#1
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Who awoke Campo out of his slumber
We all know that Kant credits Hume for awakening him out of his intellectual slumber. The rest is history, so to speak.
But what in the world happened to Campo, the racing secretary at NYRA? Is it possible that Campo has overcome his 'distance limitations' slumber by actually carding a 12F turf race (that's not a stake)? Here it is: race 4 tomorrow. What's next, a steady diet of 1 1/4 inner turf races when they get back to BEL? Hey Campo, there's more to racing than just 6F to 9.5F. Get a little creativity in your game. |
#2
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And it drew a field so stellar that the steeplechase horse has a legit shot.
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#3
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Think a 12F allowance wouldn't draw? I don't know how long you've been playing the game but the 1 1/4 inner turf race was a staple at BEL for decades. Under Campo, it's a memory. |
#4
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#5
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Look at the trainers in the race. A tour de force of fine (turf) horsemen: Jerkens, Clement, Sheppard, Tagg, Motion, Voss, Henning, etc.
There are horses, and plenty of them, that just can't deal with the speed favoring 8.5F inner turf race. I'm just saying, give their connections an option, rather than forcing them to repeatedly run in these races. As for sprints: I'm all for them, typically, but the 5.5F at SAR is a hard race to deal with over the course of 6 weeks. |
#6
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It's not just the lack of marathons, but the entire shortening of the condition book in NY. In the winter, there is the abundance of races at a mile/mile and seventy yards instead of the 8.5F and 9F races that used to be a staple on the inner dirt; races at those distances are now scarcely run in overnight races.
At Belmont, it's not just the turf sprints but the awkardly positioned 9F on the inner turf instead of the "old" 10F and 11F races that we used to frequently see. And I bet you can count on one hand the number of main track, overnight races carded at a distance over a mile on the main track. The lack of variety and shortening of distance has been in evidence the first week of the Saratoga race. Taking out 2YO races and off the turfers, the racing office has carded 10 races at 6F, none at 6.5F, and only 3 at 7F. NYRA can talk about the "distance" purse supplements as evidence of its "commitment" to promoting distance racing (post-Eight Belles). But if this is a good idea, why do it only at Saratoga? Why not do it year-round? In reality, NYRA's racing program, to the frustration of many horsemen (and in the name of the almighty field size), caters to speed, speed and more speed. |
#7
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The CDI tracks (CD, FG, AP, Crc) almost never write longer races. While people often complain about this, the tracks claim they cant fill them. But if they dont write them, why would they expect owners to buy or breed such horses? It is the chicken and the egg quandry. If they write enough of them and they are weak races, eventually the horseman will figure out that they are weak and look to acquire better horses to try to win the easier races. |
#8
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Who do you like in this race ? Im looking now.... I dont really want the 1,2,9... I dont really want the 8 either but I think thats who Im going to end up landing on. |
#9
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AP regularly offers 5.5F, 6.5F and 7F sprints for older horses, for example. This makes the sprints interesting, as there are horses that just can't handle even a .5F difference. This not only works well for the astute handicapper, who notes these preferences/limitations but also for the connections, who can cash a check every so often by running their horse at its preferred distance. Why not reward these people for all the times they're running their horses in what are not optimal distances for them? In other words, filling tracks' cards. At NYRA tracks, if your horse can't make it to 6F or can't quite get up going 6F, you're basically ****ed. Why is that? |
#10
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Or why as soon as July ends so many tracks refuse to write any short races for 2 year olds? The later developing ones would benefit from a start at a short distance like 5f but they stop writing them. |
#11
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#12
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