Palace Malice
 

After his unlikely impression of Groovy with the blinkers in the Kentucky Derby ... you have to give him some credit (and the closers in the Belmont Stakes much fault) for living out the distance and winning.

Palace Malice, despite racing wide the entire way around the first turn, was 1.5 lengths off of a 1:10.95 opening six furlong clocking.

Of course, the (correct) rule of thumb is that one second equals six lengths. So, Palace Malice ran his opening six furlongs in 1:11.20 to the hundredth.

You have to go all the way back to the great Bold Forbes in 1976, in order to find a horse who ran 1:11.20 or faster in the first six furlongs, while winning the Belmont Stakes.

One must also note, that Bold Forbes 1:11.20 was a rounded down approximation time, and could have been anything from 1:11.20 through 1:11.39 seconds.

It's very likely that Palace Malice ran the fastest opening six furlongs of any Belmont Stakes winner since Secretariat in 1973.

One can say that the closers were up against a speed biased track, just as they did the year Jazil won the Belmont from last-to-first.

However, Jazil got one hell of a setup when he swept past Haskell hero Bluegrass Cat...but he didn't get a setup quite like this year.

If anyone is curious how Belmont closers aided by a setup have performed in subsequent races, it's beyond brutal. I posted it a week or two ago.

As 3-year-olds mature and develop, they will carry their speed further. The weights come down from 126lbs. The field sizes reduce. Trainers become less willing to try and stretch-out a horse who figures poorly suited for the distance. Things get harder for those who are tactical speed deficient.

Divisional races start looking more and more like the Preakness, and less and less like the kind of sensational pace meltdowns the Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes were.

And tell me all you want about how 'The Belmont wasn't a true pace meltdown because the closers weren't successful' ... from a fractional standpoint ... in the realm of Belmont Stakes past, it was an all-time pace meltdown.

moving forward of Orb, Palice Malice, and Oxbow which one would you think will be the most successful?

I don't like Orb at all moving forward.

He was a media darling and a horse beloved by a lot of horsemen ... but I think that level of praise had a lot to do with the new Gulfstream Park's phony reputation as an inside-speed track.

His uninspiring Florida figures were explained away as though he was beating some powerful track bias at Gulfstream. The "closers can't run good figures at Gulfstream" stuff is all nonsense. Ron The Greek ran a 115 Beyer at GP this year. Hymn Book's only career Graded Stakes win came with a wide sweeping move in the Grade 1 Donn Handicap of 2012. Giant Oak won the 2011 Donn.

Who is the least accomplished Derby favorite in recent memory? Probably Dialed In, who beat Shackleford last to first in the Fla Derby, and won the Holy Bull in a race where Mucho Macho Man was the inside speed and faded to 4th.

Who is the least accomplished Belmont favorite in recent memory? Ice Box was a 9/5 favorite in the Belmont Stakes...off a wide sweeping Fla Derby win, and a huge pace setup but troubled KY Derby 2nd.

Gulfstream only has a reputation as an inside track -- because the inside post positions are great in routes due to the very short run into the 1st turn. I've seen more dead rails at GP than your average dirt track. But, it's a 9f track, and outside posts are at a great disadvantage in two-turn routes...so, somehow, that gets translated to mean "rail favoring" to some people.

Gulfstream only has a reputation as a speed track because people are still stuck decades in the past, when the old GP was, at times, very speed favoring. Generally speaking, it's no more speed favoring than your average dirt track.

Easy Goer was an all-time great horse. It's ridiculous that a horse need only win a few races at Gulfstream with moderate figures, and outfinish Golden Soul home in the Kentucky Derby in order for flattering comparisons to him to emerge by the Associated Press.

Was looking at that 104 for Orb in Derby, might be a little high of a guess in hindsight?

On the Beyer scale, Derby pace figure would have been in the 140's. Hard to live that pace. The two who best did...were Oxbow and Palace Malice. Goldencents got beat 50 lengths and was in a tight photo finish with Orb for 4th place next out.

In their defense (well, not quite) it wasn't misjudging Orb and Gulfstream so much as lazy journalism. They went 'Oh the connections are the same as Easy Goer? It's like my story's writing itself!' In many cases I don't think they bothered to go much deeper than that. In the ones who did, I think it was less that they thought Orb was like Easy Goer than they just wanted it to be true so badly.

I bristled when some of them, like Marcus Hersch, would say 'Shug's best 3-year-old since Easy Goer'

At least they didn't give into the preposterous Easy Goer comparisons, but Coronado's Quest would have had a field day with Orb in a fairly run race.

Imagine Coronado's Quest having Merit Man's trip in the Florida Derby, instead of finishing 3rd beaten 5 lengths like Merit Man was in the Florida Derby, Coronado's Quest might have won the Florida Derby over Orb by 15 lengths, and probably geared down.

Splendid performance by Merit Man in the Woody Stephens, by the way, he was 11th beaten 27 lengths at 12/1.

This is like the nicest thing you've ever said about the little guy. :{>:

What are your thoughts on the race Normandy Invasion ran in the Derby. I would think he should be a big player later this year.

Adding blinkers for the Derby will have go down has one of the biggest blunders ever, Imo.

That's an incredibly ridiculous statement.

You are right, it was overstated. A great trainer would not have made that change going into the biggest race of they year.

Not to Defend Todd, but. . . The horse hadn't exactly been setting the world on fire prior to the Derby. . . he had a tendency to switch back to his wrong lead late and I'm sure it seemed like a logical fix. If he was coming off a big win and was going in as the favorite I guess I could understand calling it a blunder, but how was trying something new with a 23-1 shot who hadn't before proven he could be competitive a mistake?

He won an eyesore of a Belmont and now we want to act like he would have won the Triple Crown or something if only he hadn't been wearing blinkers in the Derby? I'll be very surprised if Palace Malice wins another race this year unless they put him on turf, which I doubt will be happening any time soon.

I agree. He will be.

You're underestimating his performance.

3-year-olds sometimes get very good without much warning this time of year.

War Emblem (speed) was freaking terrible until he got to Sportsman Park and ran those two huge races at Sportsmans before the Derby.

Charismatic (stalker) was a complete joke before he jumped up and won the Lexington with a performance that came out of left field.

Summer Bird (mid-pack) ran sneaky well in the Derby, but was an N1X that jumped way up this time of year and took over his division.

Mine That Bird (closer) made a dramatic form reversal throughout the triple crown series.

They don't always sustain that level of performance, and it's easy to make dismissive statements because Pletcher trains and his horses rarely improve through a campaign ... but the Palace Malice who ran in the Belmont is a completely different, and much improved, animal than the one earlier in the year.