I see big gaps back to 3rd.
 

I'll put the over/under at 3.5 lengths back to 3rd place behind the inevitable Derby quinella of I Want Revenge and Quality Road.

I'll put the o/u at 5.5 lengths back to 3rd behind Rachel Alexandra and Justwhistledixie for that inevitable Oaks quinella.

There's nothing at all left to analyze with either race. I simply see a pair of vastly superior horses in each race.

Every horse that will start in the Derby besides IWR and QR is a sucker bait underlay. Some a lot more so than others. They just have too much to improve over the next 3 weeks to get level .. and Mullins and Jimmy Jerkens are a pair of magicians.

Every horse that will start in the Oaks besides RA and JWD is running for 3rd.

Now that the good stuff is over and the sillyness starts ... like obsessions with workouts leading into the race .. hopefully a whole lot of horses from both races are working like monsters and look super duper fantabulous in the flesh.

Unexpected results can happen when the pace goes to an extreme .. (Lemons Forever last-to-first at 47/1) Giacomo (18th after 6fs to 1st at 50/1) but that won't happen in either race this year ... and neither pace should be a crawl either.

I don't have anything left to say about either race after that.

I just hope we get to hear large doses about how Pioneer of the Nile and Chocolate Candy are both relishing the track in super impressive works. How Dunkirk would have won the Florida Derby if it was fairly run. How Freisan Fire has won 3 Graded Stakes in a row and just buried an Arkansas Derby winner.

Do you have this exacta in the futures?

I'd like to know your odds of neither of those 2 horses being in the trifecta if you are so sure they that much better than the rest of the group.

yes

I think for that to happen - both will have to run non-efforts or have very bad trips.

It still is horse racing - and even with magicians training them - that's always a possibility. I just think it's a not a very big possiblity ... and I see 18 under-lays opposing them .. of which none have a chance without significant improvment over the next 3 weeks assuming the top two run a similar effort to their two most recent races.

what makes these guys magicians , i thought they were horse trainers can you elaborate please?

Well , now you can cap & relax, while the rest of us work overtime for the next 2 1/2 weeks :D.

I like this approach of knocking-out your handicapping now before reading about how every horse is working like a beast, and how if any horse is capable of running big this weekend it's him, or how the surface change looks like it'll be no problem when they open the gates yadda yadda yadda.

I think your Oaks prognostication is very likely to occur... those two are just that much better than their counterparts and the field figures to be relatively compact. It isn't exactly going to be a stellar betting race (but as normal, the rest of the card will be chock full of opportunity.)
In the Derby, while I think it's greater than 50% that at least one of them runs in the exacta, there's just too many things that can go wrong to convincingly say both of them will be there. Right now, I think the correct strategy is similar to '06, take those two on top and wheel the horses that get lost on the board.

Agree. It isn't a normal race, we know who is running, we know what they can do, and their likely physical condition already. The more nonsense they throw at you about this and that working like Secretariat just causes overanalysis. Spend the time on the Derby now, and worry about the rest of the card the week of.

Flying Spur 3rd in the Oaks. :tro:

I agree it's over 50% that at least one runs in the exacta. Since each horse is roughly 20% to win the race, I guess it's fair to say they are at least 30% to finish first or second, so both being out could be 70% squared. However, they're conditional probabilities, so if one runs out the chances of the other finishing first or second greatly increases.

Feels like 60% to me that at least one is in the number......roughly.

As for the Oaks.....it's higher.

Did you use a calculator? I'd hate for these facts to be "lazy and intellectually dishonest."

Nice segue.

My brain, however, is not yet addled enough that I can't still multiply single digits.

Math Geek!

It's statistics not math.

I know. I'm a statistics guy (as you know already) and my 50% number was generated in the exact same fashion as yours- I just saved everyone the mundane details. Glad we're thinking on the same line of reasoning.

Here's a good follow up question. If one of them complete the exacta, does it pay over $150? I'll venture a guess that the QR/IWR exacta box is in the $60 neighborhood and anything involving the 5th choice or higher underneath is $150 or better.

You'll have to wait until I've been out of bed for over an hour.

Jimmy Jerkens started training horses on his own in 1997. He's had a grand total of 2,343 starters and he shows a flat bet profit with them. It's basically almost unheard of stuff.

For a comparison - Todd Pletcher started training horses in 1996. He shows a career 17% loss on the betting dollar ... what most good trainers show.


As for Mullins ...

He started 4,577 horses since 1996 and he amazingly shows a flat bet profit. He's probably God's gift to training horses.

Perhaps the greatest training achievment was him winning back-to-back-to-back Santa Anita Derby's earlier this decade with three horrendously mediocre horses.

* Here's Buddy Gil running 7th at 7/1 in the Golden Gate Derby in '03....



Less than three months later he won the Santa Anita Derby for Mullins.


* Here's Castledale running 6th at 11/1 odds in the San Rafael in '04



Less than a month later he wins the Santa Anita Derby for Mullins next out.


* Here's Buzzard's Bay running 10th at 18/1 odds in the worst Risen Star Stakes of all-time.



Less than two months later he wins the Santa Anita Derby for Mullins.


Mullins and Jimmy Jerkens are not guys you want to dismiss when they have the best horse.

She will.

with a horse like Quality Road, it's almost better to use a couple of scenarios.

like A) - QR breaks well and settles into a perfect trip

or B) - he doesn't

IWR , FF, and Maybe Dunkirk are less affected by the trip IMO

Drugs - what are Pletchers total startes from '96 on?

Also he must be pretty good , he had a filly win the oaks and the belmont stakes in the same year

Slightly over 10K.

He's 0-for-23 in all 10 furlongs dirt stakes at Churchill Downs.

You don't think a horse like Regal Ransom could get away with some easy fractions? Not that he can hold on, but is he going to set the race up for closers? Unlike in the past, there are zero one dimensional speed balls - Keyed Entry, Spanish Chestnut, Songandaprayer types.

so roughly over the same time he has started around 4x more horses than Jerkins and 2x more horses than Mullins

What are Jimmy's and jeff's stats at 10f in stakes races at CD , for fun's sake what are the chief's at CD in stakes races at 10f?

Was it Todd's fault that he ran into a monster in the derby a couple of year's ago when bluegrass cat ran 2nd? Are we to believe that one of the 2 magicians would have gotten Bluegrass Cat into the winner's circle that day?

Is this one a 'cinch' as well?

but after dunkirk he'll be 1-24. :rolleyes: seriously, he'll be 0-24.

You're all anti-Dunkirk but not pro nobody else. Being anti is easy, pro is not.

Surely this is beneath you?

so we are talking less than 1% of his total startes in his lifetime , do you think this sample size is big eneough to get an accuarte picture of the trainer's ablilty ?

I couldn't resist. Nothing gives me more pleasure than when one of the SPEED DARLINGS loses. So it was more about the PLUG and high number horses in general, rather than the pick.

Black Seventeen had to be walked off the track by his exercise rider in training a day or two before the race - and Indian Blessing basically lost the race at the start.

Like I said - it is horse racing.

No it's not.

I wish there was a way I could buy a bottle of tard repellent to spray on myself and make you go away.

I understand. But I got a huge kick out of watching the PLUG HANG in the lane when it appeared she was going to zoom by, bad start and all. She does real nice when she's the only speed on speed favoring tracks, however. :rolleyes:

It could have been worse. He could have brought up Pyro.

But that wouldn't have been useful in his habit of trying to pigeonholing me as a figure player. Because the figure horse romped in that race.

What frustrates me most about you, and, in a somewhat similar sense, BTW, is that you're a superior race watcher who is nonetheless influenced by numbers.

This influence might not be as significant as it would be for someone without your 'other' skills but it's there nonetheless. Anybody can make figures, and some even excel at it, kudos to them for it, but your other skills are what distinguishes you from them. I'd bet that you could do equally as well just watching races and keeping good notes. Can't say that about too many others here.

I would like your skillset more if you would place a little more emphasis on unknown first time starters.

obviously one of these 23 was a sacrifical lamb as well (i'm sure there were a few others but don't know all the runners)- keyed entry if i remember correctly - so sometimes hisotrical data just needs to be explained so that everyone can get a complete picture

just throwing out 0 fers when some of the horses entered were entered for a specific reason (in the above case being a rabbit) doesn't help the folks to get the whole picture

another one of the 0 for 23's was a horse who ran 2nd to a horse that was "a lock " for the derby accoridng to some here, but maybe just maybe the chief or jimmy might have moved bluegrass cat up eneough to not have made that winenr a "lock" - whose to know

I only mentioned that stat to try and annoy you.

I don't think it means much obviously.

ok coach