Arlignton Poly

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by cmorioles

Clearly, less Euro horses shipped to California because of the much longer journey and the warm weather. Most are turf horses anyway, so I don't think the surface had a whole lot to do with it.

not just euros, a lot of east coasters didn't want to go. they didn't like the track, and how hard it was. euro turfers generally don't do well, altho this was the year high chaparral and johar dead-heated. but it was only the cali connections who were happy to have the bc out there that year.
next year will be the first time on an artificial surface for the bc, i guess we'll see how it plays out...but i'm thinking you'll see more attendance by euros. after all, if for some reason the races get rained off, they won't have shipped all that way to scratch, they'll have a familiar surface to run on.

don't get me wrong tho, i'm 'old school' and was not thrilled to see dirt decried and replaced. but it's there now, so i just hope they get it RIGHT.

[King Glorious]

Originally Posted by Danzig

not just euros, a lot of east coasters didn't want to go. they didn't like the track, and how hard it was. euro turfers generally don't do well, altho this was the year high chaparral and johar dead-heated. but it was only the cali connections who were happy to have the bc out there that year.next year will be the first time on an artificial surface for the bc, i guess we'll see how it plays out...but i'm thinking you'll see more attendance by euros. after all, if for some reason the races get rained off, they won't have shipped all that way to scratch, they'll have a familiar surface to run on.

don't get me wrong tho, i'm 'old school' and was not thrilled to see dirt decried and replaced. but it's there now, so i just hope they get it RIGHT.

U are kidding right? The Europeans dominated the turf racing that year. Six Perfections won the Mile, Islington led a sweep in the F/M Turf and in addition to High Chaparral dead heating for the win in the Turf, Falbrav ran third.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

U are kidding right? The Europeans dominated the turf racing that year. Six Perfections won the Mile, Islington led a sweep in the F/M Turf and in addition to High Chaparral dead heating for the win in the Turf, Falbrav ran third.

no, i was saying they weren't happy with it being out there with the heat, and the hard track. i know who won it. don't you remember the weeks leading up to the bc, when a lot over there were saying they weren't coming? you think johar could have dead-heated with HC any where else?!

[JJP]

Getting back to the comment that Americans are always complaining or whining or whatever was said, it should be pointed out comparing our synthetic racing to Europe's is ridiculous.

We Americans were "sold" on the idea that this would be dirt racing, just safer. The Euros had nothing to compare it to, since they've never had conventional dirt. They were getting a chance to race in the winter, when they wouldn't otherwise. We've had winter racing here for years. And while Poly makes sense for a mostly winter track like Turfway, its plain stupid for tracks like Santa Anita and Keeneland to have it. Almost all the horses with 5 or more races here have established dirt form. When you see a horse like Sun Boat become a graded stakes winner on dirt, or Student Council absolutely bury Lava Man, you know there's something wrong. Its not just the running styles that people don't like; its the lack of transferability of conventional dirt form to synth that is bizarre. And while the strong acceleration of early speedballs and deep closers were admired, it appears those styles will give way to the "preferred" one-paced grinding style that wins so many synth races.

Give me Mountaineer, Ellis, Hawthorne any day over the carpet tracks.

[Riot]

Originally Posted by JJP

Getting back to the comment that Americans are always complaining or whining or whatever was said, it should be pointed out comparing our synthetic racing to Europe's is ridiculous.

We Americans were "sold" on the idea that this would be dirt racing, just safer. The Euros had nothing to compare it to, since they've never had conventional dirt. They were getting a chance to race in the winter, when they wouldn't otherwise. We've had winter racing here for years. And while Poly makes sense for a mostly winter track like Turfway, its plain stupid for tracks like Santa Anita and Keeneland to have it. Almost all the horses with 5 or more races here have established dirt form. When you see a horse like Sun Boat become a graded stakes winner on dirt, or Student Council absolutely bury Lava Man, you know there's something wrong. Its not just the running styles that people don't like; its the lack of transferability of conventional dirt form to synth that is bizarre. And while the strong acceleration of early speedballs and deep closers were admired, it appears those styles will give way to the "preferred" one-paced grinding style that wins so many synth races.

Give me Mountaineer, Ellis, Hawthorne any day over the carpet tracks.

Is the safety and longevity of the horses of any concern to you?

[Riot]

Originally Posted by DaHoss9698

Not to speak for JJP, but it is to me. However, the poly will not cure the fact that the breed is brittle now. Hurt horses will break down no matter what surface they run on.

I don't think anybody has claimed artificial surfaces will cure breeders breeding horses that can't stand up to the rigors of racing.

Let's take a group of completely sound and race-trained horses. Would you like to see the surface they race upon improved to be safer for them, to be less likely to cause injury?

[Riot]

Race horses often wear front shoe toe-grabs. Enables them to grab the track (obviously). If they don't wear them, they generally don't run as fast, as their footing may not be as "sure" on the track. Some horses may seem to slip and slide around a bit, which can vary from track to track according to the surface.

The height of toe grabs are measured in millimeters. A millimeter is very tiny (it's very roughly 1/25 of an inch). "Regular" toe grabs are 6.4 millimeters in height. "High" toe grabs are 9.5 millimeters in height.

These are relatively tiny physical differences to the eye, especially compared to the size of the horse wearing them.

If you were betting on a certain horse at Mountaineer repeatedly, you might be surprised if he suddenly couldn't seem to get ahold of the track, and put in a bad performance, if he ran up the track? What if you learned his trainer didn't use his usual toe grabs for that effort?

There is a model rule to ban toe grabs over 4 millimeters in height.

Would you vote in favor of this rule, seeing that the horse you bet on may suddenly, without the regular or high toe grabs he's used to, flounder around and run up the track?

It has been found (by a researcher at UC Davis) that a race horse wearing high toe grabs is 16 times more likely to suffer a catastrophic breakdown. That's due to the toe grabs alone - not any predisposing factors.

Should a ban on toe grabs greater than 4 millimeters be supported?

How will gamblers react, if this rule is put into place universally, when certain horses who always "ran well" now can't seem to pull off the same performance repeatedly under the new rules?

Should we rather just keep the high toe grabs, and, "try to make the dirt surfaces safer" ?

How would you feel if you owned a race horse, and your trainer regularly put high toe grabs on your horse?

[NoChanceToDance]

Originally Posted by JJP

Getting back to the comment that Americans are always complaining or whining or whatever was said, it should be pointed out comparing our synthetic racing to Europe's is ridiculous.

We Americans were "sold" on the idea that this would be dirt racing, just safer. The Euros had nothing to compare it to, since they've never had conventional dirt. They were getting a chance to race in the winter, when they wouldn't otherwise. We've had winter racing here for years. And while Poly makes sense for a mostly winter track like Turfway, its plain stupid for tracks like Santa Anita and Keeneland to have it. Almost all the horses with 5 or more races here have established dirt form. When you see a horse like Sun Boat become a graded stakes winner on dirt, or Student Council absolutely bury Lava Man, you know there's something wrong. Its not just the running styles that people don't like; its the lack of transferability of conventional dirt form to synth that is bizarre. And while the strong acceleration of early speedballs and deep closers were admired, it appears those styles will give way to the "preferred" one-paced grinding style that wins so many synth races.

Give me Mountaineer, Ellis, Hawthorne any day over the carpet tracks.

Now i know for sure, that these tracks aren't preparing these surfaces properly.

One thing that Poly is not is a surface that favours one paced horses.

This comment almost made me laugh.

What are these tracks doing to the poly out there???? Harrowing 2 feet deep?

[philcski]

Originally Posted by NoChanceToDance

Now i know for sure, that these tracks aren't preparing these surfaces properly.

One thing that Poly is not is a surface that favours one paced horses.

This comment almost made me laugh.

What are these tracks doing to the poly out there???? Harrowing 2 feet deep?

Actually, that might be the issue. Swap Fliparoo and I went walking on the Keeneland poly on Saturday and it's extremely deep and tiring. Feels like walking in deep sand.

[NoChanceToDance]

Originally Posted by philcski

Actually, that might be the issue. Swap Fliparoo and I went walking on the Keeneland poly on Saturday and it's extremely deep and tiring. Feels like walking in deep sand.

This is entirely possible that they are just harrowing too deep on some of these surfaces. That would definitley make a differnce to the pace horses, and also helped the "one paced" horses as someone put it.

Now, i don't know for certain how deep they harrow here, but it depends on weather conditions, but i've never walked on polytrack and thought it seemed "deep and tiring"

[Antitrust32]

Originally Posted by philcski

Actually, that might be the issue. Swap Fliparoo and I went walking on the Keeneland poly on Saturday and it's extremely deep and tiring. Feels like walking in deep sand.

ya ever walk on a dirt track? deep and tiring...


i dont know how these horses do it!

[Scurlogue Champ]

Originally Posted by Danzig

no, i was saying they weren't happy with it being out there with the heat, and the hard track. i know who won it. don't you remember the weeks leading up to the bc, when a lot over there were saying they weren't coming? you think johar could have dead-heated with HC any where else?!

He could have dead heated with him at Delta Downs on the dirt probably. Anywhere else and he gets crushed.