I'm basing them on all the races at Aqueduct over the last several years. If what you say was a factor, the actual average pace time for Aqueduct would be even slower than what I reported because cheap, bad, and young horses always run faster pace times in relation to final time than classier fit horses do. If you took 100 races won by NW1 NY Breds at 9f that were won in a time of 1:51, and 100 races won be G1 horses with the same conditions and final time, the G1 horses would run slower to the 4f and 6f calls on average and finish faster.
How Mike Hushion trains horses has absolutely nothing to do with how he evaluates the pace of races that have already happened. Just because I know a lot about making figures (at least I think I do) doesn't mean I know how to prepare a horse for his first start or get him to break out of the gate.
As for all the past Wood's, I use figures, not raw times. These are what I have:
2005: 114 pace, 111 speed
2006: 116 pace, 93 speed
2007: 108 pace, 98 speed
2008: 122 pace, 94 speed
2009: 104 pace, 104 speed
2010: 103 pace, 109 speed
It looks to me like you have had a bunch of horses going too fast early and finishing like plow horses in the Wood. Perhaps that is why people are fooled into thinking the pace was so slow this year. It was a little slow, but hardly paceless. Maybe this year the winner of the Wood will actually accomplish something in the future in a dirt route. It would be a nice change.
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