ELMONT, NY, May 23, 2011--Just arrived back on Long Island and was prepared to wax somewhat poetically about the big race at Pimlico over the weekend.
Instead, I just now read the news about Paddy Prado’s retirement with a fractured right sesamoid bone at the top of his right ankle. Talk about a buzz kill.
The good news is that he will make a full recovery and breeders have been ringing up Jerry Crawford, managing partner of the Donegal Racing syndicate, to talk about stallion arrangements.
Given his versatility and class, he figures to be a bit of a hot item, too. But it doesn’t make the news any easier to take, especially afteran impressive turf score in the Dixie Handicap, his season’s debut.
The sky, which was the limit, has been obscured from view now. Need to feel Dale Romans’ pain here. Two big wins in an hour and a half’s time, one of them a classic, a dream sequence for a hardscrabble racetracker from Louisville.
Instead, the game says congratulations by ripping your heart out.
As for Maryland’s signature event, I‘m thinking the next time critics want to take the time to swipe at the Triple Crown’s middle jewel, publicists should retort with a simple tagline:
“The Preakness, Always a Damn Good Horse Race.”
If all the handicappers, writers and fans that underestimated the talent of Shackleford were to line up, the queue would be longer than those in the Pimlico infield in search of a bottomless brew.
“Excuse me,” I might say to fellow underestimating Preakness analysts . “Don’t mean to cut the line, but I think I was here first.”
However, the people who bred, own, train and ride him sure knew what was happening. They knew if they didn’t choke the free runner down, just allow him to run at his own fast pace, within himself, that he’d be OK. He was more than OK, especially for a hyper-tense animal.
I watched from the porch outside the press box as handlers stood at his head, stroking his face, petting on him, trying to settle him down as he stood on the turf course pre-race. But, if "that's him," then for him it works.
It takes a very talented horse to open a mile and three-sixteenths route with a :22.69 gambit, slow the middle fractions down to a conservative :49.32, then kick home, pushbutton style, with a final three-sixteenths in a solid :19.25, holding off a horse who still has a leg up on being named the king of the 3-year-old animals at year's end.
But not if Shackleford has anything to say about it, Shackleford, or any member of a good group of horses laying in ambush on both these colts. At the moment, the Belmont Stakes has the potential to be a really good horse race. Not all dirt marathons are, after all.
Polls are becoming incresingly difficult to construct with each passing event, but here’s a look at the HRI Triple Crown Power 10, Week 14 edition, an amalgam of accomplishment and promise, per usual:
1. Animal Kingdom - That would be #1 with a bullet if not for Shackleford’s very elongated neck at the finish of the Preakness. The kickback excuse--if Johnny Velazquez’s post-race network interview in which he kept flicking off pieces of Pimlico from his face is a measure--is valid. A very classy and talented animal.
2. Shackleford - Glad to hear at this early juncture that the Preakness winner is better than 50-50 to return for the Belmont and perhaps the beginning of a rivalry. The giveaway was Romans paraphrasing Woody Stephens’ words about speed horses and the Belmont being a good thing. Here’s hoping he and Animal Kingdom have a good three weeks.
3. Nehro - Probably a consensus third choice in online pools everywhere off what he’s showed in the Arkansas and Kentucky Derbies but I admittedly have a hard time with this one: He remains eligible for preliminary allowance conditions. But he’s never taken a backward step since becoming a long distance racer and is on more than capable hands.
4. Dialed In - Realize many people are down on him but lest we forget he won the Holy Bull and Florida Derby and that still counts for a lot. His lack of early speed and performance figures indicating development have been working against him. The race comes up too close, of course, but would have loved to see him in the Met Mile.
5. Mucho Macho Man - An observer at the stakes barn Saturday night informed me that the Macho Man threw another shoe, against the right one, only this time reportedly it was a glue-on, not a conventional shoe. What’s next, Air Jordans? Not sure Rajiv Maragh is the answer here; would prefer to see a world class rider for the Belmont.
6. Toby’s Corner - He’s back galloping again and let’s not forget he was higher on the depth chart than Animal Kingdom earlier this year and it’s hard to get the image of his powerful Wood Memorial finish out of my head. This is another good colt that might turn out to be an exciting second-season sophomore.
7. Astrology - This lightly raced colt is improving with every start, from his head-banging game finish in the Jerome to his brief but noteworthy surge at headstretch at Pimlico. Finishing third in the Preakness is an accomplishment and he’s finally catching up with the group in experience and conditioning. Connections are thinking Haskell. Given his style and where’s he’s at in his form cycle, they should be thinking Belmont.
8. Uncle Mo - Whatever happened to….? He is still the 2010 juvenile champion and still ran “faster” on the Equiform performance-figure scale in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile than any 3-year-old has this year; won the Timely Writer (I know, I know) and did finish third in the Wood. Belongs here until he runs again or is retired; whichever comes first.
9. Alternation - After his Arkansas Derby too late rally from impossibly far back, he lowered his body and came with a vengeance after the talented and at this point underrated Adios Charlie and nailed him in a very solid 1:49 3/5 in Belmont Park’s Peter Pan. If he enters the Belmont as expected, he will make his presence felt.
10. Master of Hounds - Can’t remember the last time a fifth-place finish got everyone so excited but when it’s the Derby, after shipping over late from Europe with precious little time to acclimate, you must take notice. Now there are bad seconds, or bad thirds, but his was a good fifth, remembering the slow pace and his solid late run. It impressed Garrett Gomez, not an especially impressionable type.
24 May 2011 at 06:48 am | #
Welcome back to Strong Island home of the hard sell Test of Champions. I know maybe we have the rematch and the “Release of the Hounds” to join Alternation, Nehro and the rest of the SLOW crop of three year olds. Sorry for the down tone, I’m still disappointed AK didn’t run down the Shack.
Sorry to hear about Paddy’s injury, but at least the prognosis is good for a full recovery. Thankyou NBC for the black out of the Dixie to all live TV and depriving me of his last race.
24 May 2011 at 06:58 am | #
You know Cat, it’s comments like yours that sometimes result in a make-good video clip on the following telecast. Meanwhile, check out pnline sources such as Thoroughbred Times, for stakes video. Thanks.
24 May 2011 at 07:24 am | #
Earth to World:
Beyer Speed figures in Preakness--
Big Brown (won 2008) 100
Shackleford (won) 104
Animal Kingdom (2nd) 103
Astrology (3rd) 101
24 May 2011 at 07:42 am | #
Earth to Nick:
A quote from Andy Beyer,
Shackleford isn’t going to be remembered as a great Preakness winner, or even an above-average Preakness winner. He and the other 3-year-olds this season constitute one of the weakest Thoroughbred crops in years. The time of 156.47 was the slowest since 1993.
24 May 2011 at 07:50 am | #
Maybe they still didn’t fix that darn teletimer that malfunctioned in 1973....
TTT
24 May 2011 at 07:58 am | #
Amazing T, that three different tracks had broken timers for BIG RED
Preach, just watched the replay of the Dixie, funny it’s not the same when you know Praddy gets up. Thought for a moment I was still alive in the pick five.
24 May 2011 at 08:00 am | #
Cat,
The point wasn’t whether these horses are faster than Big Brown, it is that it is far too early to judge the caliber of this crop.
Most of them have had fewer starts than Triple Crown contenders used to have, hence, they have more room to improve.
Animal Kingdom’s 103 Derby Beyer came in his fifth career start. Barbaro, a horse practically anointed by fans and media as a Triple Crown winner before his Preakness injury, produced a 103 Beyer in his fifth start, a winning effort in the Florida Derby.
I read Beyer’s comments, and I also read DRF’s Jay Privman, who wrote, “Shackleford...completed 1 3/16 miles...in 1:56.47 over a track that was rated fast but produced DULL TIMES all afternoon.”
Big Brown’s Preakness produced a final time of 1:54 and 4/5. His 100 Beyer versus Shackleford’s 104--figures produced by Andy or possibly Dick Jerardi--demonstrate that final time must be tempered by track variant and other variables.
24 May 2011 at 08:06 am | #
Mr. Cat: Don’t recall any controvery over Big Red’s time in the Kentucky Derby or Belmont, only the Preakness, but my memory is not what it used to be. As usual, I was just going down memory lane, something I do often. Secretariat, the yardstick for greatness in the modern era. I think we can all agree that Shackleford is no Secretariat, but then again, who is?
TTT
24 May 2011 at 08:32 am | #
In going over my records, in defense of Shackleford, did find a couple of things he has in common with Secretariat. They both have single word, multisyllabic, 11-letter names that begin with an “S.” Sorry, that is the best I can do.
TTT
24 May 2011 at 08:33 am | #
Nick,
All I can say is too bad that Alydar and Easy Goer didn’t face this crop.
T,
Safe to say we will never see another BIG RED
24 May 2011 at 12:41 pm | #
Cat,
That’s true, but you could say the same about almost every crop from the last 20 years.
24 May 2011 at 12:42 pm | #
Cat, right on, vis a vis Easy Goer and Alydar.
24 May 2011 at 01:15 pm | #
Cat & JRP,
I want to emphatically preface this comment by saying I don’t buy into the notion about to be expressed, ie., I do not agree with this. I’m posting it here for conversational purposes.
You mentioned Easy Goer, who was beaten by Sunday Silence in the Derby & Preakness.
Sunday Silence’s winning Thoro-graph number for his 1989 Derby was a 6 (the lower the number the faster the race).
In this year’s Derby, won by Animal Kingdom (who was assigned a 0 (zero) by Thoro-graph, 10 of the 19 starters received better (faster) Thoro-graph numbers than Sunday Silence.
Now, I repeat, I do not agree with that. I believe these are numbers affected by what I call speed figure inflation.
However, a few years ago, Thoro-graph’s Jerry Brown wrote an article describing how, in his opinion, racetracks were slower now than in years past--hence the better figs for horses running times no faster than 20-odd years ago.
You can get the Thoro-graphs by going to their website and into the archives. There you will find the sheets which document the figures written here.
And for the third time, I do not believe, and no one can convince me, that Animal Kingdom and nine other starters ran a faster Derby than did Sunday Silence in 1989.
24 May 2011 at 02:40 pm | #
Nick,
Good stuff, thanks, I too believe Silence and Goer would have kicked the butt of this crop.
Ok you would think that the modern horse would be faster(the slower times due to more track cushion) and have more endurance because of:
1- Selective breeding for specific racing traits.
2- Better nutrition
3- Better training techniques with sports medicine(legal only yeah right).
So now comes the million dollar questions:
1- Why do they race less?
2- Why do they break down more?
3- Why no Triple Crown in 33 years?
24 May 2011 at 03:10 pm | #
As former jockey and trainer Jeff Carle said on Trackfacts Sunday:
1) Horses are no longer bred to race, they are bred to sell. That includes working them too fast at most 2yo in training sale and cosmetically correcting conformation flaws before the sale.
2) I, and many others, are convinced that 40 years of raceday medication has contributed to the fewer numbers of races and more breakdowns. Horsemen used to have to give their stock time to correct problems. Now they give them the needle, which might correct an immediate problem temporarily, but can lead to other issues.
3) I don’t know why no Triple Crown, other than the obvious answers which include the above issues, as well as none of the old line stables which bred for stamina and stoutness.
Just remember though, Real Quiet should have been a Triple Crown winner, and a bunch of others (Silver Charm, Smarty Jones, Risen Star, Point Given, et al) could have won with some luck.
Sunday Silence and Easy Goer could have run 100 yards further and beaten this crop at any route distance.
24 May 2011 at 03:55 pm | #
Never thought I’d say this being a traditionist, but the time has come to spread the races apart in the Triple Crown for the modern horse. Make the Preakness run on Memorial Day and the Belmont Independance Day.
The fact that Graham Motion was too afraid to give his horse a serious workout may have cost him the race. His very sluggish start might have been helped with a 3f blowout before the Preakness. Nick Zito also was afraid to work his horse.
Like Dylan said, Times they are a changing.
24 May 2011 at 06:20 pm | #
Here are my thoughts on Tobasco Cat’s questions:
I follow steeplechasing also and it is amazing the bloodlines you’ll find there. Dynaformer has been the top sire of steeplechasers for a few years, last year’s Eclipse winner was by Skip Away and recently Tiznows are becoming more successful. There are also a lot of horses with Gulch bloodlines. In fact, just about any popular bloodline you could name, except maybe Unbridled’s song, is represented. If it was true that the thoroughbred was becoming a more fragile bloodline, wouldn’t we see the breed becoming more split - with a more durable group specializing in steeplechasing and the group that races on the flats being unable to stand up to the switch?
As for breakdowns, I chalk that to modern ‘training’ regimens, which are really more for the benefit of management than the horse. Horses are pulled out of the stall for a few hours every morning and spend the vast majority of their days in a stall. It would be like taking the average couch potato and throwing him in the NBA finals and saying ‘go for it’. Tim Ritchey was considered out of the norm for giving Afleet Alex 2 training sessions a day at times. But how many other horses would have been able to stumble as badly as he did and not break something, let alone win the race? It takes weight bearing impact exercise to create good bone density and that’s something most horses housed in a stall don’t get.
24 May 2011 at 08:25 pm | #
Karen,
Wow Tim Ritchey out of the norm for letting his horse out of the stall twice a day, mind boggling.
Afleet Alex is a favorite of mine, after that stumble in the Preakness, the athleticism he showed, put me all in for the Belmont. Bred for stamina on the dam side(Hawkster) and speed(Mr. Prospector) on the other side. I believe he is the last Belmont winner to have ran in all Triple Crown races, and has the fastest final quarter in the Belmont since 1969(Arts and Letters). Who could forget Alex’s lemonade stand as well.