- This topic has 580 replies, 60 voices, and was last updated 4 years, 1 month ago by
.
- Posts
158-159 would seem fair for the Tremenjous beast. You could say the rise was O’Leary taxation
12 year olds running in the National having won the race 2/3 years earlier this century…
Monty’s Pass was 10lbs higher as a 12 year old after winning the race as a 10 year old. He had no wins to his name after his National win and carried 11-6.
Hedgehunter was rated 12lbs higher as a 12 year old having won the race as a 9 year old. He carried top weight every year after his win, yet he hadn’t won a race since that National win.
Silver Birch was 10lbs higher as a 12 year old, having won the race as a 10 year old. Granted, save for a couple point to points he hadn’t run in a chase since his National win, however the stat is still there. He carried 11-00.
Comply Or Die was rated 5lbs higher running as a 12 year old after having won as a 9 year old. Again, no wins after having won the race either. His weight was 10-8
Ballabriggs was 2lbs higher as a 12 year old having won as a 10 year old. No wins after National win. 11-4.
Nothing about Tiger Roll’s situation is new here. In fact I’d argue that a two time winner who won a race as recently as 11 months ago running off just 2lbs higher is a bit of a gift. Being let off lightly in fact, if the other examples are to go by
Fiddlerontheroof quote from Tizzard in Racing Post (website) now says…
“After Ascot we’ll decide whether we’ll take our chance in the Gold Cup or wait and go straight to the National, but let’s get this weekend out the way first.”
Why does Tiger Roll performing badly mean hes not the horse of old? O Leary and Elliot are the biggest handicap plot job fixers in the game right now (overtook JP a while ago I’d say).
I bet the handicapper has kept Tiger Roll a little high on purpose just to spite O’Leary. Can’t say I agree with that but also can’t say O’Leary doesn’t deserve it.
Had he not run since that Cheltenham win then I would have no quibble with his weight or the argument justifying it but it is like the handicapper has just blatantly ignored every run since then and just used the Cheltenham run as his current form and what he is still capable of doing.
My guess would be that if he is going to produce a good run or come back to something like his best then it is much more likely to be at Cheltenham in the cross country race as that has been the only two good races he has run since winning his second National.
Interviewer – “Michael O’Leary?”
Mark ‘Chopper’ Read – “Oh that bloody sook! He’s still crying is he?”BUY THE SUN
@peter .h Some very interesting stats but there’s one huge difference between Tiger Roll and all the horses on your list: your lot were higher in the handicap after winning their first National, for which it would be reasonable to assume that they’d been deliberately “plotted up”.
Tiger Roll is still rated higher than for his second National.
Who seriously believes Tiger Roll’s recent efforts are a true reflection of his current level of ability?
I believe it has been a not very subtle attempt to fool the handicapper into dropping his rating. The handicapper has not fallen for such a blatant attempt and O’Leary (not for the first time) has thrown his toys out of the pram when he cannot get his own way.
Who seriously believes that a diminutive twelve year old, who has been run 44 times and started out as a juvenile hurdler, is better now than he was three years ago?
Not saying he is better but O’Leary is being ridiculous if he thinks Tiger Roll was going to get something like 10st 10lbs.
And how would that look if he then won at Cheltenham with his head in his chest?
It’s not the weight (in your example, 10st 10lbs) but the handicap mark that matters here.
And he could very easily win head in chest at Cheltenham and it wouldn’t prove a thing. The opposition in the cross country is just a bunch of has-beens or never-weres. Carthorses, the lot of them.
O’Leary either does not appear to understand or refuses to recognise that the handicapper is allowed to treat the National differently. He was always going to take the two previous victories into account.
The opposition at Cheltenham were cart horses but he travelled all over them and beat them by half the track. He could not put up a performance like that without retaining lots of ability.
Michael O’Leary is a very successful businessman, but I wonder how intelligent he is sometimes.
The Handicapper cannot be seen to be climbing down to a bullying owner – EVER – as it would open the floodgates for everyone to behave the way O’Leary does.
The more he complained the last few years the more certain it became that an example would be made of him and, if anything, Tiger Roll would be singled out for unfair treatment.
Wrong?
Outrageous?
HUMAN.
And expedient.
I am "The Horse Racing Punter" on Facebook
https://mobile.twitter.com/Ian_Davies_
https://www.facebook.com/ThePointtoPointNHandFlatracingpunter/
It's the "Millwall FC" of Point broadcasts: "No One Likes Us - We Don't Care"It is a very unsatisfactory situation with the horse caught in the middle.
Mr O’Leary has tried to dictate to the handicapper and inevitably he has lost.
The fans don’t get to see this great horse bow out where he deserves to.
Gordon Elliott I’m sure would have liked to have played this one out differently.
Has he actually been scratched or can he still run?
Either way he can win the cross country at Cheltenham next month.
The more Mr O’Leary spoke the harder or easier the handicappers job became.
Fair play for trying to talk him a more lenient mark but best to let the horse do the talking on the racecourse.“Has he actually been scratched or can he still run?”
I assume he can still run until formally removed at a forfeit stage?
Would have be scratched at next declaration stage
Remember this is the owner who said he had absolutely no chance of he started now, before he won his second national. And he’d have pulled him out then if Anibale Fly had come out as had to much weight.
Tiger showed him that day when went to win his second national.
Love the horse, not so the ownerVF x
1st March next scratching stage so we won’t have long to wait on the bluffing or not. I think one thing we all seem to agree on is the Cross Country race although a fun spectacle is pretty garbage as an actual standard of race, even more so in my opinion since they made it a level weights race from a handicap.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.