The Ponies Thread (part 2)

It really looks like a debt from sacrifices made last summer will be paid in full next Saturday.
 
What do you think @t6p? I may be out of my mind since I've not seen one other person mention this. But there are certainly some dots that could be connected here;









 
Sharkey said:
What do you think @t6p? I may be out of my mind since I've not seen one other person mention this. But there are certainly some dots that could be connected here;









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Let me take a look at those videos in the next day or two and get back to you bud.
 
t6p said:
Let me take a look at those videos in the next day or two and get back to you bud.
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I'll try to explain it without the videos, T, and then you can call me nuts afterwards for thinking a past debt might be collected this race.

Last year's Belmont;

Justify - owned by WinStar, trained by Baffert
Restoring Hope - owned by the Wests, trained by Baffert, and ridden by Florent Geroux

This year's Derby;

Improbable - owned by WinStar and trained by Baffert
Game Winner - owned by the Wests and trained by Baffert
Maximum Security - owned by the Wests
Roadster - trained by Baffert and ridden by Geroux

Omaha Beach is the favourite and likes to run on or close to the early pace. Maximum Security is also a horse that likes to be on or close to the lead. Improbable's last workout (in the video) saw him being urged to run faster early than late in the workout and he did (11.80, 11.60, 12.20, 12.40 were his splits for the 4f work). Baffert's two other runners, Roadster and Game Winner, have shown that they like to come off the pace a little bit in their races.

Baffert is known as the best race "tactician" in the game as far as trainers go. WinStar is also not above resorting to "tactics" themselves as seen in last year's Belmont, and also the 2016 Arkansas Derby and Belmont which a couple of you guys took advantage of (Gettysburg).
 
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Sharkey said:
I'll try to explain it without the videos, T, and then you can call me nuts afterwards for thinking a past debt might be collected this race.

Last year's Belmont;

Justify - owned by WinStar, trained by Baffert
Restoring Hope - owned by the Wests, trained by Baffert, and ridden by Florent Geroux

This year's Derby;

Improbable - owned by WinStar and trained by Baffert
Game Winner - owned by the Wests and trained by Baffert
Maximum Security - owned by the Wests
Roadster - trained by Baffert and ridden by Geroux

Omaha Beach is the favourite and likes to run on or close to the early pace. Maximum Security is also a horse that likes to be on or close to the lead. Improbable's last workout (in the video) saw him being urged to run faster early than late in the workout and he did (11.80, 11.60, 12.20, 12.40 were his splits for the 4f work). Baffert's two other runners, Roadster and Game Winner, have shown that they like to come off the pace a little bit in their races.

Baffert is known as the best race "tactician" in the game as far as trainers go. WinStar is also not above resorting to "tactics" themselves as seen in last year's Belmont, and also the 2016 Arkansas Derby and Belmont which a couple of you guys took advantage of (Gettysburg).
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Alright Shark, I've watched all the videos and read your explanation at least 10 times, haha. I think you're saying that we should be looking at Game Winner and Roadster?
 
t6p said:
Alright Shark, I've watched all the videos and read your explanation at least 10 times, haha. I think you're saying that we should be looking at Game Winner and Roadster?
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I'm thinking there could be some tactics/shenanigans that would benefit those two along with a couple of others, T, yes, yes I am. I ran all the horses through a preliminary look with my program last week, and both were ranked top 5 in both pace balance and counter energy. Game Winner was ranked 2nd in both I believe from what I remember, although maybe 3rd in one. But that was also looking at it without a full look as some of the stuff for the horses couldn't be inputted yet like track time and things like that.
 
E1 - E2 - LP and SPD ratings for this guy's races;

91-100-90 and 97 (+5) Patterns much?
77-88-94 and 92
-----
77-94-105 and 101 (+6)
74-89-102 and 95 (+4)
97-93-92 and 91 (+2)
99-96-87 and 89

This guy was also one of the top 5 counter energy horses when I took a first look last week. He'll also probably be in the 25/1 or 30/1 range in the Derby unless his name gets bet a little.

 
Roadster;

93-94-98 and 98
86-86-104 and 96
-----
84-88-101 and 95
93-98-93 and 96

This pattern isn't as positive as those other two since the pace figures came in the horse's best race of his career so far. But because it was just barely his best race (2 poits) and also because there's very little separating his best effort from his worst (3 point spread), the pattern has to be considered a positive.
 
Sharkey said:
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Since he's in the video here's Tacitus;

91-100-101 and 103
78-87-100 and 95
-----
79-79-93 and 85
96-100-84 and 93

Big negative as far as his pace patterns go, as he improved his pace numbers across the board compared to his 1st start of current form cycle. Big negative as far as his final speed ratings go as well since that was a big 8 point jump with a lot of development in such a short amount of time. For the record, since 2000, horses who have improved their final figure by 8+ points in their final prep are 0 for 54 in the Derby. i.e. The last race was probably the time for this guy, although the Belmont isn't too far away for him.
 
Sharkey said:
For the record, the top ELD horses who I had ranked in the top half of the field is showing itself by far to be the most impactful for finishing 3rd. I reviewed 268 races yesterday (apx half of what I have saved), and the the top ELD horse which is also ranked in my top half finished exactly 3rd in 97 of them. That's 36.2% of the time. The average field size of all the races I looked at was 7.82, so it's nearly 3 times random. Or, if just sticking to the top half of the field, that's +10.6 % greater than what the average should be for horses ranked that high (1 / 3.91 = 25.6%). The top LP horse who is also ranked in the top half is so far the 2nd most impactful with it finishing exactly 3rd in 78 of those 268 races (29.1%).
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And here's Tax to represent this from above;

EP - 82.7, LP - 69.7, SP - 86.1, TT - 56.2, MP - 86.5, EL - 79.2, DP - 86.7, ELD - 77.4 (best of the top half and in fact the whole field), SF - ?, BT - ?, AC - ?, PP - ?, NF - ?, AVG - ?

93-105-93 and 101 (could be viewed as having the HLS pattern going into the Derby, although the 114 LP he had before is an outlier)
-----
94-103-96 and 102
-----
78-88-114 and 103
79-84-84 and 84
89-82-93 and 83

Hard to see this guy improving at all and thus winning the race. But I won't need him to. Just maintain something similar to what he has been running, get a good early position, run an even energy race around the track like my data says he could, and he looks like a nice priced contender to use underneath in trifectas and supers.
 
Sharkey said:
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Two really nice details about this workout from Win Win Win;

Instant acceleration when given a little push by the jock around the 0:40 mark. And then, best of all, how he tried to bully and boss around the other two in the gallop out around the 1:05 mark, which the horse was doing all by himself.
 
Sharkey said:
For the record, since 2000, horses who have improved their final figure by 8+ points in their final prep are 0 for 54 in the Derby. i.e. The last race was probably the time for this guy, although the Belmont isn't too far away for him.
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1 for 57 actually with Justify accomplishing this last year. Hofburg and Lone Sailor both regressed after their big jumps. I forgot to update it to include last year.
 
I wouldn't bet more than a dozen of these Derby horses with free money. Yuck. I've known who my 5th option is going to be all along, but finding a 6th option for the super is going to be damn near impossible for me I think with so many having already peaked and regressed last time out, have a regressive pattern going into the Derby, are too slow, or are just simply not worth a bet.
 
Sharkey said:
I wouldn't bet more than a dozen of these Derby horses with free money. Yuck. I've known who my 5th option is going to be all along, but finding a 6th option for the super is going to be damn near impossible for me I think with so many having already peaked and regressed last time out, have a regressive pattern going into the Derby, are too slow, or are just simply not worth a bet.
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Mind you, if the 2nd AE can somehow find his way in then I'll be using him as an underneath option for sure. Unlikely scenario that he does get in however.
 
Sharkey said:
Mind you, if the 2nd AE can somehow find his way in then I'll be using him as an underneath option for sure. Unlikely scenario that he does get in however.
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Signalman;

102-111-80 and 97
82-91-82 and 87
-----
99-97-90 and 95
92-102-93 and 99
85-85-86 and 85
90-88-86 and 84

EP - 83.9, LP - 69.1, SP - 85.7, TT - 55.1, MP - 85.8, EL - 79.2, DP - 85.5, ELD - 78.3, SF - ?, BT - ?, AC - ?, PP - ?, NF - ?, AVG - ?

Has the NPT, E2, and LET pace patterns, as well as profiling as the best even energy horse in the race should he get in. For a horse who'd probably be 40/1 or higher if he did manage to get in the race? Oh well. There's always the stinking Preakness where 20/1 will have to do.



 
If interested in betting the favourite, Omaha Beach, check out some of the stats Jerry Brown of ThoroGraph (he's the founder and owner of TG) has for you at the 0:40 and 1:40 mark of the following video;



According to Jerry's own data, from 1995 to 2016, horses who had 4 or more prep races heading into the Derby have seen 85 run an X race in the Derby, 37 run an off race, 29 managed to pair up their tops, while only 7 ran a new top. That's out of 158 starters, so more than half regressed badly in the Derby with that amount of prep races.

Also, from 1995 to 2017 according to Jerry's data, 69 runners came into the Derby having ran a new top by 3 or more points in their final prep. Of those, 43 of them ran an X race in the Derby, 13 ran an off race, 9 managed to pair up, and only 4 ran a new top. Nearly two-thirds regressed badly in the Derby.

Omaha Beach is coming into the Derby having ran in 4 prep races this year and coming into this race after having jumped 4 1/2 points on his TG figure. There's only been one other horse who went on to win the Derby with having a 4+ point jump in their final prep, and that was Charismatic in 1999, who also jumped up 4 1/2 points his race before the Derby. But he was 30/1 or something like that. Not 3/1, 7/2 like Omaha Beach is likely to be on Saturday.

My own preliminary look at my data saw Omaha Beach as only being slightly above average compared to the rest of the field in both the pace balance and counter energy categories (7th - 9th range for both from memory). I'll be able to finalize all that tomorrow once posts are drawn and final PP's come out. His rankings are not likely to change much based on what I saw with my early look, though.

Plus, I'm a nut who likes conspiracies apparently.

Get and keep that early aggressiveness boy!

 
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