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#101

ESPN needed to get some newer ‘feel good’ material. Most of their exerpts were repeats. It seemed cheap to me. And Kenny is always funny. I don’t get how people don’t get him. Without gambling, there would be no horse racing, so that dimension of the telecast is necessary. But Jeanine’s hat needed to go :slight_smile:

I’m sure most of you who follow all this have probably seen it, but if you are interested in post race interviews, check out www.thoroughbredtimes.com

It is all Curlin talk. Mr Jackson (I think it was him) was saying that he’d love to see Curlin run next year but of course its a business decision. I am sure the excitement of the race had all of them saying they’d love to race him next year…we’ll see.Two of the owners are breeders…so, what are the odds. But it was cute-Robby says “my vote is to run him next year”.

Why can’t I get excited about this talented horse? It is like Easy Goer/Sunday Silence all over again for me. I LOVED Easy Goer.

In retrospect, the Distaff was my favorite race. VERY exciting. But I did finally get to see Cobalt Blue’s race and WOW. What an impressive performance-BC race or not! I also caught the Bwana Blue/Slews Tizzy race. Neither fired. But that was super mud-so who knows.

I would love to see Baffert and Zito back in the Grade 1s.

What was your guys’ fav race?

#102

Holy cow, I didn’t realize until right now that SS finished 4th, not 3rd. Big oops on my part. I seriously walked out of the room as soon as Curlin won (not that Curlin’s win wasn’t exciting… I just really wanted to see HS win). And then I walked back in to see the whole GW thing.

My bad…

I still think my favorite race was Lahudood’s win in the F&M Turf… although it’s so hard to choose. You really can’t say there was a “dull” or “unimpressive” race all day.

#103

I rather liked from Friday the once-claimer Maryfield in the new Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint proving once again that horses don’t read the Daily Racing Form and thus dont know they are supposed to lose :smiley:

Here is some irony: she was a $50,000 claim in January 2006 and owned now by Nick Mestrandrea and two friends. Who is Nick? He owned the catering company for the movie Seabiscuit and that is what got him to look into horse racing. Otherwise he had nothing to do with or connections in racing.

On Saturday I have to go with Kip Deville and his effort in BC Cup Mile. His connections knew they were on a rocket as they had to cough-up $300k to get him into the race. That my friends is confidence!

#104

Have only seen race videos online, not the in-depth analysis, replays, reviews, isolated closeups, etc., but from the videos, it looked like the Sprint was an awesome race. Loved Trevor’s call.

I, too, am glad to see Baffert back on top. He always makes things a lot of fun.

What on earth happened to that filly in the FM Turf? Hard to see on online video. Was there an exit gap back to the barn on the outside there or something?

#105

[QUOTE=Glimmerglass;2765865]

On Saturday I have to go with Kip Deville and his effort in BC Cup Mile. His connections knew they were on a rocket as they had to cough-up $300k to get him into the race. That my friends is confidence![/QUOTE]

His connections were SO excited, too, which is nice to see. I loved watching them jump and scream while someone videotaped the whole thing with a home camcorder. Even the kid was dressed in their stable colors. I couldn’t help but feel hrilled for them as I was watching at home on TV. That was probably my 2nd favorite race on Saturday sheerly because of that moment.

Not that everyone else who won wasn’t happy. It’s not too often you see Pletcher beaming like that. :wink:

#106

Texarkana, just curious, why does Curlin not impress you? What would he need to do that he has not done?

#107

From what I understand, the turns in Europe are more sweeping than here, and some of the horses have a tough time with that. She didn’t like the turns, went way wide, and the jockey retired her because he couldn’t get her back in.

#108

At my place we concluded (after making sure no one was hurt) that the filly was used to racing clockwise and decided to turn around and race the proper way.

“Hey guys - we’re going the wrong way! Turn around! Turn around!”

:lol::lol::lol:

#109

Oh, the Maryfield race was the most exciting. To read the story early in the week, see the interview. See that weird good luck charm, and then HOLY COW see her win. Did you notice Nick refer to Stevens as an ‘actor’-not jockey :lol: Yeah…that was awesome.

Curlin is big, beautiful, talented etc etc etc etc. But there is something about him that I just can’t back. It’s probably like all these Penn State fanatics that can’t stand Ohio State right now…I can knock Curlin but in the end, maybe its his connections that keep him afar.

Regarding Denman and the call…I think it was the Juvenile…when he said “they’d have to sprout wings to catch him today” really turned me off. Ok, great call, right? Totally-Only, he used it on Rags to Riches in CA in the spring. And they show that clip, litterally, on every commercial break on HRTV. So, it was like so unoriginal.

2008-One Word-Great Hunter-or anbody else - Curlin is going DOWN!!! :smiley:

Don’t worry-in 10 years I’ll get over it. I am slowly starting to appreciate Sunday Silence.

#110

[QUOTE=gubbyz;2766337]
Texarkana, just curious, why does Curlin not impress you? What would he need to do that he has not done?[/QUOTE]

Gubbyz, “impress” was probably a bad choice of words on my part. It’s not that I don’t think he is talented. And wow, what wasn’t impressive about yesterday’s race with that time in the slop? I completely respect him and his accomplishments.

But it’s sort of like miss_critic said-- I haven’t been able to hop on the Curlin bandwagon. Maybe it’s because I’ve been too busy rooting for Hard Spun. :smiley:

I completely want him to keep running in '08. I love rooting against him. :wink:

#111

Thanks Texarkana, come hop on the band wagon in 2008! I love him cause I am a sucker for the big red horses, looks alot like my Gub did. :yes: Oh and he can run too…:lol: I am not a fan however, of the whole ownership thing, I much prefer the struggling underdog “can’t believe we made it here” owners ala Funny Cide!

#112

[QUOTE=miss_critic;2766440]
Regarding Denman and the call…I think it was the Juvenile…when he said “they’d have to sprout wings to catch him today” really turned me off. Ok, great call, right? Totally-Only, he used it on Rags to Riches in CA in the spring. And they show that clip, litterally, on every commercial break on HRTV. So, it was like so unoriginal.[/QUOTE]

As someone said to me not too many years ago - watch enough Santa Anita racing and you’ll hear Trevor use “sprut wings” and “scrapping the paint” many times during the average week.

While I was watching a BC preview show on TVG they had race caller, Vic Stauffer, who calls Hollywood Park and used to do Gulfstream and Hawthorne (Chicago) too. I didn’t know how much Vic disliked Trevor or seemingly did so. Vic - who is a real student of racing - does a very good job of adding in new comments to keep things fresh. I enjoy his calls far more then say Tom Durkin but his personality it seems doesn’t suit everyone.

Youtube.com one of Vic’s more memorable calls

Btw Vic was ticked that he was originally asked to do a voice-over in Dr. Dolittle 2 and when he said [the racing track scene] was shot at Santa Anita which is called by Trevor, they dropped Vic from consideration. So Trevor has 14 movies to his credit and Vic none.

Not to digress too much but other callers who add value: Michael Wrona (Golden Gate Fields) and Luke Kruytbosch (Turf Paradise and Kentucky Downs).

#113

I love Luke. He’s the voice of Churchill Downs. Trevor was better this year than last but he does tend to fall back on the same phrases, like “sprout wings” and “He says to his rivals…” As good as he is Trevor would never have come up with “incredible, unbeatable CIGAR!”

#114

You mean “The incomparable, invincible, unbeatable Cigar!” :wink:
My favorite call.

#115

[QUOTE=miss_critic;2767344]
You mean “The incomparable, invincible, unbeatable Cigar!” :wink: [/QUOTE]

Let’s look back: 1995 Breeders’ Cup Classic with Cigar and Jerry Bailey up

Final time of 1:59.58 in the slop and on that seemingly never ending Belmont track which can by itself intimidate a lot of horses.

2007 BCC in French! from Equidia

I still stick with my comments post race that Mario Pino on Hard Spun never even saw Curlin until it was too late. Maybe he was already almost out of fuel, but by the time Curlin blew by HS and Pino then went to the whip the race was over.

Just maybe if they had been a little more aware as to what was bearing down, added some urging (Pino was cruising and never even had the whip out) after taking the last turn and was ready to kick it in hitting the stretch … and who knows if Curlin would’ve gotten the best of Hard Spun. Again I haven’t heard any comments from Pino as to how much Hard Spun was taxed or not from that race. For a horse barely cited by the media before the race we all knew HS has been a grinder always in there in the end.

#116

That’s the wording! I was trying to come up with it here in my office this morning.:o

It’s tough to compare the times as Belmont’s wide turns and 1 1/2 turn 10f allows for faster turn times. Also, the track at MON was alot wetter than Cigar’s BCC.
I tend to think that if Mario had been sitting on rocket fuel he couldn’t have lit it fast enough to regain on Curlin. He was just gone. HS is an awesome colt but better at 9f than 10. The Derby and BCC are testament to his heart and class.

#117

the ironic thing is all the talk now emerging that says “… oh Dylan hates soft ground.” What the &*$&. Where was that knowledge before the race? :wink:

It was on ESPN after midnight the night before — the crazed Brit punter with the muttonchops (he’s been to very BC and is known as “Muttonchops”) —pointed out that DT hated soft turf and noted that the U.K. bookies were suddenly taking a lot of money AGAINST Dylan Thomas… ah, if only I’d been betting in the U.K.!

#118

Sadly tv ratings did not fare as well as expected:

The overnight rating for Saturday’s broadcast on ESPN, from noon until 6:15 p.m., declined 11 percent from last year, from 0.9 to 0.8, according to Mark Mandel, a spokesman for the network.

Overnight ratings measure the number of households watching a broadcast in a select number of markets. The final national rating, which measures the rating for the entire country, was to be available on Tuesday, Mandel said.

The overnight rating for the Friday broadcast was a 0.3, Mandel said.

In terms of wagering that was down too however I strongly side with these comments as to one of the reasons why:

“Monmouth had already taken three days of rain, and the results were such that it may have lowered the confidence of the people looking to gauge the track for Saturday,” [Ken Kirchner, a consultant to Breeders’ Cup ] said. “You may have had some people take a step back.”

DRF 10-29-07 “First figures show drop in Cup handle”

There is a decent chance that this is last year you’ll see a couple of things:

1 - The BC hosted at a “smaller” track (2008 it is back at Santa Anita)
2 - Held at a traditional dirt track (the Euros have been vocal in this in the wake of GW’s breakdown)

No 2 does however require that Belmont and Churchill to convert to a synthetic surface as I only see those two plus Santa Anita and maybe Gulfstream as future hosts. Arlington might get it again but like Lone Star and Monmouth it is a relatively smaller track in terms of seating.

#119

I thought Lonestar did an ok job, except they ran out of food, water, and "GASP’ beer! OUT OF EVERYTHING by the Classic!

I am not sure what to make about the “Europeans” (I say it that way bc I only read one article citing this) knocking the dirt. Let us not forget only a couple of weeks ago, some horses on the ESPN show went down on poly…not to mention others at other synthetic tracks. Breakdowns are unavoidable. I am truly sorry for thier loss-but I am not sure poly would have saved him. We’ll never know sadly.

#120

Regarding the lack of interest by Churchill Downs to bid for being host again for the Breeders’ Cup: Courier-Journal 10-27-07 “Event’s Churchill run may come to an end; Work pays off in little revenue, track officials say”

While event revenues are not disclosed, the Breeders’ Cup receives the bulk of the wagering revenues on the day of the championship races, while Churchill makes what it would on a regular Saturday – or a little more, Sexton has said.

While too small to accomodate even 45k in people that the BC official like to see I’d still LOVE to see the BC at Keeneland. You can go there on a Friday during the Spring or Fall meet and be convinced at horse racing’s popularity hasn’t changed a bit since 1920! If there is one track fans of the sport should make a trip to at least once I’d say Keeneland is it. Then again I also think a trip to a ‘lesser known’ track should be undertaken as well :wink:

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