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Some wonderful analysis of the possible outcome of the derby.But first Aidan runs pacemakers to ensure a good fairly run race, not to dictate the pace to allow a horse who does not stay to win the derby. Such an outcome would serve nobody well. Coolmore breed from true champions not from set up outcomes. A falsely run derby would not help a breeding operation.Aidan has made that clear again and again that he wants a true race with the best horse winning.His pacemakers never slow down the race but always set a good pace..
I guess you never saw Notnowcato’s Eclipse then, Andyod?
Wasn’t there a race recently (last 2-3 years) where Ballydoyle entered 2 pacemakers who merely forced another stable’s pacemaker to go way too fast, thereby ensuring that the remainder of the field ignored the pacemakers altogether and the race was run slowly.
Fame and Glory: There is no doubting he is a very nice horse but his last piece of form may have made him look better than he actually is with Mourayan running no sort of race. The fact Johnny Murtagh has doubt about which horse he will actually rides seems to back that up.
If JM had ridden the horse in the Derrinstown i`m 95% sure he`d be on him in the Derby. Ballydoyle`s number 1 (whoever it is at the time) has a habit of choosing the wrong animal for the Derby and it looks like he`s gonna do it again. I have 7s on F&G and 10s on Gam Amhras. I`ll be topping up nearer the day and expect to get paid off.
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"As I said in a previous post last Thursday there’s an old saying "4th in the Guineas 1st in the Derby""
I’ve heard the saying myself, Fist, but I don’t think there is much statistacal evidence to support it……………….not in recent years, at least.
Colin
A few have won novice hurldes at Market Rasen though
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Fame and Glory: There is no doubting he is a very nice horse but his last piece of form may have made him look better than he actually is with Mourayan running no sort of race.
That’s pretty contentious when Mourayan reproduced to the pound his Ballysax running against Hail Caesar and actually improved on his Ballysax form viz-a-viz Fergus McIver. Clearly, he went backwards in relation to Fame And Glory but why shouldn’t that be put down to improvement on the winner’s part?
There are obvious parallels between the Rip Van Winkle/ Fame And Glory situation and that of Hawk Wing and High Chaparral a few years back. There are the same stamina doubts about Rip Van Winkle as there were about Hawk Wing but there is also a big question mark over Rip Van Winkle’s ability given that he has come up short by some way in the Dewhurst and Guineas. He may well come on a lot for Newmarket but he will need to and the longer trip is far from sure to suit him whereas there’s every reason to think that a Montjeu colt out of a Shirley Heights mare will positively relish the step up from 10f to 12f.
I am only reading the race the way I saw it Gus and I never really took any of the others seriously. As we know Mourayan met with some trouble in the first race and even at his worst I would expect him to have beaten the rest.
If Mourayan had come under presuure like that a couple of furlongs out I would be more convinced it was down to Fame and Glory alone.
I think all too often punters want to be impressed and very often they miss the obvious. Fantasia was a classic example and to a lesser extent Delegator.
There is no doubt in my mind that I saw Mourayan come under severe pressure 4 furlong from home and that Flame and Glory at the end of the day beat very little in real terms.
I am aware he travels exceptionlly well in his races and according to his jockey he does so whether it be fast pace or a moderate one.
What puts me off him is he took just a bit too long to dispose of the opposition for a horse that was instantly made a short priced fav for the Derby.Horses which are ridden the way he is, depend on having an explosive turn of foot and blowing the opposition away in the latter stages of a race. I am not convinced Fame and Glory will find what’s required.
You can bet your boots there won’t be as many of the pricipals struggling with a half mile to go like Mourayan was.
If he finds himself chasing the likes of Gan Amhras up the home straight I think he’ll lose out big time.
That’s only my personal view of the horse and I am sure many will disagree.
I have both Fame And Glory and Gan Amhras, but there is no doubting whatsoever, that where Gan Amhras is an exciting prospect, he has it all to prove against Fame And Glory at epsom. Fame And Glory is the one they all have to beat, and although I agree it is an open year due to the sheer abundance of class, Fame And Glory ticks every single box you could want really.
One thing however that could be percievably a negative (not really a negative as such) or one thing that makes the form much harder to distinguish between, is that Fame and Glory is (I think) the only one of the derby contenders to have had his trial run with a bit of cut. All the rest have had to slog it out on gd-fm, which most of them would not have wanted, which will certainly go someway to explaining why his win was one of the most impressive visually.
For that reason I think (as have mentioned before and will continue to mention) the current value lies with Age Of Aquarius and Montaff from the Lingfield trial. Father Time IMO franked that form on saturday when running on a similar surface over shorter in trip where he was finishing strongly in a slowly run race, which rationgswise IMO makes the form of the Lingfield trial look probably under rated somewhat.
Age Of Aquarius is an impressive stamp of a horse, and Montaff also looked pretty good. With horses as good as that so far out in the betting they have to played IMO.
Both of those two look like rock solid contenders at huge prices…
I regret I have not seen Notnowcato.Tell me about it The other line about two pacemakers is difficult to comprehend. How can you force another horse to go too fast? Surely his jockey will determine how fast he goes? If true it bares out what i said . No dawdling..
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Depends on the horse Andy and of course the jockey.
Some horses wouldn’t give a hoot if the are surrounded by others but some will stick their heads out and race anything that looks them in the eye..
If an opposing jockey can get them at it too soon so they use up a lot of energy and at the same time keep their own horse relaxed it can give them a big advantage.
I suggest you watch Ruby over the jumps he’s an absolute master at doing it.
As far as Freemantle is concerned I think he’s too exposed but GS could be anything. Who knows how much he could suddenly improve? Wouldn’t be the first time AOB suckered everyone including himself.
I suppose it’s down to the fact he has so many good horses. With so many you don’t know exactly how good some are or how much they have improved until they run in a race. Some don’t do a tap at home then shock everyone.
I regret I have not seen Notnowcato.Tell me about it The other line about two pacemakers is difficult to comprehend. How can you force another horse to go too fast? Surely his jockey will determine how fast he goes? If true it bares out what i said . No dawdling..
Archipenko and Yellowstone went up to make the pace alongside Champery early on. About 1/2f-1f later, after they’d gone clear of the others, they dropped back leaving Champery way clear of the others and they all completely ignored him.
It ended up turning into a slowly run affair with Notnowcato coming across the entire width of the home straight (I’m convinced he lost about 3-4L in doing so) and still won by 2L.
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Which race was that in Zarkava?
2007 Eclipse.
Coolmore had George Washington
Up against the badly campaigned Derby winner Authorized.
I think the jockey Ryan Moore was the guest on the Morning Line, and intimated that he would be coming up the stands side.
edit: Getting a bit mixed up as regards being badly campaigned. Worst was Motivator. Also thought New Approach was badly campaigned. I’m getting a bit pissed off about Derby winners not running over 1m4f afterwards, apart from the Arc.
Any Derby winners that immediately go for the Eclipse are doomed. Motivator was campaigned dreadfully, as was Authorized and also New Approach, Gerald is right.
I just don’t see the issue with going Irish Derby, Niel and Arc. These owners are just obsessed with winning Group 1s over 10f all the time and 9 times out of 10 it leads to more bad than good. If they really want a 10f Group 1, why not stay in training as a 4yo? They’ve got 3 opportunities in the first 2 months of the season alone and they’ll end up scaring most of the opposition away.
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Andyod
You didn’t really have to see the race: the information is all on the RP website:
The Coral-Eclipse is invariably billed as a mouth-watering first clash between the generations over this sort of distance, and so it was once again. But this latest renewal offered far, far more, with tactics playing a huge part in a thoroughly enthralling affair.
It started in the very early stages, where two of the Ballydoyle three-year-olds were rushed up to press Authorized´s pacemaker Champery before being reined back to slow things down at the head of the main group and leave Champery stranded…………
……………Authorized was bidding to become the first Epsom winner since Nashwan 18 years previously to complete the Derby/Eclipse double, Erhaab, Benny The Dip and Motivator all having failed in the meantime. He was also bidding to become the first Derby winner since High Chaparral in 2002 to win again afterwards. He failed in both tasks task, but he ´won´ his race up the far side and his defeat by Notnowcato can arguably be attributed to the tactical nature of the race, which conspired against him in more ways than one, and he should have more opportunities to restore the tarnished recent record of Derby winners, for he could well be back on course again as soon as the King George, for which he remains a short-priced favourite in most books, and he also still has the Arc among his long-term options.The way the race was run conspired against him, for once Yellowstone and Archipenko came back to the pack and left his pacemaker in a long lead he no longer had any meaningful assistance. Still at the back of the field, along with George Washington, into the straight, he made his move towards the outside of the pack.
The AOB pacemakers deliberately messed up the pace to give doubtful stayer George Washington the chance to win the race; tell me again it doesn’t happen.
Zarkava
I disagree that Derby winners shouldn’t run in the Eclipse.
Authorized would have won the race, had Frankie followed his pacemaker rather than the mafia’s, and thus allowing Notnowcato first run on him. He proved this in his next race, over a sharper 10 furlongs, where he not only comprehensively turned the result around, but also beat subsequent Arc winner, Dylan Thomas.
Similarly with Motivator, had more use been made of his undoubted stamina, rather than getting involved in a funereal pace, he would probably have beaten Oratorio, not only in the Eclipse, but also the Irish Champion.
While I have great admiration for the work you have done on trends, I feel they may mislead, unless actual form is taken into account somewhere along the line..I disagree about derby horses should be kept to 1m4f. It all depends on each horse and how they are geared. The derby is often a race won by the horse who is most far forward that gets the trip of 1m4f on the days conditions at that time of year. BHut for that reason it can be won by 1m2f or even 1m6f types depending on how the race pans out.
Authorized IMO was right to go for the International as it is a 1m2fish race which usually favours 1m4f types (when its run at york rather than newmarket). However IMO Autrhorized should have went for the irish derby and King George as he’d have picked up both fairly easily IMO.
Motivator on the other hand was sort of right to go for the Eclipse and Irish champ as it was only Oratorio that beat him, and he did beat the overhyped Azamour in the Irish version, and there had been a doubt pre derby that he would get the 1m4f trip. At the same time I’m fairly convinced that Motivator would have hammered Azamour in the King George that year so would have liked to have seen that race.
New Approach always looked like he’d better at 1m2f than 1m4f so when he went back down to 1m2f last season I was very excited, however, when the international moved from York to Newmarket, due to waterlogging, newmarket was gd-fm, which NA hated and even with the slightly amended trip, I think he was always going to struggle, however had the race have been run at york on the usual good-good/soft I would like to think NA would have been considerably better. But at the same time he did seem somewhat regressive at round about that time last season which was a real shame.
It is a bloody shame that the last few Eclipses have not seen great turnouts from the the 3yos. With Sea The Stars, Rip Van Winkle and Gan Amhras having run so well at newmarket, and Naaqoos still looking potentially like a horse who will see out the trip well. I think that there could be real strong team to challenge the poor older division, but whether they bother or not is a real question, likewise if the ground is good or worse in the eclipse then I think that Westphalia could also be a serious contender.
Zarkava
I disagree that Derby winners shouldn’t run in the Eclipse.
Authorized would have won the race, had Frankie followed his pacemaker rather than the mafia’s, and thus allowing Notnowcato first run on him. He proved this in his next race, over a sharper 10 furlongs, where he not only comprehensively turned the result around, but also beat subsequent Arc winner, Dylan Thomas.
Similarly with Motivator, had more use been made of his undoubted stamina, rather than getting involved in a funereal pace, he would probably have beaten Oratorio, not only in the Eclipse, but also the Irish Champion.
While I have great admiration for the work you have done on trends, I feel they may mislead, unless actual form is taken into account somewhere along the line..I don’t think it has anything to do with quality. IMO hold the race 10 days later and Derby winners would have much more success. However, in the past 14 years, 9 horses who finished in the top 6 in the Derby ran here and only Hawk Wing won a 5-runner affair. Authorized 4/7F, Motivator 2/5F, Tobougg 9/4F and Sakhee 7/4F the main ones beaten, with the latter 2 unplaced.
Now, this could be down to the track – much flatter than Epsom, suiting pace a lot more than Epsom. Interesting to see all 4 3yo winners in the same period had all run in the 2000 Guineas, or it could be down to the Derby, with the race simply taking too much out of them.
Authorized IMO was right to go for the International as it is a 1m2fish race which usually favours 1m4f types (when its run at york rather than newmarket). However IMO Autrhorized should have went for the irish derby and King George as he’d have picked up both fairly easily IMO.
Motivator on the other hand was sort of right to go for the Eclipse and Irish champ as it was only Oratorio that beat him, and he did beat the overhyped Azamour in the Irish version, and there had been a doubt pre derby that he would get the 1m4f trip. At the same time I’m fairly convinced that Motivator would have hammered Azamour in the King George that year so would have liked to have seen that race.
Well I agree with the first paragraph. I don’t really care much about what Motivator should have done, but how on earth could you possibly call Azamour overrated? Watch his Irish Champion Stakes. Absolutely phenomenal turn of foot. 3rd in a Guineas, 2nd in an Irish Guineas, won the St. James’, won the Prince of Wales’, won the King George. Not much more he could have done.
I remember prior to the Irish Champ Stakes talking to someone about Oratorio being a cracking chance after his eclipse win (prior to which I hadnt even really thought of him as proper group1 class). The general idea he had was that Azamour couldnt be beaten, and IMO that was reflected in the betting, why Oratorio started at the price he did, when he was getting weight from azamour, is why I think he was overrated. His King George wasnt great for me either, and IMO Motivator would have taken him to school, but it is all about opinions.
I dont buy into the whole jumps fraternity outlook that we need to keep horses about season after season, but I do think at times that the mid season races do tend to suffer when the 3yos seem to avoid the older crop.
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