The pace was an absolute crawlfest in the Gotham. Mr. Fantasy will never beat halfway decent horses going long without an easy lead. I Want Revenge ran OK, and might be alright, but lets see how he does without everything going his way.

Now, Imperial Council is a different story. While clearly he got a great ride, saving ground, but the dynamics were WAY against him, and it seems pretty obvious the idea was to see what he could do in more realistic race situations down the road where the stakes are MUCH higher. I think we know now.

He fits very well, at this point, with any KY Derby contender and may well prove the best 3YO this year.

Nicanor has a far better chance of running in the 1st race on Derby day (a maiden) than in the feature.

The race dynamics definitely did not favor IC today and I Want Revenge did enjoy a great trip but it made absolutely no sense for him to be nine lengths out early. You think that was part of the plan? I mean, it is peculiar that Shug McGaughey is the only guy whose horses can work :48 and change at Payson and then end up eight lengths off a :48 and change in a race.

He was moving well in the late stages and should get better going longer, but he's now going to need to run at least 2nd in the Wood to get into the Derby. The best thing for this horse might be for him to miss the exacta in the Wood and thus skip the Derby because then he might be able to grow into a nice horse later this year.

NT

He gained no ground whatsoever on the winner in the stretch. Mr. Fantasy was walking home in the final 100 yards.

Still, all things considered (pace, experience, etc.), it has to be viewed as a solid effort.

I dont think IC ran a bad race but if he had a bit of trouble or had to lose any ground he gets beat 10+ lengths. The pace was an obvious factor and it prevented him from having a legit chance to win or even run closer but I dont know that I am as high as Andy is on him. Though rooting for Shug is a lot more palatable then some of my other contemporaries.

After watching it again, the winners race may wind up being more of a mirage than a sign of things to come.

I think the plan was clearly to drop out of it and make one run. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think Shug knows exactly what he's doing.

I hope he gets in the Derby.......because he can absolutely win it.

IC will always be limited by his poor stride conformation. He hooks his left front out badly and to the left, and then to compensate brings it inward almost touching/crossing his right front.

He is a good athlete otherwise,but with his stride conformation problem he has no chance.

gotham Allowance GP

Oh boy.

Without a doubt, my favorite part of this board is seeing Andy respond to things like this. I have no idea one way or the other if this illustration is meaningful, but I don't need to in order to get a kick out of a well-timed "Oh boy."

yea its like Vineyard Haven all over again, except i can actually screencap from head-ons now.

:D

...and I refuse to believe I am the only one who finds it amusing. I'm seriously laughing my ass off as I type this.

Easy trip or not I Want Revenge was great today ... and is obviously a new horse on dirt. His last race was just pathetic. He has a very ugly turf pedigree and was certainly one of the best projections of the So Cal horses likely to improve coming East from a pedigree standpoint. He did surprise me a whole lot even considering the soft trip and likely dirt improvement.

Mr. Fantasy broke a little akward but was exposed.

Imperial Council is going to get a lot of undeserved attention because his sire and dam sire are both Belmont Stake winners - and he's trained by Shug.

Yeah, he was against a real slow pace on a track that was a bit kind to speed... Giacomo was running faster figs with more adverse trips earlier on in his 3yo season .. and he was trained by John Sherriffs - who is just leathal at getting a horse cranked up. He once won at something like a 70% clip with first time starters over a 2 year span in Southern Cal when he trained for 505 - most of his horses winning debuts with Beyers in the 90's to triple digits. He got Tiago to have the best finish of any American runner in the BC Classic last year - which is a complete miracle by itself.

Shug always seems more worried about six months down the road than having them all cranked. Saarland was just 6/1 in the Derby after running two non-threatening races in the Gotham and Wood in his only two 3yo starts.

I'd be way more interested in Imperial Council if you could substitue his pedigree and trainer ... because together, they might attract a flood of sucker money in the Derby.

I laughed , butt of the joke or not, it was pretty funny

There is something about unapologetic disdain that I find humorous.

Like I've explained to you countless times through PM.... No matter how many times you ask...I will never get into that sort of thing..

Please just let it go..

I don't usually disagree with you.. but I have to this time.. Here's why.. in one corner you have McGaughey, a hall of fame trainer.. winner of countless Graded stakes.. success most trainers can only dream of... In the other corner you have message board fans with thousands of posts to their credit...

It's a no brainer who is right..

I wouldnt be surprised at all if Imperial Council's owners were reading this thread and totally second guessing Shug and their horse..

Right or wrong I think the betting public will connect IWR's effort today with POTN and Papa Clem.

What are Papa Clem's chances and how will he be bet next week?

It's ok. I sometimes break out the pom pom's for horsies I like too.

Instead of reading this board his owners should look around for Shug's copy of "How to train your horses to be dead last plodders who routinely suck up for minor placings." That can be followed by Volume II, which is of course, "How to train a Derby winner."

NT

Guess I saw it differently than most. I thought that I Want Revenge ran a bangup race given the setup: how often do horses contend OUTSIDE and draw off on the inner dirt? But I won't get too excited, as he probably didn't really beat much.

As for Imperial Council: not only did he get a perfect inside-out trip but he was sufficiently behind any of the action (slow pace or otherwise) and only ran AFTER all the others had. He basically ran evenly throughout (something I don't see too often). I can see him beating the winner, should they meet again, if there's enough of a duel to run that one to submission. In other words, he kind of needs a collapsing race. Of course, there are probably better horses than the winner and probably better closers than IC.

The chart for the race is attached (should anyone be interested).

The inner has been even, save from Feb 16th til Feb 27th, and I Want Revenge had as easy a trip as possible.....stalking the crawling pace of a distance challenged horse. Now, he absolutely ran the best race today, of that there can be no doubt, but the question you need to ask yourself is what you think the absolute intentions were from the various connections. Don't get me wrong, this is a guessing game, and most will hypothesize based on their own wants, but it's hard to believe given the way Imperial Council was ridden, that the plan was not to use this race as a learning experience and stepping stone. I'm sure they wanted to win, but they also wanted to use this race in the manner it was advertised, as a Triple Crown prep.

Prep Race
 

Agreed that this was a prep. But I Want Revenge is not a front runner he ran close to the pace today so that Mr Fantasy would not get a 5 length lead and then passed him IWR still has room to grow and at least he had 4 races as a 2 year old as a backboen. Quality Road has still not raced beyond 9 furlongs. And Dunkirk has no foundation. Better to be improving this time of the year than backpedalling and there will still be an injury or two.

Now he's not a front runner?

He ran slower earlier in his race today, relatively speaking, than any other race he has ever run.

Just because a horse gets taken back to get an education in one race, doesnt mean he needs a collapsing pace from now on. He was very tatical in his last race sprinting at Gulfstream. I think he could have easily been anywhere Maragh wanted him today.

All that Imperial Council showed today is that he can suck up and pass tired horses, with a, positionally, perfect trip. I don't have as high a regard for Shug as most do. Obviously, he is the perfect trip, suckup trainer. He doesn't have anything new in his arsenal --- suckup on the rail, come out for a clear run in the stretch. I suspect that if this horse CONTENDED early, he'd have done what the rest of the field did: BACKED UP, significantly, late.

I don't get some of this. A horse duels OUTSIDE but he's doing it with a suspect router, so it's not of note. Why then, didn't any of the other non distance challenged horses with enough speed to stay close do so? Why, contrarily, did they all seem to be run off their feet, unable to keep up as early as going into the turn. I mean, DAMN, the pace was CRAWLING, right?. Under these constraints, NO HORSE would be able to get credit for wiring a field.

What's sad about all this is that we saw about as impressive a performance as it gets by a horse. BUT the winner probably is not much horse. Which certainly doesn't say much for the rest of the field.

I'm eagerly waiting for his BEYER. I wonder how it'll compare to his POLY numbers (which, I hear are SLOWER -- by default).

But if he's up a bit closer he may not finish quite as strong. Props to IWR for setting the pace he wanted and finishing the strongest of any including IC.

And just because the education thing is out there doesn't mean everyone buys it.

What's with all the excessive love for this horse?

The Beyer should be about a 110 or so I would guess.

I Want Revenge actually closed about 3 lengths on Pioneer of the Nile in the final quarter of the Hollywood Futurity when he missed him by a nose.

I actually thought he might be wrangled back like Haynesfield, Imperial Council, and Giant Ryan were today.

He had the same thing happen to him in his last race at SA - pressed a slow pace - but he was totally flat. He looked a lot better on synthetic when they took him back.

Breeding and trainer.

And a serious dash of hope.

IC DIDN'T FINISH STRONGLY. He gained exactly zero lengths on the winner in the final 5/16ths. He passed a NY-bred with distance limitations for 2nd.

(But I thought his race was OK. I just need to be clear about that.)

IC first 3 races were nothing to sneeze at. Maybe he'll be just a above average miler who wants to stay close to the pace, but with him being so close to the lead in his 3 efforts, you have to realize the Gotham was used as a learning experience.
Nothing against the winner, at all, but I don't all of a sudden think IC is a pig when they simply tried to see how the horse would do coming well off the pace.

:D

Imagine the outpouring if IC had run well. ;)

Not true, but that's just a differance of opinions. I want revenge took to the dirt and it sure looked like he had alot left in the tank, but that was due to he was a much better horse and had nothing to do with his conditioning. You're right and I was wrong, please accept my humble apology.

This all started because you said he 'should've won' yesterday, which makes less sense by the second.

I Want Revenge is a decent horse.....I know I got mocked, maybe here maybe somewhere else but Mullins has said for 6 months, well before the futurity this was the most talented horse he has had.....and while he may be a scum bag cheater he is not a hyperbole machine, in fact he usually is the opposite talking down his chances. I always was impressed with the way IWR has run and laughed when Crist and others used the figure in the Hollywood Futurity as reason to claim none of those horses can run, figures on synthetic are probably 5-10 points to slow at the higher levels if the horse runs the same on dirt. I have a little future wager on this horse at a big number so hopefully he is as good as he looked yesterday although as been pointed out he got a great setup.

Yea, I didn't do a great job of expressing my opinion in that post.

Imperial Council has the problems with his stride, and he isn't really bred to be any better at 10 furlongs than 8.5. Going into the Gotham he wasn't a Kentucky Derby consideration of mine. However he is well liked, and physically he is a nice athletic colt. If he were to run a great race in The Gotham, he would have earned some respect at least as a consideration to run 3rd or 4th. The Gotham was a weak looking field headed by Imperial Council, a gradeII synthetic shipper and two horses who were somewhat unknowns (Masala, Mr.Fantasy).
In a race like the 2009 Gotham, any horse who is supposed to have a shot at winning the Kentucky Derby "should've won". Reflecting and trying to be more fair and accurate, if I Want Revenge did run a big race, a competitive second would have been fine.
Imperial Council ran a non-threatening 2nd and passed a nobody for second at the wire after that horse dueled all race and quit.

He did run a non-threatening second. My only reason for pause is that if they had no other aspirations beyond the Gotham, he would have been near the pace like his other previous races. If he would have been run off his feet or dueled into the ground, I would think he has no shot at improving going 2 turns.
But I think it's ridiculous to think the horse is slow because they took him way back in what turned out to be a paceless race. I think he deserves another chance in the Wood.