First of all, as far as the Derby Trial goes, ouch indeed.

Albany (some of my best friends are from Albany)-- what Frankel has jumped on, probably because it reinforced opinions he already had, is the sheets concept of spacing races, especially off efforts. He also has used Ragozin for some private buys, most of which he has moved up. Ahem.

Frankel is a smart guy, and he presumably has used sheets as a way to keep his horses running against slower horses when possible, but when you are dealing with top horses, some spots are pre-ordained. How you get there is not.

Your thinking about fast horses bouncing is what defined my play last year. I said that the winner would almost certainly come from a group of 4 horses (two of which ran 1-2), but I didn't use SJ because I thought he would go back from the two big negative efforts, and was relatively short. This year the ones off big numbers are coming in with very unusual aspects-- extra rest, no 2yo tops, etc. Very tough race.

I'm going home.



TGJB