Nashoba's Key races

[the_fat_man]

Originally Posted by The Indomitable DrugS

* Her amazing win over Zenyatta's half sister Balance at Del Mar. Victor Espinoza trapped her behind an impossibly slow pace and she rolled home despite a terrible setup:

In terms of fast/slow pace she got a 'terrible' setup. But this is only a minor part of the equation, as 'setups' is a larger set than numeric pace. In terms of 'setups', she got the best trip in the race. Talamo has her outside of Balance on the 1st turn and early backstretch. Then he moves her inside, and Balance keeps her hemmed in, and behind horses, until after they enter the stretch. So, while Balance is trying to run on the outside at the leader, at a key juncture in the race, NK is drafting and waiting. She got out a relatively 'fresh' horse. Given this setup, she's supposed to win the race.

It's interesting that you gave a detailed writeup of the recent Gold Cup, where Awesome Gem got, essentially, the same trip as NK, yet appear to have missed this one. Appears that while you're on top of the ground loss issue, you've yet to come to grips with when/how a horses moves within the context of the race.

Hope you don't take this as criticism.

Come on DrugS: you're better than that.