Derby Chances

[The Indomitable DrugS]

Originally Posted by Kasept

Nice Doug..

Is The Factor going to shape up into this the way Sidney's Candy did last year?

Sidney's Candy had no dirt races. He was a guessing game.

I think a horse you compare The Factor with is like a Lion Heart or maybe even Silver Charm type if you want to be kind.

Lion Heart and Silver Charm both worked extremely strong at a 2yo sale. Silver Charm was also a Baffert and also from a low-profile 2yo sale (OBS April)

Both had brilliant early speed and were brilliant young horses. Silver Charm ultimately could rate - a lot of people didn't think he could going into the Derby or he would have been a clear-cut favorite.

Lion Heart is very close to The Factor in every way ... but the difference is that he was ouchy going into the Derby. He was 2nd in preps to Imperalisim and The Cliff's Edge looking like a horse with issues. Biancone might have emptied the cabinet on Lion Heart for the Derby.

Each horse is its own entity ... but The Factor feels kind of like a healtier Lion Heart more than any type of horse I can think of off the top of my head. The comparison to Silver Charm is more obvious.

The main thing about The Factor is that he at least proved the comparison to a Conveyance to be a bad one. Conveyance gave up a lot of late ground to bums like Cardiff Giant and Dublin was running over the top of him at Oaklawn.

The Factor basically finished his final 1/16th slightly faster than Harve De Grace and was going about as fast late as Blind Luck. He also ran plenty faster early on than those two horses.