Perfect Drift retired
 

I posted this in retirements but hey... deserves its own thread.

http://www.drf.com/news/article/98400.html

I 2nd the notion..

o boy this is a emotional time for me, i dont know how to feel.
anyone there to talk to ?
i love this horse

Hoss beat me to it...

I'll miss him. One of the greatest hangers of all time.

He has certainly occupied an imortant place in racing in recent years.
You could always count on him to show up for the big races.

Ummm....I actually liked him quite a bit too, but unless this post was your first known attempt at sarcasm, you might want to consider trying to settle down a bit.

I would have liked to have seen what he could have done under a really good trainer earlier on in his career, he could have been one of the better geldings of this era me thinks...Still he wasn't half bad. Makes one wonder.

Not really.

Yes... expand that opinion.

I would have to be paid to argue about something that never happened. It's ridiculous.

No one's arguing, I just didn't understand your response.

I don't wonder about Perfect Drift and what could have been and I find it odd anyone would.

There.

That's cool, no big deal, I think I am just one of those can't help but wonder types of people. Thanks anyway for the expansion.

Not to argue, but I dont see how the original trainer did such a bad job. Horse won multiple graded stakes and beat some pretty darn nice horses along the way. On top of that, he is still racing at 9.

I have no idea how to train a horse and i dont pretend to know. Maybe Chuck or one of the other trainers can comment on how to train a horse not to hang.

I would like to make this point googling up Murray Johnston's training record, but I can't right now....however I do remember him being 0 - 44 at one point in the season while shipping Perfect Drift out west to run in a Gr.1 race. Perfect Drift ran second in that race, no slight accomplishment, now maybe if the Trainer was Dutrow like he would have won that race. Yes It's speculation, however the reality is maybe someone could have done better with him given the Trainer's low win %.

BTW Even Chuck would have done better..than Johnston

Perhaps you are right. I am not one to equate winning percentage with training accumen. There are so many factors involved it would seem especially in this age of medication.

Now you're reaching.

































j/k Chuck!!

I know this may sound like a bit of a kiss up...which I never do because I just don't believe in that kind of stuff, but I'm not joking I think Chuck could have done better. I remember him being a pretty decent trainer, I'm not sure what happened in the meantime? But he did a pretty good job on that one turf horse ridden by Court which escapes me at the moment. That one sticks in my mind. Johnston couldn't make up his mind whether PD was a dirt ot turf horse it seems half the time.

You seem like a nice guy and I would bet that it wasn't your intention but you are actually not being very kind to Chuck when you say "EVEN Chuck could have done a better job". EVEN is the operative word.

What specifically did Murray Johnson do wrong that Chuck or any other trainer would have improved upon? Not to say that someone couldnt have done a better job, my question is "how"?

You're right, even shouldn't have been used. It wasn't meant as a slight though I can understand why it can be construed that way. Thanks for noticing that, it helps to clarify the intention of the post.

Honestly...unless you are involved with the horse on a daily basis, that is an impossible question to answer accurately. You can say that he should have run here instead of there, but without knowing what was happening at the time, it's a wild-ass guess, IMO.

Good discussion, I was trying to think of a Top Handicap horse that ran from 2000 and beyond, that was trained by someone that would not be considered a good high % Trainer and I couldn't come up with one single horse. The closest was Jay Robbins for Tiznow I guess, that is the only possible exception I can come up with.

When you take that into account Perfect Drift didn't do so badly afterall.

I don't quite get the gripe here. Are you saying you'd rather see good horses juiced to the gills so that they can really launch into the stratosphere?

I think Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Mark McGwire might need you to do some PR work for them...

Who's griping? I wasn't aware I was...this is friendly discussion for those who are interested in joining in.

Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Mark McGwire that's a different can of worms of a discussion, I seriously doubt they are the only ones on the stuff infact we know they weren't.

However, using that baseball analogy I guess my position would be to have a Clemons pitch to a Bonds and see who would have won rather than Clemons pitching against well I can't think of a clean Baseball player at the moment...probably that says it all.

Murray Johnsom is not even training anymore is he ???????????
I think Someone told me he was selling Free Walkers or something like that.

:zz:

I read somewhere that he needed Perfect Drift to break even, and so once he lost Perfect Drift he couldn't do it anymore.

Happy Retirement At Stonecrest Drifty!!!!!! Thanks For The Memories!!!!!! :{>: :{>: :{>: :{>:

there was no sarcasim at all, i have always loved this horse and fought for him on this site many times

:wf

Steve, really enjoyed the segment on Perfect Drift Monday with Steve Haskin, even with the technical difficulties. Good rememberances of a wonderful horse.

I just saw that 'ol PD will be @ TP this Saturday. They are throwing him a retirement party.