Kentucky Derby...and Beyond?

I'm going to be heading out for most of the day, but will be stopping at some point to make these plays for today;

- Conquest Mo Money to win (2u) and place (3u)
- Hence to win (1u), place (2u) and show (3u)
- Always Dreaming / Conquest Mo Money, Hence / Conquest Mo Money, Hence in a couple of trifectas for 0.5u each

- Watch Me Whip to win (1u) and place (2u) in the Sir Barton, which will take place a couple of races before the Preakness

The track is already looking like it's drying out pretty good compared to an hour thanks to the wind at the track, so I'd expect we'll have fast tracks for both of those races.
 
Wow, Watch Me Whip getting bet down to 5/1 in the Sir Barton with less than 10 mins to post. So much for that being a value play.
 
Meh, although he had some excuses considering he had his momentum stunted on at least two occasions during the race that was a pretty poor effort from Watch Me Whip. But at least Whitmore was able to win the Maryland Sprint earlier in the day, so free money was to be had there. Free money that I'm not collecting on since it appears that I don't like free money for one reason or the other.
 
Nobody backing Lookin at Lee after his 2nd place finish in the derby?
 
timmyclax22 said:
Nobody backing Lookin at Lee after his 2nd place finish in the derby?
Click to expand...

I think I've backed him in every race he's had this year, but hes not for me today at the price he's going to be offered up as. Rather have Hence at more than double his odds. Lee has got to be considered if looking to hit the tri or super, though.
 
And while I am in degenerate mode, Conquest better finish than Senior Investment -170
 
I hate this year's crop. I really do. They're so inconsistent from one race to the other. Pretty much every one of them.
 
Hit the exacta in the Preakness really enjoyed that race, thought Classic Empire had it. Was somewhat bittersweet since I'm going to the Belmont next month, would've loved to see AD go for the triple crown.

Also annoyingly found out that the trifecta i hit on Race 10 becomes an exacta since Zipessa was scratched. Still happy with my results today after a rough Derby weekend.
 
i was on vacation last week but I managed to get field vs always dreaming at -120 so that was nice. I thought empire was going to take it.
 
List of probables as of now for this weekend's Belmont Stakes;

Classic Empire, Lookin At Lee, Irish War Cry, Gormley, Patch, J Boys Echo, Epicharis, Tapwrit, Senior Investment, Twisted Tom, Multiplier, Hollywood Handsome, and Meantime.

Nice field. Well, sort of, since I don't know if any field consisting of this year's bums can be classified as such. But for what we have to work with this year it's not too bad at all even if neither the Derby or Preakness winners are entered in it.

You guys have any early thoughts? I've already given out who I'm going to be playing myself, but after looking these horses over this weekend I've come to the realization that I absolutely love, love, love Twisted Tom in this spot at what odds he'll be offered up as.

For me, this is always the easiest of the three triple crown races to handicap just because I find the formula to find a horse that should run well to be pretty simply. History shows that a horse's class rarely matters in the Belmont. A horse's previous speed figures also rarely matters. For a 12f race like the Belmont it almost always comes down to how far a horse can run, not how fast they can run. What horses are best bred to handle the distance? What horses have that energy conserving grinding or galloping running style to see them out? What horses give the visual impression that they may be able to handle 12f? If there's one race where pedigree matters above all it's this one with few Belmont winners showing it to be an exception. I also give added emphasis to the stamina based horses who are already familiar with running on the Belmont track as well because history shows that it's been an important indicator over the years for this race. I posted the stats a few years ago when talking up Commissioner on Sherdog for his Belmont try, so I can't recall them offhand exactly. But they were overwhelmingly in favour of Belmont winners having previous experience over the track. Ditto when it comes to the jockey. Just because of how unique the track is compared to other tracks a rider will almost never win the Belmont without having ridden the track with some regularity beforehand. It's a big plus when a horse you're on has a rider that rides the track throughout the year. The last couple of years have been the exception when Asmussen and Baffert won it, but history shows that trainers who station their horses at Belmont and run regular races over the track are also at an advantage when it comes to success in the Belmont itself. Look at Pletcher as one example. Even with winning the Derby this year his record is pretty horrible in that race considering just how great of a trainer he is. But when it comes to the Belmont he's been money more often than not. He's run the race twice in the last decade and just missed another two wins when his horses got nosed out at the finish in both 2014 and 2016. He finishers top 3 with more than half his starters in the Belmont compared to something like 18% in the Derby.

So yeah, those are the things I'm looking for in a Belmont horse for the most part with the most important question being "how far can this horse run on this day at this track?". Pretty simple.
 
Now that that is out of the way, allow me to make the case for Twisted Tom.

Pedigree;

http://www.pedigreequery.com/twisted+tom

The top half of Twisted Tom's pedigree is the exact same pedigree as what Destin featured last year when he just got nosed out of winning the Belmont by Creator.

http://www.pedigreequery.com/destin8

Twisted Tom's sire, Creative Cause, and Destin are 100% full brothers, and that type of pedigree was lamost good enough ton win the Belmont last year. But that's not even the best side of Twisted Tom's pedigree. Look at his bottom half. His dam is a daughter of a Belmont winner in Thunder Gulch. His 2nd dam is a daughter of a Belmont winner in Seattle Slew. His 3rd dam is a daughter of a Belmont winner in Stage Door Johnny. His 4th dam is a daughter of a horse that sired multiple Belmont winners in Exclusive Native. Twisted Tom's male side of the has already showed that it could be good enough to contend for a Belmont win, but that female side of his pedigree is fucking loaded with stamina influences. Especially that tail end that features one Belmont influence after another. A horse's dosage index is a bit outdated nowadays, but it used to be heavily relied upon at one time in this game when it came to speed or stamina influences. Take a look at Twisted Tom's DI. It's way down there at 1.13. That's incredibly low by any standards (today or yesterday), and indicates that the horse is almost completely bred for stamina.


Running Style;

Twisted Tom's last two races to show that;

http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-racing/race/USA/LRL/2017/4/22/7/federico-tesio-s

http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-racing/race/USA/LRL/2017/3/18/9/private-terms-s

He's a pure grinder who doesn't expend energy in bursts. He just grinds away and grinds away pulling off 12 and change furlongs all the while staying within distance of the early leaders. And he visually looks like a complete stayer too who isn't getting tired at the end of his races judging by the way he's finishing his races as well as how he gallops out well past the field at the end of his races and doing so with his ears perked straight up. He had plenty more in the tank in both those races.

Based on both his pedigree and visual evidence, I see no reason why this guy shouldn't be able to run a long, long way on Saturday.


Belmont Experience;

Along with Meantime, Twisted Tom is one of only two horses that have racing experience at Belmont, and in fact he's the only one who has won a race there having broke his maiden last Sept. Belmont is also Twisted Tom's homebase where he does almost all of his training and he gets over the track really well as seen here when he, on two different occasions, outworks a pretty good stakes winning older horse in Economic Model who I believe will be entered in the G1 Met Mile on the Belmont undercard;

http://www.xbtv.com/video/workout/e...m-in-101-16-at-belmont-park-on-may-28th-2017/

http://www.xbtv.com/video/workout/t...s-in-101-13-at-belmont-park-on-june-3rd-2017/

His workout last week was the 4th fastest of 27, and the one yesterday was the 2nd fastest of 26 at that distance. He not only ran those workouts in good time, but also did so by doing everything right and with strong gallop outs after the workout.


Jockey & Trainer;

Twisted Tom will be ridden by Javier Castellano, who, based on his 4 straight year-end Eclipse awards for outstanding jockey, is probably the best in the business in today's racing. But he's also a rider who has had plenty of Belmont success over the years having won the Belmont spring riding title in 2013, 2014, and 2015, as well as the fall meet in 2011, 2013, and 2016. He's currently sitting 5th in overall Belmont wins this spring meet with 21, but is 2nd in winning percentage at 21%

https://www.nyra.com/belmont/leaders/jockeys

Castellano's having a good meet at Belmont so far, but it's nothing compared to the meet that Twisted Tom's trainer, Chad Brown, has been having with Chad having entered 69 horses so far in races at the track and winning with 23 of them. An outstanding 33% win rate and 62% top 3 rate.

https://www.nyra.com/belmont/leaders/trainers

After having just won the Preakness a couple of weeks ago with Cloud Computing all I can say is... Stay hot Chad! At least for one more weekend thank you. But speaking of Cloud Computing I think it's quite telling that Chad elected to enter Twisted Tom in this race instead of the Preakness winner. Ditto when it comes to a horse like the undefeated Timeline, who just won the traditional Belmont prep race a few weeks back when he took Peter Pan and may end up being the most talented horse in this year's crop when all is said and done. Cloud Computing, Timeline and Twisted Tom are all trained by Chad Brown yet the trainer is electing to bypass this race with both the Preakness and Peter Pan winners (who'd each be amongst the top 2 or 3 favourites if entered and give him a strong chance to win) in favour of some unknown longshot like Twisted Tom? Hmm, I wonder why. At 15/1 or even 20/1 I'm very anxious to find out. $$$$$
 
Always enjoy this guy making a fool of himself with his sore loser rant and his idiotic idea. What was sad is that a lot of dumb people were agreeing with him without bothering to think about how damaging his idea would have been to horse racing.

 
The post positions and morning line odds for the Belmont Stakes;

1 - Twisted Tom 20/1
2 - Tapwrit 6/1
3 - Gormley 8/1
4 - J Boys Echo 15/1
5 - Hollywood Handsome 30/1
6 - Lookin At Lee 5/1
7 - Irish War Cry 7/2
8 - Senior Investment 12/1
9 - Meantime 15/1
10 - Multiplier 15/1
11 - Epicharis 4/1
12 - Patch 12/1


Classic Empire was supposed to enter the race, but he was scratched this morning due to coming down with another foot abscess. That sucks since he was going to be an easy play against for me as the heavy favourite. Oh well. We got what we got, and there's enough to work with this field.
 
If my count is right, 10 of the 13 races at Belmont on Saturday will be graded stakes races with 6 of them being G1's. Included is the return of Songbird in the G1 Phipps. Fantastic day of racing all around. I'd say it's 2nd only to the Breeders Cup in North America when it comes to overall quality of the card (Travers day right up there too). Hopefully we can cash a few tickets on the day.
 
Sharkey said:
The post positions and morning line odds for the Belmont Stakes;

1 - Twisted Tom 20/1
2 - Tapwrit 6/1
3 - Gormley 8/1
4 - J Boys Echo 15/1
5 - Hollywood Handsome 30/1
6 - Lookin At Lee 5/1
7 - Irish War Cry 7/2
8 - Senior Investment 12/1
9 - Meantime 15/1
10 - Multiplier 15/1
11 - Epicharis 4/1
12 - Patch 12/1


Classic Empire was supposed to enter the race, but he was scratched this morning due to coming down with another foot abscess. That sucks since he was going to be an easy play against for me as the heavy favourite. Oh well. We got what we got, and there's enough to work with this field.
Click to expand...

Hey Sharkey, do you think Twisted Tom drawing the first post position is going to benefit him in this race? He was sitting at +1400 this morning at 5dimes and I'm glad I didn't pull the trigger. Looks like we should be able to get him at a better price than that.
 
t6p said:
Hey Sharkey, do you think Twisted Tom drawing the first post position is going to benefit him in this race? He was sitting at +1400 this morning at 5dimes and I'm glad I didn't pull the trigger. Looks like we should be able to get him at a better price than that.
Click to expand...

It's not going to hurt him, T, as he obviously should get a ground saving trip the whole way, and besides Gormley, there's not really much early speed to his outside that should impede him in any way. But saying that, considering distance, expected pace, and the track, a horse's post position should have little to do with the final result of this race. All 12 horses should have a fair shot to get whatever early positioning they want regardless of where they've drawn.
 
t6p said:
Hey Sharkey, do you think Twisted Tom drawing the first post position is going to benefit him in this race? He was sitting at +1400 this morning at 5dimes and I'm glad I didn't pull the trigger. Looks like we should be able to get him at a better price than that.
Click to expand...

Most people still make the mistake of handicapping the Belmont like it's any other race, T, and use conventional tools like the BSF or what have you. Things that don't matter much if even at all. Here's the truth. The Belmont is going to be a slowly ran race regardless and if the guys gave out accurate or true BSF for the recent runnings of the race then we'd see most winners run it with something in the 80's or even the 70's on occasion. If I'm remembering right, Creator's true BSF in winning the Belmont last year was something like a 76 or thereabouts. But they bump it way up year after year to help everyone save face just because it's a classic race at the G1 level. It doesn't matter how fast a horse ran in a previous race at a much shorter distance because nobody is going to run fast in the Belmont. All that matters is how far a horse can run on that particular day at the track, and with that you take into account the horse's pedigree, running style, visual impression, condition (coming in fresh or could the horse be fatigued from recent racing?), and things like that. We've seen a lot of comparitively prettty slow animals run really well in the Belmont over the last decade or so (Commissioner, Lani, Ruler On Ice, Atigun, Da'Tara, Incognito, Drosselmeyer, etc) and a few of those even won the race. They didn't do it by suddenly getting faster. They were able to finish well because they were able to stay on better than most if not all of the horses they were competing against. Ruler On Ice and Da'Tara combined to go 1 for 22 in their traditional distance races after they posted Belmont wins with just 1 little allowance win to their credit. They weren't much good going into the Belmont either. But for one race in their career they were able to run further than everyone else in their respective fields and were able to nab a classic G1 win to their credit.
 
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