Congrats Martin Garcia

[stonegossard]

Originally Posted by Rupert Pupkin

Gomez doesn't care about being leading rider at a meet. That's not his main goal. He doesn't want to ride 8 horses a day. His goal is to be leading rider in the country in terms of money won. He has done that the last 4 years in a row.

Not only that, but he's not going to be the leading rider at that many meets when he's constantly travelling and missing days. I don't know how you could hold that against him. He's won the national riding title 4 years in a row. A guy can't do much better than that.

He is definitely a very good rider. My point is I don't think talent wise he is any better than the jocks I mentioned a few posts ago.

As far as leading money rider in 2010? Well....getting a pick up ride at the last second in some cheap claiming race at HP just so he could beat Leparoux while Leparoux was out of the country was very weak on his and Ron Anderson's part. Pretty sad in fact. But it didn't matter as the Eclipse voters saw past their bs and gave the award to Leparoux who deserved it.

[my miss storm cat]

Congrats to Martin. The more I read / hear about him, the more respect I have for him.

Seems like a really decent type... good for him.

Hold on did someone dis Calvin and praise Martin? Are you serious? Martin has many more years of horrible rides. The Preakness is the Shemp of the triple crown. Lets not go overboard with praise just yet.

[eajinabi]

Originally Posted by Coach Pants

Hold on did someone dis Calvin and praise Martin? Are you serious? Martin has many more years of horrible rides. The Preakness is the Shemp of the triple crown. Lets not go overboard with praise just yet.

Martin has only been riding for 5 yrs and he has already a pretty decent resume. He is probably not the best jock out there but he did deliver today and praise is well desereved for his ride today.

[stonegossard]

Originally Posted by Coach Pants

Hold on did someone dis Calvin and praise Martin? Are you serious? Martin has many more years of horrible rides. The Preakness is the Shemp of the triple crown. Lets not go overboard with praise just yet.

Borel clearly can't ride outside of Churchill. He is lost at every other track. Too bad the jocks that ride down at CD aren't more like Cordero (you know....a jock who wouldn't let him get away with his rail riding).....if they were he wouldn't win nearly as many races.

It's insane how a guy can win so much at one track and then not do a thing anywhere else.

[dalakhani]

Originally Posted by Coach Pants

Hold on did someone dis Calvin and praise Martin? Are you serious? Martin has many more years of horrible rides. The Preakness is the Shemp of the triple crown. Lets not go overboard with praise just yet.

He had the best horse and sat the perfect trip. I didn't see what was so great about the ride either except that he didnt f it up which is better than a lot of them can say.

Baffert goes through a lot of jockeys first call. I wouldnt get too comfortable if I were Martin.

[eajinabi]

Originally Posted by dalakhani

He had the best horse and sat the perfect trip. I didn't see what was so great about the ride either except that he didnt f it up which is better than a lot of them can say.

Baffert goes through a lot of jockeys first call. I wouldnt get too comfortable if I were Martin.

I am surprised John Velasquez did not get the mount for either Aikenite or
LAL. Velasquez is first call for Pletcher and has ridden for Baffert east side on few occasions

[dalakhani]

Originally Posted by eajinabi

I am surprised John Velasquez did not get the mount for either Aikenite or
LAL. Velasquez is first call for Pletcher and has ridden for Baffert east side on few occasions

Garcia was going to get that mount...period. He is riding all of Baffert's good horses now. He is Baffert's new Victor.

I think JV could have had the mount on Aikenite if he had wanted it. I don't think the decision was too bad either way. Somewhere out there Aikenite may still be running.

[eajinabi]

Originally Posted by dalakhani

Garcia was going to get that mount...period. He is riding all of Baffert's good horses now. He is Baffert's new Victor.

I think JV could have had the mount on Aikenite if he had wanted it. I don't think the decision was too bad either way. Somewhere out there Aikenite may still be running.

I had high hopes for Aikenite since his 2 yr old career but me thinks the owner is running that ship and not Pletcher

Originally Posted by stonegossard

Borel clearly can't ride outside of Churchill. He is lost at every other track. Too bad the jocks that ride down at CD aren't more like Cordero (you know....a jock who wouldn't let him get away with his rail riding).....if they were he wouldn't win nearly as many races.

It's insane how a guy can win so much at one track and then not do a thing anywhere else.

Lucky for Calvin it's at a major track with arguably the biggest race in N.A.

Originally Posted by stonegossard

I thought you wished both your former jockeys well ? You should be happy no?

I'm very happy for Martin. Culmination of alot of very hard work and perseverence. He deserves all that's coming to him.

As for Rosario I do wish him well. He's the competition now though and to that end I root for Tyler to beat him every time.

I'm sure it's a bit sweeter when Joe Torre beats the Yankees or Girardi the Marlins.

You're lucky SCUDS likes you.

Originally Posted by Coach Pants

You're lucky SCUDS likes you.

I'm lucky ANYBODY likes me.

[2Hot4TV]

Originally Posted by Coach Pants

Hold on did someone dis Calvin and praise Martin? Are you serious? Martin has many more years of horrible rides. The Preakness is the Shemp of the triple crown. Lets not go overboard with praise just yet.

Belmont is the Shemp, cant remeber who won it and no body watchs it unless there is a triple crown chance.

[cakes44]

Originally Posted by dalakhani

He had the best horse and sat the perfect trip. I didn't see what was so great about the ride either except that he didnt f it up which is better than a lot of them can say.

I couldn't agree more. He ran 4 wide around almost the entire 2nd turn. IMO, he just rode like he was on the best horse, and good for him that LAL was.

[dagolfer33]

The main question is, will Garcia get preferential treatment by the stewards like Gomez does?

[CSC]

I would say this was a Stu Elliott type of ride rather than an Eddie Arcaro type of ride. Ramon Dominguez's ride yesterday was closer to Arcaro.

[SCUDSBROTHER]

Originally Posted by dagolfer33

The main question is, will Garcia get preferential treatment by the stewards like Gomez does?

Gomez knows how to make other horses think his horse is gunna knock them over. He makes other horses shift laterally (hard n' quick.) That can def. alter whether a horse gets by his. The actual contact seen on tape is usually not that bad. He quickly redirects his horse back away from the horse he swerves into (because it's a planned action.) It's a "go to" trick he has. When he realizes another horse has a bit more than his, he will pull this trick out. It usually works, and he usually stays up (Derby '09.) He gives them a way to go in his favor (contact is usually minor) even though the other horse would easily have gotten by if he didn't have to make a hard lateral shift (breaks momentum quite a bit.) So, if Garcia can cheat that well, then he can probably get almost the same calls go his way. You have to give the stewards an angle to keep you up. Gomez is very good at that. He is an excellent cheater (the best.)

[SCUDSBROTHER]

You can see the example of this cheating brilliance on the replay for :
HOLLYWOOD PARK
Fri, Jul 11th, 2008 - Race 4

You can see the oncoming horse has to shift towards you on the pan shot. Before he had to do that, Vic ("It's gunna be close...Now it's gunna be really close") thought the horse was gunna go right on by. After the race, you can hear Vic say he "wouldn't let him by." That is not true. Gomez hits hard right-handed until he realizes he won't win this way. He then plays his only card to play, and that's the same one he used about 10 months later to hold the place spot in the Derby. The horse's path is quickly taken, he must shift out, and loses momentum. No lights flashed. No mention of an inquiry. Just paid the Sadler chalk. I like Vic, but he does have conflicts of interest when he comes on here. Two of those are his friendships with O'NEIL n' Sadler. That's in full effect each time he supports this no call.

[Sightseek]

It's going to take more than a Jockey change to help out Drosselmeyer, but like Lucky, Winstar wants to "try something different."