Of these, wasn't Read the Footnotes the only one to race, let alone break his maiden, at Saratoga as a 2YO?

Rick Violette with 2yo's on dirt at Saratoga since '98:

24-for-88 (27.3%) $3.86 ROI

In 2yo dirt races at Saratoga that are 5.5fs or shorter:

15-for-41 (36.6% wins) $4.45 ROI


Again ... a lot of the damage was done in the late 90's - Indian Charlie can tell you how I was a rabid Violette fan ten years ago. It took a while for me to figure out why he was so great with these obscurely bred types sprinting at Saratoga.

How do you go back that far? When I plugged in just 5 it was not that good, I dont really remember late 90's, since I was no older then 14.
Why is he so great?

I think so. They were all his type of 2yo though - the fast pinhook.

Dream Rush was a 90k yl turned 285K 2yo who worked very fast.

Readthefootnotes set the track on fire going 3/8ths at Timonium and was a 320K buy - a ton for a NY bred coming out of the Timonium 2yo sale.

High Finance was an M & H that I think worked fast.

How about breaking this out yearly since 2005 at Saratoga?

He's great with them because he gets the right kind and he doesn't try and train the speed out of them.

Say you've got one owner who wants to buy 8 horses for 200K a piece.

You can go the Zito way and try to buy the 8 as yearlings looking for fairly nicely bred well put together classic types. Or you can buy 8 horses from Ocala and Timonium that don't have the best breeding or conformation - but are very quick.

If you go the former - you're not going to look like much of a debut trainer. If you go with the latter - you're probably going to look like a good debut trainer.

While they were all pricey 2YO plays, my thinking was that we're starting to see a trend where most of Violette's early-season 2YO winners become one-hit wonders (perhaps with the exception of Worstcasescenario). I know that we're looking at a small sample size, but it may not be a coincidence that, of the four horses that you mentioned that "went on with it," only Read the Footnotes broke his maiden at Saratoga. High Finance, for example, didn't even debut until he was a 3YO.

The last 3 Fasig Tipon Calder sales toppers all raced as 2yo's.

2009: Sales topper Al Zir won his debut handily by 4 lengths at Newmarket against a 14 horse field. He went off at 9/5 odds. He also won his 2nd start and than was 3rd in a Group 1 stakes 3rd time out.

2008: Desert Party won his debut by 4 lengths going 4.5 furlongs at Arlington Park. He won the Sanford Stakes at Saratoga over Vinyard Haven second time out

2007: The Leopard was 2nd in his debut at Belmont to a Rick Violette debut winner. He won his second start going 6fs on the dirt at Saratoga with a 94 Beyer. Ended up 3-for-6 as a 2yo with two stakes win - one was a Graded Stakes win.

Generally - these horses that top that sale and make the races at age 2 aren't slow pieces of crap that often. Lion Heart topped this sale about 10 years - he was amazing as a 2yo.

2010: 1-for-5
2009: 3-for-10
2008: 2-for-5
2007: 2-for-12
2006: 4-for-14
2005: 2-for-12

His debut BC weekend at Santa Anita was arguably the best dirt performance of the entire weekend (outside of perhaps Cajun Beat.)

Shouldn't they become one hit wonders though?

There's only been one trainer since '98 that has won with more 2yo debuters at Saratoga than Violette - and his name is Todd Pletcher and he's had over a hundred more to debut than Violette.

Should they? Somehow, I suspect that they're not paying significant six-figures sums to win a maiden race worth $50K, only to have the horse never be heard from again. Winning a debut race is great, but at what cost to the horse's future. I'm not saying it's necessarily Violette's fault. We don't know, for example, what pressure an owner is placing on him to get the horses to the races early. In this regard, the Klaravich horses that others are training also seem to be getting to the races relatively early.

I happen to like betting heavilly on 2yo mdn races....but then again I am a moron

...and i will be betting against Brock

How is Sightseek's colt looking? There was a photo of him on Tod Mark's page, he has a beard. :D

I'm over on the main ...most of the Mott's are working over on Oklahoma....he now has a name "Raison d'Etat"

Do you know who Pletcher had out galloping before the break on Sunday? I was out there, but there were a bunch of non-discript bays.

Saw Trappe Shot that day.

My notes show who worked and how... but the gallopers I don't recall.

Brock will eventually be the Best horse to Come out of this race, but it won't be tomorrow, the colt wants to run All day long and tomorrows race is to short. He's definitely a 2 turn horse...

Better to win that MSW race early than win no race at all.

I think a lot of those horses are simply very precocius types who are fast and way ahead of the game early. A lot of them also have had it put to them early on to be so sharp for the sales.

I agree with you that it's stupid to pay 200K for a horse just to win a 50K MSW race right away. If they sold them all right after those sharp early scores - their ROI might be a lot better.

It's not like the guys buying the yearlings are doing any better. They'll spend 200K on one - and sometimes you finally see a few published works at age 3 - the horse runs once or twice - peforms badly and that's it. Sometimes they never even start at all.

Violette shouldn't be expected to develop his horses like a Zito or Bill Mott might just because he wins more often with them as debuting 2yos at Saratoga. Those guys have a million more horses - and those guys debuters typically run like first time starters. Violette doesn't have the quantity - and his debuters often run like they've already started 7 different times.

Brock is taking money at 3-1, but none of the other firsters are; Stay Thirsty is even money with 7 minutes to post

2.3 million piece of deuce.. As I said what kind of moron would buy a horse for 2.3 million

Obviously I don't know how good the race will turn out to be, but I'm certainly happy with Bernardini's 5th winner. The time was a lot slower than Bulldogger's, but I don't need to see a 2 year old by Bernardini running that fast. He's speedy - not sure how far he'd want to go, but we'll find out.

I can't wait to bet against this horse next time...he practically crawled on the lead and beat a bunch of horses who are going to be bet againsts next time out. A McPeek no hoper who was 31-1 was 2nd in this group. Hell, 15K NW2L Filly and Mare Claimers set a quicker pace than him...I think this ends up being a big time negative key race.

I played a whacky tri and was sick of my bad ticket structure
11/5,8,9/all/... Anyway the point is, I think the 8 ran well. I also think the 9 will be ok.

That filly claiming race was at 6 1/2 furlongs though and you know the times are screwy at that distance at Saratoga. Seems like the track got slow as the day went on.

I think there are going to be a few next out winners out of the race. Orsonian ran well with some trouble. Was slammed at the start then rank early as he seemed to not like dirt in his face. When he finally got running he closed well and while he might not have beaten the winner, he was probably second best. He's going to win next out.

Magnet Cove got hit pretty hard on both sides coming out of the gate and flew home. Should be dangerous going two turns next time. Brock ran too bad to be true. Fair Whit battled, at least a little down the lane and seeing an improved run out of him next time should be expected. The same could be said for Eltheeb who ran like a horse that wants to go farther.

Can you please use numbers, so I dont have to go back and check out who your talking about. Numbers would be easier, already in mind from seeing the race 4x.

Dude just go to the first page of this thread. The 5 is Orsonian - I agree w/ Hoss about him.

If you saw the race 4x, then I imagine you saw everything that I'm talking about already.

I have X and I buy a horse for Y...Dude has xxxx he will buy a horse for YYYY..It's all about the action

Another brilliant training job by Violette with Bail Out the Cat today, who apparently still doesn't know how to break correctly.

On top of these numbers:

Here's Violette's stats with 2-year-olds at Belmont's Spring meet:

2010: 3-for-5 ($3.34 ROI)
2009: 3-for-5 ($4.62 ROI)
2008: 1-for-3 ($3.53 ROI)
2007: 2-for-6 ($4.20 ROI)
2006: 0-for-4
2005: 2-for-6 ($4.79 ROI)
2004: 2-for-6 ($4.32 ROI)

Since '04: 13-for-35 (37.1% wins)

He's also got a very good record with older turf horses at Saratoga going back a long way .. and juiced up his numbers some more with a 17/1 shot winner in yesterdays first race.

I wish all trainers were as consistant as he is in regard to the form patterns of their stable.

Doug, what happens to all of his first out winners though? I know Im getting really frustrated with them.

They don't develop much most of the time.

If they did - he'd be a training genius.

I really don't understand how Klarman (Klaravich stables) and William Lawrence, who are big-time finance guy who run hedge funds, think their current game plan is effective.

If they sold all of these horses after their debut race - it would be a more effective game plan.

Though, after time, it would be harder to sell them I suppose.

Freddy had one who was pretty fast and could carry it well for a total cheapie - and the horse could barely even train. How does something like that develop over time? The longer you wait - the faster the sounder ones catch up. I realize the Violette/Klaravich's cost 15 to 20 times more money, but I doubt things are a lot more rosy for the durability of those horses.

Exactly. . . they could do the same thing with the type of cheap horses Wesley Ward has (I question his strategy too, though). Either spend less and continue to try to win early (with few readily apparent benefits) or spend the type of money you're spending now and try to produce an actual stakes horse or two. Either way, for the sake of RHT's bankroll, change something.

Valiant Passion was bought by Team Valor and given to Pletcher for training.

Why not? Just another step towards every horse in the country being in one of four different barns.

NT

Another example of why trying to 'read' workouts is useless: RudyRod's $27 winner Saltamontes in today's 2nd race at Saratoga. This filly had all of THREE printed works, a slow 4f breeze 7/21 at AQU, a middling 4f breeze 8/2 at SAR and a faster 5f gate breeze 8/12 at SAR. Based on what you saw in the works, the horse was a total pitch, but Rudy the Magic Man finds yet another way to put one over in NY.

It's one of racing's great mysteries. Klarman did begin spreading horses to other barns in the last year or so which seems to indicate his frustration with that long-running game plan which produced Read the Footnotes and little else. Hell, he had as much or more success with Sciacca early on in the game on a tighter budget including with Subordination (Hollywood Derby, Eddie Read, Brooklyn, et al).