BitPlayer Wrote:
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> I think that puts him in the lead in two-turn
> Beyer clubhouse. While the figure may be right,
> there are certainly questions about how predictive
> it will prove. Gulfstream seemed to be
> speed-friendly yesterday, and Maximum Security was
> allowed to set relatively slow fractions.
>
> How late did Maximum Security get bet? I had him
> at 7-1 off the doubles, and he was about that in
> the early betting.

It came in right at the last minute. He was 6-1 just as the horses were about to enter the gate, then dropped to 9/2 in the next flash.

The drop was interesting from several aspects:

(1) It was a significant drop, especially considering the size of the win pool (you don’t often see moves like that in big events like this).
(2) Every other horse in the field drifted higher in the last flash with the exception of Union’s Destiny, a longshot whose odds dropped modestly (42-1 to 36-1, basically just noise).
(3) He dropped well below his 7-1 Will Pays odds at the last minute rather than drifting slightly upwards towards those implied odds as would have been expected.

Agree on the question of how much to read into his performance going forward.

To my mind, this was another race that hinged on how the pace played out. The question going in was whether it was going to be a hot pace, with Hidden Scroll and the stretching sprinters -- Max Security and the two cheaper ones (Hard Belle, Bodexpress) -- all vying for the lead.

This was an especially intriguing question considering the scuttlebutt around Hidden Scroll and whether they were working to try to get him to rate, most likely because of what happened in the FOY, even though he was clearly the main speed in this race, breaking from the rail, and with three stone-cold closers (Current, Wallbanger, Bourbon War) to his immediate outside.

The entire complexion of the race changed when Hidden Scroll did in fact end up rating. And when the two longshot stretching sprinters weren’t hell-bent on the lead either, that left Max Security on the lead at a comfortable pace. #serviswithasmile

Once the half went up in 48.98 (and the quarter in 24.42), the race was all but over. The deepest closers (ie. Bourbon War) were the most compromised - there was no way they were going to be able to close into that kind of leisurely pace and make up ground on a frontrunner like Max Security who has a faster turn-of-foot and plenty left in the tank.

Hidden Scroll’s performance is tougher to gage going forward. Perhaps he fell victim to what seems to happen to so many horses when you take them out of their game and try to change their natural running style. Or maybe that -2(neg) debut in the slop was too taxing. Or maybe he just freaked in the slop that day (as many horses sometimes do, often inexplicably), and he really isn’t as good as that promising debut effort suggested.