And then we return to pre-1984

it's a shame that 12 f is considered a marathon.

as for the new races, since this is called the breeders cup, how much input do breeders have regarding races?
and as for the differing distances, anything that would encourage breeders to look for different types of horses, rather than sprinter/milers who might carry speed 10f, has to be a good thing. right?

hey, at least the belmont won't be decried as a useless race due to it's distance. and maybe racetracks will card other races in line with the year end big day.

and maybe 'win and you're in' won't only deal with races on a certain network.

When it was THE championship race of the year, in Kelso and Buckpasser's time, it was run at 2 miles.

I hope that the Turf Sprit might be added to the Global Sprint Challenge Series-it may be too close to the leg in Japan...

Ticket prices will shoot up again for next year on the Friday. I'm sure that they had these 3 more races agreed on last year but decided to add 3 and then 3 because they knew that the swingeing ticket prices increases would be best administered in 2 doses.

As with most things in racing, this is good for owners/trainers, bad for bettors. The BC used to be the one day you could count on big fields and competitive races. Not any more. Of course, nobody cares about bettors anyway.

How it is "bad for bettors?"

The dilution of the fields argument is a tepid one at best.

Because now we get smaller fields on the one day we used to be able to count on big fields. Just like the rest of the stakes races, the talent is going to get diluted among more races, period. Less horses in a race means less competition and shorter prices. That isn't bad for bettors?

I'm not convinced of that, I think it's an assumption that won't play out. But we'll both just have to see.

I don't know about Euro attendance in 2008. Artificial surface presence expands the options for many of them, but they have to add the longer flight across country from NY. The generally-always-firm turf course is attractive to enough horses from Euro to be tempting (they don't all like ground with give in it).

What was the Euro attendence at the last left coast BC, anybody recall?

It obviously will reduce field size. There is no doubt about that. The addition of three new races this year already decreased field size.
If someone had a really top notch 2yo turf filly this year they could either take a shot against the boys in the juvenile turf OR try the dirt in the juvy fillies. Not next year. They can enter her in a BIG money 2yo turf race for fillies instead.
Saying that it won't reduce field size is nonsensical. People could disagree on how big of an impact it will have....but it will certainly have an impact.

I am not a fan of synthetic surface at major tracks, however if the 2008 BC is managed even half way decent, it should be a huge success as far as field size.

The surfaces have been around for a few years now and trainers are catching on.
In 2008 you will get all the standard BC horses , + several polytrack specialists, + extra foriegn turf horses to run on synthetic.

I don't think we will see negative effects until we move back to a dirt surface for a few years. I think a BC with a synthetic surface lowers the quality of the sport, but field size should increase.

The Classic should absolutely have a fully loaded gate in 2008. If not then someone isn't doing their job.

If the dollar doesn't recover a little, the incentive for horses from across the pond to come over is diminished. Some will certainly still do it (as they did this year) but probably not as many as in past years.

Yes, that will have an impact. The owners always have to weigh which races they ship to and consider things like economics, bloodstock, prestige...
Some of these outfits seem to ship a couple horses over and participate each year.

Horsemen have always planned for big target days. The days of choice have simply changed.

When exactly did best return on investment shift from racetrack earnings to stallion earnings - the mid-1980's? I'd like to go back and look at the PP's of most of the horses who have run in the Breeder's Cup races since inception, to see how significant a change has (or has not?) occured in race frequency leading up to a big race.

Didn't the Juvenile races all vastly oversubscribe this year? I am sure that was a major factor in the decision to add the juvenile fillies turf race. So now instead of 22 entries in the juvenile turf we will only get 16. Either way we will wind up with a full field.

2007 Friday:
F & M sprint - 10 entries - 14 allowed
Juv turf 1 mile - 12 entries - 12 allowed
Dirt mile - 9 entries - 14 allowed

2007 Saturday:
Juv Fillies - 14 entries - 14 allowed
Juv colts - 13 - 14 allowed
F & M turf - 12 entires - 14 allowed
Sprint - 11 entries - 14 allowed
Mile - 14 entries - 14 allowed
Distaff - 12 entries - 14 allowed
Turf - 8 entries - 14 allowed
Classic - 9 entries - 14 allowed

Here's the 2007 lists, including nominations under the Division click http://www.breederscup.com/content.aspx?id=28964

Who clearly moved from Saturday to Friday at time of entry? Seriously, let's figure it out to see how fields were affected by adding Friday.

Just La Traviata and she'd probably be crippled right now if she'd have tried to take on the boys.

well start breeding them again for the longer distances. and then they should have better horses to run in it then claimers.

Easiest way is to look at the entries for the three Friday divisions (cannot cut and paste it off the website, sorry) - and see what horses more properly belonged in a Saturday race.

If they didn't really belong in Saturday, then they were right to enter on Friday.

I'm willing to wager that at least 3/4s of the field in the BC Dirt Marathon next year are either stakes winners or G1 placed.

I think we have a few of those horses now, they just don't have the niche to excel race after race. I think we might see horses separating themselves out into two clearer groups, into the clear milers, and then more of a separation into the 1 1/4-1 1/2 horses.

Because I think those horses that have any kind of speed will be in the Classic or the Dirt Mile and the Marathon will be left with all of the horses that are devoid of any kind of speed. The Belmont is won by horses with speed because they are better than the other horses and there isn't another choice of race for them on that same day. On BC day, there will be other races.

or maybe these races were added for next year only(but not necessarily announced as such), to try to appeal to the euros more. after all, with the all weather track, there would be no worries about shipping all that way and then having to face a bad track like they did at monmouth. not all experiments are repeated. if it is a failure, i'm sure they'd go back to the drawing board.

You don't honestly think their will be real horses considering those three races as options....do you? The Marathon will be completely comprised by horses that were never even considered for the Mile or Classic.

And I'm just as " sure " that you are dead wrong.

Guess that puts a crimp in the "short fields will result" argument.

why?
if the race fills poorly, is full of the horses so many are convinced will be there, you think the powers that be would just leave it?

Why? Because they are stubborn people that will never admit when they are wrong. And the committee is made up of people who are never told they are wrong.

That argument is settled....or perhaps you didn't see the fields for the races this year.

As I've said a few times already, I don't expect any horses of quality to be in the Marathon anytime soon. I expect it to be barely above the level of an upper level claiming race. Even that may be too much to expect early on. I know it's going to be brutal to watch a bunch of slow horses staggering home down the stretch at the end of 12f. I think that the series of races they have during the year will also be horrible races. But I do think that it's a good idea and as I said, one side had to make the first move. The breeders wouldn't and I can't blame them. Maybe now, with the series and the BC race on the schedule, there is at least a little bit of incentive to try to breed horses for those kinds of races. The turning of the tide will be slow and it's never going to get back to the way it was. But at least it's a start and while maybe I'm being overly optomistic and maybe a bit naive, I think it's a move in the right direction. Time will tell. I don't think this race will take anything away from the Classic and I don't share the same concerns that you and some others have about naming the winners of every race as champions. We know better. I wouldn't care if they made the race an immediate grade one race. We know better.

Calling the 1 1/2 mile race a BC race drags down every other race.

But what do I know.....I stopped watching the NFL in 1987 when they let the scab teams take the field for five games.

I understand that sentiment. It's the same one I have with calling prep races grade ones. IMO, if the Santa Anita Derby, the Florida Derby, the Wood and the Blue Grass are preps for the Kentucky Derby, making them the same grade as the main event does the Kentucky Derby an injustice. I believe the graded stakes committee decided that next year, not only will they keep the Arkansas Derby as a grade two but they also upgraded the Rebel to grade two status. That's very stupid to me. But I don't get worked up over it either way. They could make them all grade ones or make them all grade nines. They can call the new races BC races or they could call them whatever they want. I judge the races by what I think is the quality of the field and won't let a grade or title bother me.

I agree with you about the Derby preps and their graded status. However, I can also understand the other side of the argument. There are pros and cons and the people that spend a great deal of money for horses have more than a right to a say in this matter. However, there is something highly illogical about TC preps being Graded the same as the actual TC races. However, they don't carry the same weight, or anything close, in terms of commanding breeding attention.

I don't care a great deal either about the whole thing but I do find the entire system greatly flawed. I wish there was a way to objectively grade all races at the end of the year, after they have been run, and after we have seen what kinds of horses actually comprised the fields. One of the main problems, of course, with this is the same people with questionable judgement, and personal agendas, would be doing the post race rating as well. Thus, all in all, I guess I would have to agree that it just doesn't matter or isn't really worth wasting much time over. However, wasting my time is my full time job.

I wonder if Evening Attire will try the 1 1/2 miles race.

I brought up the idea of grading races at the end of the year a long time ago to a semi-prominent trainer on the Southern Cal circuit. He said that he thought it was a good idea but that one of the main problems we'd have if we did that was that if we thought the problem of top horses ducking each other was already a problem, it would become even moreso by grading races after. Take the situation in 2003. As much as I wanted to condemn Mineshaft's being selected for HOY because he beat NOBODY and the only time he faces another horse that was considered one of the top 6-7 older males (Perfect Drift), he lost, I had to at least acknowledge that his people put him in the races that were considered the best races during the second half of the year. That nobody chose to face him in those races wasn't their fault. Now, if there was no grading until the end of the year, the connections of several different horses could pick and choose their spots and stay away from other top horses and make the claim that the race they went in was the best race and the others ducked them. At least by knowing ahead of time what the grades are, we know which races are supposed to be the best ones and where the best horses are supposed to go.

That's a very valid point.

It's a good thing I bet most of my money in maiden races and turf races.

The 2 year old turf races and turf sprint will be oversubscribed every year. The juvy and juvy fillies will always fill with a large field. You could make a case the "marathon" may steal a horse from the classic but if they are willing to run in a $500k races as opposed to a $5 million dollar race they may not be a viable contender anyway.

this is the third time i believe since the bcs inception that races have been added.
have any of them proved to be a mistake as yet? of course the ones just run have only run once, so hard to say there....

Before they started the F/M Turf, there were quite a few female turf runners that ran in and did pretty well in the open turf events. Included on that list are such runners as Miesque, Ridgewood Pearl, Estrapade, Miss Alleged and Hatoof. So they more than proved that they could hold their own in the open events, which the Europeans pretty much knew anyway because they don't hold the same reservations as Americans do when it comes to racing females against males. But there were also several that would skip the BC because they didn't want to take on that big a challenge and would instead point to a later race like the Matriarch. A horse like Discreet Cat may have missed the BC altogether if there was no Dirt Mile this year. Some might argue that these new races dilute the fields. I don't think they do. I think that the prime contenders for most races will still go in the races they were contenders for. No horse is going to skip the $5 million Classic for the $1 million Dirt Mile or $500k Marathon if they are a prime contender for the bigger purse. I'm ok with adding more races that don't take away from the other races because it increases the chances that more of the stars of the game will be present. I wonder if having a Dirt Mile in 1994 would have brought Holy Bull to the BC? A BC with him there, even in the Dirt Mile instead of the Classic, would have been better than it was not having him there at all.