6/8 (BEL): 151st Belmont Stakes Day ~ 8 G1's
 

BELMONT STAKES

1. Joevia (Sacco/Lezcano) 30-1
2. Everfast (Romans/Saez) 12-1
3. Master Fencer (Tsunoda/Leparoux) 8-1
4. Tax (Gargan/I. Ortiz) 15-1
5. Bourbon War (Hennig/Smith) 12-1
6. Spinoff (Pletcher/Castellano) 15-1
7. Sir Winston (Casse/Rosario) 12-1
8. Intrepid Heart (Pletcher/Velazquez) 10-1
9. War of Will (Casse/Gaffalione) 2-1
10. Tacitus (Mott/J. Ortiz) 9-5

OVERNIGHT: http://www.equibase.com/premium/eqbH...-BEL-20190608D

You’d be hard pressed to give two worse rides in a row than Mike Smith just did. Scary bad.

Mike Smith could have definitely got him out.

Another Smith gem

You know what’s gonna happen here, ride of the year.

Nice main track these last few days. Not sure why or how but unacceptable as a bettor. Kind of taints what should have been a fantastic day.

Good call on the winner, mr hoss.

I didn’t like the winner at all.

Thought Spinoff was Winston, must be spinnin too many joints of the ice cream cake, which I rate at 5 ⭐️

I agree. You would think a business would want to make their customers happy. I bet if Belmont did a poll and asked their customers if they want them to juice up the track and make it lightening fast, I bet 90% of people would say no. So why do they do it? It is mind-boggling. Nobody likes it. Why do they do something that their customers don't like? There is no upside either, only downside. What is really shocking is that they are so clueless that they probably don't know that people don't like it. I wonder who the guy is that is in charge who makes these absurd decisions.

As handicappers, we can pick up a bias pretty quickly if we're paying attention. So I don't feel like I have any big disadvantage if there is a bias. But by the same token, I don't like it. It's just one extra thing to worry about and an extra factor to focus on. I know that tracks are not going to be the exact same every day. There are factors that can change the track that are out of their control. That's part of the game. I'm fine with that. But for them to go out of their way to intentionally change the track and make it lightening fast is inexcusable.

How is a track being "lightning fast" inexcusable? How does that affect the results?

Asking for a friend.

It is inexcusable for them to intentionally mess with the track to make it faster. People play Belmont every day and know how the track plays. Sure it can change a little bit from day to day. There isn't much they can do about that. Horse players accept that.

But why would management go out of their way to intentionally make the track lightening fast (which causes a speed bias)? Nobody wants them to do that. It makes the track play totally differently from the way it normally plays. How could they not know that their customers don't want them to do that? Do they think people want to have to totally change the way they handicap?

Playing the bias 101
 

It must have affected the results a little. There was one guy who did not have a single winner on top on Friday or Saturday. Pretty amazing feat on the 2 big days of the meet with all those races.

Who cares if it's slow or fast? You care there is a significant bias, for two reasons, the first is being it's hard to toss logical horses into plays if their style doesn't fit the bias, and the second is its more work because now you have to weight their effort the next time they run which is tricky.

Tacitus
 

I’d say I’m more upset Tacitus ran about two miles in a 1 1/2 mile race. Sir Winston ran the route exactly as I hoped the ten would. Four wide all the way around isn’t much of a ride.

Sad stuff from a pathetic guy.

Don’t be such a baby

Even someone as clueless as you should know that picking races well in advance on tracks that end up with extreme biases is a very dicey proposition. However, it's even more disgraceful when, given everyone here knows you look at every pick I make, I have been literally crushing it over the past month ( and frankly been strong for even longer than that ). But, two days where, and you know this too, I repeatedly said I was putting very likely and logical horses second to try to find pricier alternatives, none of my "top selections" won erases all else. Good for you. You got me. You are also the worst kind of person....someone who was actually a friend of mine outside of cyberspace, who became so jealous of my relatively microscopic supposed success, that you decided to lash out on the internet ( ..and, yeah, there were those infamous Phish tickets too ). Honestly, it doesn't get any lower than you.