I’m following 2 5yo horses, Cozmic One and Crown the Kitten on Equibase virtual stable just out of curiosity and being a racing fan. About once every 2 weeks I get a message that one of them as been “worked”. Knowing that race horses are trained almost every day, I assume these reports are when the boys are breezed. My question is; since they are both raced at distances greater than a mile why are they only breezed 4 furlongs? How does the trainer assess that the horse has the ability and speed to be competitive in races more than twice the breezing distance?
Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Yes, when you get a work notification, that means they’re breezing.
Very generally speaking, 4f is a “maintenance work” distance. Most horses breeze 5 furlongs and even 6 (more common on the west coast) when they are getting ready to race. With horses that are 5 years old, however, their aptitude (ability, best distance) is already known, so now it’s just a matter of keeping them fit. For an older campaigner who has been in training pretty continuously, it doesn’t take much to keep them conditioned. So there’s no point to add the extra wear and tear of breezing longer distances.
Cozmic One is still in training? …Why? He hasn’t raced since July 2015. I assumed they’d quietly stuck him in a field somewhere.
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Cozmic One has been working pretty steadily since February. Interestingly with respect to the original question, most of his recent works are 5 and 6 furlongs.
What LaurieB said. You don’t need to work the distance of the race in order to be fit enough to run it. What does not get reported are the gallops - you can open gallop a horse for a distance but it will not get recorded as a work.
I wish they’d try him on turf.
In addition to this ^^^^ – some trainers on occasion will enter a horse in a race just to USE the race as a distance workout (so to speak) – not looking to win (although a w/p/s can happen) – thus the comment by these trainers, "He needed the race." It adds and/or evaluates fitness + adds experience if horse is younger.
They are not using the race as a work as much as they are admitting they cannot get the horse racing fit without racing it. They run faster than they work. As a horseman, I don’t like to “waste” races, so my horses run when they are ready to run, and not before that point. I’m usually 1st or second coming off a layoff, and the only first time starter I had was 4th. It’s very expensive to enter a horse in a race if the horse is not ready to be competitive. You have to pay the rider, the groom, the pony, the gate, lasix, possibly shipping, and if the horse does not pick up a check, you have to wait a couple weeks for the opportunity to race again. I prefer a minimum of 3 weeks between races. Every day that the horse is not racing costs the owner money, and owners and trainers who waste races usually don’t stay in business long.
As an owner/trainer racing all my own horses in NY and NJ (for years, many years ago) – I never ‘wasted’ races either – other than to very occasionally appease the stewards by filling a race for them if they called me – but some trainers (back in my day) and not just the lower eschelon trainers, used races in the way I described them. Wasn’t my cup of tea – and not yours either.
“other than to very occasionally appease the stewards by filling a race for them if they called me”
I assuming it was a mistype so to keep things clear for people reading this thread. “Stewards” have nothing to do with “filling” races, nor “writing” races. That is the job of the Racing Secretary.
“It’s very expensive to enter a horse in a race if the horse is not ready to be competitive. You have to pay the rider, the groom, the pony, the gate”
No snark intended but in the grand scheme of what it cost to buy, own, pay training expenses. A few hundred dollars to run a horse is chump change. Most tracks these days pay far enough down the finishing order so that race day expenses are pretty much completely covered. Unless one is using an expensive vet.
I have had the good fortune to have spent a fair bit of time around some of the best trainers of the last 75+ years. Here and in some other countries. They sure heck do “give” a horse a race knowing perfectly well the horse has little to no chance of winning. It’s can be a “schooling” race for some horses, for others a “tighener”. And it just might be a paid work out if they finish in the top 6+ that a lot, most tracks pay down to.
They don’t consider it a “wasted race” and they had/have been at the top of their game for decades.
One of my favorite expressions by a very well known trainer that I was good friends with when asked what he thought of his horse running that day. “Larry, he’ll win but not today”
So in other words don’t bother betting on the horse.
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Work out times are just a guideline, a reference point. They have little value without the “visual”. Watching the horse work. Plenty of $10,000 claimer can put up a bullet work. Out work stake horses. On paper only. They look like egg beaters coming down the stretch. Flat out getting it, legs in a blur.
Where as a good horse, a potential good horse will work in respectable times and hardly look like they are putting any effort into it. Consistently. These are the kind of horses an owner or trainer can get excited about. Assuming the owner knows what they are looking at. Most don’t, most just go off time.
As the late great Woody Stephens was often quoted saying, “time means nothing except to those in jail”. .
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Mistype – LOL – I realized my ‘senior moment’ later in the day ( stewards??? – Oh no! ) and didn’t have time to correct until this morning. Thanks for clarifying for other readers.
^^^^^^ Agree. Even back in my day tracks payed down the line too. But since I was racing ‘off the farm’ (rarely stabled anything but youngsters at the track – in borrowed stalls via a friend) – shipping in to run made my ‘time’ expensive. Very long day, especially if my horse was in the last race. Always tried to run my horses when they had a good shot.
I disagree, since my horses pay their expenses. But I’m structured as a business, not a hobby.
All the owner/trainers I knew (small stables) would have had a very hard time staying afloat if they relied soley on their horses to pay the bills by winning $$. And all the owners I knew approached racing purely as a hobby – they had money to burn and just enjoyed the game win or lose. Trainers (with owners) did obviously run their outfits as a business – they got their day rate, etc. from their owners who payed their bills – winning $$ only added to the pot.
Since I ran a lay-up farm and broke babies for owners and foaled mares, my day rate enabled me to run my own horses without much financial worry. Would have been great (and then some) if my horses payed their own way – not a realistic approach for me. My farm was my business. Running my own horses was a hobby.
My set up has been pretty much the same as yours. But with the exodus of broodmares in this state in the last 5 years, over 2,000 mares down to just a little over 400 foals dropped in 2015. My business model has gone down the drain. I like providing re-hab but market forces in this area make it difficult to make a decent profit in relation to the work and skills needed. I loved breaking/starting babies but but stopped doing that a few years ago to non farm born and raised client horses. Market forces at work again. People around here wiling to do it for $35 a day. Youngsters full of hope and ambition but not a high skill level. I only charged $50 and IMO it really wasn’t worth it at the level.
Market forces have made us decide that it is time to sell this big farm and downsize quite a bit. A bitter sweet sale.
When I send the homebreds that we race to the track. They are fit and ready to roll. Trainers loved getting our horses and did pretty good with them all things being equal.So did their employees, grooms and riders. But when I send a horse to a trainer I don’t dictate things. They know I could easily pull my trainer’s license and do it myself. They ask me what I think, but in the end I leave everything up to them by and large. If I don’t like how things are going I make changes.
My “hobby” racing is Steeplechase horses, Timber. Little to no money in it but to me it is a LOT more fun. If I won the lottery my barn would be full of them.
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It’s obvious to me you seem to know what you are talking about. What name do you race under? Would like to see your approach to things. Everybody in this game learns some things from others.
I know a lot of very smart people that structure their racing stable as a business. Some years they make good money, great money, some years they loose a lot.
You summed it up in post 17. I stay small and avoid clients, just have a couple runners for myself. I’ve been around the track since childhood, but only got into it as an owner about 15 years ago. I stayed small, as my experience with different types of racing operations, farms, etc made it abundantly clear how high the overhead was and exhausting the labor. To put it in perspective, I am happily running a profitable Chick-Fil-A as opposed to trying to get into the high end gourmet restaurant business. And I get Sundays off. I tend to prefer older horses, and don’t hesitate to give them farm time or retire them when needed. Right now my biggest problem is finding horses I like - low inventory. I have a vet who is a dear friend, and she will occasionally ask me to rescue/rehab a racehorse that has an injury that may keep it from racing, but should allow a good second career. I keep the horse for no charge, and she has been very generous with my bills. Being a small operation, I do all the labor myself and don’t need expensive equipment.
As a child and young adult, I dreamed of the big beautiful farm and for a little while considered being a trainer. But the farm looked too expensive, and I don’t feel I had what it takes to be a successful trainer - I don’t feel that I understand the subtle nuances of what race/level the horse is capable of winning.
If I’m remembering correctly: When R. Reagan became president, a law was passed that made owning racehorses (owners only – not trainers) a HOBBY not a business (or something very close to that).
Used to be – as an owner (pre-Reagan) you could write off lots of racehorse owning expenses on your income tax returns – but Reagan put an end to that. As a result there was an exodus of racehorse owners – the little guy/common man owners – not the kings of the sport.
That was my era and I lost many clients because of this law. They all went poof.
