There is an extreme bias to any horse drawn low. First of all the bends are incredibly tight, and the straights are very short, so horse's are forced to make there challenges around the bends, costing far to much ground. Obviously the American jockeys are better around those tracks, as they race on them day in day out, but that doesn't make them fair. It's like running a 400 metre athletics race, without a staggered start
I agree with Giants Causeway, Shergar. I have never seen a horse who himself seemed to understand the idea of racing as much as he did, hated anyone going past him and would drag himself to the lead again with all he had. I think the Americans have all the advantage our horses have at Royal Ascot and it's just the nature of home advantage in international racing, the horses are used to racing those tracks and the jockeys know how to ride them better. It's part of the challenge really and also part of the prize. If a European horse gets a Breeders cup to his name it raises his stallion profile quite a bit because it takes so much to get one with all the natural disadvantages. The difference this morning between SNA and Sea moon is huge because one has a Breeders cup next to its name.
Bluesky.....Some of his battles in the home straight, were remarkable, the one with Kalanisi in the Eclipse will always stand out for me. Giants Causeway was under a strong drive infront, whilst Kalanisi cruised up to him pulling double, he headed GC in the final furlong, but GC kept on finding, and got his nose up on the line. For a horse who won so many G1s I don't think he had an easy win, he seemed to grind out everyone of them, in close finishes
The only way to beat GC was to come late and wide, so he didn't realise they were there until it was too late. If anything got to "eyeball" him, they would never beat him.
Ron.....I'm sure Kalanisi tried that in there second close battle in the Juddmonte, but Kinane realised it and angled Giants Causeway across the track, so that he could see him
Those 2 had some battles. Kalanisi's jockey was banned in that race for excessive use of the whip in a G1. And in the Eclipse both jockeys were banned for 10 days for excessive use of the whip in a G1. Both times GC just came out best. But Observatory beat him that way in his last race in the UK at Ascot (QE2). Didn't see him until it was too late.
Unfortunately I couldn't get on here from the office, so I've missed all the complaints about my comments. I should have expected that somebody would say that I am anti-O'Brien, but the fact that most of the other European horses ran below form does kind of exaggerate St Nicholas Abbey's effort. When I commented, I had not seen the race, I had just read the race reports. Beating nobody in a visually impressive fashion does not automatically make a horse great, whoever trains it. I would still have said the same if Sir Michael Stoute or Sir Henry Cecil trained it. I can publicly deny that. I did back Sarafina ante post this year and obviously she ran disappointingly from her poor draw. Whilst she was hampered in the race in 2010 I would not go so far as to say that she would have won with a clear run, as the same principle could be applied to Behkabad. O'Brien could take his horses over to America for a prep-race before the Breeders' Cup, which would enable them to acclimatise and he would find out if they handled the dirt and the tight tracks. Any European trainer could do the same but they all treat the Breeders' Cup as an end-of-season extra. The York Ebor meeting form was not worth the paper that it was printed on. Sea Moon did not lose the St Leger because he did not stay, he just was not good enough, even allowed some raceday excuses.
QM......There is no way that AOB is going to sacrifice the back end of the European flat season, just to have his horse's warm up for the Classic on dirt, and no one in Europe would want to see him do that, the BC is an after thought, always has been, and I hiope it always will be. Every horse has it's optimum trip, and I think it is very naive to suggest Sea Moon doesn't, you cannot seriously be suggesting that Sea Moon ran aswell in the Leger as he did in the Great Voltiger. The Leger is a funny race over a funny distance, and you can always forgive horse's a dodgy performance in that, take Rewilding last season, or even Shergar
KS, there are plenty of valuable warm-up races in the USA if European trainers are interested in chasing lots of dollars including the Classic. We both seem to agree that it is an afterthought so there is no point complaining when AOB or anybody else fails, no matter how good the horse that they send. The home team are always going to have the advantage and whilst the visitors refuse to prepare properly, they are just throwing their money in the pot with poor prospects of good returns. Go back and look at the Great Voltigeur again - the race was slowly run and Sea Moon beat trees by a wide margin. If you look at the York winners as a whole, they did not exactly clean up in the top races afterwards.
