- This topic has 149 replies, 36 voices, and was last updated 17 years, 4 months ago by
.
- Posts
Hard to crab HTN too much on today’s run really. The pair were well clear and Ravens Pass appeared more suited by the way the race was run than the O’Brien horse (I think Gosden commented after the race that, tactically, this was their best effort with RP this year). Henry ran far too good a race to be a horse that is gone (or one that is ‘going’) and if he takes in the Breeders Cup mile and the going is firm he’d take all the beating IMO.
I’d love to see them take in the Classic with Ravens Pass as I think he’d see out the 10 well and looks to have plenty heart.I thought that Murtagh was working just a little harder than Fortune from a furlong out.A pity New Approach never returned to compete at this distance since the Irish Guineas.He was good at it!
I felt blessed to experience my first trip to Ascot in lovely sunshine!
I was looking forward to backing Tamayuz until i saw her walk around the parade ring a few times. She was on her toes, got warm under the saddle and had sweat dripping down the inside of her hind quarters so i abandoned her instantly. On the other hand, RP was an absolute picture of calmness and health thus getting my vote . HTN was in great shape too and it was a joy to be so close to this class of animal for the first time. It was like being in the presence of film stars! I was truly gob smacked at the muscle definition on both HTN and Tamayuz, the latter being chunkiest of the lot!
What also suprised me was lack of interest around the parade ring for such an important race. I thought we’d be packed like sardines around the perimeter trying to get a good gawp but very few people seemed interested meaning there was plenty of room which a kind of surreal feel to proceedings!
AOB seemed very relaxed and would look up and acknowledge calls to him with a funny little wave which i thought was a nice touch too.
All in all it was a great day apart from the two and a half hour crawl back to London along the M25 at 3mph and a wotless coach driver that decided to chuck a left off Cromwell St and take us through Knightsbridge on a busy saturday night, meaning the journey home took FOUR hours
Hard to crab HTN too much on today’s run really. The pair were well clear and Ravens Pass appeared more suited by the way the race was run than the O’Brien horse (I think Gosden commented after the race that, tactically, this was their best effort with RP this year). Henry ran far too good a race to be a horse that is gone (or one that is ‘going’) and if he takes in the Breeders Cup mile and the going is firm he’d take all the beating IMO.
I’d love to see them take in the Classic with Ravens Pass as I think he’d see out the 10 well and looks to have plenty heart.RP wasn’t stopping and if anything, was just beggining to go away in the last 50 yards.
10f no problem IMO and i can’t remember one performance saying as much about a horse. He’d been fooling us all along!
Excellent performance by RP who has improved and pleased to see him get his deserved GR1. The riding tactics for me were the difference as Fortune rode his own race and no excuses for HTN who he beat fair and square.
Tamayuz, who btw is a colt Onthesteal, was very disappointing and obviously did not run to his form.
The third best miler – or maybe even the best – is the current favourite for the Arc.
Agree with onthesteal that Tamayuz was not very impressive in the paddock. Henry’s not very big either and Raven’s pass looked half asleep.
Does anyone else feel that Henry may have been over run towards the end of this season?
What I mean by this is AOB always wanted a decent gap between races for Henry near the beginning of the season and now, as he chases the world record Grp1 total, Henry’s rest time has halved and look what we have….two defeats for Henry in little more than a fortnight.
A good run by Ravens Pass and realistically this was the form choice.
Great pace set by Racinger and Honoured Guest, really added something to the race
Say Raven’s Pass did not run HTH, HTN would’ve been an easy winner and in a good time. Would you have said he was over raced then?
After any horse aggressively campaigned gets beat the question is often asked.
Had Lush Lashes got beat in the Coronation, Falmouth or Matron, we would’ve heard it about her. It has been recognised by some great Irish trainers, that the time to run their horses is when they are in form. Not to wait until the next "target" like so many British trainers do. When that target comes around the trainer or horse is not in the same form.
So In my opinion the answer is no.
In my opinion the pacemakers added nothing. They went off at such a rediculous pace and were ignored. Tamayuz was effectively making his own pace which he has shown easily capable of doing anyway.
Also again in my opinion…..
Those pacemakers may have contaveined the rules.How can anyone say they were "trying to win" when they seemed deliberately ridden at six furlong pace at a mile. Such tactics are surely to the detrement of their chance so therefore if deliberate, against the rules.
Mark
Value Is EverythingSome important aspects, IMO, after this race.
Tamayuz is better than shown last Saturday. I don’t think he ran in his real value, and yes, he look very sweaty before the race. I wouldn’t bury him prematurely, though his value is, clearly, below the first two.
RP and HTN seem to have opposite trayectories this year. The first one is running better and better every time out, while the second one is a little bit away from his peak form from summer.
AO’B stated afetr the St. James’s that HTN is the best miler he ever trained, and everyone was already thinking about the son of Kingmambo, with good reason probably, tackling Rock of Gibraltar’s record of Group 1 races. Obviously, he won’t make it, and I don’t think that Henry is the best miler trained by Aiden… at all. He’s a brilliant horse, don’t take me wrong, but quite far from what his trainer was meaning to say three months ago. Might be a strategy for his retirement to Coolmore at the end of this season, or might be another big mistake, like when back in 2002 the ballydoyle team (EVERYONE there) was saying that Hawk Wing was the better horse in that super powerful thoroughbrec empire. We all know he wasn’t. The Rock was a much better miler, and High Chaparral a much better 12f competitor.
So, he either is very good at marketing Coolmore (at the end of the day he gets paid by the Coolmore supremos), or sometimes he misjudges some of his better horses badly, badly.
Henry’s defeat on Saturday comes without excuse, even the ground was a bit firmer, I think he wouldn’t have come out first, Raven’s run a crackin’ race, and, IMO, what would have hapened is that HTN could have come a bit closer… but that’s all. Murtagh, I think, should have try to put Gosden’s colt under pressure a bit earlier if he wanted to have a better chance at all.
I don’t know if they’ll clash again in the BC at Santa Anita, but should they do, there’ll be two options.
In the Classic, or in the Mile.
In the first one, I don’t see them beating either Curlin or Big Brown.
In the second one, my money would go to RP.
I think he still has improvement in him, while Henry might have lost a bit of his top form.Hawk Wing was a better miler than Rock Of Gibralter. HW had better form, ie he was capable of putting up a better single performance than ROG.
However, HW was not so consistent as his stable companion possibly due to running over distances beyond his best.
HW did not truly stay 12f so yes, High Chapperal was the better at 12f, and again more consistent. But HW was the better horse, capable of a better single performance at a mile than High Chapperal was at one and a half.
And Hawk Wing was capable of a better single performance than Henry The Navigater too.
Mark
Value Is EverythingHawk wing,was a much better horse than both rog and hc.He should never of run in the derby he was a seriously good horse who was a bit fragile and the derby bottomed him out it also didnt help that the stable had a virus that yr which finished the horse off for good imo
HW had better form, ie he was capable of putting up a better single performance than ROG.
The two are not the same thing. Hawk Wing’s Lockinge was probably a better performance than anything by Rock of Gibraltar, but given how effortlessly Rock of Gibraltar won his races, it’s no more than conjecture on either side to say with any degree of accuracy that Hawk Wing was capable of putting up a better single performance.
Indeed, I don’t remember Hawk Wing winning any classics on the bridle.
If a horse can win seven G1’s in a row I can’t see how you can argue that Hawk Wing was better. A horses greatness isn’t purely down to his physical ability it also includes his mental attitude as well as his soundness. Both of which the Rock proved he had far more of than Hawk Wing.
I agree with Aragorn.
For me, the most important aspect of a horse is his performance, and I just had to review the results of the three of them.
Comparing HW to both the Rock and HC is a joke, IMHO.I’m not saying that HW is a bad horse, simply that he was overrated. And honestly, I think that in a 1m race he would have suffered seriously to defeat Raven’s Pass if the latter showed a performance like last Saturday’s.
I’ll hazard a guess and suggest that all those that think HW was better than RG are also of the opinion that Master Minded is the best two-miler they ever saw?
Hawk Wing was hugely unfortunate not to defeat ROG in the Guineas, and was therefore campaigned unsuitably as to avoid a classic winning stablemate. Therefore the two are uncomparable for me, would the Rock have been so consistent & durable had he run the same races as Hawk Wing, over such varying distances and surfaces?
Nobody will know, but for me its a fact that, due to them being stablemates, the 2000G both made the Rocks career and ruined the Hawks.
Some important aspects, IMO, after this race.
Tamayuz is better than shown last Saturday. I don’t think he ran in his real value, and yes, he look very sweaty before the race. I wouldn’t bury him prematurely, though his value is, clearly, below the first two.
RP and HTN seem to have opposite trayectories this year. The first one is running better and better every time out, while the second one is a little bit away from his peak form from summer.
AO’B stated afetr the St. James’s that HTN is the best miler he ever trained, and everyone was already thinking about the son of Kingmambo, with good reason probably, tackling Rock of Gibraltar’s record of Group 1 races. Obviously, he won’t make it, and I don’t think that Henry is the best miler trained by Aiden… at all. He’s a brilliant horse, don’t take me wrong, but quite far from what his trainer was meaning to say three months ago. Might be a strategy for his retirement to Coolmore at the end of this season, or might be another big mistake, like when back in 2002 the ballydoyle team (EVERYONE there) was saying that Hawk Wing was the better horse in that super powerful thoroughbrec empire. We all know he wasn’t. The Rock was a much better miler, and High Chaparral a much better 12f competitor.
So, he either is very good at marketing Coolmore (at the end of the day he gets paid by the Coolmore supremos), or sometimes he misjudges some of his better horses badly, badly.
Henry’s defeat on Saturday comes without excuse, even the ground was a bit firmer, I think he wouldn’t have come out first, Raven’s run a crackin’ race, and, IMO, what would have hapened is that HTN could have come a bit closer… but that’s all. Murtagh, I think, should have try to put Gosden’s colt under pressure a bit earlier if he wanted to have a better chance at all.
I don’t know if they’ll clash again in the BC at Santa Anita, but should they do, there’ll be two options.
In the Classic, or in the Mile.
In the first one, I don’t see them beating either Curlin or Big Brown.
In the second one, my money would go to RP.
I think he still has improvement in him, while Henry might have lost a bit of his top form.A slightly contradicting opinion of HTN there….First he was slightly over the top and then he could have been a bit closer.
IMO, HTN ran right up to his best and the only difference from his St James palace run being that RP began his run a length up as opposed to three lengths down. That’s as good as HTN is IMO and tactics plus the realisation that RP sees out a mile and more was the undoing of the ‘best miler AOB has ever trained’.
Gosden must have some regrets.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.