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I am quite happy with my antepost vouchers on Grand Chaparral @ 6/1, Naheef @ 20/1 & Tholjanah @ 40/1. But with the increasing chance of easy ground this weekend the one I’m starting to fear the most is Bandari.
Not quite Escorial. When it tells you something clearly with the right criteria in place you can be very certain about it. This in about 70-80% of cases. When the message is mixed it is best to widen the net and take account of other factors.
Surely dosage analysis is something to take into account alongside analysis of all known form. In a race like this, where these colts are to some extent going into the unknown, I suspect dosage (a subject I know next to nothing about) is an especially helpful consideration.
Your interpretation of the form book, Esc, has identified High Chaparral. Steve M’s work has identified High Chaparral. Non Vintage’s helpful analysis, which appears to take into account dosage and form, has identified High Chaparral. Even the ground seems to be going the way of High Chaparral. (My own way of punting requires me to go "against the crowd" which is why I’m on Fight your Corner, even though I believe High Chaparral is the likeliest winner on all known form.)
As far as the French Derby is concerned, hadn’t Sulamani already proved himself over the classic distance before the big race?
I agree High Chaparral is the right horse in almost every respect. I just have a nagging doubt that he is as well balanced as everyone including the pundits on C4 are making out. He changes his legs too often for my liking and I wonder how he will be at Epsom?
I’m coming right round to Fight Your Corner now and think he has the edge, although in truth most of this analysis is out the window now that there is about 12 inches of rain on the course. Any one of about eight might win it now.
Dosage for the Guineas pointed to Hawk Wing as being a natural 9 furlong + horse, which is just the type I like for the race. Right decision, wrong result.
Surely Hawk Wing won’t line up now and Kinane will switch to HC. I look forward to seeing Hawk Wing run in a proper 10f race on good ground.<br>
Steve, I look forward to seeing Hawk Wing line up in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, having found the 12/1 at Coral irresistable!
If 10 furlongs is his trip, and if he acts on the dirt (he’s a son of Woodman so he should, shouldn’t he?) and if he can find the speed of his Guineas form, perhaps he can run even War Emblem close.
The O’Brien yard is almost certain to take its strongest possible team to Arlington, and at this stage of the game Hawk Wing looks their obvious Classic horse.
Yikes!! 12/1. That looks worth chucking away a few quid on now RM. 10f on a fast dirt track there’s only one winner.
Well done in backing him. Right result but second best horse.
ROG has similar headline figures to HW slanted slightly more toward that of a miler.
DP = 7-5-17-0-1 (30) DI = 2.16 CD = +0.57<br>
Esc, are you playing devil’s advocate?
I thought you said directly after the Guineas that ROG was second best on the day…
No problems, Esc. I just recall you saying something on the lines that if ROG beat Hawk Wing again you’d give up the game; and then later mildly rebuking me and others for getting all excited about ROG’s demolition job in the Irish Guineas. What a great game horse racing is, eh?
Everything was against Hawk Wing when they met at 2 and ROG was more precocious anyway.
The Guineas was rated as two races by the handicapper and HW came out about five pounds superior, a mark that Post Mark claimed to be conservative.
Slavishly following the form book would make the likes of Secreto better than El Gran Senor and Shahrastani better than Dancing Brave.<br>
(Edited by Steve M at 5:50 pm on June 6, 2002)
If Hawk Wing and Rock of Gibraltar met again over a mile, I think Hawk Wing would come out on top, though not by much. Back to the derby, with all the rain, can’t see Hawk Wing beating High Chapparal over a mile and half, I believe he needed firm ground to have any real hope of staying. Took the price available on Murtagh’s mount, can see it starting fave now.
Escorial and others who might be interested, from a purely academic point of view obviously…
Here is some dosage analysis for the horses involved in the Prix du Jockey-Club last weekend. They are listed in order from greatest dosage-predicted stamina downwards, using the same programme and statistics as I used for the Epsom Derby runners’ dosage figures.
SULAMANI – 104.3  (10.2f:12.5f)<br>DIAGHILEV – 102.9  (9.8f:11.8f)<br>SIMEON – 101.6  (9.7f:11.8f)<br>MARTALINE – 101.6  (10.5f:12.5f)<br>ACT ONE – 98.4  (9.3f:11.8f)<br>GREAT PRETENDER – 96.5  (9.5f:11.5f)<br>BLACK SAM BELLAMY – 96.0  (8.5f:10.8f)<br>WITHOUT CONNEXION – 89.7  (8.4f:10.5f)<br>KHALKEVI – 88.3  (8.9f:11.0f)<br>LOUVETEAU – 88.3  (8.2f:10.3f)<br>LE FOU – 85.0  (8.4f:10.6f)<br>ALVARINHO – 83.6  (8.1f:10.7f)<br>POLITIES – 75.7  (7.6f:9.7f)<br>TEMPLE OF ARTEMIS – 65.1  (7.1f:9.3f)<br>CASTLE GANDOLFO – 47.6  (6.4f:8.5f)
There was more stamina present here than in our Derby. The last 13 runners left in at Epsom scored an average of 79.1 on my index, compared with 88.3 in France. The average suggested maximum suitable distance for the French runners was 10.9 furlongs, nearly half a furlong further than for Epsom (10.5f). Furthermore, the French race featured 7 horses with a rating over 95 (which I would deem very likely stayers), and 3 with a rating under 80 (doubtful stayers). This was in contrast with the English Derby, which, using the same criteria, contains just 4 very likely stayers and 6 doubtful stayers!
But this is all slightly by-the-by, and we need to come back to your originial question Escorial, about whether dosage theory might have put you off backing a winner in this case.
SULAMANI is (or rather, was :( ) one of seven horses in the field with an abundance of (dosage-based) stamina in its pedigree, and actually came out top of my ratings. If we had had this discussion last week, I would have done two things, the first of which would have been to inform/reassure you that Sulamani was virtually guaranteed to stay 12 furlongs at Group One pace, and the second would have been to stick a tenner on the bloody thing! Ho-Hum! :) ÂÂÂ
nb: I meant to add that the first five horses home in the French Derby were from the top seven in the list (all rated over 95!)…
(Edited by non vintage at 9:43 pm on June 6, 2002)
Actually Esc, you’ve answered your own question.
"Form. Allied to statistics". In essence that’s all dosage theory is – another ‘statistical’ way of viewing the race, another factor to add to the mix.
For those of us who price up races it would be a factor to adjust our prices, just as say Trainer Course form does. You do ratings – same applies surely? In Sunday’s instance you may even have avoided going each way on Sulamani!!
On the other hand, one thing I’ve found fascinating in this thread (and brilliant postings all by the way) is that this dosage theory lark seems to lead to differing opinions.
Here’s Nick Mordin’s take in the Weekender (and after all he introduced me and no doubt thousands of others to dosage in the first place).
His qualifiers on dosage grounds:<br>Fight Your Corner<br>Moon ballad<br>Naheef<br>Tholjanah.
Apply his other winning trends and he comes up with:<br>Moon Ballad<br>Naheef
which at least should keep Mesh happy.
I’m very taken with suny bay’s notion as to why Kinane has chosen to side with a non-stayer – the other one’s not much good!!
Which seems to leave Fight Your Corner.
As long as Hawk Wing doesn’t win. (Though RM, nice one, I had to snaffle a bit of that Breeders Cup insurance).
In essence, I use dosage figures as an additional factor to take into consideration in certain circumstances. These tend to be good quality races for relatively unexposed horses over 12 furlongs or more. In weaker heats, a horse which doesn’t stay may be able to win because it is easily better than the other runners and stamina never comes into question. Dosage would probably confuse the issue here.
In this instance, my opinions would have been prejudiced as I know the result, so I have only produced dosage figures. Normally I would do a little bit more digging and come up with some sort of cross-analysis (as I did for the Derby).
Given just this table, my response would probably be to put a line blindly through those horses (3 in this race) at the very bottom of the list (i.e. those that are very unlikely to stay). I would then place a big tick next to those at the top of the list (normally anything rated over 90, and certainly anything over 95), and a question mark against the remainder.
That would be the extent of my reliance on this information by itself. In conjunction with other factors, such as form, commentaries, speed ratings and available prices, I would probably refer back to the dosage list.
Ultimately, the fact that we all use different factors when assessing a race, and interpret similar factors in a variety of ways has to be a good thing. It should encourage us to continually strive to improve our own analysis and to learn about and assess other people’s techniques. Additionally, it means that when you reach a definite conclusion and strongly fancy a particular horse, this horse is not necessarily an odds on shot. If we all relied on exactly the same selection criteria, it would be!
Finally, I am a crime analyst with a weird and perverted love of all things involving number crunching, statistics, and Excel spreadsheets. This may go some way towards explaining why I like dosage theory!
Excellent stuff non vintage.
I know it’s bending the facts, but assume for a moment that Sulamani had won that Listed race over 10 furlongs. Non vintage’s figures would then have been a very helpful tool in deciding whether or not he’d be as effective over the classic distance.
Connections of Act One said they felt their colt didn’t quite get home. I’m not so sure I go along with that (bearing in mind the gap back to Simeon in third) but the brilliant winner saw out the trip that bit better – and non vintage’s figures would have given you the necessary confidence. Not that you’d have needed every i dotted and every t crossed at 12/1!
With the Epsom Derby, of course, these colts are (more or less) taking on 12f for the first time. I’d certainly consider looking at reliable dosage figures in a race like this – not so much, perhaps, a day or two before the race; maybe a month or two before the race when the ante post markets still offer a bit more in the way of value.
The Dosage is an essential factor in fact. It told us that horses like Daylami and Petruska would IMPROVE for 12 furlongs, when some experts had them dowm for milers and sub milers respectively.
Petrushka’s dam only managed to win at sprint distances and yet Petruska won a couple of Group 1s at 12f, as we predicted before she had run as a 3-y-o.<br>
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