Stick and stones, sticks and stones. Clearly you are Bummed at the whole thing. The bright side is that in 3 weeks you will have forgotten what really happened and be racking up leaves waiting for Santa. Cheers.

Interesting that it's perfectly OK for you to use the same words you hate when someone mentions ducked in reference to Rachel... that you are now on a campaign of running down Zenyatta to further RA in the public's eye, do you recognize what she did on Sat will probably not be seen the rest of our lifetime?

All he is resorted to now is namecalling, and running down Zenyatta to try to prove a point, it's pure desperation on his part.

Bummed for what? I know who the better horse is and deserves end of year honors. I just find it sad that I cant enjoy what Zenyatta did because of a couple tools on here cant take a step back and put into perspective what really happened as a whole this year and what Rachel really accomplished in her once in a lifetime campaign for a 3yr old filly.
It's too bad people on here cant just talk of Zen and her accomplishment without bashing Rachel and trying to diminish the year she had. To say anything other then what Rachel did this year was spectacular and unmatchable is complete nonsense.
Zenyatta's year will be matched wayyyyyy quicker then Rachels ever will. Im willing to bet there will never be a 3yr old filly that will ever accomplish what Rachel did this year.

Dude me running down???? Are you kidding me ZERO IQ boy. You've been bashing Rachel all along. Find the post were I bashed Zenyatta. Lay off the POT dude it effects short term memory.

And YES Zenyatta's one accomplishment WILL be matched. Rachels year NEVER will.

Um I believe I will see it in about one years time.

I'm having a hard time swallowing this. If taking one chance in a big race trumps taking a chance in two or three races, and winning each time, then what's next?

When the emotion and the excitement of the Breeders' Cup wears-off, and people have time to digest the year as a whole, because it is in fact Horse of the Year, then I wonder where the decisions will lie. Polls etc. now are like polls right after a party's convention during election year.

As of right now there is no critaria for selecting HOY, it is simply who each voter thinks Horse of the Yr is as White explained last night. With this you can expect open intrepretations who that is. I posted this morning that Steve was right on when he said we are so conditioned with beyers these days that alot of us underestimated her going into the Classic, winning 13 races on synth regardless if one believes the competition is bad is not as easy on the surface as it may look. Look at Richard's Kid, the results can be random...I can own up to maybe erroring on my opinion of her prior to the BC Classic and getting sucked into the void of that she was beating inferior fillies on a junk track. Regardless what she did on Sat was special, when you look at the way it all played out, no pace, losing a pace threat a min prior to post, flat footed start, and then the ease she won coming down the lane, it was a game changer and I think it's sad that people let what was a conservative campaign until the Classic get in the way of recognizing greatness.

The handlers have no one else to blame but themselves. If they wanted HOY so bad they should of taken on and beaten all comers. I dont think she was at the top of her game all year. She did throw in 2 clunkers and the weakness of the field was the only thing that saved her. That being said, if she ran against the boys those days she would have been beaten. But they stayed with the girls to fluff up her numbers and that is what is going to cost her HOY. May this be a lesson to all horse owners and trainers, if you want the accolades dont hide in the corner all year while someone else is doing all the work and jump out in the end and try and do one thing and steal the credit.

Because greatness should not/cannot be proven in one race in my opinion. Greatness is doing something beyond the ordinary once and then again, maybe even a few more times.

The difference between a campaign like Ghostzapper's and that of Zenyatta's was that his showed brilliance stretched over three different distances, even if it was only four races (of course she only ran five). He also squashed a much better Classic field.

NT

I recognize greatness... she was great, it was an awesome performance. Yeah, she had a pretty darn good trip for a closer and the slow start is overrated for a horse with her style, but sure, it was awesome and exciting. Great, indeed.

Unfortunately for her, someone was greater. I'm not knocking Zenyatta at all... quite the contrary. If I'm knocking anything, it's her campaign, which in the big picture was not nearly as great as Rachel's. Yeah, her ace in the hole is the Classic, but that does not trump a Preakness, Haskell and Woodward win in my opinion, nor should it.

We can talk for days regarding greatness, one thing I don't agree with is the citing of beyers as the definitive rule for how good a horse is, they are useful and are great from a conversational viewpoint but they should never be the absolute in determining that one horse can beat another when comparing horses.

Hmmm, how many major horses, the type who have won a whole bunch of grade 1's, have finished unbeaten. Is it a big number?

How many fillies have won the classic?

How many horses have come from last in every race to run by the entire field?

Those three things, I guess they are ordinary everyday events.

And how many of them were predicted to be the 3rd or 4th choice by people on message boards?

NT

Gulfstream wants to decide it on their track in Feb.

http://blog.timesunion.com/horseraci...zenyatta/3629/

Enormous stage and will be the Hot place to be pre Super Bowl. Horse racing needs it but I won't hold my breath

Oh yes waiving the fees will get it done.

How about 5 Mill instead.

apples and oranges, but yea I was wrong on the odds, not as wrong as you are on this one but wrong.

I wouldn't have brought it back up if you hadn't said to me that I'd be proven wrong.

Nowhere in my post did I say that Zenyatta was not a great horse. I simply said, and maintain that greatness is not attained with one effort. She has had a tremendous career and capped it off with an effort for the ages. However, the nod for HOY shouldn't go to her because of the one performance, in my opinion, at least not in a year where there was another horse like Rachel Alexandra.

NT

Man, you mean to tell me that there arent enough"rich" people out there, owners, sheiks, heads of state or people in general that would want more then anything to make this happen? Start hitting people up for loot, sponsorships hang banners along the track like they do overseas on the backstretch. What about striking a deal with Fox to televise and take all the tv money and put towards the race. Race one day SB the next, ratings would be through the roof, im sure there are plenty of smart people that can make this happen. They can raise enough money to bring them both there.

Yeah, but Zenyatta won't show..why bother with all this hype when you know she won't ship there. Just like she wouldn't have run at CD this year. Doesn't mean that RA is or isn't HOY, but all this "let them decide it on the track" is just wishful thinking.

I disagreed with the statement that the classic was the only non ordinary thing she has done

This is a very educated post. So they shipped her all the way to Kentucky this year, knowing it would rain about Wed when she flew there, just so they could say she shipped.

Keep sending it in, bet bet bet.

Yea, she pretended like she was going to race at CD, thats non ordinary.

But But we tried to race at CD, now give us the HOY award

the CD race is not relavant to this discussion, where are you reading that they are trying to make it part of it?

Someone says that she shipped to scratch....now that is what I like to hear from my competition. :$:

I was just trying to get a rise out of you. I was totally joking.:D

Ok so I voted for Zenyatta in this poll, I thought Saturday locked up HOY for her. I beleive she would have blown Rachel away in the Woodward and in the BCC had they hooked up, but the award is HOY not whos better or who would have won.... IMO now the numbers do not lie and Rachel Deseves it.


# of Grade 1 wins this year....Rachel 5--Zenyatta 4

# of times facing "beating" the boys....Rachel 3--Zenyatta 1

Average Beyer, per start this year....Rachel 107--Zenyatta 103 "Rachel also ran 3 more times and one could argue she held her form longer and took it with her to 7 different tracks"

Average Field Size, per start this year....Racehel 7.25-- Zenyatta 7.60 "remember Rachels Acorn she only faced 2 other fillies, if not for that race she would be around 7.8 per race" I feel this is important because of the quality of horses Zenyatta beat all year, besides Life Is Sweet she beat no one, till the Classic.

# of different tracks run at... Rachel 7-- Zenyatta 3 I think this proves whos campaign was harder.

Again I think Zenyatta head-head at 1 1/4 would defeat Rachel but the Tale of the Tape does not lie, Rachel deserves HOY hands down IMO.

I'm not so sure that Zenyatta would beat RA at 10 furlongs. In the Haskell, RA was given a sensible ride, was behind Summer Bird for part of the race, and looked like she could have gone around the track one more time. If she isn't sent to the lead through fast fractions like she was in the Preakness and Woodward, then she can get 10.

Well said and I completely agree.:tro:

NT

I have had classes that put a ton of emphasis on the final exam. Z won more money this year, because she won the biggest race this country has. She took the tougher test, and romped. Tougher test, and more money won (both point to a quality edge.) This is a dirt/synthetic ..East/West fight. That's all it really is. Same thing you see each Monday when Beyers come out. Z pretty much told Beyer to go touch himself fancy.

Come on Travis, you have seen alot of races and what Zenyatta showed was a race horse that has the will to win and with her stride she is perfect for 10 furlongs. At equal weights she would be real hard to beat at 10 f with any decent pace. AS far as HOY, it doesnt matter.

Its not the better horse award... I beleive Zenyatta is better, its HOY and I beleive Rachel deserves it.

She is no doubt custom made for ten panels. But she really did have a good run through the pack in that all the holes opened-up when she needed them. Yeah, she had to go and get them a bit, but she's good and that's what good ones do.

This whole HOTY debate is tough because people think you're knocking one or the other, which isn't the case at all.

Zenyatta was awesome on Saturday and it really saddens me we couldn't see her do that in a few more exciting spots. And unfortunately for them, and this is not a slap on their character at all, but I think it costs her Horse of the Year in the end. We'll see.

I love the fact that its even a discussion. In the last two years, we have seen four wonderful fillies in Goldikova, Zarkava, Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta.

In this argument, I have to side with the Zenyatta camp. Rachel Alexander ran a great campaign that has to be considered one for the ages so what I am saying isnt at all trying to impugn her body of work. To me, its all a circular argument anyway.

To me there is something to be said about stepping up in the brightest of lights and displaying greatness against the best. Those bright lights arent at monmouth park in august and they arent at saratoga in the first week of september. The best aren't two credible competitors in a seven horse field.

The brightest lights in horse racing in this country were at Santa Anita Park on November 7th in a full unrestricted field that was the most competitive of the of year. Zenyatta showed up and dominated and gave the performance of her life and to me the performance of the year.

Zenyatta is horse of the year in my book.

what a crew... ruth's chris is my absolute favorite joint
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pi...d=317917410583

i'd be alright with a co-hoy. really the way it should be.

As wonderful as Zenyatta's performance was in the Classic, and it was an epic thing of beauty, HOY should still go to Rachel Alexandra. The overall body of work by RA is just simply better. The number of different tracks she won one, along with the higher number of times she defeated males give her an advantage in my opinion. I'm not trying to take anything away from what Zenyatta accomplished, she's had a wonderful year with a storybook ending. I just believe Rachel Alexandra's year was better, and worthy of HOY.

I can't argue with that Phil but the whole thing seems to be an oddity of the calendar. You and I walk out of Pimlico KNOWING we just saw a display of heart that we are unlikely to ever see again, and then she does it twice more that summer in races a 3 year old filly isn't supposed to run in let alone win. Z ran and won the last race. Does that mean it counts for 3?

While the cackling of experts were waving fists full of cash against her RA sent them all home indigent and poor. Now because she doesn't run a different surface in November somehow her success is distilled to simply good. Einstein runs grass, poly and dirt to Beyers > 100 while all the rest are respected for their Beyer > 100 wins run on their preference. Rachel runs on dirt but should clean up HOY voting...

"This trial is a travesty. It's a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham." - Woody Allen, "Bananas"

Here's Haskin's take. Scroll down a ways for the HOY thoughts. http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-raci...source=twitter

Er, yeah it's sooo Rachel's fault her owners at the time were anti-colt races. Also Man O'War's owner kept him out of the Derby because he looked down on going to Kentucky in May (well really ever right? Didn't he think of KY as "the west" and had to be talked into doing it with War Admiral?) I guess MOW just sucks huh? Being as he didn't even run in the Derby..

I could see going with both, I could see giving it to Rachel. Saying Zenyatta deserves it and Rachel doesn't is where I'm balking.

PS There's a Ruth's Chris in Beverly Hills? Mmm...

These RA backers are the same ones that think Easy Goer was better than SS. They also loved Alydar over Affirmed. War Admiral over Seabiscuit. They ignore what's done on the track.