Quote:
Originally Posted by Smooth Operator
She could probably run a strong ten panels tomorrow.
Nothing better than training and racing on synthetic…
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I don't know what the reason is. It may be that they aren't mainintaining the synthetic tracks properly. But the way the synthetic tracks have been in California for the last year or two, training on the synthetics is actually much harder on the horses than training on regular dirt.
I've talked to several trainers trainers about this lately and they all said the same thing. They said they can't train their horses nearly as hard on the syntehtics as they could on dirt. You can't gallop them fast and work them fast. You can do one or the other, but not both. The horses won't hold up if you do both. Because of this, a lot of trainers actually gallop their horses on the dirt on the training track a few days a week.
When they first put in the synthetic track at Hollywood, it was like a miracle. Horses that had been really sore started going much better within a couple of weeks. The track was great when they first put it in. Not any more. Now it's harder on the horses than dirt. Don't get me wrong, I'd still rather have the synthetic tracks that we have now than the run-down dirt tracks we had before. But that's not really a fair comparison. How can you compare a run-down dirt track that is 50 years old to a new synthetic track? A fair comparison would be comparing a new dirt track to these synthetic tracks. I would much rather have a new dirt track.
If you want to know the truth, I was actually shocked when all these different trainers recently told me that you can't train your horse nearly as hard on these tracks. They all told me that they have had to adjust their training and train their horses much lighter. I had originally thought it was the exact opposite. It may in fact have been the opposite when they first put them in but not any more.
You would be surprised if you knew how many guys are using the dirt training track for a lot of their training right now. They don't work them on the training track but they gallop them on it a few days a week.