, but, what's in the mind of that trainer breezing 1-3 times a month? I've been in racing 20+ years. I'm still without an answer. Discussions with these sorts seem perpetually non-sensical, defensive, or alternatively based on "what works". The trainer down the shedrow is blaring the latest country hit three feet from his horse's ear drums and that horse won a race. Something is working, if you can follow that sort of thinking.

Nevertheless, identifying safe minimums for breezing and galloping will provide for us further benchmarks as to what we must and can do if we want to stay in racing. I consider this probably the most important discussion for this blog. I'm unable to think of anything more important that breezing/racing enough to provide sufficient fracture resistance/injury prevention to our animals over a long haul.

As such, I'd think this to be a lengthy detailed discussion. How do we look at this? What is the evidence, our conclusions and their ramifications will be forthcoming in the next posts. Anybody's thoughts on "minimum" breezing for safety would be welcome.

Training:
Mon. 10/6: Off. We begin, amid a rain shower, our next cycle this evening.

Overdose, Near Track Record 10/5/08

x
Training:
Sun. 10/6:
Rod: with weather coming in normal rest day postponed. After yesterday's speed work Rod trots 1.25 miles with 4 short galloping sequences. Getting the idea.
Art: 1 mile slow gallop + 4 x 2f riderless speed in near :12s. 3 miles total volume. Nice work by Art!

The Relevance Of: How Often Can We Go?

A chuckle or two and much congrats to Tin Cup Chalice by Crusader Sword taking the Indiana Derby, a horse by Lido Palace (stud fee $5000.00) the Champagne, and the New Mexico bred wins 17 straight. There is hope!

I trust we can agree that our old timey trainers, Preston Burch, Max Hirsch, et. al., pushed their horses to the limit, and that breezing/racing 10 times a month is the max in answering "how often CAN we go". These trainers also established that the horse can breeze/race three days post breeze/race provided we observe--as per prior posts--the limits of monthly bone cell destruction which we may limit by controlling the variables of speed, distance, frequency, rider weight, track surface, etc.

We want, of course, to make the likes of Tin Cup Chalice competitive with the horses of the Sheiks, Wine Merchants and Wall Street Tycoons and their more modest equivalents at our local tracks. Assuming thus that we'd have to do more with our horse than the Dutrows, Asmussen, Eion Harty, or Dick Clarks (Iowa) of the world, the relevance of establishing an upper SAFE limit to our program is that this gives us the flexibility and knowledge to piece together an ideal program.

I'll next look at the minimum we must do. Interesting video below shows more slow motion galloping. Watch closely the forces at work on the lower leg structures. Also, a little "same old, same old", Larry Bramalage and friends requesting research in 1993.

s
Training:
Thurs. 10/2: Art: off. Rod 1 mile trot + 2 miles riderless slow gallop.
Fri. 10/3: Art 1.6 miles in :18s. Rod trots 1.25 miles, and riderless 2 miles medium with spurts.
Sat. 10/4: Art: galloped 1.6 miles :18s with some :17s. Rod: trotted 1.25 miles with a few steps of gallop + 2 miles riderless fast work with some stops. Nice work by Rod who is growing up.

Figuring It Out

Frequency, or more accurately for most conventional stables "lack of frequency" of breezing/racing qualifies imo as the 2nd, 3rd, 4th biggest problem in the sport just behind the #1 problem of lack of bettors. Failing to work horses is of course but a subtext of the "trainer problem" that has plagued this sport certainly since I came in in the mid 1980s. We lose owner after owner and all their connections due to any variation of trainer incompetence, lack of knowledge and common sense, or flat out inability due to lack of money or riders in terms of giving horses needed track work.

Doubt the extent of the problem? Then reconsider, as documented on the blog, that conventional trainers with D.W. Lukas as the #1 example permanently injure one third of their horses every six months:

http://ratherrapid.blogspot.com/2007/01/lukas-and-injuries-stats.html
(URL failing--see 1/27/07 post on Lukas injury stats.)

The injury rate is nuts and it's amazing to me the sport survives at all with what happens.

The above illustrates that if as horse owners/trainers we want to survive in the sport short of spectacular con jobs on unwitting new owners we must figure out mandatory breezing/racing frequency in terms of fracture resistance, i.e. the minimum amount of fast work the horse MUST do to avoid permanent injury.

I think we look at this in the following parameters:

1. How soon CAN we work again after a breeze/race?
2. What is the IDEAL spacing of breeze/races?
3. What is the MINIMUM frequency we must achieve?

And, to the above I'd add what I've already established (sort of) on the blog that these works must be carried on minimally for 4 furlongs at :12.5 sec/f speed, i.e. anything slower or shorter is insufficient for appropriate bone remodel and maintenance.

I've already noted that the old time trainers with at least some of their horses were working them every three days, and that with variations this CAN be done. I'll take a close look later as to whether three day spacing SHOULD be done.

I've also noted that of late--starting probably in about 2002--we have seen more and more conventional trainers morph their stables into more intense training than the D.W. Lukas model of breezing every 9-10 days to the point many of these breeze every 5-7 days though many, like Todd Pletcher, will interject literally weeks of no works after races which serve to reduce the overall averages.

Starting next post I'll analyze the three questions I presented here--how often can we go, must we go and what is ideal. I suspect this will be a fairly lengthy discussion.

Training:
Wed. 10/1: Rod off. Art riderless speed work.
Thurs. 10/2: Art off. Rod trots 1 mile and does 10 min. mostly slow gallop riderless work.
Fri. 10/3/08: Art 1.6 miles medium gallop. Rod: 1.25 mile trot + 2 miles riderless medium intermittent with several fast spurts.