"He beat nothing"

[RolloTomasi]

Originally Posted by Riot

So what does it take, nowadays, to be "something"?

Important enough for Tom Durkin to announce it over the PA system?

[sdjcom]

Originally Posted by RolloTomasi

Important enough for Tom Durkin to announce it over the PA system?

I understand what you are saying, however if they would run them more often, against each other and into their 4-5 yr old years
then everyone would have a better idea to judge so-called top 3 yrs. after the triple crown and 6-7 races alot of these horses are retire to stud or hurt.
however i was impress with this years 3 yrs old that ran this past week-end.
court vision tale of ekati, harlem rocker,etc.. they look like they could become some top notch older horses if they would run them like. spec-bid affirmed seattle slew and so forth.

[Linny]

It's tough to gauge the babies but with older more established horses it makes sense to say "he beat nothing" when you watched the final strides of this year's Woodward.

[Dr. Watson]

Originally Posted by RolloTomasi

Important enough for Tom Durkin to announce it over the PA system?

Twun-Tee Three annn Four !!! Scorching Fractions!!

[Riot]

At least, with YouTube, people can go watch all the baby races, career races, for great horses of the past.

[Oaklawnfan]

Aren't we breeding a different horse today? I think that makes it tough to compare today's horses with the greats of yesteryear.

[Riot]

Breeding a different horse ... I think the bloodlines are perhaps quite narrowed and concentrated compared to 50 years ago.

As a cause I think we have to remember how horses were bred then: a farm would stand it's own stallions, and breed them to their own and client mares on the farm, with a few trade-outs here and there to friends, with 150 covers resulting in a much smaller foal crop of 40 or so (each mare would be covered 2-3 even 4 times until she got pregnant). And the mares bred were strong producers. Nobody wanted to mess with the 2-3 months it took to get junk pregnant.

Quality over volume made money and kept a farm alive, and quality meant a farm produced horses that could run and make money for buyers.

In the early part of the last century alot of horses were being brought over from Europe for infusion into American stock (Nasrullah was brought over from Ireland specifically because he was an outcross that was a proven runner producer). That trend then reversed in the latter part, with American stock being prized and snapped up by non-Americans, thus we lost alot of our best bloodlines, created during the 1940-50-60's, to Europe.

Now there are big stallion stations, we have ultrasound to pinpoint ovulation, we put mares under lights Dec. 15, thus that 150 covers puts 120-130 foals on the ground; then the stallion goes to the opposite hemisphere and does it again (as travel is extremely easy nowadays).

There is a "world pool" of genetics, rather than American, English, French, Irish, etc., and it's fairly diluted.

It's easy now with vet management to get any mare pregnant on one cover, even the more difficult ones, and it seems breeders do indeed now breed any mare standing still - even junk mares, poor race record mares.

Because for the past 20 years, you could sell just about anything.

Too many foals out there by the same stallions and their brothers and their sons (even the good ones), so too hard to make money as there isn't a limited supply of a particular genetic line, we're swimming in it. And it's breed to any mare around.

Now volume makes money, quality can only be purchased by the upper % of buyers with enough money to pay excessive price points (it is an open market where the buyers set the prices). So fewer dedicated breeders have access to a variety of genetics, and a variety of good genetics. It's been years since breeders could dependably go to an auction and know they'd be able to buy what they needed for their farms, genetically and conformationally. They were priced out many times.

Compare the Coolmoore worldwide operation with Claiborn, for example. That business model was outstanding for Coolmore, but it killed the Claiborns.

So where are the exceptional horses? Alot of times they were the result of hybrid vigor, a "nick", and that's pretty homogenized nowadays. Maybe breeders have different opinions than this outside watcher, I don't know.

[SCUDSBROTHER]

That Zenyata is "something." That's about the only thing myself and the Arlington guy have ever agreed on(about 10 minutes after her 1st race.) Still just toying with girls.

http://www.derbytrail.com/forums/showthread.php?t=18328

[Pedigree Ann]

Originally Posted by Riot

So where are the exceptional horses? Alot of times they were the result of hybrid vigor, a "nick", and that's pretty homogenized nowadays. Maybe breeders have different opinions than this outside watcher, I don't know.

A lot of them are coming out of the regional state-bred programs and don't have 'gilt-edged' pedigrees. They aren't as 'valuable' so they aren't hot-house raised and so won't break a bone in their first 5 starts. Horses like Peace Rules and Lava Man.

You are correct about today's 'elite level' horses not being able to race more often, but bloodlines are not the answer, IMHO. The problem is how they are raised. In the olden days, weanlings who became yearlings were put in a field with the others of the same sex and allowed to run, play, and build up bone density. They came to the sales skinny and with awkward angles, ie they looked like yearlings, not 2yos; in the fall, they were taught how to be ridden, and before they went into race training at 2, they had had plenty of conditioning.

Nowadays, the 'better-bred' youngsters have too much invested in them to let them loose in a field with others, for fear they might get hurt; even a non-performance-effecting scar can cut thousands off the sale price. As trainers have started getting these hot-house flowers, they have modified their training methods so that the colts can win a big race before they break down, so that even properly raised animals aren't raced as much as they could.

[Riot]

I agree. We know horses raced at two are sounder, last longer, and break down significantly less often than those who had light or no race work at two (adaptive remodeling); we also know there are clear limits to the type of work that is optimal for future soundness regarding speed and distance.

Hard to quantitate specifically how the practices that come before "full track life" influence, but would be great to do (bringing weanlings up for sale vs field weanlings, putting 60 days of exercise on a yearling vs a 21-day quick pretty-up, sending the long yearling right on to training then being given a break vs not, keeping the long yearling at a training center vs track training them, etc)