Is it Time Now?

[jms62]

Originally Posted by RolloTomasi

I wonder if people felt the same way when Seattle Slew and Affirmed followed up closely after Secretariat busted open a long dry spell.


If a "near miss" is defined as a horse winning 2/3rds of the Triple Crown, then the dry spell between Citation and Secretariat saw 62.5% "near miss" Triple Crowns while in the interim between Affirmed and American Pharaoh only 55.5% of the Triple Crowns were "near misses".

So the premise that the Triple Crown has become easier is on a shaky foundation.


A quick fix of that would be to bring back the $1 million bonus for the horse that tallies the most points in all 3 Classics and the $5 million bonus for the Triple Crown sweep.

As far as the NY upsets, not sure the Bet Twice, Easy Goer, Touch Gold, Victory Gallop, Empire Maker or even Lemon Drop Kid and Birdstone Belmonts were considered true upsets.


This is a downstream intervention that ignores larger systemic problems (i.e., breeders no longer breed for stamina) in the name of simply making the races more "competitive". In fact it takes the same micro-level alteration (i.e., making races shorter) seen in the handicap ranks as justification.

Why not explore upstream solutions that promote and emphasize stamina to compliment the abundance of speed and precocity (and unsoundness) that currently plagues the sport? Instead of artificially making races more competitive, why not force breeders to focus on neglected facets of the sport (i.e. classic distances, older horse divisions)?

Even if you couldn't compel breeders to alter their methods, sometimes the pendulum simply swings the other way. The top stallion in North America right now is Tapit, partly on the basis of his ability to impart stamina in his offspring (he earned yet another placing in the Belmont Stakes today). If a single stallion begins to dominate a certain subset of races (e.g., sprints, middle distances, classic distances), then it is the breeders who will be forced to become more competitive lest Tapit sire a Belmont winner annually.


Just as you would give tacit approval to the elimination of stamina in the makeup of a Thoroughbred, you would also abandon the characteristic of robustness. Whatever one thinks of Justify's ability from a historical standpoint, certainly--as many have pointed out--winning 6 races in a the span of 112 days is a feat unlikely to be matched in the near future.

Why reward owners and trainers (and breeders) for keeping their horses in the barn during their active racing years and then retiring them from competition before they've arguably reached their peak at 4 or 5 years of age?


Are those traditions (ability to carry speed over a distance, able to maintain form in a short time frame, etc.) "outdated" or are they simply being outflanked by a new era of greedy and influential players in the sport who forego the true qualities in a champion Thoroughbred along with the horsemanship necessary to foster them in the name of "stallion making", pinhooking, and other forms of speculation and exploitation that need not ever be validated on an actual racetrack?

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