Re: The OTB breeding #s (612 Views)
Posted by:
toppled (IP Logged)
Date: April 29, 2007 10:59PM
I know it worked for years, but didn't work that well in the Giacomo and Smarty Jones Derbies. I don't recall the #s and whether they were below 9-I think Smarty wasn't anywhere as low as Street Sense, but there were a lot higher #s. Still, Smarty was so much faster than the rest, it really didn't come down to breeding. Giacomo was the only one I remember who had a low number (I don't recall what it was,but it was in the bottom 3 and possibly the lowest, I really didn't know about the 9 cutoff until this year so I never paid attention before) but that race defied just about every handicapping angle other than started working out better in the mornings and ran the race of his life. This year the #s are so close, I'm taking breeding into account more to separate them, so I'm paying closer attention to the details of the #s. Last year the method was a great success. Barbaro had a good #, but I had Barbaro more on class and a pattern I liked that made me think he was explosive. I didn't bother using Bluegrass Cat even though his breeding # was good, because I tossed him off his Bluegrass-my mistake. The OTB guy loved Barbaro last year & I'm sure he cashed an exacta because he loved Bluegrass Cat's breeding. I don't think 10f breeding can speed up a slow horse, but lack of it can slow down a fast horse when the #s we're looking at are at shorter distances. I didn't bet the Derby the year Smarty Jones won it, so I'm not sure what I would have done if I had analyzed it.
The way he does it he goes back multiple generations on both sides of the horse's lineage assigns a # to the sire and specific mare and averages them. For example: Any Given Saturday-Sire 10.0, mare 8.60 ave 9.30. I don't have the breakdown for Street Sense since I wasn't watching the show that day when he gave all the details, so I only have the total #. This year he did detailed study on all but the last 4 he did-Teuflesberg, Zanjero, Sam P and Storm In May-those he did a shorter lineage check going back less generations.