Classics Betting Update, News, Opinion

Its a perfect example of why your literal approach to form and ratings is flawed.

The full potential of horses is rarely exposed in maidens and falsely run races, the test of a Derby at a proper gallop exposed them far more than a slowly run 10f race when having just their 2nd runs. They physically didnt improve 30 pounds, the race they ran in previously just didnt allow for their full staying ability to be revealed.

Derbys are where the form is established, not maidens.

 

That Irish Derby was a terrible renewal. Just because a race is called a Derby does not mean that it is entitled to be a certain level of form.

God help Waldkonig if Tiger Moth is truly a 118 rated colt. He's got miles to catch up. Do you seriously believe that Tiger Moth is 1 lb behind St Leger winner Logician now?

In June last season, Logician was rated 90, how can anyone seriously consider that Tiger Moth has already surpassed that mark by two stones. You should try grasping ALL of what I am saying for once. One colt taking a big leap forward is one thing but what odds that three from the same maiden all jumped forward two stones in the same space of time. As I have explained, the assessor is limited by how much he can go back and upgrade a race because it would look ridiculous and it is much more likely that yet again horses have been overrated because the race was a Classic. We will see in the fullness of time how good it was and it could all look even more muddied when the Epsom race has been run. It looks like Military March would have had no chance with his 113 rating from the Guineas with all these 118 rated colts around and O'Brien presumably will be running his best colts at Epsom. Not the same scope coming from a Guineas and improving, as there seems to be from maiden races to Derby races.

Sovereign won last season's Irish Derby by six lengths. He was officially rated 105 going into the race but despite having his 9th start and going off 33/1 he was raised to 118. That Derby has seen two group 3 wins since and a handicap win. Runner up Anthony Van Dyck has been beaten SIX times since. Oh yes, Derbies are where form is established.

 

O'Brien has not ruled out that some of yesterdays runners will run again at Epsom this week. That says a lot about how mediocre his team must be overall and that there is not a lot of confidence in those that he has put into the race already.

I am not sure this mob handed and late approach is good for the race. There is already a pathetic level of opposition to Coolmore in Ireland and the way it is going Aidan's biggest opposition may be his own two sons. That incestuous scenario is not good for the game in my opinion.

I saw an article which opined that Santiago should be even shorter than 3/1 for the St Leger, but surely his high rating means he is likely to swerve the race now. It's not exactly been a target for the better horses in recent times and backing him for the Leger at short odds will likely risk a NR scenario.

I took 12/1 for him but fear that he may miss the race. 3/1 being called too big is nonsense given the likelihood of him actually running.

 

Presumably you found the recent Racing Post headline to be amusing?


Telecaster repays Morrison's patience with dominant display at Longchamp

 

Irish racing is a farce with the Obrien clan and its backers, it ceased being a sport a long time ago but what can you do, its one of the biggest breeding operations in the world and they have no competition, no laws against what they are doing. As you say the only competition will be among themselves, bar the odd Ger Lyons and Jessica Harrington runner, and its a licence to print as they have carte blanche.

Its like a computer game, Obrien and Coolmore are doing in real life what I used to do when I played Starters Orders, bulk breeding a bunch of similar high level horses who mop up G1s year after year, the in game races become irrelevant as your horses fill the top half of the places in every G1, the horses lose their individuality and character as they are like clones, year after year the same pedigrees, grinding the breeding process to get horses good enough to run in the online league. It becomes harder and harder for one to actually standout from the pack, and what we saw in last years Derby and this years Irish Derby is a seemingly inevitable natural progression of what they are doing.

Its ironic that they never seem to get the proper superstars that Juddmonte get.

US racing, despite its drug issues, is a far better product for racing fans.

 

Ladbrokes seem to be a stand out of 7/1 on Santiago for the Leger. That is way bigger than the rest of the pack. So much for the 3/1 is too big article.

 

You have to wonder with Jessica Harrington sometimes. She talked about Cayenne Pepper earlier in the season and stressed that the filly would make her mark at real staying trips this season. With Alpine Star already a good winner for the stable you would have thought Cayenne Pepper might have been aimed at the Oaks this year.

Later on I read that the Irish Oaks might be the preferred target which is fair enough but I cannot agree that the best place to introduce the Australia filly was in the Group 1 Pretty Polly, taking on older fillies over 10F on seasonal debut. Not only that, she was also taking on a 2/5 Favourite in Magical.

Talk about over-facing your horses. Not surprisingly Magical won easily but Cayenne Pepper was second and it was a commendable effort. Perhaps Jessica should challenge Usain Bolt to a race just to see how it feels when you are thrown in at the deep end.

That seemed an unnecessarily tough introduction for a filly last seen chasing Quadrilateral home in the Fillies Mile. What next, a clash with Enable? Come on Jessie, give the filly a chance for Christ sake. It is hard to have imagined John Gosden sending Frankly Darling out to a baptism of fire like that on seasonal debut

 

RP do like to go over the top with their stories. You could also have had

Telecaster runs up to form against a mediocre opposition.

 

If Obrien has better than Santiago going to Epsom they will win the Derby, they will set the race up to expose Kamekos stamina and the only possible threat to them looks to be English King now that Military March is out. The stamina test should play to Russian Emperor but I just cant get away from the fact he has zero gears. Mogul looked the obvious candidate all along but the vibes were that he would need the run badly at Ascot and while he will leave that well behind here, he might still be short and on all evidence we know he is nothing special in any case. Vatican City might actually be the one to be on, he looked a class horse in the making when winning at Dundalk, and took the step up to G1 in his stride with a strong finishing 2nd in the Irish Guineas, shaping like 10f would be well within his range. 10f was the limit for most of his illustrious classic winning family, but Taj Mahal did stay 12f and he might get away with it. If any of these Obrien horses is going to be a proper class horse its him, and now that my 2 antepost bets are down the drain, he is the one for me at 10/1, and Moore might be tempted to ride him which would see him start at about half that price.

 

Cheers Grendel. I think I am failing to express my point though. My point is simply that just because the RP has banged up a rating by 30lb, it doesn't mean the horse has improved by 30lb. It simply means that they once rated the horse x and now they rate it x + 30 which to me makes their assessments of lightly raced horses dubious at best and can be taken with a pinch of salt.

At least Timeform recognise when a horse is underrated by allocating a "p" ; but don't appear to have updated for the Irish Derby yet

 

Surely the bigger joke is 10/1 about Palace Pier? Is his horsebox going to collect him at the entrance to the straight?

 

The Derby betting is a shambles of quoted horses who won't be running:-

Ocean Atlantique, Al Aasy, Pinatubo, Waldkonig etc have been ruled out but still persist in the betting.

2YO winner Hudson River is even quoted and William Hill have him at 25/1 despite sprinter Mecca's Angel being his mother and the fact that the youngster made his debut only yesterday.

Palace Pier is 10/1 for the St Leger with Unibet, who seem pretty clueless about the real world. I am assuming they are called Unibet because once you have had ONE bet with them you realise they are ****.

 

Cheers Ron, perhaps the point I am failing to get across it that big jumps in form become harder to achieve depending on the initial rating involved.

For example, if a horse runs to 50 first time and then goes up to 80, it is more likely than a horse running to 90 first time and then producing a 120 performance on their next start.

In the case of the Irish Derby, rating the 1-2 on 118 puts them pretty close to the maximum rating they might be expected to achieve as a 3YO. Not very many reach 120 as a 3YO and we have two knocking on the door of it already and that is before the Epsom Derby is run.

In a year where it has been noted that the staying division has looked to lacking and in a topsy turvy season where a Queen's Vase horse landed the Irish Derby as a clear favourite it seems odd that they are queuing up to bust the 120 barrier in the manner that the ratings given afterwards suggest.

I remember US Army Ranger finishing second in the Derby and shaking my head at the 122 rating he was awarded. He had made heavy weather of winning the trial and his 108 rating coming in meant that the stone increase for being runner-up looked decidedly generous. US Army Ranger raced 15 times in total and he never won after his Derby run. His rating of 122 declined steadily, ending on 103. He never added to his short head win in a Group 3 where he was 4/11 Fav in the Chester Vase and was getting 4 lbs from runner-up Port Douglas, who seemed conveniently to "Drift" across and gift the stablemate a clear run.

 

Not just a shambles it’s a disgrace.

 

AOB 7 Derby entries of 17.

Oaks, Entries - Bharani Star, Dubai Love, Ennistymon, Frankly Darling, Gold Wand, Love, Oriental Mystique, Passion, Peaceful, Queen Daenerys, Tiempo Vuela. (11).

Derby, Entries - Amhran Na Bhfiann, Armory, Emissary, English King, Gold Maze, Highland Chief, Kameko, Khalifa Set, Max Vega, Mogul, Mohican Heights, Mythical, Pyledriver, Russian Emperor, Serpentine, Vatican City, Worthily. (17)

 

I have a fiver free bet so went with a Vatican City and Frankly Darling double.

 

We seem to be coming at this from different ends of the rainbow Grendel. I understand what you are saying. I accept the term "jump in form" because it is literally that. But that does not equate to an improvement in the horse's ability when looking at lightly raced horses. If I had an unraced Derby contender, I would be looking after it, giving it gentle racecourse introduction and experience in a maiden or two. If the horses it beat were donkeys, who cares. It doesn't make my horse any worse. When I pitch it in a higher class to give it a stiffer test and it wins it will get a higher rating (maybe 35lb more). The assessment it would have got for its one or two maiden runs is irrelevant. (ie it did not lessen its chances of winning at a higher level).

It looks as though we have different views on this but then that's what makes discussions more interesting. If we all thought the same it would be boring

 

If Kameko wins the Derby then I reckon we will be relying on the older horses to win the Arc (probably are anyhow)

 

Wouldn’t it be great to see Tom Marquand ride the Derby winner on Saturday.

I think we are in for a shock. I might even throw a few quid EW on Max Vega

 

Probably no horse sums up this year's Derby as well as Highland Chief does.

The Cole's colt flopped in last season's Royal Lodge but his earlier 3rd in the Chesham behind Pinatubo meant that he was never going to escape the Handicapper's eye and he was awarded an official rating of 101. He goes into the Derby as a Royal Ascot winner but it was a Handicap race he won at the Royal meeting. I am not au fait with the record of handicap winners who went on to win the Derby but there cannot have been many and especially ones who landed their Handicap just a couple of weeks before the Derby. Now rated 107 it will be a crushing blow for quality if he can land a Derby. He was 20/1 at Ascot and that could look the mother of all bets if he was indeed a Derby winner lurking in handicap company but he only had half a length on his field and would have to give them another 6 lbs if meeting them on their previous marks again. By Gleneagles he hasn't got a lot of stamina on his sire's side but the dam did stay and her progeny have as well but at a much lower quality level. 16/1 for a Handicap winner with about 10 lbs to find doesn't appeal to me.

Aidan has refrained from sending his Irish Derby runners. Looking at those he has in the race sees little that appeals to me. Mogul has got five lengths to find to get in front of Pyledriver this time and the runner up in that race, Arthur's Kingdom, was no feature in the Irish Derby after slipping as they left the stalls. I have watched the race back and seeing Arthur's Kingdom coming out of stall 4 he ducks his head down briefly and loses a couple of lengths but rousted by his jockey he quickly makes up and is racing prominently enough. I don't think you could use that to explain away a 14 length plus beating for a horse who was 7/1 second favourite for the race. I had wondered about the first time cheekpieces on Arthur's Kingdom on his 6th start. It remains a worry for me that Mogul ran behind colts rated 103, 107 and 102 last time and he needs to have summoned a lot since that run. Never impossible knowing O'Brien but the 4th to Kameko in the Futurity is an added concern. If he is Aidan's best it would be a worry that the trainer has decided to throw 6 other darts.

Best outsider? Surely some will be looking at Amhran Na Bhifiann. He was 4th in the maiden won by Tiger Moth and the 1-2-3 there were 2-3-4 in the Irish Derby and the Galileo colt was only a length and a bit behind that trio. He is a full brother to Was, who won the Oaks. In a crazy year some might see an interest at 50/1, with each-way places likely to be enhanced on the day.