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Originally Posted by DaHoss9698
Look I can't bash Frankel as he is obviously a world class trainer, but he is also so overly cautious and scratch crazy it's maddening. I think as horse fans we are all being brainwashed into thinking horses can't run well without 4 weeks or more rest. I think it's crap. I understand not all can, but I truly believe good horses can run good races without having "plenty" of time off. Allen Jerkens seems to disagree strongly with Frankel and he seems to have made an okay career for himself. Not all horses need to be babied.
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You can bring a horse back in 3 weeks and they may win, but you may win the battle and lose the war. They may not come out of the race very good. It can totally knock them out. It obviously depends on the horse. Some horses are stronger than others. Smarty Jones was an "iron-horse". Most horses would fall apart if you gave them a campaign like that. He lasted for a while but it eventually caught up with him. I heard that when they finally retired him, he was a mess. He had practically no cartilage left.
In addition to handicapping for the last 25 years, I've been an owner and racing manager for about 23 years. I can tell you that in most circumstances I personally hate running a horse back in 3 weeks. There are times that I will do it, but in general I will try to avoid it.
It obviously depends on how hard the horse ran in his previous race. If the horse didn't run very hard, then that's a different story.
Everything I'm saying is a generalization. If you have a horse that always gets 5-6 weeks between races and then you run him on 3 weeks rest as a one-time deal, you can probably get away with it. You just don't want to make a habit of it.