Off the top of my head...
Sunday Silence
Skip Away
Seattle Slew
Kelso

None of these had a ton of starts as 2 yos. All went on to have very solid 3 yo and older years. Don't really follow Lumpy's reasoning on why the current training and running patterns are ruinous, but all things go in cycles. Right now it is more beneficial to retire early for stud value. That will eventually change as it becomes less attractive. Then you will see more horses raced -- and bred to race -- into their 4 yo and 5 yo seasons.

Looking at the performances of the horses in the thirties, forties, and fifties, I must say that I believe the biggest culprit of unsoundness in the breed are the track surfaces themselves. For example, Man O' War ran two to three seconds slower than the horses do today, and still broke world records at the time. Yet, maiden claimers can run faster nowadays. It is all about speed and new records.

Also, I think drugs and medications as well as the two year old in training sells cause more horses to be unsound and break down.

Now, there is a possibility that the breed may be slightly weaker than it was seventy years ago, but I don't think that is the factor. Of course, if you breed an unsound horse to an unsound horse, the most likely result is going to be an unsound horse especially if both of these horses are prepotent, but genetics don't always work like that. Species evolve gradually, and seventy years is not enough to cause the breed to be considerably weaker. Also, I believe that the trainers are as good as they have ever been.

With that being said, horses have always been unsound and have broke down. I just don't think it happened quite as often seventy years ago, but who knows. Every once in a while, we get a horse that can run like those in the past here in the states. Look at Lawyer Ron, and Cigar. Sure Lawyer Ron had a surgery, but he is back on the track and winning. You also have lots of claimers and allowance horses who run quite often without injuries as well.

It's facts like this that lead me to believe that Phalaris and BB are on the right side of this argument. The breed hasn't changed THAT much in 20 years. Horses used to run on 2-3 weeks rest (or even shorter) routinely. Have trainers REALLY gotten so much smarter in the last 20 years?

I don't think current trainers are either dumber or smarter than those 20 years ago. (Hell, many of the best today were training 20 years ago.) I think it's more a factor of what's fashionable (and follow the leader). It's only natural to fear making a mistake. If your horse is injured in a race, you are more likely to be harshly judged if the horse ran recently than if it ran after a big break. Yet I doubt there is any real evidence to support that judgement.

Rupert questions why ALL the best trainers today favor more spacing between races. It's a good question. But if it turns out that good horses run just as well on 2-3 weeks rest, it wouldn't be the first time that a whole group of the leaders of some endeavor were found to be taking a non-optimal approach.

--Dunbar

Worth mentioning also is that no fewer than eight horses who won the Preakness between 1950 and 1962 had their final prep in a race scheduled between the Derby and Preakness. There actually used to be an event, the "Preakness Prep," run at Pimlico in the week before the race. There was the modern two-week interval between the races except in 1953-1955, and in those years, when there was a three-week gap, most Preakness starters had run in at least one race since the date of the Derby. Not only did these eight winners run in these races, seven of them had multiple workouts between the dates of the Derby and Preakness. (Many of them were significant workouts, too, like Hill Prince's 5f in 59 4/5 the day before the Withers on the Saturday between the Derby and Preakness or Native Dancer's 6f in 1:11 3/5 two days before the Preakness.)

In Man O' War's day ...

... there were no starting gates ... and horses were timed ... by hand ... from a standing start.

Today ... they break from gates ... are timed electronically ... and have a running start to the first timer beam.

Absolutely right.

As I said in an earlier post on this thread ... the objectives of trainers have changed ...

... today it's shoot for one big score ... then begin syndication negotiations.

Trainers today are in a different business than trainers were 25 years ago and more ... and I repeat ... it's killing the sport.

Thanks ... I had forgotten about the Preakness Prep ...

... the sport has lost much of its professionalism.

This thread just makes me think about how the career of Afleet Alex would have turned out if he had not been injured in the Preakness (yes he was injured in the Preakness). Tim Ritchey was training him like an old time trainer and it seemed to be working. Improving bone density, tendons, muscles and the overall horses foundation was part of his theory. Everybody thought he was nuts but he didn't cave in to the pressure. It's not easy to do. I'm also wondering if anybody has read the late Tom Ivers book "The Fit Racehorse". It dealt with a lot of this. I can't say I bought into everything that Ivers said in the book but a lot of it seemed to make sense and it made you think.

This thread needs more fart jokes!! Ha Ha:)

Re-read what you just wrote and consider why this is not a creditible argument . Man O' War is NOT an example of horses of the thirties, forties and fifties ... Actual times from the past can be scientifically adjusted to allow for walkup starts, track bias, and perhaps, iron shoes . Some studies indicate that the horses of the past---and even further back than you mention, were actually faster than their recorded times indicate . As far as today's trainers vs those of yesterday, there were good and bad then and now, but today's training does focus on the big event, and major marketing influences where and when a good horse will race . Totally agree with BB and Phalaris ...

Yes, I agree with this...and I actually love the way Ritchey trained Alex. There definitely seems to be a postive correlation between the way Ritchey trained Alex, and Alex's bone density. I must read that book by Tom Ivers.

Well, I totally disagree with you. I know that Man O' War ran before the thirties...I was just using him as an example. So, then you don't think that it is the track surfaces. Funny, because those that actually run horses on the surfaces are very likely to disagree with you. Everything nowadays is about speed and new records. That is why it is so hard to keep horses sound on the California racetracks, and the California racetracks have become speedways. They weren't speedways a long time ago...not like they are today. Let someone like Rupert enlighten you if you want to argue with me. I know that he knows a lot better than you do.

Yes, BB, I know this, but the fact is that the tracks are now speedways. Everyone wants to see new records. Unsoudness problems is why the Cali tracks are turning to polytrack, and why so many trainers are now endorsing it.

Honey ... you need to get your facts straighter before embarrassing yourself so consistently.

The peak speed period for California tracks was from the mid-1950s through the late 1960's.

They've been slowed since then ... sometimes just a little bit and sometimes quite considerably.

See my prior response ...

... this is getting to be more than just embarrassing ...

... you're on the verge of becoming a complete bore.

At the end of the day, I agree. I don't believe that modern trainers are idiots. They are charged with producing successful horses based on a different paradigm than previous times. People want one-time brilliance, or a few easy romps unmarred by defeats. Therefore, there is a modern tendency to make every start count. The traditional idea of a "prep race," a race in which a horse runs to gauge its current form and fitness and to tighten it up for an upcoming target race, is utterly obsolete and foreign. You don't see in-form, high-class horses running in allowance races anymore and now, we're starting to see them skip stakes races seen as preliminary to the races that matter. BB and I recall times when the best horses ran in the Woodward, Marlboro Cup AND Jockey Club Gold Cup; just one of many series of once-prominent races that have diminished (or disappeared entirely) due to lack of interest. Ironically, now that there are many times the number of stakes races as there were a few decades ago, a given stakes-caliber horse will run in fewer of them. The inevitable result: the handful of best horses are spread among several races, creating poor fields with one or two good horses up against a few lower-quality animals who have nothing to lose in showing up and being beaten.

The "make every start count" theory of racing and training horses not only dictates avoiding minor races or serious competition for as long as possible, it also requires avoiding anything that might prove a challenge for their horse. Some of us remember when serious handicap horses ran in Carter Handicap and Met Mile, because it wasn't assumed that a horse capable of getting 10 or 12 furlongs was utterly incapable of - or at least irretrievably harmed by - running in a race less than 8.5 or 9 furlongs. You saw major turf winners runnning in major races on the dirt, and vice versa. You saw 3YOs taking on older horses and fillies in against open company. Lots of times this resulted in defeat, but when good horses were running 10 or 15 times a year, a defeat or two didn't ruin your resume.

The result was high-class horses with more defeats, but also better, more interesting sport - unless, I suppose, you groove on the idea of a handful of MLB teams playing a half-dozen times a year mainly against collegiate-caliber competition with championships determined at the end by a single inning in a single game against whatever shows up - no playoffs neeeded. Compared to a real baseball season, that's pretty much what horse racing has turned into and there are some of us who lament what has been lost. We're not going to apologize for our feelings on the subject, either.

Current trainers of good horses have a completely different sort of expectation placed upon them and they are sorting themeselves out by those who are best able to spot horses in places where they can win. We can't reasonably accuse them of incompetence for failing to turn out horses of a more traditional mold, because they are not even sort of trying to do so. When (and it is a matter of when) the artificial bubble that is the thoroughbred bloodstock market pops, some of them will convert themselves to a new situation - in which horses are worth what they can earn on the track - just fine, just as many of their horses, trained and campaigned with this in mind, will. I firmly believe that most thoroughbred foals cavorting on a farm somewhere today are capable of much better, and much more, than their older brothers and sisters are producing. The difference is in the intent of those who prepare and campaign them - not necessarily the horsemanship of those people.

They have been slowed a bit, but the part where I refer to them as being speedways (like a car race track; hard like a road) is that they are harder than ever. They don't have a soft surface...that is why they are turning to polytrack.

It is the same with Belmont which was faster during the 70s and 80s than it is today. Although, the horses at Belmont don't nearly have the same soundness issues in terms of quantity as those out in the Cali tracks.

Fact, after installing polytrack at Turfway, 24 breakdowns turned into 3 during the same period of time.

So BB, why did they try to slow the track down after the 80s at Belmont and after the 60s in Cali?

Very defensive and childish . The way you used MOW in your post indicated the he was a horse of the thirties to fifties . A writing problem . I never discounted that today's surfaces are not a part of the problem, but they are not the main problem, IMO . I never proposed an argument . I do not know what " I know he knows a lot better than you do " . First of all, the statement is insensible . Second of all, how do you know what I know ? As much as it pains me to agree with BB, I must say that the word embarassing does apply .

What are you talking about? Practically every horse out out there today does it the right way. The original question had to do with horses winning big races at 2,3, and 4. If there aren't any, then that makes your argument even weaker. It would mean that what I'm saying is not extreme enough. I'm saying that a horse can last and stay in top form as a 2, 3 , and 4 year old if they are raced sparingly. If I am wrong, and a horse can't stay in top form for 3 straight years running sparingly, then they certainly can't stay in top form for 3 years straight running 15 times a year. That's the stupidest thing I ever heard.

Anyway, if you look at the winner of the BC Classics the last few years, horses like Ghostzapper, Saint Liam, and Pleasntly Perfect were all lightly raced. They are even more extreme cases than what I'm talking about. These horses would support the argument that if you want to win the big handicap races, you should run even less often as a young horse than I recommend. It just shows how hard it is to keep horses sound these days. Unlike the old days, horses today are bred for speed rather than soundness.

Ghostzapper was a great horse but he wasn't very sound. Frankel couldn't run him very often. I don't even understand what you are saying. If you have a horse who has an injury, do you think that you can just whale on him and nothing will happen? If you had a sore ankle, what do you think would happen if you went out and sprinted on it? It would obviously get much worse. If you have a horse like Ghostzapper who has soundness issues, you have to treat him with kid gloves. You don't have a choice. If you drill him fast in the morning and try to run him every three weeks, he would last for about one or two races. It's not rocket science. As I said before, if you had a sprained ankle but you were trying to somehow run in a race in a month from now, the best thing for you to do would be to rest the ankle. If you went out and sprinted tomorrow, you would make your ankle worse and you woud lessen your chances of having any chance to make the race next month. With a very high percentage of horses these days, that is the type of thing that trainers are dealing with from day one. The horses are not very sound and you need to be very careful with them. There's not any question as to what would happen if you push them harder. If you push them harder, they will fall apart. There isn't a 99% chance that an unsound horse will get worse the harder you push him. There is a 100% chance. If you have an injury and you ignore the injury and put extreme stress on the injured area, the injury will get worse. There's no doubt about it.

Where to begin ... where to begin ...

First of all ... you're fortunate that I've raised two exceptional children to adulthood ... which has long since helped me acquire the patience and fortitude necessary to deal with someone as wildly immature and unfocused as you.

Second ... if a track surface is too hard ... the solution is to make it softer. This can be accomplished will a nice heaping of good old loam. The question of whether or not to install an artifical surface is a completely different matter.

Third ... tracks which became too hard received complaints from horsemen when their charges began breaking down ... so that's why they were made softer. Of course ... they can't be made too soft because that brings on injuries like bowed tendons. So ... like Goldilocks' bed ... the tracks have to maintained "just right."

Fourth ... if California tracks are harder then ever ... then how at the same time are they softer than they used to be?

Can you begin to understand how wacky your posts are ... how impulsively they're composed ... how self-contradicitng they are ... not only from one to another ... but within themselves?

Child ... you need to get yourself under better control ... or find yourself a big, strong man who'll help you accomplish that.

Where to begin ... where to begin ...

First of all ... you're fortunate that I've raised two exceptional children to adulthood ........ no wait ... that was my last post.

Ummm ... Rupe ... what you're doing is making an assumption that horses who race less frequently are more sound ... and therefore ...

[a] If they run even less frequently ... they'll become even more sound ... and ...

[b] If they run more frequently ... they'll become less sound.

You're using circular reasoning to reinforce a premise which is not only false to begin with ... but which is contadicted by actual experience.

What Phalaris and I have been proposing ... all backed by actual racing history ... is that when horses begin their racing careers earlier ... receiving training and racing appropriate to their individual needs ... they'll become MORE fit ... not LESS fit ...

... and much more able to withstand the rigors of a career as a professional athlete. Do you understand that?

Let's make an imperfect analogy ... suppose Earl Woods had waited until Tiger was 21 to take him to a golf course ... how good a golfer do you think Tiger would (wood?) be today?

Take a look at all the best human athletes in every sport ... when did they start to play and how frequently did they play? Right ... they started when they were kids ... and they played until their mothers came to drag them home.

Can you understand that? An earlier start in the sport ... earlier training and earlier conditioning and frequent participation ... makes an athlete BETTER able to sustain a long career ... not LESS.

A lot of people are looking at Polytrack as the answer. It will definitly help but people are misguided to believe that the track surface is the main reason that horses are breaking down. Racetrack vets prerace inspections are not what they used to be along with drugs(legal and illegal).

Lots of trainers used the track for a built in excuse every time they broke a horse down. What will their excuse be now when their horses start to break down on polytrack?

They'll think of something ...

... they always have.

That is a great post. You really explained things well.

She usually does ...

... keep your eye out for all her posts ... you'll learn a lot.

Uh didn't Afleet Alex break down during his three year old season? Maybe the training contributed to the injury as opposed to the oppisite view. I mean if his bone density was so strong , why did he break down in the first place? Please dont give me the Preakness arguement because he looked pretty good in the Belmont 3 weeks later.

Light exercise is good for a young horse. Running a 2 year old 10 times is not good.

At the 2 year old sales, they drill the horses as fast as they can go. The good sales are in February, March, and April. If you had ever been to a 2 year old sale, you would know that most of these horses do not come out of these sales very sound. Most of these horses' legs cannot take that kind of stress so early in the year. Horses certainly should not be running hard so early in their 2 year old year. If you guys had any practical experience in the real world at these sales, you would see that an extremely high percentage of these horses come out of these sales with fairly serious ailments. From my experience, I would estimate that with over 80% of these horses, the buyer is forced to give them a rest right after the sale because the horses already have problems.

You and Phalaris remind me of an accountant who looks at the books, but who has no knowledge or understanding about the business. You come to conclusions that are totally the opposite of what is going in reality. You totally misinterpret all the data that you are looking at. If you had any experience in the business, you would see how much different things are than from what you think.

Afleet Alex injured himself during that near fall with Scrappy T in the Preakness. JJ Graci was the spokesman for team AA during his triple crown run. He'll tell you the same thing and he was as close to the connections as anybody. Sure they kept him together enough for the Belmont but the damage had already been done.

The only thing you will learn is a little bit about horses' records from 40 years ago. You won't learn anything about racing today.

I can tell you just from reading many of Phalaris' posts that she does not bet on horses. If she does, then she is a $2 bettor. She would go broke betting on horses because she has no understanding of most of the simplest concepts such as how much time horses need between races and this type of thing.

If you guys think you know so much, then why aren't you making big bets?

That is exactly right. We don't know whether the injury came from the Preakness incident or not.

What do you mean "If it turns out that good horses run just as well on 2-3 weeks rest?" We know that they don't. Maybe they did 40 years ago but they don't today. You act like they still don't know the answer as to whether good horses run just as well on short rest. We know they don't. Any good trainer will tell you this. They're not guessing. It's not just a hypothesis. They see their horses every day. As I said in an eariler post, any good trainer can see the effects of their training on their horses. If every time you start galloping a horse 2 miles a day as oppose to 1 1/2 miles a day, the horse starts losing weight, it's obvious that the extra exercise is amking the horse lose weight. Most of this stuff is not rocket science. A good trainer will notice even subtle changes in their horses.

There have been times that Todd Pletcher has said, "I hate to bring the horse back in 3 weeks. I wish I had more time." Why do you think he says this? Do you think he's just guessing that 3 weeks isn't enough time? He knows from experience.

Your contention that sometimes leaders don't take the optimal approach is not applicable here. Trainers have tried both methods. This isn't multiple choice either. There are two choices here: 2-3 weeks off vs 4-5 weeks off. They've tried both a million times. They can see what works better.

Well Rupert, do you think his training regimen helped cause or bring on the injury, because I think that it helped him in terms of it made his bone stronger However, if you present a different POV, I will listen to you and consider what you say. Or were you just referring to the fact that we will never know for sure that his injury came from the Preakness, or from the Belmont, or from a workout? Now, I know this is true.

Lesson #1 - Dont believe what you read, especially if it is about horseracing.

Lesson #2 - Think for yourself. If they knew the horse had a stress fracture and ran him in the Belmont anyway, then they are dangerous. Just like the rest of us they speculate that it happened in the Preakness but he sure looked good running 1 1/2 miles 3 weeks later.

Sorry, prudery. I mistook you for someone else. You should have known that I knew that Man O' War raced before the thirties, and that I meant the teens, 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s. I just went a little bit earlier...that's all. I could have easily used Seabiscuit, Kayak...etc. You didn't have to point out the fact that it wasn't a credible post because I failed to add the teens and 20s or earlier in. Everyone knew what I meant.

In light of the second part, I know that Rupert knows more than a lot of this board in this subject area from listening to him talk about it and from your posts as well. He knows more than I do too, don't feel bad. You didn't have to take the cheap shot at me by calling me embarassing.

What makes you think it helped him ? Because they said it did? What do you think they are going to say? They may well have thought it would help but the results speak for themselves.

No, he could have easily taken a mistep while training and the two best veterinarians said that he had some of the strongest bone that they had ever seen. It also could have been a stress fracture from continuing to work after he was exhausted from a grueling TC campaign. I don't know what happened to Alex. I do think that his training helped Alex get through the TC races though prior to his breakdown.

Well, I train show horses, not racehorses, and I know that working them the right way certainly helps keep them fit and sound. The results can't speak for themselves by using one horse...they just can't. That would be like saying that Barbaro's breakdown was caused by the fact that they layed him off for five weeks before the Derby, which is probably not the case.

I really don't know what effect that strange galloping regimen had on him. I will tell you that I think he would have definitely won the BC juvenille if they didn't run him so many times. He was awesome in his first 4 races. In his 5th and 6th races of his 2 year old year, he didn't look like the same horse. If they would have spaced his races properly and made the BC Juvenille his 4th race of the year, I don't think he would have had any problem beating Wilko in the BC Juvenille.

I'm guessing that he was hurting by the time he got to the BC Juvenille. In addition, they waited awfully long before bring him back as a 3 year old. He didn't come back until Mach. I wonder if this was by choice. It probably was not. He probably had some type of injury and was not ready to run until March. I didn't like the way they brought him back on only two weeks rest after he won his first race back.

I just don't like the way they handled the horse. As I said before, if they only ran him 4 times as a two year old, I think he would have won the BC Juvenille. Not only that, but I think he would have come out of his 2 year old year unscathed and he would have probably been ready to go sooner as a 3 year old. Then they could have put him on a normal schedule instead of starting so late and having everything so rushed.

This is the same question that I asked all of last year. People kept talking about how Ritchey was doing all of this unconventional stuff and that is why Alex thrived so much and did so well. They praised him for being so in tune with exactly what the horse wanted and needed...........and the horse didn't make it past July of his 3yo season. So what did he do that was so right? I'm not saying he did things wrong, although I did think it was stupid to be working that fast and that far off of a layoff. But what did he do that was so special? And if it worked so well, why did the horse still break down? And as Cannon Shell pointed out, IF they knew that the damage had been done in the Preakness and yet they still pushed him to the Belmont, then all that talk about them "doing what's best for the horse" was just BS. Which I thought it was all along anyway. Those were new owners and they were doing what was best for them, from pushing to the Belmont to announcing over and over again that they were planning on running later in the year and the next, even though I'm sure they had it already decided that he was done. Jeremy Rose pretty much admitted as much after one of those bullet workouts when he said that Alex felt stronger than before the injury and was ready to go but the insurance company said no. That was the whole thing that irritated me last year when people kept talking about how Cash is King was to be commended for doing the right thing. They did nothing but make a bad situation worse.

I have no wish to fight with you or debate that which I disagree with and that includes some of Rupert's theories ... I did not call you embarassing, I referred to some of your statements . You spoke of three eras, and then gave as an example a horse that did not run in those eras . I am sorry, but you do not know if everybody knew what you meant, and more importantly, your statement as written implies incorrectly that MOW did run within those eras . Your writing is sometimes misleading . I cannot comprehend who you mistook me for as I am an infrequent poster and you surely do NOT know me . Why should I feel bad because you think Rupert knows more that you or I, in your opinion ?? That is your opinion. Everyone has the right to at least one .