Best 2 year old ever POLL!!!
 

On the closing of the "derby futures" pool one, I thought this would be of interest. My vote would have to be Devil's Bag or Ruffian.

Go back in time and look up Tremont. Citation was a good 2yo as well.

Where does that put stablemate Bewitch?

I really hope no one says Favorite Trick..... Or Vindication

Capote was a pretty damn good 2 year old

we need to put an asterisk next to his HOY! Are you kidding me???

Bid or Ruffian...stack of track records all over the place. Raise a Native would have to be in the discussion.

I'll be the guy who brings up Secretariat... how could you question him in any way?

I think Arazi might be in the discussion. Has any other colt been champion 2yo in both Europe and North America?
He won three G1 races in Europe that year (along with a G2 & and a G3) and then came over here and ran the most impressive BC Juvy race ever. I don't know if he is #1, but he was a good one.

I would consider Grand Canyon's win in the '89 Hollywood Futurity, the best singular performance by a 2-year-old.

I saw a race of Bold Forbes on tape that was pretty stunning as well.

His win in the BC Juvenile was more a function of a strong rail bias. His true abilities were shown in his 3YO season.

As for the best, I'd go with Devils Bag.

there was a 2yo colt owned by claiborne that ran in the mid 80s in socal, he went by the name of swear.

he was awesome to watch, and i believe he won each of his 3 starts by 7. he died though before turning 3.

grand canyon is another really good one, though a tad inconsistent.

landaluce is another. she has to be included.

as for favorite trick, he wasnt even the best 2yo to set foot on the track that crop!

some early season 2yos that probably would be counted if they had been stopped on earlier would be dehere, officer and MTR.

Why would anyone bring up Favorite Trick? He didn't do much. Let me list a few of his accomplishments. Lots of two year olds have had similar success.

1. Undefeated in eight starts, including seven straight stakes.

2. Earned $1,231,998.

3. Won Grade 1 stakes in New York and California.

4. Won the Breeders Cup Juvenile, G1, in the fastest time in the history of the race.

5. Co-leader in total number of 1997 North American graded stakes wins through Breeders Cup XIV.

6. Won at 4 1/2, 5, 5 1/2, 6, 6 1/2, 7, and twice at 8 1/2 furlongs.

7. Won by an average of 3 1/2 lengths per race.

8. Won at four racetracks, on both coasts and in the mid-west.

9. Won on tracks labeled fast, good and muddy.

10. Defeated the winners of the Futurity Stakes G1, Champagne Stakes G1, Norfolk Stakes G2, Cowdin Stakes G2, Arlington-Washington Futurity G2, Hollywood Juvenile Championship G3, Del Mar Futurity G2, Sapling Stakes G3, Nashua Stakes G3 and the Kentucky Cup Juvenile G3, and everyone by at least three lengths.

11. Gave weight winning both the Bashford Manor Stakes G3 and the Saratoga Special G2.

12.Was favored in seven of his eight starts at odds no higher than 7 to 5.

13. Was "clear or "ridden out" in each of his last six starts.

14. Ran a sub-45 half-mile fraction in the Saratoga Special G2 on a muddy track assigned a variant of 19 by Daily Racing Form.

I've seen that all before.........

http://www.chef-de-race.com/articles...ck_for_hoy.htm

Favorite Trick being named Horse of the Year as a 2-year-old, over the strongest group of older males to race in the decade of the 90's, was pure lunacy.

He wasn't 1/10th the horse that the letter made him out to be.

He beat some terrible horses in his many 2yo stake wins--the 2nd place finisher to him in the Breeders Cup Juvenile was a Canadian turf horse named Dawson's Legacy...that wasn't much at all. The horse who finished 3rd in the Breeders Cup Juvenile, behind Favorite Trick, was a horse named Nationalore. He ran 26 times in his career, and never even broke his maiden!

Who said anything about Horse of the Year? I thought this thread was about two year old years? You can say he beat bad horse all you want. Is it the horses fault who lines up against him in the starting gate? ( Coronado's Quest, Cape Town and Grand Slam were a few of the horse he beat.) How many horses go 8 for 8 in a year, with 7 of the 8 being stakes?

Who cares who finished second and third in the Breeders Cup. If long shots come in behind the winner that somehow diminishes the winner? He ran the race in record time which still stands today and up until last year he had the largest margin of victory.

He wasn't the best, but DEHERE played a huge role in getting me excited about horse racing. I saw all of his Spa races.

Colin should probably appear in this thread..

Johannesburg was a champ on both sides as well, I believe. Azari was better. His Juvenile win was unreal.!

I agree Arazi needs to be on the list...who can forget that move he made iin the BC...

To actually have a prominent 2 yr old actually running 8 races only 10 years ago I think alone puts Favorite Trick on this list...talk about a throwback!!!!

He was a superb, superb 2 year old...end of story.

favorite trick hands down... this is amazing some of you are saying dont name him, as a 2 yr old he peeked and he beats any of these other horses that are being named, just take a good look at Ironhorse's post.

Citation won 28 of his first 30 starts, all but one of which took place during his 2- and 3YO seasons. One of those defeats came in the Chesapeake Trial, a six-furlong prep that was run five days before the Chesapeake in mid-April 1948. It was Arcaro's first ride on the horse and, so goes the story, he did not want to beat the heck out of the horse to win a six-furlong prep race. History tends to treat this as an astonishing upset, forgetting that the winner of the race had a demonstrated affinity for this track, having set a world record winning a stakes race there at 2. The other time Citation was defeated in this span of time came in the 1947 Washington Futurity, a race won by stablemate Bewitch.

It was a blanket 1-2-3 Calumet finish and Bewitch, who was undefeated and winning her eighth straight (and sixth stakes), was considered the stable star 2YO. Citation, at that point, had run in only one stakes event.

Jimmy Jones is supposed to said (years after the fact), "We kind of figured our horses could take the first three places, so we told the riders before the race we'd split the fees three ways between them and whoever was in front should be allowed to win it without anybody whipping anybody to death."

Naturally, all three riders said that their horse could've won easily.

favorite tricks record as a 2 yr old will never be matched... this post says best 2 yr old. so if its best 2 yr old it has to be him, 2 yr olds these days see the track 5 times tops, thats the good 2 yr olds, most trainers point to the derby, if you see a real good 2 yr old run more then 5 times as a juvenile its rare.

i would like for you to explain to me how favorite trick is "hands down" better than Colin. Colin went undefeated as a 2yo with 11 stakes wins. my guess is that you know absolutley nothing about Colin so i would suggest using caution before declaring anyone hands down the best.
your later claim that favorite trick's record will never be matched is equally useless, considering he did not match colin's accomplishments. the thread asked for best 2yo EVER.....not best 2yo in the last 5 minutes. get some historical perspective son.

ok well i will post only for what i have seen ... i dont have any clue about colin. im 21, i have been going to the track since i was 8 so i will only discuss the last 13 years

smart move.

i missed the fact that kasept had already brought this colt up. as i stated earlier, he would get my vote. given the number of stakes races that he won, the fact that he was undefeated, and the fact that he squared off against another very talented juvy named Fair Play multiple times......i think he belongs at the top of any list.

There are any number of horses who won more races, and beat demonstrably better horses in the process, as 2YOs. If you have only been in the sport for a few years, Favorite Trick's campaign stands out - rather like a dim star against a black sky. If you had ever seen a starry night, you'd know that Favorite Trick's accomplishments appear more ordinary in comparison.

The trends you're talking about are not very old and there are plenty of us on this board (who are not fossils) who remember when it was perfectly ordinary for high-class stakes 2YOs to run much more than they do in the 21st century. There are other 2YO champions of the 1990s who ran seven or eight times; that was common in the 1980s and par for the course (or even considered a light campaign) for many decades before that. The pendulum could swing again.

Phalaris -
Do you have more information on Barbizon?

Also, the crop of 1958 with First Landing and Intenionally was that overall pretty outstanding?

Spectacular Bid's only competion was the clocker's watch, which he stopped in record time over and over again.

Nic,

She has more information on EVERYTHING... Probably the best informed source anywhere...

And '57 was THE crop. Best ever...

Isn't she amazing?!

I'm glad to see you say that. I found just about every one of Phalaris's posts at ESPN to be interesting and well-written. Even when being provocative, she was able to put forth her ideas logically, without raising the volume level of a discussion. I hope she posts here more often.

--Dunbar

Favorite Trick showed that the horse makes the pedigree. Not the pedigree makes the horse. Unlike Big Red, this horse was small, and a speed ball. Had to have more guts to keep the ball rolling. Only Native Dancer had a better record winning 9 of 9 as a juvenile . Since they can never compete, who knows who is better.

Records are only records. Even though Trick amazed many, he was no Big red

who knows who is better between native dancer and favorite trick? well.......me for one. the answer is native dancer.

Only 50 years between them
:)

"pwp"
 

I'm sure "Phalaris" will not mind some expansion on her identity, as anyone can go to her website (http://www.phalarisproject.com) and see who she is instantly...

Paula Welch Prather is one of the industry's top historical authorities.. period. Her work keeping the American Racing Manual going for DRF is a vitally important contribution to the recording of the game's history, as are so many of her projects and contributions... It's a real pleasure to have her here and contributing when she has time...

Her Bio:

Driven by a desire to be involved in the racing industry, Paula Welch Prather began her career at the Phoenix office of the Daily Racing Form. Starting as a copy editor in 1993, she became the Special Projects Editor in 1996 and served as the de facto librarian and researcher for the venerable publication. Instrumental in producing the Graded Stakes Yearbook from 1995 through 1998, she created the over 16,000 running lines that would appear in the 2000 DRF Press book Champions, a project that was five years in the making.

Paula stayed behind in her home town of Phoenix when the DRF moved to New York, but in late 2003, an opportunity arose for her to join forces once again with the Daily Racing Form to serve as editor of the American Racing Manual. She still proudly serves as the editor of that annual publication.

Paula has served as the US correspondent for the New Zealand Bloodhorse since 1999 and is serving the same role for its new sister publication, the Irish Bloodhorse, which began publication in late 2005. She began helping with the compilation of the bi-monthly magazine of the Arizona Thoroughbred Breeders Association in 2002.

Outside of the racing industry, Paula worked for five years at the Phoenix office of Ticketmaster, where she served in a variety of roles including client services and quality assurance. Given an opportunity to return to an equine publication in 2005, she joined the staff of the Scottsdale, Arizona-based Saddlebred magazine The National Horseman in the role of traffic coordinator.

In the spring of 2006, Paula and her husband, Barry, moved to New Mexico, a relocation which offered more physical accommodation for the library and an opportunity to be available for full-time work in the racing industry.

A December 1992 graduate of the Race Track Industry Program at the University of Arizona in Tucson, Paula is a member of Gamma Sigma Delta, the honor society of the college of agriculture. Prior to transferring to the University of Arizona in order to take part in the RTIP, she completed three years of work in journalism at Arizona State University.

If you have a list that doesn't have Native Dancer in the top 2 of all time great 2 year olds then you need to familiarize your self with the Grey Ghost.

I said top 2 because he may not have been the best but he certainly shouldn't be worse than 2nd.

Agreed