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Originally Posted by blackthroatedwind
And then there's Student Council. His dirt form, while not awful, was certainly not superior to a number that finished behind him on Polytrack. Thus, these races are meaningless as " dirt " races and can only be rated as tests of synthetic ability. Now, this may not necessarily be a wholly bad thing, but it is certainly a new thing.......and no winner of the Santa Anita Handicap, as long as Santa Anita is a synthetic track, can ever be truly compared to the past winners of this race.
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The Pacific Classic was Student Council's first race at 10f and he won it. The Hawthorne Gold Cup was his second race at 10f and he won that, too (and on 'real' dirt). This is a case of a horse needing a longer distance than he was running at, not a radical improvement on Poly. Milwaukee Brew was the same sort of horse - adequate form at 9f, superior form at 10f, and he did all of his running on 'real dirt.'