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Queen Anne prep for the old Rev-dog at Baden-Baden today, GT. Takes on Irish raider Imaging and some locals at 4.10.
Would want to be winning quite well to have a chance next month, obviously. Ground described as ‘good’ by the local turf club, though that could be anywhere between g-f and heavy!
Robert North – a general question for you, would appreciate a rambling in-depth reply.
The hardest yard for me to ‘get right’ up north (and I have been trading the northern dross quite a lot lately) must be Roger Fell‘s. I understand his MO is to get horses fit on the racetrack as he believes in doing the minimal amount of work on the gallops with the aim of giving his owners more days out and more prize money. He made a good point recently that many injuries occur at home, so you lengthen a horse’s racing career by doing as little on the gallops as possible. If they’re running and risking their tendons, in his opinion they might as well be doing it on the racecourse.
As a result, I suppose you get the wildly fluctuating profiles many of his horses display. You often see one who has been out of form for three or four runs heavily gambled and winning just two or three days after a poor run in a similar contest. Are there any patterns you can pick up on when trying to secondguess his horses?
He’s a shrewd buyer at the sales, often buying well-bred types at knock-down prices from underachieving trainers like Burrows, Tregoning and Weld. He has lots of nice types to go to war with this season – but when will they come good? Today’s Redcar pair of Watheer and Montalvan, for example, appeal as a pair who might rate significantly higher by the end of the season.
Indeed, some disgraceful stuff from hein here. This forum is becoming utterly toxic – horrible behaviour going on in the memorials section, mindless bashing of pretty much the only proven long-term winner in the DLAP section, security issues…
What a shambles. Cormack has a lot to answer for.
Bit of a flyer but any view on The Revenant in the Queen Anne, Ginger?
Plenty of value pickoffs to be had in the race but the general standard of the ‘established’ types is hardly unattainable.
The Revenant runs in the old Bateel colours with connections always game for a runner at Ascot meetings. Big improver since leaving Hugo Agogo (seems the case with quite a few of his old horses lately). Only raced up to G3 level so far but value for quite a bit more than the result when coming from behind off a slow pace in a Saint-Cloud G3 last time. The bare form obviously smells rather ‘early season’ (and he was fitter than most), although he’s now proven away from a soft surface and looks the type to improve for a strongly-run race in a big field. 50/1 with 365 – maybe goes off somewhere around the 14/1 mark with a run. Haven’t pulled the trigger on it yet but tempted to have a go for a bit of sport.
Indeed, any chance mods could remove Downpayment’s post and ban the user? What a ridiculous, inappropriate and plain wrong thing to say. It would be awful if anyone connected to the horse saw that message.
Beyondtemptation ran her best race for years last time out and was a terrifically hardy and geniune mare adored by connections. Regular rider Tommy Dowson was in bits post-race.
Being in foal had nothing to do with the accident and was just an even sadder post-script to one of the saddest things I’ve seen on a racecourse in a long while.
“Coronation Stakes:
55 points @ 5/1 (WH) Qabala (min 9/2)”Agreed! I was looking at this race a couple of days ago when the news RE: Hermosa’s future targets came through – ending up cutting both Qabala and Jubiloso for the firm. Surely the race cuts up a great deal with the likes of Hermosa, Commes, Maqsad, Lady Kaya, Fairyland, Skitter Scatter and others running elsewhere. This looks the obvious target for Qabala and she’ll start 5/2f I expect.
Each-way could be the play, though? Jubiloso produced some sexual sectionals and would have the Guineas horses in trouble with a run, I suspect.
Well done on your recent success by the way, Gingertipster. I am roundly mocked in the office for looking at TRF but I do keep an eye on your thread. You’re up there with the likes of Hugh Taylor as far as your winrate and sense of value goes. It’s all the more impressive in your case as you are often betting into strong Saturday markets on the morning of the race – and you’ve been doing it for years!
Hang in there Spud. I’ve been watching your thread and I think you have a lot of the right thought processes even if the staking plan is running down Chasey Lane a bit. Keep at it.
I’ll send you a PM.
Awful. One of my favourite all-weather horses.
Certainly had his quirks at the start but was otherwise a thoroughly genuine and hardy old slugger. 10 wins from 60 starts and was holding his form well despite being kept busy in 2018 and 2019. He was an important horse in the career of Josephine Gordon – winning six times for JoGo, including when she was a 7lb and 5lb claimer.
Like the mighty Spare Parts, Swiss Cross and Pearl Spectre, Gentlemen was a superb advertisement for Phil McEntee’s training operation. He’ll be right near the top of my list of trainers when I start getting involved in ownership.
I agree with old Joe. I priced this up the other day and made Brian Boranha about half the current market price. The classic case of a small stable being disregarded by the market.
For those who missed it: I put up a long post explaining my absence from TRF, my long-running feud with David Cormack and my concerns over his general character and running of this forum, linking in to my doubts about some of the claims he made in that previous post.
I stand by the specifics of what I said there but on second reading I felt it was all rather unseemly and the bitter and twisted tone reflected almost as badly on me as it would on Cormack. I deleted it. On reflection, I think it would be best for me to resume my absence from posting here. I just find Cormack (and a few others) make me so angry. My health is not good at the moment, I have a baby on the way and am still trying to work and study the racing 10hrs a day – life is just too short to give time to people you can’t abide, isn’t it? I do read some of the Big Races section and enjoy the discussion there but will try not to be provoked by anything else I see on the main forum.
Just a final note on the cross country eventing comparisons for Archipenko, there’s a 6hr video of this weekend’s FEI event on YouTube. I counted 18 backhanders in total (admittedly probably saw less than usual due to a very short run-in there). Given event riders carry hard riding crops rather than foam whips, their contact is more of a flick than a strike but I imagine the effect is similar.
Find me on Twitter if you still want to keep in touch.
DELETED
Also – Archipenko – allow me to find a few YouTube clips of major competitions and show you what I mean. I think there’s a wire crossed somewhere.
I’m not sure how many of you actually follow eventing, but riders in contention for the overall win actually do regularly give their mounts 1-3 backhanders after the last in the major competitions. Devotees of the Pippa Funnell series of games will also remember the ‘WHIP!’ button appearing after the last.
I’m afraid I’m not ‘back on the forum’ to stay, Cormack. I have major personal objections to your conduct and the way you run TRF as I have told you in private. I feel passionately about this subject though and just want my deconstruction of your arguments to be right there alongside your article for the aide of anyone impressionable or influential who might come across it.
I don’t think your response was particularly good there. You have very little concrete to back up your arguments. Bill Shoemaker was a famously quiet rider without much strength in a finish but was suited by the US style of racing in an era without such strong emphasis on sectional efficiency. Chris Catlin was a good recent example of a UK-based jockey who rode well without being particularly whip-happy, although he never won a G1 and was regularly jocked-off by his retained yards in the big races. Perhaps that tells you something. As Luke Morris (no jockey has ridden in more UK races than him in the last two years and his opinion therefore carries more weight than any) said in the aftermath of his recent dispute with apprentice Theodore Ladd:
“I knew I’d had [the maximum permitted] seven hits. I could have hit mine for an eighth time and maybe I’d have won – I don’t know…if there was more discretion for stewards around the lower end, for jockeys who go one or two over, they could really hammer someone who hits the horse ten, 12 times or more, then that might be fairer.”
This really hits home how vital the whip is for encouragement. Without it, you just don’t have a viable sport.
Perhaps I’m wrong but you really strike me as someone who doesn’t watch a great deal of racing, especially hands and heels. The front-runner bias is infuriating in those contests. Use of the whip isn’t just for encouragement but also for correction to run straight and overtake. I suggest Louise is wrong, especially where professional jockeys in top races are concerned. Perhaps a flailing amateur like David Maxwell can use the whip out of sync with a horse’s stride pattern but generally it is an aide to a horse running straight and quickening ahead. Again looking at your favourite example of the King’s Stand – let’s take the 2018 renewal. Without the whip, Battaash would have won with Blue Point hanging in behind to his right until straightened up by Buick using the whip in his right hand. How frustrating would that have been to watch? This is a Group 1 race with enormous ramifications for stallion value and the future of the breed. For a prominent-racing gelding to deprive a superior entire colt would have encapsulated the farce you seek to create within a moment. You fail to recognise that not every horse has Frankel’s level of superiority in hardly being able to help winning by clear margins under hand riding. Horses are herd animals and most instinctively shy away from being in front – the whip is needed to help overcome that ingrained trait. That does not make the all-out win of Blue Point any less valid. Likewise those of Giant’s Causeway, Persian Punch, Wichita Lineman, Anzum, Hardy Eustace, Synchronised, Bobs Worth, Flagship Uberalles, Mabs Cross, Alpha Delphini or any of the other excellent horses whose best performances depended on vigorous riding and whip use. Your dismissive comment that more “genuine” horses would be favoured is quite offensive to fans of horses like these. In my view, you have a very perverse taste if you think horse racing without those kind of wonderful horse and jockey performances would actually be superior. It would be severely diminished as a sport. You can’t even call it a sport if you’re deliberately forcing participants to perform well within themselves, especially at the top level.
Rather than lowering itself to take on a trial (which would be yielding much too far in my view) I suggest that racing irons out this type of nonsense with a long (perhaps 3-5 year) study of race finishes. Each whip strike from each jockey on each horse would be recorded alongside the perceived purpose of the rider and response from the horse. Each race-winning (or placing) whip use such as Buick’s should be recorded alongside correctional use for 1pt in the “keep it” column and each unnecessary hit of a clearcut winner or exhausted unplaced horse would be 1pt for the “ban it” brigade. I’d suggest that “keep it” would be +1000 in quick time.
“Taking your example of the Kings Stand as an example. On average, how much faster (in lengths or seconds) would you reckon a horse would go with whip assistance compared to without during a 5 furlong race? I realise it may vary horse to horse but what would you say the average would be?”
I don’t think it’s possible to answer that exactly. A bit. Even a tiny amount is crucial to retain the competitive nature of the sport.
Get on with it man.
