The Marlboro was a sponsorship race that ended when Marlboro pulled out

Because the you will need points to qualify since the race will be overfilled

Phillip Morris pulled out when the race couldn't draw entries and lost it's audience. The last year the race drew a field of 5 and was on ESPN.

Directly a result of the Breeders Cup.

Why do fans need to fight in the first place? Any sane person would take their wagering dollar elsewhere. There is really no need to fight morons. They'll never change.

The day the industry listens to the gambler/fan and is able to implement the good ideas and not the bad ones is the day The Pale Horse comes from the Heavens and prevents anyone from enjoying the changes.

I love the Australian greys-only race. It drew a good field!

Which will result in some of the good horses in the division not running in the summer because they already have enough points which results in weaker fields. Hooray.

Please correct me if I am wrong, Aren't most of the turf sprint races run between five to six furlongs? Isn't Santa Anita the only track that runs Six and half furlongs on the turf. I though they were about six and half furlongs on the turf.

What determines whether these new races are a success or failure? Will it be field size? Quality of field size? Attendance? Just curious....................

Breeders cup is starting to look more like Calder Extreme day

Exactly.

One thing about 2008 and the addition of these 3 races -

- combined with AWT track instead of dirt, it immediately makes the event more foreign friendly.

Absolutely.....now mediocrities from all over the world can converge on our supposed biggest races like cockroaches.

I guess I'll never understand why people say that the BC hurts racing. The idea was to have a series of races at the end of the year where everyone focuses on being and the best meet the best to determine the champions. That is basically what we get every year with the BC. That's bad? People say it's so bad because it's hurt other races run during the year, races like the JCGC and Turf Classic turning into basically prep races. So what. They are still huge prep races. Didn't this year's Classic winner run there? Didn't last year's runner up run there? The 2003 HOY Mineshaft? Cigar, Skip Away, Easy Goer, Slew o' Gold, AP Indy, Turkoman, Gate Dancer. All of those horses came back to run pretty well in the Classic. What has changed is NOT the races but the attitudes of the PEOPLE involved with today's horses. From the breeders to the trainers, THEY are the ones that have messed the game up, NOT the BC races. It's them that don't allow horses to be able to withstand racing 8-10 times a year anymore. So now, because people can't breed or condition a horse to run more than eight times a year and they "need" two months between starts, they have to cut back schedules. That is not the fault of the BC. Trainers like Pletcher and Frankel are as much to blame, even moreso in my opinion, than blaming the BC.

As for the BC being what caused a lot of this shortening in the first place, I find that to be absolutely ridiculous. For those that have been around longer than I have, I know that for you, the championship distance was always 12f or maybe even 16f when the JCGC was run at that distance. But for as long as I've been around, the 10f distance has always been referred to as the championship distance. So the BC put in a race at that distance. That was bad? They put in a sprint championship at ......6f. That was bad? What is the distance considered the championship distance on grass? It's 12f and the BC put in a race at that distance. That some of the races like the JCGC, Vosburgh and Super Derby decided that they needed to shorten up to become better fits for the BC races, blame that on the racing secretaries and the horsemen that asked for it. Don't blame it on the BC. The 12f of the JCGC was just fine for Easy Goer, SoG, Turkoman and Gate Dancer. It was the breeding of horses that could no longer handle running 12f anymore and especially running 12f and returning to run 10f in a few weeks that caused them to shorten the races. That's not the fault of the BC.

Champs Elyssees for 2008 BC Classic

Whether Diamond Stripes ever "ran" on Saturday is up for debate but he certainly at least left the starting gate. For the two fillies not running in the BC Sprint was probably the best thing that could have happened to them. They were toasted by much cheaper speed in the FM Sprint and had no business against the boys.

In the case of Corinthian and Discreet Cat both would have likely skipped the BC altogether to run in the Cigar Mile if the races hadn't been added. I think the Cigar Mile suffered more than any BC races did cause of the additional three races.

wow...just.....wow!

Yeah pretty much. I mean what a horror, more races with big fields filled with horses from all over the country and possibly the world. Races which will have huge pools in which to bet into. I mean it is sooooo baaaad for the game. The negativity around here is unbelievable.

Extra races that will reduce the pools on Saturday. Outstanding.

I get what you are saying to an extent. Did the addition of races this year hurt field size? Probably, but the weak dollar probably played a larger role in keeping non-U.S. horses away. But still....I just don't like it.
For example, if they expanded the NFL playoffs from 12 to 16 teams I would hate that too. As a fan of the sport, it would stand to reason that I would enjoy having a couple more playoff games to watch. But it would piss me off because at some level, I feel the playoffs should be reserved for really good teams that earned their way into the playoffs by accomplishing something meaningful in the regular season. I think the same holds true for the Breeders' Cup. As a fan, I just don't like to see a bunch of horses with questionable talent in "Breeders' Cup" races. It might not make a lot of sense, but as a fan, it just bothers me.