Excuses
 

A popular belief is that SS is lucky to always get the perfect trip, If this happened one or two times, mabe this would be true. Isnt it strange the good colts get the perfet trip. This happens with SS every race. Yje perfect trip in his last two was there for almost all of the runners. Even stranger that SS is the one that gets it.Lets quit downgrading his races with the perfect trip notation. The quality of the horse makes the perfect trip posoble and a quality ride knowing your horses ability makes the perfect trip.. Im a big Curlin fan but its getting old the down grading of SS performance because of the perfect trip. This horse trainer , jockey combo is so good that he makes the trip because of the quality of the horse.

I couldn't agree more.

I couldn't disagree more

I'm stuck in the middle.

ridiculous comment

Even you would have to admit his quick acceleration plays a big part in getting good trips.

It's not a question of downgrading Street Sense, per se, because he gets perfect trips, but when you objectively analyze races you have to take into account trips. The bottom line is that things have worked out extraordinarily well for Street Sense in a number of his races. Now, part of this is because he is a closer, but not a plodder, so he has the ability to put himself into races and not necessarily become victimized by slow paces. This sets him apart from, say, a horse like Dynever, who had no natural speed, and was thus constantly victimized. Thus Street Sense can sit six to eight lengths off the lead if the pace isn't as acute as it has been in these previous two races, and still close effectively. However, his trips in both the Derby and Preakness have been picture perfect, both because the paces were strong, and because he was able to navigate smoothly through the field. Some of this is because he is a handy horse who seems comfortable inside of horses, while many are not, but there is no denying that he has been the fortunate recipiant of unusually friendly circumstances.

The bottom line is that this won't always be the case and until Street Sense overcomes a mediocre trip, such as Curlin did in this Preakness, he still has something to prove. At least to objective observers that is.

Yes, DrugS is denying that Street Sense's inate talent, which he can't admit is greater than he believed, makes it much easier for him to get these advantageous trips than the average middle to deep closer.

He's a very good horse. That's the bottom line. But, as much as I like him, I would like to see him perform well under adversity. Though, in many ways he did this in the Keeneland Breeder's Futurity. Now I would love to see it at a higher level.

dynever, now thats a name that i thought was long gone, in more ways then one

He was a very talented horse who was a victim of being a plodder. I used him as an example.

I could have used Giacomo....but I thought I would use an actual good horse.

It is. I think the Arabs changed it. Also long gone were all the horses he was trying to pass in the stretch. Well, at least one per race.

At least the two of you were able to extract the important aspects of my post. And, most incredibly, one of you didn't include his usual massive grammatical and spelling errors.

Don't recall the new owners changing Dynever's name. And he passed a few in the DWC as I recall.

Street Sense should have won the Preakness. If Borel doesn't look back and spends that fraction of a second going to his left hand instead of turning his head, I believe he wins. He certainly did the horse no favors the last 50 yards and a left hand was in order given his move back to the rail habit.

Not to sound shallow, but winning the BC Juvenille,the Kentucky Derby and coming in second in the Preakness sort of goes a long way towards proving himself.

You really should have used Giacomo, 3/4ths of the board dont even remember who Dynever was.

Thanks you for making up for your prior lack of poor grammar.

saying that a horse still has something to prove to some observers, is not the same thing as saying that the horse hasn't proved a lot already.

you are right, he has proved himself to a large extent, more than most of his class.

But BTW is also right I think, based on the trips he has had there is more to prove. I don't think he was at all denigrating what the horse has accomplished.

I believe I once said somewhere that Street Sense would very likely have been capable of running a sub 21 quarter at a 2-year-old in training sale if trained to do so. Obviously a horse like Curlin couldn't do that.

SS rated nicely, just a head or a neck off of something like a 21.62 first quarter in his maiden win going 6.5 furlongs.

If anyone remembers Arazi, who blew a lead going 4.5 or 5 furlongs in his debut---they'd take him way back in the early stages of his dirt races, and he had one of those explosive, hard-to-sustain move as well.

your welcome, I don't want to get an undeserved reputation.

Arazi, to me is the greatest horse of all time, but for personal reasons.