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Crist Blog | July 29, 2007

Mid-Jim Dandy Day

--The mystery of the track-record Whitney clocking has yet to be solved definitively. Randy Moss of ESPN and Beyer Associates writes that he believes the time is accurate based on timing the replays, while Steve Davidowitz, an expert clocker who has gallantly led the 34-year crusade to correct the official time of Secretariat's Preakness, came up with a slower time while hand-timing a low-quality video feed, as noted in his comment.

There really are only two possibilities here: Either the time is wrong or the condition of the track changed drastically between the Whitney and the Go For Wand. There is simply no plausible way that the Whitney was legitimately 2.5 seconds and 24+ Beyer points faster than the Go For Wand. The strongest argument for thinking the time is incorrect is the bizarrely fast third quarter of 22.91 into the turn. The strongest argument for thinking the track changed is that this happens a lot in New York, where the track is often worked on after the first race of the day, which often does not fit with the rest of the card, and before stakes races.

Either way, Beyer has awarded Lawyer Ron with a provisional winning figure of 116, which makes a lot more sense than a figure of 125 or higher that the raw times suggested. I still have trouble believing Lawyer Ron ran the fastest nine furlongs in the history of Saratoga on a day when the track was not unusually fast. Perhaps there was a wormhole in the space-time continuum.

I'm fascinated to see how other figuremakers such as the Sheets's Len Ragozin and Thoro-Graph's Jerry Brown deal with the race. Brown is a strong proponent of treating races on the same card differently due to changes during the day, What will really be fun is to see what the faux "speed figures" that appear in some publications, calculated by computer without human intervention, will come up with. Either Lawyer Ron will get the biggest figure in racing history or Ginger Punch will be downgraded to a $40k claimer,

And to the commenter who suggested that the entire question about the time and figure had anything to do with anyone's pre-race picks or opinions, you could not be more wrong. I grant that we figuremakers are a geeky, fussy, obsessive breed, but the goal is always to get things right, not to justify pre-existing opinions. Whatever figure one assigns to Lawyer Ron has nothing to do with the obvious fact that he ran a huge race that puts him atop the nation's handicap horses.

As for Sunday:

--J Z Warrior's 10-length victory in the second race at a generous $8.40 cast laurels on the race she came out of while casting further doubt on the true quality of the seemingly fast 4 1/2-furlong juvenile races run at Churchill Downs this summer. Cozy Mesa flopped Thursday exiting one of those races and here Jolie The Cat was a false favorite coming out of the same race. While Subtle Aly won the Schuylerville coming out of one of those events, her figure declined from a 97 to a 75 doing so. So beware of those Churchill races, which might not be quite as fast as they first looked. As for J Z Warrior, she emerged from the fast-early fast-late race at Belmont July 29 won by According to Plan, who disappointed in the Schuylerville but had a legit excuse after stumbling badly at the start.

--Maybe I'm making the Jim Dandy too complicated and you're just supposed to single Street Sense as an odds-on layover, but I can't shake the feeling that this is purely a prep for the Travers and that his connections couldn't care less about winning today. Carl Nafzger's m.o. --with Unbridled, Unshaded and Street Sense -- has long been to be a little short in the prep while leaving something in the tank for the major goal. Unbridled lost to stablemate Home At Last one start before winning the BC Classic, Unshaded ran a blah Jim Dandy before winning the Travers, and Street Sense lost a four-way photo against the likes of Dominican and Teufelsburg before winning the Derby.

But where do you turn? Second choice Tiz Wonderful tiz a wonderfully talented horse but going a mile and eighth in stakes company off an eight-month layoff is one tough assignment. (According to the stats in Formulator, Steve Asmussen is an impressive 11-for-56 over the last five years bringing horses back from 180-day or longer layoffs in routes, but none of those was in a stakes race.) The four others have their shortcomings but I can't confidently draw a line through any of them. None of them appears to have much chance of beating Street Sense or Curlin in the Travers, so this may BE their Travers, whereas Street Sense is merely tuning up.

--It never fails: Go out of your way to knock an uninspiring favorite in a race where you love a longshot and they run 1-2 in the wrong order. At this morning's Siro's seminar, Andy Serling and I both liked Pat Kelly longshot Stormy Winter in the 4th but couldn't leave well enough alone and had to express our disdain for the Bobby Flay-owned, Todd Pletcher-trained Sophie's Salad. The Sophie's Salad-Stormy Winter exacta returned $100.50.

Posted by Steven Crist Jul 29, 2007 2:49:54 PM | Permalink

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