Pacific Classic
 

The nine that are expected to run in the 16th edition of Del Mar’s annual signature event are Lava Man, Giacomo, Perfect Drift, Magnum, Preachinatthebar, Super Frolic, Good Reward, Papi Chullo and Top This and That.

People keep waiting for Lava Man to take a step backwards, and while he may do that sometime this year, I don't think it will be in this race and I don't think it will happen in California. I think this race will be pretty chalky with Lava Man over Perfect Drift and/or Giacomo.

All I can say is they are lucky Surf Cat is on the sidelines....

Thats a pretty nice field. Better than I expected based on what Delmar has put out thus far.

HOY is Lava Mans for the. Just 2 more wins and we get a "people's horse" to capture this award. Hard not to root for a guy like this, and the Tin Man.

Oh I agree. Very hard to knock the horse. Also very hard not to want the horse to win. But the horse hasnt done anything wrong all year and two more wins earns him HOY.

Well now that Flower Alley has lost any chance he ever had at HOY, there is only Bernardini to worry about for those honors.

I told Kev that if English Channel had won the Arl Million and went on to win the BC Turf, he may have a realistic shot at it.

English Channel ran a good race Saturday. But when you let a horse that is as experienced as The Tin Man go to an easy lead then you arent going to catch him. With all that said, English Channel is prob the 4th best turf horse in the country right now.

whos the top 3 EB?

My top turf horses in the US right now are

1) Gorella
2) Showing Up
3) Cacique
4) English Channel

Now you could always Flip Flop 3 and 4. But when you make all things equal, I think that Gorella is the best turf horse right now. Kind of like the best pound per pund turf horse so to speak.

The Tin Man just spanked Cacique and Eng Channel and he doesnt get in this list?

WOW....OK....I love Gorella...I really do...but she had the PERFECT set up on Saturday. Put her in the Arlington Million and let her lolly gag in the back of the field and let her try closing into those fractions....No way....she doesnt finish top 5 in that race.

Showing UP...I have no idea....until he faces olders...still up in the air.

Cacique over EC?? Cacique has finished in front of EC 2 times:

1st time: Manhattan...MY God EB...have you seen the fractions they ran in that race???? 1/2 in :51......3/4 1:16.60.....1 mile in 1:40...EC was also carry 2 more lbs that day and was beaten a 1/2 length. 2lbs equates to more than 1/2 length over the distance of a 1 1/4 race.

2nd time: Arlington Million...not quite as slow as the Manhattan, but EC was 3 wide the entire race vs 2 wide for Cacique. You are intelligent enough to know that 2 wide vs. 3 wide for a race of that distance is a HUGE difference.

EC has 3 wins from 5 starts this year...with 2 grade 1's
Cacique has 1 win from 5 starts this year...with 1 grade 1.

Not yet. I mean that was a perfect race for The Tin Man. I think when you rank horses to have to take past performances, recent races, how races were raced etc etc. The Tin Man got to dictate the exact race he wanted. Put another horse on the lead with him and I dont think he wins last Saturday. But another performance by him like last Saturday would put him on top of the list. I cant ignore what he has done, but one race doesnt make it for me.

Tim...I hardly call that a spanking. You could have put a decent $50-$75K claimer in front of them with those fractions and they wouldn't have caught him either. IMO...that race was nothing buts other jockeys letting Tin Man get away with slow fractions....plain and simple.

Like I said, making everything equal, Gorella is the best turf horse right now. You just can pick one race out and give that as an example. That isnt fair. You have to look at the entire resume. I also dont use weight as an excuse as to why a horse doesnt win unless the weight is absurd (5 lbs or more). And i also said you could flip flop numbers 3 and 4. But I truly believe that Cacique has more upswing that English Channel.

Exactly GPK. A perfect race for The Tin Man.

The same Gorella that finished 5th behind EC in the Woodford Reserve?

yeah....you can toss that race completely. The horses that ran 1-2-3 the whole way finished 1-2-4.

NOTHING AT ALL against the winner. I love seeing that old fella out there winning races...its great for the sport..

Yes. Again, you have to make everything equal here GPK. Just like when people said the Roy Jones Jr is the best lb per lb fighter, Gorella is the best lb for lb turf horse right now.

don't get me wrong EB....I simply love Gorella...she's essentially the female version of English Channel....real small but has a huge heart and loves to run. I'm a huge fan of hers...

what are you basing that on...I know its your opinion strictly...but what are you basing that opinion on?

again....Gorella took the place of Megahertz and Intercontinental when they both retired as my favorite female....but I have a hard time placing her the best turf horse in the country. Shes easily top 5....but I can't annoint her the best yet.

I think you guys are not giving the Tin Man as much credit as he deserves because of his running style. Horses like this win races and its always chocked up to the fact that he was loose on an uncontested lead.

Horses like English Channel and Kittens Joy win races from rating just off the pace and they are declared turf machines, it never comes up that they had perfect set ups. Only horses like the Tin Man who dictates his own wins and losses.

On the flip side, a horse like Gorella wins, and people say the race fell apart and was handed to her on a platter. Nonsense, the horse was flat out awesome and could have beaten many top males on Saturday.

I did not and still do not think the Tin Man is better or worse than English Channel or Cacique. I think they are all pretty close and pace and luck determines which horse wins on any given time they meet. Its as simple as that.

Interesting discussion but getting back to the Pacific Classic....does anyone like someone other than the 3 I mentioned (Lava Man-Giac-Perfect Drift) in this spot? Who could ruin my trifecta here and why?

thats the beauty of turf racing.

Pace makes the race....always has...always will.

Tim, you know how much I loved megahertz.....loved watching her lounging around in the back of the field....baking cookies...drinking tea...watching tv...while they did all the running up front. But there were a few times where she and the jock were caught sleeping and the pace in front of them wasn't so hot and she was left with too much work to do in a slowly run race and she wouldn't win. Gorella hasn't faced that scenario yet this year and it will be interesting to see how she fares when she does.


You have to give Victor as much credit as anyone...he gave the perfect ride on Tin Man. I think the other jocks did a piss poor job in that race. A trained chimp could read the PP's and see that he was the lone speed in the race and if let loose on a lead like that...it would be all over...and it was. As much the other jockeys fault than anything.

Let me add that I was very much against Tin Man when originally analyzing this race and the horses I thought most likely to win were Ace and Better Talk Now.

After watching the race, this is clearly what I think:

1) Yes the other jockeys were mistaken to let Tin Man go out and run slow.
2) Yes English Channel got a wide trip, but whos to say it cost him a win? Will never know.
3) Cacique got the best trip of anyone besides Tin Man and even with the pace being as slow as it was, he had every shot to go by if he was really that good. He wasnt.
4) Better Talk Now should retire. First time in his life hes run 2 very poor back to back races.
5) Tin Man is a lot better than I thought.

all/PD/all
all/all/PD

Gorella is a lot better than I gave her credit for being. Film Maker is a very good horse. Gorella is a truly great horse, I wont be betting against her until she runs against men again.

see....I love this....this thread is the reason I love this board. Different people giving different opinions and noone getting mad, upset, calling others names.....its just a great debate about a topic that we all love.

Tim your statement on number 3 is absolutely absurd, and I mean ridiculous. The winner came home in 22:3. There is absolutely no way that Cacique or anyone else was going to go by, Secretariat wouldn't have gone by. At a mile and a quarter when a horse is on the hedge saving all ground and comes home in 22:3, well I mean you might not see that the rest of your life. It was the function of a pace that was TWENTY LENGTHS SLOWER than the fillies ran in the Beverly D. Cacique was very good, I just don't know where you are coming from by saying he had every chance to get by. Do you have any idea how crazy that is to say? He was two lengths back and also in tghe outside path, in order to have "gotten by" the winner he would have to have come home in 22 flat. Do you really think its reasonable or at all sane to say that a horse wasn't that good because he couldn't come home in 22 flat for the last 1/4 mile of a 1 1/4 turf race? Tim, thats just maniacal.

Gorella's last two races are the key to me. She closed on the outside Saturday with such ease. I mean in 50 yards she was 6 lengths in front. Also her last race was more impressive to me. A small field, with a horse loose on the lead and she caught the horse and was drawing away at the wire. I loved Gorella last year when she made her debut at Keeneland. I think they have figured out the horse is best when able to come running on the outside. I feel Gorella can win off a slow pace and with a fast pace. Again, lb per lb she is the best turf horse.

The Tin Man is a great story and what a great horse. Even though the horse is 8-the horse really is like a 4 or 5 year old because he hasnt been worn down by continuous years of racing. To me The Tin Man needs to be able to dictate his own race. I dont think he is as versatile as a horse like Gorella or Cacique or English Channel. But he is a very very good horse.

Very well said Oracle. No one had a chance of getting by The Tin Man...not even the great Awad could have gotten by. The race was over when he got the half in 50 and change. At that point it was lights out. You cannot let a horse like The Tin Man do that.

I certianly respect what you are saying and I see where you are coming from. But I would still love to see Gorella in the type of race like the Arlington Million with that kind of pace. IMO....as much as I love her....no way she gets it done.

That statement(tim's number 3) is like saying this if you think about it.
Now I'm willing to bet that in American racing history that no horse on the grass at a mile and a quarter race(or dirt) has EVER come home in 22 flat. Sprinters run that for a first quarter, but routers will not do it for a last quarter.
That statement translates to this "By not running by the winner, Cacique showed he really isn't very good because he failed to do something that no horse in American history had ever done". Umm, does that sound really rational to any of you?
It was one of the flukiest pace races in history. For the filles and mares to have gone TWENTY LENGTHS FASTER(visualize that in your head if you can, the leader in the Beverly D would have been TWENTY LENGTHS ahead of The Tin Man) is mind boggling. The Million was beyond a crawl, it was a walk. Therefore when they turned for home the front two both had completely full tanks of gas and could sprint to the wire. The only difference was that one had a jump on the other, and that margin was almost EXACTLY what the difference at the wire was. They both flew home the same way, its just that after crawling that slow one in front had the edge.

Okay maybe so. But still you cant diminish a horse like the Tin Man because of a running style, which by the way is a brilliant one. He never has poor trip excuses when he loses like the others. Its comical, he actually has an excuse why he won a million dollar race, and people talk about the fact that the jockeys gave him this race over the fact that the horse has tremendous ability.

Tim he is a nice horse but you are fooling yourself and not us. The fact is that Live Life(who actually held 3rd in the Beverly D!!!!) went exactly 20 lengths faster than the Tin man. Your argument holds no water. Envisoon The Tin Man TWENTY lengths behind Live Life. There is no way to even begin to express just how slow the pace was. The minute the 3/4 time was up on the board there wasn't any way it was going to be anything but those two horses in that order. Horses that talented who are allowed to go that slow will never chuck it. Hes a great horse, he was before the Million and is now, but you really can't say that the race proved anything except that the connections on cacique and English Channel were extremely arrogant and igonred the Tin Man's ability. However if you feel so strongly that he is better than those two horses I will be happy to bet you straight up if they meet again that both horses beat the Tin man. be happy to give you that proposal, very happy. They got fooled once, they won't get fooled the next time.

Never said he was better Mike, this is my exact quote.

I did not and still do not think the Tin Man is better or worse than English Channel or Cacique. I think they are all pretty close and pace and luck determines which horse wins on any given time they meet. Its as simple as that.

But to bet English Channel to win at 2/1 versus the Tin Man at 5/1 considering the post positions is pretty absurd. English Channel is a nice horse but there is simply way too much to guess at in turf racing.

Time for "really stupid amateur fan question of the day." If the pace was that slow and other jocks knew it could be a problem, why wouldn't you take your horse past the Tin Man instead of backing up behind him? Couldn't a horse who didn't usually run in the lead still go to the front and build the pace a little without causing himself too many problems? At least start moving ahead before they round the final turn? Or are racers such creatures of habit that they need to run in a certain position in the pack?

Sorry if that's obvious as hell. :o

Meg....in a race like that...who wants to risk ruining thier horses chance of winning by trying something complete different just to wear down another horse and set it up for someone else to win. Too much money at stake in a million dollar race like that.

Good point. Thanks! Still, if you know you're probably screwed anyway, might as well give it a shot (...and that's why people like me will never be trainers). ;) Although I see the problem if an early move makes you finish out of the money entirely, instead of at least nabbing some place or show cash.

At the same time, I don't like the fact EC hasn't been able to settle along the backstretch when JV has a firm hold on him....he overcame it in the United Nations but not in this field.

Nice thing is come 10/7 he'll have Ramzutti to do the dirty work for him...kind of ironic considering all the talk about BTN having a rabbit.

Like I said, if there is a rematch and you wanna go heads up against either lemme know. hes a very good horse who got very lucky.