Quote:
Originally Posted by The Indomitable DrugS
I don't make numbers to that point - but - you have to take into consideration that she was exiting brutally slow paced races - some of which over days when the racing surface was yielding much quicker times.
Mike Smith just let her settle away from the gate like he always does. The only difference is that she was in with MUCH quicker horses this time - and on a surface that is much less kind to closers. Smith started to push her along after a quarter mile to keep her from dropping 30 back - and she basically had to work hard for 8 furlongs.
The idea that Smith "waited too long" is the single most retarded thought a person can have. He literally moved 8 furlongs out on her - and Zenyatta, with all that momentum on Blame - never got past him after the wire.
Had Smith let her drop 30 lengths back early and get comfortable - who knows what would have happened. She would have made up an insane amount of ground late and exploded past the wire for sure - but it's anyones guess what the result would have been.
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I agree with you 100% about Mike Smith. He didn't "wait too long". He didn't want to be that far back. She didn't want to run in the early going. It wasn't his fault. She looked to me like she didn't like getting hit with the dirt. The thing that people are forgetting is that her two races at Oaklawn were in a 5 horse field and a 6 horse field. In the 6 horse field, she had post 6. She took very little dirt in those races.
It is true that Zenyatta never got passed Blame on the gallop-out but I think there are good explanations as to why. Blame was much fitter than Zenyatta. Blame has been running 1 1/8 mile races and 1 ¼ mile races. Not only had Zenyatta not run 1 ¼ miles in a year, she hadn’t even run 1 1/8 miles for 5 months. Her last two races were both 1 1/16 miles. As good of a trainer as John Shireffs is (even if he’s the best trainer in the world at getting a horse ready for a big race), I still think that Zenyatta was at a disadvantage coming into a 1 ¼ mile race against the best horses in the world, coming out of 1 1/16 mile races. Don’t get me wrong, 1 ¼ miles is definitely her best distance but it’s hard to be 100% fit to run 1 ¼ miles when you haven’t even run 1 1/8 miles for 5 months.
In a normal race, all Zenyatta needs to do is run a strong final 3 furlongs. In this race, she was a good 20 lengths back (between calls) going into the clubhouse turn. This forced her to have to make a prolonged run for the final 7 furlongs rather than just the final 3 furlongs. I’ll bet you she ran her final 7 furlongs in about 1:23 1/5, which is unheard of. So she’s coming out of 1 1/16 mile races and she is forced to sprint her final 7 furlongs in a 1 ¼ mile race. It’s not surprising that she didn’t gallop out as strong as Blame.