Forum Replies Created
- Posts
But, Daylight, surely we want variety in flat racing programmes? Most people would rather watch and bet on a run-of-the-mill race of 10f plus, rather than a run-of-the-mill sprint. They’re more entertaining, there’s more to watch and enjoy. People are just not going to turn up to watch and bet on programs of sprints and mile races.
Race programs should be more responsive to the wishes of the racegoer rather than merely providing races for what the bloodstock wished to produce. It would be a step forward if the racing authorities reduced the number of sprints and increased the number of longer races – of course there would have to be a time lag of a few years so that breeders could catch up, and produce more animals capable of staying middle distances at least.
Of course it won’t happen, but it would be nice if it did.
It was me Sharon, not Robgomm, but no matter – I see today at Yarmouth there are 4 handicaps open to horses of 3 or above, run over a mile or less, and these have attracted fields of around 20 runners each. The one stayers handicap has a field of only 6. So, if you want to get a run, buy a horse that will stay 10f plus.
Clearly we should be producing more staying types and fewer short runners.
Daylight, you’ll find that a 20-odd runner sprint handicap will have a much higher overround, maybe 140 per cent or more, than an 8 to 12 runner race (illogical though that may be). So where’s the value for the punter?
Tooting, it’s true that low grade horses entered in handicaps up to a mile often find it very difficult to get a run, but that isn’t normally the case for middle distance and especially staying horses. The trouble is, there are too many poor short runners (I hesitate to call them ‘sprinters’) being produced by the bloodstock industry which seem to find ready buyers at the yearling sales, but have little to offer in the longer term after their early 2-y-o exploits show them to have no talent.
Who wants to pay money to see these animals running in races which are little more than very profitable equine bingo for the bookmakers? Who would want whole race programmes full of them? Do we want our racing to become like America’s, with an endless diet of 6 furlong rubbish?
Only 30 years ago it would have been virtually impossible for a horse rated 50 or below to win even the feeblest selling handicap, never mind having races specially framed for it to compete in.
I don’t have a problem with having races for bad horses, but why should they be subsidised? Such horses should be competing at the flat race equivalent of point-to-point meetings (or ‘picnic’ meetings like they have in some parts of Australia), where gate money, on-course tote take and entry fees provide the revenues for prize money.
Thanks, Tete Rouge, I was lucky enough to see Fred Winter ride during the last 3 or 4 years of his career.
Not a tall man by NH standards (5ft 7in maybe), his greatest attributes (to me anyway) were his strength, determination and courage. He had a great ability to galvanise a horse by using his whole body to squeeze a horse forward, and snatch a race out of the fire. In that respect he was at least the equal of McCoy.
I’ve always felt that the nearest jockey to him, stylewise, wasn’t another jump rider, but Willie Carson. And like Willie, they say he was by no means a ‘natural’ in his earliest riding days (unlike John Francome, for instance), but by hard work turned himself into a quite outstanding jockey.
I’ve seen all the top riders since and including Fred Winter, and in my opinion McCoy is the best. Of course his association with the great Martin Pipe will tend to exaggerate, statistically, his superiority over others, but I’d rate him just ahead of Francome, Dunwoody and Winter (in that order).
P Regent & Ihaventalight, do I hear the piteous bleating of people talking through their pockets?
Racing Daily, I think that Teenoso (along with such horses as Pinza and Santa Claus) falls into the category of "Derby winners underestimated because they disappointed at stud".
Teenoso was a a slow developing horse who was never going to appeal to breeders – his 2-y-o form was little better than yesterday’s Belmont winner Sarava. He really needed a Group 1 winner from his first crop if he was going to be a success and attract high class mares.
I think people’s opinions of classic winners of past years as RACEHORSES is often coloured by their subsequent performance as STALLIONS. I would rate Teenoso as no worse than an average Derby winner, as a racehorse, possibly a little better.
Racing Daily,
so…"I just hope that the Derby doesn’t produce another Teenoso. Wins the Derby, and doesn’t win anything else after ".
You don’t think that races like the King George & QE Diamond stakes, or the Grand Prix de St Cloud count as races then?
This notion that the throughbred is more inbred than in years gone by is simply NOT TRUE!
Any accepted measurement of ‘inbredness’ shows that the thorougbred is less inbred than it was 100 years ago, when it was less inbred than 100 years before that.
I just don’t understand where people get this idea from.
There is a genuine issue about the over-use of shuttle stallions and a possible future reduction in gene-pool variability, but at the present time it just ain’t so!
The point about the over-use of unproven stallions is an important one. Although the thoroughbred is less inbred now than 100 or 200 years ago, there is a distinct danger that the vast books of mares covered by fashionable or well-marketed stallions (especially shuttlers) will in the near future reduce the gene pool. There’s nothing wrong with inbreeding in itself, but it needs to be done with care, and with specific objectives in mind, and not just because there’s not enough choice for mare owners.
It makes even less sense when this happens with unproven stallions. Probably 80 or 90% of stallions ‘fail’ at stud, in terms of transmitting excellence to their offspring, so the crime of over-use is compounded.
Just as many outstanding broodmares were not great racemares, there have been many extremely successful stallions who although well-bred and good-looking, who were not of the very highest class on the track. It is these stallions who are now not going to get a chance to show what they can do, including supplying more variability into the gene pool. No one is suggesting that bad racehorses should get as good chances at stud as champion ones, but you do need that variability if the breed is not to regress.
It’s a pity that many breeders, bloodstock agents and trainers cannot work out that a stallion that gets 6 black type performers from 30 foals a year is a better bet than one that gets 10 from 100.
The Scots have always preferred the crueller methods of snaring and trapping, and will no doubt be able to continue these practices without any hassle from their leaders now that all horrid activities involving animals are officially deemed to have been banned.
If snaring doesn’t take your fancy, cat-owning is a possible alternative. Watching your pride and joy killing a wild mammal can provide many a pleasurable half-hour.
Another option is a trip to your local halal abattoir. It will provide you with the chance to watch animals slowly bleed to death (men-only I’m afraid).
But if snaring is a bit too static, not hands-on enough for you, and multi-culturalism doesn’t really grab you, why not have a go at angling? (Pisciphobes needn’t worry, you don’t have to eat the fish!).
No doubt the Scots will be passing laws banning these activities very soon, having absent-mindedly forgotten to put them in the bill they’ve just passed – so hurry now while stocks last!
Scotland now joins Nazi Germany in banning ‘hunting with dogs’, the sport having been outlawed in the 1930s on the diktat of their loveable veggy leader A. Hitler.
I’m not a lawyer, but in the rest of the EU hunting is more of a civil liberties/cultural freedom matter than anything else, so it wouldn’t surprise me at all if the new law was overturned in some court or other, or so watered down as to be practically unworkable.
Let’s hope so.
I would have thought that a good indication of danger in a steeplechase is the number of horses that end up on the ground, ie who fall or are brought down.
If you check on the RP site you’ll see that the 2001 National had 40 runners, of whom 16 fell or were brought down.
In 2000, the National also had 40 runners, of whom 16 fell or were brought down.
The only difference as far as I can see is that in 2001 horses were falling, or being brought down onto, much softer ground than in 2000, and so were running a lower risk of sustaining serious injuries. Racing on fast ground is far more likely to result in fatal accidents than racing on heavy ground.
So, if running the National wasn’t a problem in 2000, why was it one in 2000? Is getting a horse caked in mud ‘crueller’ than getting it’s leg broken?
I agree with your assessment of Intikhab SteveM, isn’t it possible that it was a misprint in the Annual and they really meant 125?! But seriously, they do seem to be a little guilty of believing the hype.
But to be fair, Timeform has come up with some pretty <br>wacky ratings in the past, particularly for 2-y-os in the 10 years or so after the war – Windy City’s mark of 141 (!) in 1952 is probably the maddest.
