Who Will Be The Pace Setter In The Derby?
 

With Old Fashioned out, and the slight possibility :rolleyes: of a souped up track on Derby day, who will be the pace setter for the derby? Speed may be dangerous without Old Fashioned in to keep the pace honest.

Depends who runs

Atleast you didn't say The Pamplemouuse.

QR

Balto Star

Keyed Entry with PVal aboard.

Regal Ransom if he goes.

It will be sloppy, and Mike Smith will surprisingly send Chocolate Candy to the front, from Post 15 or 16

I was looking at the possibles and he's got to be one of the few legitimate horses to benefit from OF's defection, pace makes a race and I don't see a super fast pace brewing this year. The track will be souped up and despite the funny remarks, it would be something wise to think about.

And still run 14 wide around the first turn.

If Mike Smith rode in a walkover race he would still find the 7 path.

Why the jockey change to Mike Smith for Choco Candy, anyways. I missed it.

It's so early, still, in the runup to the Derby. Perhaps there's a speedster in the Lexington who Square Eddie won't catch and they'll enter into the Derby and be cheap speed?

Then, for the hardcore believers, we still got the Withers and the recently Graded (III) Derby Trial one week before the Big Day.

Jeez you guys are fast. I'm away ten minutes and two guys beat me to the Mike Smith wide punchline.

The Lexington has to be the last call for the derby.

Pioneer of the Nile with Victor Espinosa riding. Gomez takes Dunkirk

From a visual aspect I went back and took a look at the preps last night - forgoing using charts for now. From what I saw it wouldn't surprise me if Papa Clem or even I Want Revenge are very close to the lead or maybe even find themselves on it. The Florida Derby split times were no doubt aided by the condition of the track that day, thus I downgraded QR's split times.

If they keep defecting in front of him, Join in the Dance could easily become the pacesetter.

NT

He's actually not very fast - coming out of two extremely slow paced races he will have to show a lot more early speed - which he might be capable of - to make the early lead in the Derby.

But if he does ... I think he'd be a prime candidate to finish 18th beaten 25 lengths.

He dawdled in the Blue Grass and Tampa Derby but seems to have some natural speed, which might be enough to make him the sacrificial lamb that provides Quality Road a target.

NT

If Papa Clem gets an uncontested lead, I can see him being very dangerous at probable long odds surmising Churchill will be souped up for the Derby:rolleyes: . His Robert Lewis was very, very good on a fair race track. Toss out the slop loss at the FG and you have perhaps an underrated horse. Yeah I know he didn't beat much in the ARK Derby but in a paceless race, he might War Emblem them. I'm just not sure 1 1/4 is his best distance.

I'm not sure QR needs a target.

If I was JRV I wouldn't hesitate to place him on the lead if he breaks clean and no one else is being sent.

But ... JRV has never seen a wide stalking/pressing trip he didn't like. I'm sure he'd rather have him a settled 2nd - outside of the pace setter - and about a half length or a length off the lead

Why are you automatically equating a souped-up track with a speed-favoring one?

The track in 2001 was arguably as souped-up as it has been in recent memory yet the winner of the Derby came from well, well off the pace.

NT

Papa Clem isn't naturally fast enough to make the lead without having to be too hard used.

I'm not sure he needs a target either and I would expect JV to take the initiative as well if no one goes.

It looks as if in the effort to get Quality Road to relax, because everyone determined that he was an unrateable lunatic after losing to Theregoesjojo:rolleyes: , he was trained to stalk in that cozy 2nd spot. The pace might not have been quick in the Fla Derby but he looked awfully comfortable in that "watchdog" spot.

NT

Memory had them running the 1/2 in 44 and change, when M. Wind, Keats(I think) and Balto Star cannot get within a sniff of the lead, that pace was doomed to collaspe regardless of the condition of the track.

I wonder how much not having lasix had to do with Quality Road's allowance loss?

He's run two monster races since adding lasix - and the way he was so strongly bet in a very tough Fountain of Youth field off that allowance loss suggests to me that a plausable excuse for the alw races was possibly floating around.

Right but the thing is everyone labels the CD strip on Derby day as "souped-up" yet the amount of wire-to-wire winners of the Derby is shockingly small. Thus, what I'm telling you is that to make the blanket generalization that a souped-up track is speed-favoring is incorrect.

NT

In the majority of Derby's lately the horse on the lead out of the gate couldn't win a top class race at 10 furlongs if they replaced the dirt on the rail with a conveyer belt. A souped up track isn't going to magically make Bob Black Jack, Keyed Entry or Spanish Chestnut able to get 10 furlongs.

Fair enough, we will have to disagree on the souped track part. I believe other factors such as having 20 horses in a field make it very difficult for a horse to steal a race on an uncontested lead, I will agree on the part that it is difficult to wire a derby field. Historically it doesn't happen often, Go for Gin, War Emblem just a handful of horses in recent memory.

It is amazing to watch that 2001 Derby and realize how many horses stopped badly before even reaching the far turn. I know horses stop in every Derby, but that was half the field who were done running after 6f.

Right but did the pace hold up at all in any of the Derbies that you mention? Wouldn't a souped up track that is assumed to be speed-favoring at least enable some of those horses to hang around.

My point is very simple. It happened after the Fla Derby and it's happening again. Labels like biased, speed-favoring, souped-up are thrown around very casually, especially when one wants to fit their own agenda. They are all isolated instances but at times can be mixed. A souped-up track, a track that has been situated so that times are fast, is not necessarily a speed-favoring track. To say that the CD strip is often souped-up on Derby day would be accurate. Yes, the track is often very, very fast on Derby day. But to assume that because it's souped up that its going to favor speed is a connection I wouldn't make.

Thus, anyone spending time right now trying to figure out who COULD go wire-to-wire because they're hoping that the track is souped-up AND will favor speed ought to start handicapping the Queen's Plate because that set of conditions cannot be expected at this point in time.

NT

It may be early but why not discuss something different, instead of focusing on the syth/dirt debate? Thats' been kicked around to death around here. With Old Fashioned out there does seem to be a lack of pace this year. Maybe there will be a late addition, but this race looks completely opposite to the probable pace set up when we were capping in 01 when there were legitimately 3-4 speed horses.

Congaree ran an awesome race that day - and Point Given ran HUGE for a mile that day when you consider how wide he was on both turns and how relatively close to the pace he was considering his style and the easier paced races he was coming out of ... he really did fall apart in the final quarter though .. understandably so.

Invisibile Ink was a stone cold grinder who I thought had several races better than looked on his form - and as a few here will recall - I relentlessly touted him in a fashion of almost Jon White like annoyance going into that years Derby. Similar to what happened with Giacomo - I scored some - but my opinion was certainly never validated by what happened in subsequent races .. though in both cases the sexiest thing about the horse coming into the race was how well they projected trip and style wise from what absolutely had to be insanely hot paces.

What did you make of the fractions in the Florida Derby given the condition of the track?

didn't he come out of that loss to jojo with a cough? seems several horses in jerkens' barn had a virus during that time.

that's my question about that race. how good was QR, and how much did he benefit from the track? but for his first around two turns, i thought he looked very good.

That's the debate, souped up tracks/flattering numbers/speed biases. We know where Pletcher stands with his frank comments after the race.

They were legit.

Souped-up track does not necessarily equate to speed bias, and Gulfstream Park on Fla. Derby day was a chalk-fest, which makes the debate even more uncertain.

To me the bottom line with this Dunkirk vs. Quality Road stuff is whether or not as a handicapper you think Quality Road can do what he did in the FOY/Fla Derby at CD going 10 furlongs with some additional pace pressers to put away late in the race. Provided QR runs his race, he will be on the lead and/or close. Then you have to ask whether or not Dunkirk, or anyone else, can outrun him late to the wire.

My thoughts on that argument:

* Right now, the pace does not look too brutal. QR probably is on the lead or coasting just off it. He will likely sit his trip. I do, however, question if he might get a little bit weak late in the race. Though he finished-up in the Florida Derby, I don't think he finished-up super strong as to where no one could catch him late going another furlong.

* Dunkirk ran a big race, going wide at GP is never easy, closing at GP is never easy. But he had a fair chance to run by QR and didn't. I think, at 8-1, he's a big-time bet against when you add up all the variables against him. At this point, I Want Revenge is a more plausible horse to run down Quality Road late than Dunkirk and scary enough, they might not be that far off in price.

A really sharp handicapper should have noted that being the best physically and having a top-class race in his debut, and working as well as he did leading up to the FOY, that he should have been given an good chance with TOFP and JoJo. We shouldn't have needed an insider's plausable excuse.

We messed up.

We all like to think that we are tremendous judges of talent, but the fact is we should have been raving about how Quality Road towers over these others in physical talent, and 5-1 would seem like a fair range of odds.

Compare them now, JoJo and TOFP didn't shrink ! QR didn't grow a whole bunch more! We missed an obvious thing because we were caught up in other stuff like move-ups ,and we we wrote off QR prematurely, even though he was working like a monster up to the FOY