Hansen ran really well in defeat. He's so much better than I originally thought.

What about the Beaumont on Sunday?

I agree that he's better now, but Mike Maker is just horrible with debuters. His horses typically run abysmal first-out and start developing rapidly 3rd or 4th time out...especially routing.

Look at Blue Grass 3rd place finisher Gung Ho. He was 3rd by 9 at Indiana Downs with a 25 Beyer in his debut. He broke his maiden 2nd time out at PID with a 49 Beyer.

I tried to justify Stately Victor as my Kentucky Derby pick by focusing only on his fairly good 2nd place finish on dirt in his 2yo debut at Saratoga in a race that was rained off-the-grass.

I've had horses come out of 2yo sales who I knew were lightening fast -- and they'd debut for Maker and get beat 15 lengths with no excuse. By the 4th start they're high quality alw or stakes horses.

I guess it's not as extreme as it once was with Maker stats wise ... but you really have to project so much future improvment with his runners. To be honest, I don't think he's ever had a horse who was near as strong on form as Hansen was after two races.

It stinks but there have been some legit horses win it lately and Sacristy could be ok. The other race hasn't had a decent graded stakes horse win in 5 years

Hansen was terrific....but considering the weight that Dullahan carried, he should have beaten him. Gung Ho, who a lot of people here were very smart about, also ran well. The others? Not so much.

The single best thing about the Blue Grass is that not a single no-shotter got lucky enough to earn a Derby Golden Ticket. The right two horses, who already had the earnings, ran 1-2.

So you must think Morgan's Guerrilla is the 2nd coming

I'm still waiting for turf with him. I knew he had zero chance in his debut ... between 'PG85 starting a thread about him before it and being a Maker FTS .. it's a deadly combo.

His 2nd in the Illi Derby was actually pretty damn good -- Chased a fast collapsing pace while very wide and was much the best in that race.

The mare was a mile better on turf.

I hated the ride he got in the Ill Derby.

You won't have to wait long, I've been told he is running in the Lexington next week. Seems like the owners are willing to sacrifice a very good horse at the altar of Derby fever.

I was hoping they would go to Pimlico with a fresh horse, guess not.

How is maker off 14 days?

1:28:2 for the Beaumont. That has to be the slowest 7 furlong graded stake I have ever seen. Older 10K claimers went over 4 seconds faster earlier on in the card.

Abt 7f distance VS standard 7f distance.

The ABT 7fs is 184 feet further than the standard 7f distance at KEE.

That makes sense, I wonder why they would change it?

I'm not sure... Keeneland has used both an ABT 7f and 7f distance for a very long time. I have no idea why they do this.

Believe it or not -- the Moss pace figures treat them as the same distance and all of the ABT 7f races at Keeneland get pyscho fast pace numbers.

I even left Moss a comment about it a few years ago -- and he never replied and it was never changed.

Trainers have a lot to worry about, but I'm sure not many have had an argument over hair dye. :rolleyes:

http://www.drf.com/news/keeneland-ma...ess-blue-grass