So what does it say if the synthetic tracks are drawing bigger fields?

A. The horsemen as a whole must like it.

B. It brings out the questionable horses
because they have a chance on the stuff.

C. None of the above... and here is my reasoning...

I choose A.

The most overused quote from the pro carpeting crowd: "all the horses have a chance and there's no bias."

When speed never wins and a surface repeatedly favors ass-draggers, I say its biased.

Speed never wins??? Did you not see opening day at SA?

Brad Free has an interesting piece he wrote today in DRF:

Handicapping | Posted 1/10/2008, 6:55 pm

Cushion Track still the right way to go
By BRAD FREE

http://www.drf.com/drfNewsArticle.do?NID=91504 (Subscribers to DRF Plus)

If you look at Arlington, Keeneland, Turfway, Golden Gate, etc, and look at the handicapping websites where they list the percentage of races won by front end, stalkers, closers, etc. during each meet, you will see that speed indeed wires quite a bit on artificial surfaces.

Only 2 vanned off today at Santa Anita.

The big difference is being able to put down that surface and being forced to by the CHRB. I'm pretty sure for $11 million you could put down a crazy safe dirt surface like Saratoga had this year. Actually you could have done that with 10 million to spare.

Or maybe they haven't been trained to a sufficient degree of fitness to compete at the distance?

Wow.

Windshields installed on jockeys at SA :D ... see Bloodhorse

Very deep, very insightful.

Didn't read the artical and I bet it's about the asphalt base coming apart. The track looks real bad and I bet Santa Anita doesn't wait to make a change.

The base is kicking up. They say its new sand added, but anybody with a brain knows better. 10 claimers are going 107 for 3/4s.

The kickback on all the synthetics has always been an issue. At TWP there are a lot of horses that refuse to run through the kickback and totally shut it down. Same with Keeneland and horses swinging out 10 wide, they wont run through the garbage

Some wont through dirt either.
All kinds of diff. kickback at diff. dirt tracks and depending on the amount of moisture in the dirt you can get giant clods in the face.

If the stuff does indeed prove to draw larger fields, and allow running in all weather (in the long run), get used to it.
Why in the world would anyone not want larger fields, and racing during times that they were previously unable to run horses?

Pee Garden, do me a favor, dont try to act like you know something when you really dont. You dont know anything about track composition, kickback, or anything else that relates to horseracing. Keep your comments isolated to the football threads where I dont know anything about the topic. In this case, like most horseracing topics you chime in on, you are clueless.

You wanna try me.
How many tracks have you walked on?
How many tracks have you dug into?
Give me the % sand by volume and the type of sand used in
the track you frequent (not the base). What is the average grain size
smart guy?

We will stick with the sand for now. Then we can move on to the type(s) of dirt
Maybe they refer to it as silt and clay in your area, we will get to that later.

Ive walked on a lot more than you Pee Garden

Im not going to google some useless information to battle with you. If you cannot see the kickback is an issue at these tracks then you dont watch many races. When visors are implemented, horses are cocking heads to get out of kickback, nice horses arent finishing runs unless they are out in the 8 path, thats enough for me.

Maybe Santa Anita should hire you as the track Super. Call Magna and tell them you have all the answers, dont tell me because I dont care. I didnt know we had an authority on tracks here, why are you here wasting time when they should be flying you out to fix their issue?

'Bout time you admitted it. ;)

I called your bluff and you
chicken out. Nice BS. You dont know squat.

Why is sand even used, why not just pure dirt. Lets start with something easy for you?
And that base that was kicking up that was not sand, what was it then?