Derby Trail Forums - A question for the handicappers

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Quote:

Originally Posted by pick4

Dutrow Jr. hired the "best blacksmith" there is in Ian McKinlay. I'm a handicapper and a fan of racing so I'm definately not an expert on equine maintenance. However since Dutrow Jr. says the horse is A OK and the 1/4 crack is not a big deal. McKinlay says this 1/4 crack is not a big deal. I have to believe the experts on this one. The IEAH crowd are total scumbags and part of me wants them to run Big Brown and lose. But I think he's going to win the Belmont. We'll remember the horse down the road and not the 3/4owners and their hanger ons.

okay. inspired by this non sequitur i'll add this.

i'm not a serious handicapper having given up once i realized i was either not smart enough or too lazy. i'm pretty much dead money in the pools.

but i did ride for a while when i wanted to nail this girl who was wasting her life training show arabians and being a hot lipstick lesbian with a fat unattractive girlfriend with a serious personality disorder.

i thought a lot of myself at the time and considered the possibility she would give up munching carpet for me a real possibility. the fact i had a dick didn't seem a real handicap when compared to a bipolar bisexual whale.

as it turned out she was, in fact, a lesbian.

at this point, i should have realized i wasn't a good handicapper. but it took a few more years afterwards.

nonetheless, i did ride. just not what i wanted.

As a kid I rode at summer camps and continued riding into my 20's. I haven't been on a horse in decades, but expect to be on one this summer at a National Park when my 14-yr-old son has his first riding experience. Looking forward to it.

--Dunbar

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShadowRoll

First, horses listen only because they want to listen. They can be as obstreperous and resentful or as obliging and content as any person. They won't do, and you can't make them do, anything they don't want to do.

this is a point that I think MANY "handicappers" and certainly casual fans overlook.....they forget that that horse is not a machine, when jockeys are getting hammered for bad rides sometimes I think it is just that they might be on a difficult horse to ride (not always--I'm not forgiving some of the stupidity that goes on out there)....anyone who hasn't sat on a horse just can't grasp what it is like to finesse (because you can't out muscle) an 1100 pound animal.

as far as the quarter crack...they can be minor and they can be debilitating, from the reports out of BB's camp it would seem that his is minor.

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Indomitable DrugS

I gave up riding when I turned 8.

are you mailing CJ some socks?

Quote:

Originally Posted by paisjpq

Well said...

From a person who watches his wife
ride and handle the animals. And who has been
scraped off and wont get back up ever again...
witnessed so many personality traits in
so many different animals.
And the jocks just get up on them and sometimes
just figure have to figure them out on the fly.

I started riding behind our neighbor girl on a working Quarter Horse when I was 3. A few years later we moved off the farm and I had to be content with trail rides at riding stables, on grade horses. Then when I started grad school at the University of Kentucky I took hunt seat lessons for my "PhysEd" type exercise, something new for this Minnesota girl. Started doing some dressage, cavaletti work, that sort of thing; a couple of the horses were TBs and former racehorses - one of my favorites was Papa, aka Swing Papa (ch 1960 by Papa Redbird-Swing Again, by Sun Again, one time placed in 19 starts).

After a few years, the dissertation took over my life, I got married, got my PhD, had kids..., When my boy was 8 or so, he started taking riding lessons and was doing well, but then riding lessons began to conflict with soccer games, so I took over his spot for a year or so. Got to jumping obstacles a couple of feet high around the hunter course. That stopped when we went on sabbatical the last time and I never picked it up again. Always had a touch of exercise-induced asthma, so could never get really serious about it, but greatly enjoyed riding whenever I could.

Who knew you could get a doctorate in BS.

God, you learn something every day on the internet.

Quote:

Originally Posted by hoovesupsideyourhead

drugs mom is hot

No doubt.....I've met her. She's everything DrugS is not.

Quote:

Originally Posted by philcski

I ride, very badly I might add, thankfully the horse I ride knows that and takes care of me.

Or he's too chunky to want to move fast :D

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShadowRoll

Not sure I fit your specifications, since I'm as much of a fan as a handicapper, but here goes.

Before last summer, I'd never been on a horse before, was even a little scared of them. But I live in a county in Pennsylvania that's real horse country -- more thoroughbreds than any other PA county, plenty of farms with connections to famous horses (e.g., Barbaro, Smarty Jones), I even think Michael Matz lives in my township -- so I thought it incumbent upon me, given all the opportunities, to find out what it was like to ride.

I signed up for this short (8 weekends?) riding course at one of the local farms. Although the actual teaching was conducted mostly by teenage girls, which didn't instill me with a lot of confidence, they had us doing low jumps by the third lesson. I generally rode a retired racehorse, which was pretty cool. I never fell off, but came close a few times. There were a couple of things I thought I undertsood, intellectually, about horses, but which I came to realize that I could only really appreciate, viscerally, by experiencing them.

First, horses listen only because they want to listen. They can be as obstreperous and resentful or as obliging and content as any person. They won't do, and you can't make them do, anything they don't want to do.

Second, jockies are crazy mf'ers. Horses are so big and powerful, and their reflexes so much quicker than humans, that any feeling of being secure in the saddle is only an illusion. A jock is really no more in control than a leaf riding a dust devil.

As far as handicapping, I guess I'm a lot more aware that these animals aren't black boxes, and that their performances can be as much a result of the vagaries of their mood as of their ability. This has made me more willing to discount isolated bad performances and more willing to give further consideration to horses I might have otherwise cursorily written off as non-contenders. It's also made me appreciate how a good trainer -- one that keeps the horse healthy and happy -- can improve performance. No matter how bad the recent form, I pay close attention when a horse is claimed back by a trainer that was more successful with the animal in the past, especially when there's a little time off before the next start. Also, as was said above, being able to observe at close range the body language of horses, which I'd previously only read about, has been helpful.

low jumps by the 3rd lesson?!
Enjoyable post...especially the part about the horses only listening because they want to. :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by blackthroatedwind

Who knew you could get a doctorate in BS.

.

Actually, it is in a mathematical discipline. Nonparametric statistical models. And I got the BS (Bachelor of Science) BEFORE I went to grad school, in mathematics, at Caltech.