Who do you think will win the Preakness? I can’t wait to see Justify run. It seems like most if not all of the top flight horses he ran against in theDerby are not running in the Preakness. Who is his competition?
Also, who do you suppose is responsible for his unusual racing career? It seems to be designed to benefit the horse and not to make money for the Justify business machine- owners, trainers, etc. He wasn’t raced at all as a two year old. He only had three prep races before the Derby. When he does run the jockeys let him take his time and just ask for speed on the home stretch. There doesn’t seem to be any desire to push him to set a record. It seems so humane.
Do you think this would be a good plan for all horses?
Justify’s main competition in the Preakness will probably be Good Magic who ran 2nd to him in the Derby.
I’m not sure what you mean by an unusual racing career. The fact that he didn’t race at two is pretty normal. Not all TBs are precocious. And he only had three races before the Derby because that’s all he had time for.
Justify was sent right to the front in the Derby and he set very sharp fractions to hold that lead. Mike Smith certainly wasn’t letting him take his time. In his earlier races, he was mostly just loping along early because the horses he was racing against didn’t have the class to keep up with him.
Yes, I think winning the Derby would be a good plan for all horses.
Yep, you are right about the sharp fractions to hold his lead. He sprinted out of the starting gate. One of the photos pointed out that he and Mike just had a few dollops of mud on them instead of being bathed in it like the other horses.
Thanks for being so kind about my last question. I meant to ask if anybody thought that skipping racing for two year olds might be better for the horses.
If he was physically capable of racing at age 2 and running in more races at age 3 they would have raced him. He was not going to hold up.
WRT the actual race, he did not “take his time.” He went lights out the first half of the Derby and crawled home. The further they went, the slower he went.
Do you have citations? This has always made sense to me (we wouldn’t have any meaningful human athletic endeavors until after college if you couldn’t “work” bones that weren’t “closed” yet!) but I’ve never had the science back-up to show to people spouting the “OMG! They are exercising babies, I would never even set a saddle on the back of a horse under FIVE!” crowd.
The Nunamaker shin study is also one of the most important studies involving conditioning race horses as well. Progressive loading absolutely strengthens the bones, tendons and ligaments, and it also addresses age related training.
I don’t subscribe to the “let them grow up” before doing any training on them theory. It’s kind of like saying children should not exercise until they are mature. There are health related benefits to exercise at any age, and studies support youth exercise. Of course, you need to do what is appropriate for the age and maturity level of the individual. But racing 2 yos does not appear to be detrimental to the long term soundness of race horses.
Would have been interesting to see additional commentary on track conditions the day of the race as well as if the track is considered a “fast” or “slow” track. He did mention that for a few tracks but not for all tracks listed.
If he could have been competitive at 2, he would started. Say what you will about BB but he seems to have mellowed a bit after his near fatal heart attack a few years back. To the point he didn’t even start a colt in the KD last year, didn’t stick something in just to satisfy an owner who wanted to see their silks in the post parade. He saddled the winner of The Oaks last year then went home and watched the KD on TV for the first time in decades. Said he enjoyed it.
I don’t even know if J was under BBs care at 2, but mellowed or not, if J would have been competitive, he would have started at 2.
IIRC, it sounded like Justify was a big colt and BB (I think it was) just didn’t feel Justify should start at 2 but rather wait until he matured more as a 3YO.
In the interviews after the Derby, BB said Justify was sent to Los Al with his second string when he first came to BB. It took him a few weeks to get him to Santa Anita and then he saw him work and realized what he had. He said if he’d known from the beginning he would have possibly raced him at two to not have “the curse” hanging over him but at that point it was too late. :lol:
If Baffert said that, he must have been feeding reporters a line. Even he is not so busy as to need to dump a $500,000 Scat Daddy colt owned by two of the most important owners in the business into a second string at a lesser track without first having a look at him to see what he had. :rolleyes:
That piece is on the final prep race prior to the derby, not the derby itself. It was published on April 17th, the derby was in May. And they all crawled home in the Derby, compared to the stopwatch.
“Kenny [Troutt at WinStar] and both Michael Wallace at the China Horse Club both had wanted Bob to train some horses,” Walden said. "So we ventured into California last year, gave Bob a couple. We gave him a horse named American Anthem. And he did very well with him. And Bob and I have a great relationship over the years. And I just appreciate his camaraderie with communication. And that’s important to me, that we can communicate on a level that I know what’s going on whether they’re 50 miles down the road or 3,000 miles down the road.
“And so Bob’s been great that way. As far as why we sent him Justify, I can’t tell you that there was a great reason for that. We did think Justify was one of our better horses. And if you are going to send a horse to Bob, you want him in the first barn. You don’t want to ‘Los Al’ too long” — a reference to Baffert’s barn at Los Alamitos in California. "We had to keep sending him to Los Al. And I kept saying, ‘Bob, when are we going to get him to Santa Anita? When are we going to get him to Santa Anita?’ Finally he worked him and said, ‘Man, this horse can run.’ I said, ‘Well, if you got him over here three weeks ago, we wouldn’t have the Apollo curse.’ " That referred to the fact that no horse in the 136 years since Apollo in 1882 had won the Kentucky Derby without racing as a 2-year-old.
Come April, Baffert recalled to reporters at Santa Anita about how Mike Marlow, his assistant at Los Alamitos, had been “raving” about Justify well before the colt first raced Feb. 18. Come May 5, Baffert said, "I mean, the first time we worked him there [at Santa Anita], I talked to Elliott. I said, ‘I think we have something really special.’ " As their shared colt improved to 4-0-0, they sometimes sounded like two trainers instead of one.
You always say that and I always feel the need to point out that a report done by racing for racing might shade the truth. No one else believes racing a two year old is good for them. And your comparison to not letting children exercise is silly. Of course exercise is important, it’s the hardcore training and competing at a young age that isn’t.
I thought I read that Zenyatta wasn’t raced at a young age due to her size, no?
It wasn’t a report done by racing whatever that means. It was a comprehensive study done at New Bolton Center that has been nicknamed the Maryland shin study. It is available to read in full on the net if you would like to read it for yourself.
If Zenyatta and Justify had been ready to race at two they both would have. You hope to get them started at two, but have to let the horse guide you along their progression.
It’s a numbers report and does not draw causal relationships. It is factually correct. Not sure who you are hanging out with, but those in racing believe that racing a 2 yo is good for them. I’m happy to read any reports or studies that you know of that state otherwise.
I don’t know about relative soundness studies, but the studies on working young horses and stressing the bones to strengthen them was based on exercise and then turn-out for a couple of months to allow the remodeling, then moderate exercise and turn out again. Not exercise and then racing them as 2 year olds.
