"Spaced" Races And "Fresh" Horses Are Killing The Sport
 

Here we all are ... doing what we have become accustomed to doing ... waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting ... for something interesting to happen at the top tier of the sport we all love.

Weeks and weeks and weeks go by ... without any sighting of our best horses bursting out of a starting gate.

I did a bit of research a few weeks ago into the performances of past champion fillies ... and revealed that most of them were making 12 to 15 starts per campaign ... and some made several more.

Not that many years ago ... a horse who made fewer than 10 starts in a given year would not even be considered for a championship because of lack of activitiy.

Now ... we're thrilled when the best horses make four starts in a year ... and absolutely ecstatic when they're asked to make a heroic total of six.

Here we are in a banner year for quality race horses ... the likes of which haven't been seen for many a moon ... and what do we get ... weeks and weeks and weeks of waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting.

We're the fanatics ... and we're being bored to sleep. Just imagine how this plays with the general public.

I find it hard to believe this let alone say it...but for once Bold I COMPLETELY agree with you.

Well said
 

Bold Brooklyn:

Great post. Did Forego ever miss a race - at least once a month under 130 pounds or more?


I read that the average horse makes 7 starts per year...
Yes, it makes sense to space races and yes an extra week off probably is beneficial but why can't we get 9-10 starts per year?

Horses are being ruined by these early 2 year old sales which a horse runs 11 seconds per 1/8 mile and their knees aren't even closed yet. The horse then starts in April in Keeneland in MSW races and we never hear about them again after they are 3...

I don't know if the breeding has anything to do with it or not. The predominant Mr. Prospector - Northern Dancer outcross which appears in over 90% of horses bred today may or may not contribute to speed and the lack of durability....

PSH

There has been an evolution in the wrong direction. We once demanded a body of accomplishment. As near as I can tell, we are now we are stuck in a rut where all we want are perfect superhorses. Any horse with sufficient starts (say, more than four or five) to appear that he or she is not the best horse ever to step onto a track is discarded in favor of a maiden winner "who might be anything." We never want to see a horse lose a race, so if that means giving crowning adulation for winning parades against hapless third-raters or simply assuming a horse is so superior that he needn't even actually run in races to prove it, so be it. So that's what we get: carefully choreographed, brief campaigns which are focused upon winning races, never mind the competition, culminating with the hope that these half-tested, underprepared animals can manage to stay sound and in form long enough to win on Breeders' Cup day.

We are, truly, moving toward a point when horses - aside from classic-bound 3YOs - with championship aspirations will rarely be spotted on the track before the late summer, and will have two- or three-race seasons (a prep and the Breeders' Cup). What else would they need to do? Why would anyone bother risking their horse's reputation and limbs running in races that don't matter? Reputations are built in a day and come undone just as quickly. Welcome to the 21st century.

Actually, yes. He missed the end of the season due to injury in all of his later years on the track.

1975: Injury to leg prevented JCGC participation
1976: Ankle trouble; dropped from JCGC consideration days before race
1977: Ankle injury prevented likely starts in Marlboro Cup and JCGC.

We're down to about 6.5 starts per season now. There has been a decline in the average number of starts per season every year since 1992 and a general trend toward it since the early 1960s. 2YO-in-training sales probably have nothing to do with it, considering that back in the 1960s, when horses averaged more than 10 starts a year in this country, it was perfectly normal for 2YOs to be running in real races in January and February. Decent horses on good going routinely covered 3fs in 33 and change and faster. I started a project of studying the future race records of these horses and ran out of time before I got very far, but found that a large number of the horses I'd checked up until then went on to have long careers.

Two words: Native Dancer. That pretty much covers the Northern Dancer/Mr Prospector axis, as Native Dancer is the grandsire, through unsound offspring, of both. However, it doesn't help that pretty much every breeding line that once produced durable horses has been discarded as unfashionable.

If you took out the stats for the upper level Stakes horses would you find that average starts are declining as quickly?

This is once again why I upgrade the amazing year Mineshaft had a few back. Every 3-4 weeks like clockwork and no bounces ever.


But yes, it is a negative for the sport.

Blame The Breeders Cup.............These days all you have to do is win one or two races and then win the BC and you are champion.........what a shame

Just follow Australia...

They run every damn week during their campaigns

lol, I had the same reaction, paisjpq! Can I REALLY be agreeing with BB?

Earlier this morning I re-checked the date for the JCGC and thought, soooo long to wait!

I was hoping Phalaris would chime in, too. As opposed to most who will comment on why horses can and cannot run more often today, Phalaris has substantial data supporting what he/she says.

--Dunbar

Unfortunately, the lack of readily available data in electronic form prevents an easy answer to that. I'm working on a project which will eventually have race records for stakes winners across a lengthy span of time (which could then be compared to contemporary breed norms), but for practical reasons, I had to rearrange the order in which I am doing certain tasks so I won't be working on that aspect for a long time, probably years.

Sticking to relatively current data, I can run average start-per-season figures for crops back to the early 1990s. During this recent span, it appears that the horses who earned significantly more than average for a year (generally indicative of better stakes-caliber form) show a faster decline in average starts per season, but started at a much higher average compared to lesser-earning runners. I would be curious to see what would happen if I ran comparable numbers for more distant times, as the current trend toward fewer starts per season was well-established by the early 1990s.

Thank you for posting all of your finds here. :)

I maintain that the biggest problem in racing today remains the insane breeding practices...we breed almost exclusively to unsound lines in order to produce precocious two year olds that can run a hole in the wind but fall apart before the summer of their three year old campaigns. There are exceptions always but look at all the most popular lines and you'll find horses with shortened careers (long before the breeding money mandated early retirements) lacking many "S" or "P" CDR's in their 4-5 generational pedigrees. That's why I've been so outspoken in supporting the great sire Broad Brush with his linage back to Domino.
Ther have been studies that have provided pro and con data regarding two year old racing, I prefer that two year old's not race or be seriously trained to race until the fall of their season but that won't happen. It might be a good thing to move everything back a year and run the classics for four year olds but again, unless breeding practices change, there might not be any horses left to compete...and due to greed and Arab spending sprees, that won't happen either. I don't think there is evidence that two year old racing harms horses per se...Count Fleet raced 16 times at two and still won the Triple Crown (of course he was injured in the Belmont and never raced again...but still had 21 races).

that and they have grade 1 stakes races with a 1 to 5 shot.....and the pick 3 pays 9 bucks...

they need to cancel these races if they are not getting filled properly with the right talent level....and force these owners and trainers to earn the big checks and Graded $$$...

I did research on this ... which I published on the "other" forum last year ...

... and it showed that 26 champions from the 1940s thorugh the 1960s started their 2YO careers in February, March or April ... and 25 of them ... all except Hail To Reason ... had full, essentially injury-free careers.

Now ... this may have been a Darwinian outcome ... the survivial of the fittest ... but I really don't think so.

I'm absolutely convinced that racing early and racing often is more beneficial to developing race horses into professional athletes ... than months and months of shedrow walks and three spaced races per year.

Someone please convince me otherwise ... with hard statistics.

I certainly can't, perhaps others have access to such data. There were studies done in Europe that appeared to demonstrate increased bone mass and tendon strength in horses racing early and often at two, but I understand there has been a problem with replication of results and one would think that shouldn't be the case with a "Historical" type study so...
It's just my personal feeling that pushing everything back a year would be beneficial...a moot point as long as money dictates such things (that reads as NEVER). My point remains that the problem is in the breeding...breed the best to the best and hope for the best has changed to breed the fastest developing to the most fragile and make a quick buck while the horse can still stand!

The new math.

I recall that a recent British study showed a higher percentage of catastrophic breakdowns in horses which started at later ages. I know of a study which showed a higher rate of breakdowns on turf vs. dirt. There are definitely a variety of results from different studies that have been done.

There are a lot of interesting variables that I wish could be examined.

Training: When those 2YOs were racing in January - as early as the first and second week of January in some jurisdictions - they were necessarily having real workouts during their yearling year. We hear occasionally of the yearling trials that they used to have as well in the old days. Perhaps the actual racing was an unrelated factor and early training that inevitably accompanied it conferred protective benefit that translated to more starts over more seasons. If that training was a factor in longer careers, was it merely that it was early training, or was it different in some other way than other training methods perhaps correlate less well with more starts/more seasons?

Breed-to-race vs. breed-to-sell: Can it be demonstrated that a higher percentage of horses bred to succeed are the products of breeding programs intended to produce sale horses rather than horses raced by a breeder/owner? If so, I believe it can be shown that treatment of said yearlings is very different. There is experimental evidence suggesting that young animals which are stalled have structural systems less well prepared for work than those which spent critical periods of their development with room to play and run. What else is done to make attractive sales yearlings that might be counterproductive to making sound working animals?

Track surfaces: Are tracks indeed deeper and slower or harder and faster? Some people would like to blame shorter careers on harder, faster surfaces, while others write off the fact that raw times seem to be declining on deeper and slower surfaces. Both can't be true, at least not at the same time on the same track. And how about turf, which is a relatively recent phenomenon in US racing? Anecdotal evidence of older, imported turf horses bucking shins like youngsters if they work or race on dirt is common; is a history of training or racing on turf a risk factor for horses which will ever run or train on the dirt?

Feeds, etc: How have feeding practices changed? How might that affect career longevity? For example, excessively high protein food is blamed for causing soreness, too-fast of growth and probably structural problems in young dogs.

That's just a few ideas aside from the obvious things one could examine about the changing trends in how US thoroughbreds are raced. (ie, if one were to compare the race records of classic starters now vs. the 1960s, you will see fewer starts, debuts at later ages, more races at longer distances and more time between races)

It's not by choice that these horses don't run often. With the really good horses, it is often times by choice. With top horses like Bernardini, they are obviously going to give him plenty of time between races and pick their spots.

But if you see that a horse is bought at a 2 year olds in training sale for $70,000 and the horse doesn't run until he is 3 years old, it's not by choice. In 99% of these cases, the connections had the horse in training as a 2 year old and wanted to run the horse as a 2 year old, but the horse got hurt. That's why some of Phalaris' arguments are so silly. If she sees a horse that didn't run until he was a 3 year old and the horse doesn't last, she thinks that they should have run the horse as a 2 year old. she doesn't relize that they couldn't run the horse as a 2 year old. They tried to but the horse got hurt.

This isn't brain surgery. It's not that complicated. Phalaris' argument would be the same as arguing that people who take a lot of sick days from work are sick more often than people that don't take a lot of sick days. Therefore, taking sick days from work must be what is causing these people to get sick. If these people simply did not take sick days, then they wouldn't be sick. This is obviously an absurd argument. Taking sick days is not causing people to get sick. It's the opposite. People being sick is causing them to take sick days.

Some of you guys come up with these ludicrous theories, that you would know were absurd if you had any knowledgs about the business. There is practically nobody in the business who intentionally does not run their horses as 2 year olds. If Bill Mott has a big, long-striding Dynaformer colt who is a late foal and looks like a grass horse, a case like that may be the exception. With a horse like that, they may not try to run the horse as a 2 year old. But with the other 99.9% of horses, the trainers try to run them as 2 year olds. When you see a horse who doesn't make his first start until he is 3, it was not by choice.

As to human sick days ... people wouldn't take as many of them if they weren't paid for them. Stop paying someone when they're out "sicK" ... and the number of sick days decreases dramatically.

As to horses ... you're mostly missing the point.

I don't have any large base of hard data to support it ... but I do suspect ... from years of observation .. that racing horses early and more often is more likely to result in their becoming more physically fit and able to endure the hardships of a career as a professional athlete.

Racing 3f in February ... learning to break alertly from the gate ... learning to maneuver in a pack ... learning how to dig down and give a little more ... is good preparation for the future.

Not every horse will be ready to do that .... and not every one who tries will succeed. But ... on the whole ... the methodology employed 40 years ago and more ... produced a higher percentage of professional athletes who could race 12, 15, 18 times per year without serious injury ... than today's "spacing" and "fresh horse" theories do.

Again without hard numbers ... it just seems that more G1-level horses break down and have shortened careers today ... than they did in the past ... and ...

... and this lack of frequent appearances by the best-quality horses is killing off interest in the sport.

Not sure where that came from? The post qualified the theory as pertaining to top horses which you seem to agree with. Certainly trainers want their horses to race...my point, and I'll stick to mine and let others address theirs, is that because of insane breeding practices, the thoroughbred of today is too fragile to withstand long campaigns and frequent work!

Yes, I agree with you. I was mainly repsonding to Phalaris, especially some of her past posts.

Not particularly pertinent to this topic ... but ...

... Phalaris both knows and understands as much about thoroughbred racing as anyone on this planet.

Amen to that!

By the way, I think that trainers are smart to run their top horses sparingly. It's really hard to keep horses sound and the top trainers know this. If you have a really good horse that looks like he has a good chance to win the Breeder's Cup and that race is your main goal, you would not plan the race to be your horse's 10th start of the year. You would want your horse to be at or near his peak on BC day. Therefore, you would not want the BC to be the horse's 10th race of a long, hard campaign. You would obviously want your horse to come into the race relatively fresh.

For all of you geniuses who think that horses can run 15 times a year, you should go and buy some horses and try it.

And the geniuses who think they can't ... should learn a lot more about thoroughbred racing history.

You've bought into the "fresh horse" theory ... and I completely disagree with it. Nothing will definitively resolve the difference .. but ...

... I do know that thirty years and more ago ... I watched all the best horses in every division race 12 or 15 or more times every year ... top horses facing each other five, six or more times within the campaign ... and today ... fans only get to see their favorites a handful of times at best.

Regardless of which training method works better ... the old way at least made the sport a lot more interesting.

Phalaris has no understading of horses at all. You should read some her past posts. She thinks that if you have a good 2 year old with a lot of potential, that you should run the horse 15 times as a 2 year old and this would increase the horse's chances of lasting and winning some big races as a 3 year and 4 year old. She thinks that you would have a better chance to win the Ky Derby if you ran your 2 year old 12 times as oppose to 4 times.

If you talk to any good trainer out there, they will tell you that this is the most absurd thing they have ever heard.

So there are two possibilities here. The first possibility is that Phalaris has no idea what she is talking about.

The second possibility is that Phalaris is a genius and guys like Pletcher, Mandella, Frankel, Zito, etc. are all idiots.

Which is it? Is Phalaris a genius and the all the great trainers are morons? I think it's slightly more probable that Phalaris has no clue what she's talking about.

Horses are also faster today, whether it be from better training methods, nutritional advancements, or "move up" factors, they are faster and the stress from racing is much greater, they need to have their races spaced, so they can properly recover and be at peak.

Well... for some reason, what they are doing isn't stopping the amount of breakdowns, is it? The real problem lies in that the thoroughbred breed isn't as hardy as it once was. I for one am one that believes that thoroughbreds should NOT be run as two year olds at all. I don't believe that the stress on their legs is good for them when their bones aren't even closed up. Shoot... I wouldn't even sit on a horse's back until they were 3 years old, but that's just me. Perhaps there is some merit in running them more frequently as two year olds though. If facts are presented that say that bone density is IMPROVED off of more starts as a youngin, then I can't argue with that.

And you will also read those trainers say that times are changing....and who is changing the times? The breeding industry. Trainers answer this change by pleasing their clients with less starts against weeker horses = better stallion resume.

I believe the same things ...

... and so did Ben Jones, Jimmy Jones, Hirsch Jacobs, Sunny Jim Fitzsimmons, Moody Jolley, Max Hirsch, Syl Veitch, Preston Burch, John Gaver ... and many many other Hall-Of-Fame trainers ... who develop0ed champion after champion after champion.

Your definition of a "good" trainer ... is very different from mine. A good trainer to me is one who brings out and sustains the talent of the horses in his care.

The ones I mentioned did that a heck of a lot better than any of the ones you cited.

They absolutely, positively are not. Not for the last sixty years or so.

There's not a shred of evidence to back that up.

I point you to the Thorograph Website, there's as article by the name of "Are races horses getting faster", they present some good arguements, take a look, I am not saying you have to believe, just take a look...

Something has obviously changed over the last 40 years. I've been really into racing for about 25 years. One of the first things I learned as a handicapper was not to bet horses that were overraced and/or coming back too quickly. It took me a couple of years to figure that out. I would see a really good horse break their maiden first-time out and then they'd come back around 15 days later in an allowance race that they should win easily. I would see these horses get beat time and time again. It didn't take me long to figure out that these horses needed more time to recover. I noticed that if a horse was given 26 days or more after breaking their maiden first-time out, they would have a good chance to win that first-level allowance race.

When I started buying horses, I would see the same thing. I would see that it takes them time to recover from races. Only in rare situations would I ever run a horse on only three weeks rest. Through my experience I have found that by only running horses every 4 weeks or so, not only do they stay sounder but they will stay in form for a much longer period of time.

Race times are ever-so-marginally faster ... and nowhere near any statistical significance ... than they were sixty years ago ...

... and that's mostly due to track maintenance and timing methods ... than to the ability of the horses themselves.

Don't disparage Phalaris ... there's an awful lot you can learn from her ... she's one of the leading authorities in the business.

The Boss told me that you can run every 3-4 weeks when you are beating a bunch of GOATS.

That's a real "DUH!" example.

Why should a maiden winner be favored in his first race against horses who previously won at the same level ... and have had more experience since then?

It's very difficult for all but the most talented horses to move up to the next level and win right away. Do you think those horses would have had any better chance in the new, higher condition if they had waited another couple of weeks to try it?

I didn't disparage Phalaris, never mentioned his/her name...

All that I asked was for you to read that article...

:D Couldn't resist on that one could you?

It's fine to have that theory, but there's no evidence to validate it.

Many great horses of the past raced 40, 50, 60 times in their careers without any significant loss of form.