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Isn’t the term ‘quickened’ used to indicate that a horse shows a superior turn of foot, compared to those around it, irrespective of the pace, overall, of a race. As opposed, of course, to suggesting that a quickening horse has suddenly run the final furlong in a faster time than any other stage of the race?
If they go a slow gallop, then they can be compared to a marathon, where runners utilise aerobic fitness more than anaerobic capacity and they have the ability to speed up at the end of their races as they don’t have a high build up of lactic acid during their race.
Does anyone have any examples of sectional times where the final sectional is the fastest of the race?
Dancing Brave in The Derby was pretty quick I believe.
Nice one Monksfield! 10.8.
And let’s not forget Secretariat, who performed the incredible "negative splitting" in the Belmont Stakes if I can recall.
To be fair it is pretty obvious when a horse is cantering and when a horse it all out sprinting at full stretch, you can visibly see it, a good example of a horse quickening would be binocular in his hurdling debut race, look at the way he moves throughout the race and look at how he finishes the race. Two completely different speeds, the latter being the faster, there is no way that he is going slower than throughout the race.
If you think about it logically, if you are the fastest sprinter in a race over 1 mile then you will ideally sit at the back of the pace and hope that they set a slow pace that you can "quicken" off, alternatively you may sit at the front and cause that slow pace yourself. The difference between speed and stamina is largely why one group of horses will go to the front and one will be happy to sit at the back.
This is hard to explain, basically in a race where all different horses are suited exactly equally to the ground, if they go a really slow pace until the last two furlongs then fastest horse over those two furlongs (ie. the one with greatest turn of foot) will win, regardless of who would have won had it been run differently. Can you understand that concept, or have I explained it badly?
To everyone who has posted so far – re-read the opening post of this thread. My question was "Can we all agree that it is undisputed that ALL horses slow down at the end of a race?"
Are any of you saying that in the final 100yards of a race horses are accelerating?
I think part of the problem is that watching a race can be very deceptive. It looks for the world like horses are quickening past one another.
This is what i thought. That’s it not a case of horses quickening past each other but rather a case of one horse staying on far better than the other. Come to think of it i’m almost certain i read this in Mark Johnston’s biography.
The actual instances of a horse receiving the form book comment ‘quickened’ are very rare.
Professional racereaders are, for the most part, excellent and should be,in my view, the first port of call for form study. In other words read the results section first.
If Raceform, Timeform or RP says ‘quickened’ it almost certainly has.
‘Squillions’ of comments of this nature…is well wide of the mark.To everyone who has posted so far – re-read the opening post of this thread. My question was "Can we all agree that it is undisputed that ALL horses slow down at the end of a race?"
Are any of you saying that in the final 100yards of a race horses are accelerating?
It depends on the race, on jumps a lot of the time horses will be wound down at the finish, but on the flat, horses tend to get boxed in and come late, or be mistimed and so definitely there are times when horses will be accelerating over the final 100 yards.
Look, someone on here has asked a question which appears to some to be stupid or illogical. A discussion has opened as you would expect on a forum, but some of these responses are simply a bit rude for want of a better word. They belittle the poster who is merely asking a question. Give a full answer or leave it. Gaz/I did that and I wish I hadn’t bothered.
Thats what I am trying to do crizzy, I dont mean to come across as rude, if so, pay no heed, it is not intentional.
No problem Bulwark. I wasn’t refering to you. Gaz just made a point about quickening that seemed a fair point following from mine. It was the nature of other bods that seemed abit much. Thanks for response.
Are any of you saying that in the final 100yards of a race horses are accelerating?
Stop being such a dork.
You guys obviously think I’ve got a screw loose with my question but I’m convinced I’ve read somewhere that the final furlong is always run in a slower time than the penultimate furlong but I can’t find it anywhere on the net.
The reason I think it’s an important point is that it illustrates (if my point is correct) how difficult it is to read a race.
As I remember Alan Potts had something to say on this subject in ‘Against the Crowd’ (I can’t find my copy at the moment so I am repeating from memory) but it was something along the lines that very often horses look as though they are accelerating at the end of races but in fact they are merely maintaining their speed for longer (and thus demonstrating what he called ‘power’) whilst the others are tiring.
Stop being such a dork
Any need for this? If you think the poster is wrong, then say so and expand.
As I remember Alan Potts had something to say on this subject in ‘Against the Crowd’ (I can’t find my copy at the moment so I am repeating from memory) but it was something along the lines that very often horses look as though they are accelerating at the end of races but in fact they are merely maintaining their speed for longer (and thus demonstrating what he called ‘power’) whilst the others are tiring.
That would be more prevalent in races with a faster pace throughout. Such like a 100m race in athletics. The athletes are going full speed for the full duration, so when lactic acid build up is at its’ highest at the end of the race, then it will show people slowing rather than getting faster.
However, for slower run races, then yes, people and horses can quicken up at the end. It all depends on the pace of the race beforehand.
Scallywag, IMO you are not really helping Tuffers who is simply asking questions by your one line seemingly condesending comments. This is a forum where constructional comments seem more welcome. Why do you not expand and be a bit more helpful? You scallywag.
Sectional timing is the only way to quantify whether horses are accelerating or decelerating over a set distance, and from what velocity the change is occuring from.
Trying to glean this from watching a race is nigh on impossible, and misleading. To the eye a horse may appear to be quickening when infact it’s actually slowing down less rapidly than the others it’s passing.
I’ve no idea if all horses are slowing at the end of a race, but would guess the majority are.
Cue Prufrock and Jim F?
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