Resulting Saturday’s 3 year old races:
J Boys Echo ran into the Kentucky Derby picture with a decent effort on Saturday at Aqueduct. While, Gunnevera ran past what turned out to be very pedestrian competition. J Boys Echo ran a decent 75.0 while Gunnevera only managed a 72.5…
Typically a KD contender has hit a 75.0 by the end of business in January, and carried more weight than the light load of 118lb. But in this day and age when trainers are trying very hard to be clever in the way they handle their 3 year olds – I guess this very nice colt has some chance… We will see what happens next…
Irish War Cry has been dropped, Practical Joke should be dropped, but has only been demoted…El Arreb has been dropped and is one step from being shown the exit door… as are many others…
Kentucky Derby 2017:
Kentucky Derby Info… Before we get going on this years KD, we should get a handle on some recent history. It’s important, because this is a giant ask, and we have to understand who and how they are going to arrive in Kentucky for this season’s Kentucky Derby. So let’s look back first…
Previous Winners Raw Clocking, Mile and Final JerryJ’s Figure
2014 California Chrome (97.45, 203.60) 74.3
2015 American Pharoah (96.45, 203.02) 76.5
2016 Nyquist (95.61, 201.31) 79.0
Interestingly and not surprising Nyquist had the fastest clocking and also earned the highest JerryJ figure – a 79.0. It’s also worth noting that Nyquist also ran faster in the final quarter, both in actual time and in relative time. What do I mean by relative time? Considering that Nyquist ran faster through the opening 8 furlongs, so it would be reasonable to allow him to come the final quarter a little slower. Nyquist ran the final 1/4 in 25.70, while American Pharoah ran his final 1/4 in 26.57 and California Chrome 26.21 (CC was a little faster in the stretch than AP, but that would be expected because his split were a little slower). But American Pharoah, seemed to run faster – RELATIVELY- than California Chrome, because he expended more energy through the opening mile. So while he ran slightly slower in ACTUAL closing quarter, he ran equal to CC or even faster. By the way, the variant for these 3 different KD, were very similar according to my protocols for assigning variants. And it’s a pretty solid day for making variants, because we have much more data to work with due to 12 race cards and the huge fields and the higher quality horses. But kudos to Butch, he’s a fabulous track super!
One last comment on the slowish clocking and JerryJ fig of CC, it’s just one race and he always ran down to his competition, if they had run faster, surely he would have run faster and to my eye, he had pulled himself up for the last 100 yards — At Least. To me these are all superior racehorses, with American Pharoah going on to be a GREAT racehorse. Also, they all ran similar ground loss, because they all went on an outside trip.
One more comment on the quality of Nyquist. To my knowledge he ran the fastest 1st quarter of any horse who ended up winning the Kentucky Derby, with the possible exception of Seattle Slew, whose actual clocking was slower than Nyquist, but he had to make up 3-4 lengths after breaking slowly and getting in behind some slower horses. Nyquist’s Kentucky Derby was sensational…
NEXT WEEK we will get into the form AP, CC and Nyquist showed going into their KD’s.
Here are my current numbers for a series of KD Contenders, as if they were going to run a 1 1/16 tomorrow…
McCraken 78.5 *
Iliad 75.5*
Unique Bella 78.0
Tapwrit 77.8
One Liner 77.3
Classic Empire 76.5
J Boys Echo 76.0
Mastery 76.0
Royal Mo 75.8
Girvin 75.5
Gormley 75.5
Amer. Anthem 75.0
El Areeb 74.3
Gunnevera 73.5
Practical Joke 73.5
Notice in this listing, I have rated on McCraken and Iliad as STAR horses and put them to the top of this list… Also note, Classic Empire ran a 77.8 as a 2 year old and is the only horse with a rating below his best 2 year old effort. We will have to see how he comes back from his abscess injury.
Daily Bias Report…
Aqueduct …(3-9-2017) No play at Aqueduct today.!
Santa Anita (3-9-2017) Honest.
Race Day Las Vegas Section
Thursday 3-10-2017
Santa Anita Race #7 Battle of Midway off at 9/5… surprisingly took hold and raced wide around the first turn, went wide on the far turn, showed some acceleration to open a clear lead then held well late while under urging.
Gulfstream Park Race #8 Veil off at 9/2 slow early, had mild gain late, never threatening…
Race Day Plays for New York and So. Cal Plays
(starting February 24,2017 thru 3/9/17)
NY — Total Return $4.70, Total Cost $ 12.00, ROI Total $0.39
SA — Total Return $39.20, Total Cost $ 18.00, ROI Total $2.18/$1.00
GP – Total Return $~~~, Total Cost $ 2.00, ROI Total $0.00/$1.00
Returns on all plays for 2017…
Total Return $ 148.10
Total Cost $ 142.00
(Updated to include Shareholder Value at Fair Grounds)…