Why West -- Why?

[the_fat_man]

Hard to believe that Tagg would give Mr PREMATURE (Ariel Smith) a leg up on yet another one of his horses; Why West, in this case. Of course, Mr PREMATURE, once again, rode as if the 1st horse to ENTER the STRETCH is the winner and had the filly wide and under the whip on the turn. Abused her and then had to check badly twice when the winner bore in then out late stretch.

Maybe Tagg has finally learned his lesson. Of course, there are any number of other trainers out there who will continue to ride Smith and pay the price for it; in terms of lost races and abused horses.
Being clueless when you're getting screwed seems to be quite common in the trainer community.

Moving on to part B, in a race fraught with INCOMPETENCE: why wasn't the winner taken down? At a very basic level, we should at least expect a horse to keep a straight path in the stretch. Maybe Why West is not coming back on the winner but taking her path TWICE over the course of a few strides should've resulted in the DQ of the winner. Any way you cut it, the stewards screwed up.