Regarding BR's Wood figure, this was a situation that goes straight to the figure making comments I made here recently. The problem is not just how you deal with BR and Survivalist, it's also how do you deal with all those horses behind them. We posted the race here before-- you can find it with a search for "Wood" and "attached"-- and you will see what the options were. Not that it matters, but this is a time it fit with the sprints, and I added 3 relative to the other 2 turn race. Andy did it the same as I did, Len about a point slower-- and I would very much like to see him post full sheets for that race. It would be very interesting, considering how fast they had the New York 3yo preps-- in their Derby probables package they had Scrappy T going back 8 points and Survivalist back 2 1/2 off a pair in Florida, and they were 8 clear of the next horse, so the rest have to be going back 10-15 points or more.

Re Riva Ridge, who won the first Derby I ever bet, shortly after I joined Ragozin-- keep in mind that not only was he a 4yo when he set that record, but as I said in "Are Racehorses Getting Faster", the track wasn't nearly as deep then (cushion was 2 1/2 inches then, 3 1/2 now), and the track had a higher clay to sand ratio, making it faster when dry than the current soil.



TGJB