Just how much faster are horses now?

[The Indomitable DrugS]

It's amazing when you look at the Thoro-Graph sheets and you hear Jerry Brown make his claims about how wildly faster racehorses are now than they were just 10 years ago.

John's Burger - recently won a pair of $5,000 starter alw races going six furlongs at Mountaineer. He earned a negative 2.5 and negative 2 on TG for those two wins.

By comparsion - when Artax won the '99 Breeders Cup Sprint in sensational fashion - he got a TG figure of 0.50. The great Kona Gold was second with a 1.00 - the mighty Big Jag was 3rd with a 0.50 (five wide trip) Forestry was 4th with a 1.25 and Successful Appeal was 5th with a 2.50

But yeah, John's Burger's two workmanlike six furlong 5K starter alw wins at MTR would have crushed that star studded group of sprinters on TG.

Ferdinand won the Derby with a 7 on TG. Alysheba won the Derby with a 6 on TG. Winning Colors won the Derby with a 6.50 on TG. Sunday Silence won the Derby with a 6.25 on TG. Four great horses right there.

On Aug 7th at Monmouth, Sir Tyler T finished 4th beaten 4.50 lengths in a 5K claiming route on the dirt - his TG number was a 6.25 On July 17th, Sir Tyler T was 4th beaten 6.5 lengths at Monmouth in a 5k claiming route. His TG number was 6.25

Basically - Ferdinand, Alysheba, Winning Colors, and Sunday Silence - in their Derby victories - all ran good enough to translate to a soundly beaten 4th place finish in a 5K claiming route at Monmouth Park today.


Jerry Brown has all of his fancy convincing power point presentations on why this is so. He says this is not reflected on the Beyer figures - because Beyers are weighted down by pars. On Ragozin, horses are faster than before - but not quite to as extreme a level as on TG.

The most interesting thing to me is that how the gap between being a stakes horse and a claiming horse seemed to be much wider on everyones numbers 10 years ago. I think it really speaks to how "good" claiming trainers have become over the last ten years.