It looks like we had a lot of horses jumped up in their final Derby preps this year. So what can we expect from them in the Derby itself?

I used the same method as I used to look at the "2 preps or less" and "more than 28 days" questions to see what the "facts" tell us.

I compared the "big jump in final Derby prep" sample to the "did not jump" sample to compare them using the TG stat categories of top/pair/off/X and I looked at all the Derbies for 1997 to 2004. (I did not have any complete sheets before 1997. Sheets from 1997 through 2004 are available in the TG archives.)

Note that I defined a "Big Jump" as a new top that is 3 or more points better than the previous top. I also limited the sample only to horses with a top of 5 or better (this only eliminated a couple of slow horses).

The sample size for the "Big Jump" group is small (only 20) but the results are so striking that I think they provide some definite insight.

Here are the results:

First for the "NO big Jump" group (sample size of 111):

New top: 7%
Pair: 28%
Off: 30%
X: 35%

And, now ...drum roll please... here are the results for the "Big Jump" group (sample size of 20):

New top: 5%
Pair: 5%
Off: 15%
X: 75%

Wow! Only 1 horse ran a new top (Proud Citizen) and only 1 paired his top (Charismatic) – note that both were trained by Lukas. That is it. All the others crashed and burned on Derby Day. Some prominent names from top barns included: Indian Charlie, Stephen Got Even, War Chant, Millenium Wind, Indian Express, Tapit, The Cliff's Edge and Ten Most Wanted.

I will let you all draw your own conclusions but many of the favorites in this year's Derby were likely big jumpers including Bellamy Road, Afleet Alex and Bandini, which could make this a very challenging Derby to handicap.

Cheers.

Chris

P.S. I am sure someone will ask specifically about those that jumped to a negative fig. There were only 2 and both X'd (Millenium Wind and The Cliff's Edge).