Syn to Dirt Beyer Converter

[Sightseek]

Originally Posted by philcski

Yes.



They were a lot closer than given credit for. On dirt, no- Rags to Riches was an outstanding filly, probably the best of the last 3-4 years. On turf or synthetic, maybe. But unfortunately, due to injury and early retirement and because they ran for the same trainer, we never got to find out.

Rachel Alexandra would beat them both on dirt.

[philcski]

Originally Posted by Sightseek

Rachel Alexandra would beat them both on dirt.

I think so and I hope so. However, there isn't much competition in her division this year so we may not know how good she really is until she faces the boys or older fillies.

[Riot]

I find the Keeneland (and Turfway, and Arlington) Polytrack surfaces rather boringly predictable, rather than random. They very noticably tighten up with cooler weather and wet (favors frontrunners), slows and becomes more deep with warm/dry (becomes obviously fair), and this is very apparent during some days as the day progresses, and when one compares morning training times to race times. Keeneland has been spot on with this, this meet so far.

It very often plays very fairly to both speed (must be fit) and closers (must be fit).

At Keeneland, the lack of favorites winning is due more, IMO, to the variety of horses (especially young horses) shipping in from all over (mixing of populations that have never run against each other before).

Fall meet is more predictable than spring, regarding favorites winning (haven't checked it for sure, my impression)

Arlington and Turfway, with their populations rather more fixed and constantly competing against each other, are hardly chaotic or random IMO.

Some handicappers view Kee as chaos, some as great financial opportunity. It plays little like turf in my experience.

Regarding Derby horses, one has to see if they can handle the Churchill dirt surface during their last two weeks of training, anyway. The morning gallops and works reports are most important to me in the final separation of the field.

Regarding using a formula to convert synthetic to dirt figures, I'd want to know under what weather conditions the synthetic figure was obtained.

[SniperSB23]

Originally Posted by philcski

I think so and I hope so. However, there isn't much competition in her division this year so we may not know how good she really is until she faces the boys or older fillies.

Will we really learn anything when she faces older fillies/mares? Proud Spell is retired and Zenyatta is unlikely to run outside of California.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by philcski

I think so and I hope so. However, there isn't much competition in her division this year so we may not know how good she really is until she faces the boys or older fillies.

she knocked over two seconds off the oaklawn track record a couple races back. it's what i always saw from days past, if a horse had no competition, they still had the clock. i think she's the best horse in training-and i'm generally very stingy with praise.