2004 Preakness (Smarty Jones)
 

Just watched the replay a few times and have a few comments:

1) At the time it *seemed* like an exciting race, but really now, it wasn't ALL that great.

2)When Mike Smith took Lion Heart wide, I assumed (and probably everyone else did too), that he was doing that to force Smarty wide. But, now, in retrospect, I think he was actually trying to find "The Mike Smith Path" (you know, the one he took with Deputy Glitters a couple years later)

Just a couple 1:00 am observations.:D

If you watch the up-close angle as they turn for home, you can see Smarty Jones dig in, which is cool. He accelerates well. Easily making him one of the top five horses of all time. :p

In some kind of objective and retrospective analysis, what you say about whether it was a great race may be true. But I was in the stands that day and I can tell you that it was pretty exciting. During the stretch run, it was so loud that I was yelling at the top of my lungs and I couldn't hear my own voice.

Of course, I also drove up to Belmont that year. That was the most disheartening day I ever personally experienced in horse racing.

Hey, anyone hear anything about Big Brown today?

Yeah that day sucked.

As an aside, Smarty's sister is in R4 @ Delaware today.

Okay, I get it. Would you rather talk about Hillary and Barack instead?

I wonder what they think of Big Brown.

That Belmont was a heroic performance by a great horse.
That race put Smarty as one of my favorites after
being a skeptic. Pure guts on the track.

I don't know if I would call Birdstone great....but to each their own. He certainly was particularly good that day.

Apparantly you weren't at Pimlico in 2006.

Actually, I have never seen Belmont more quiet than after Go for Wand broke down.

What is that supposed to mean?

Oddly enough, I had a very different experience- was in the top of the stretch seats and without a view of that spot on the track, everyone was left wondering what happpened.

No I would not call Birdstone even close to great.

But I would call the performance by Smarty
heroic, as I posted. The winner was not even
close to the best horse in the race. Clear to me
anyway.