Ride on Normandy Invasion

[Rupert Pupkin]

Originally Posted by Calzone Lord

It's very simple ... the further back you're positioned the better.

Orb was 18.75 lengths back after a half mile, and he, like everyone else, was still too close to the pace.

Had Rosario gone into the race with the plan to allow Orb to drop out of the field early and try to lose contact with the entire pack, it would have resulted in a better performance from Orb and he would have won with greater authority.

The problem is, NO ONE expected a pace anywhere close to that. The insanely fast pace was unexpected.

The last sloppy track was 2010, and Rosario allowed the pathetic longshot Make Music For Me to lag 28 lengths off of the early pace. He's in a purple box in this picture: He ultimately made a big wide move on the far turn and finished 4th



The horse in the red box was Ice Box... he was 24 lengths back after a half mile and was "FLYING" late to finish 2nd despite running into lots of traffic.

Here is the rest of Ice Box's career ...

Belmont Stakes: 9th beaten 11 lengths as the 9/5 post time favorite.

Haskell Stakes: 6th beaten 7 lengths in a field of just seven.

Travers: 8th beaten 7 lengths at 7/1 odds.

Monmouth Cup: 5th beaten 7 lengths at 9/2 odds in field of 6

Allowance Race: 3rd at 7/2 odds

Woodward: 6th at 11/1 odds

Jockey Club Gold Cup: 7th and last at 10/1 odds

Breeders Cup Classic: 8th at 30/1 odds.


The Mine That Bird tactics of dropping out of the pack early ...



would have been genius this year.

But that's in hindsight. No one could have predicted that pace...and if you're going to purposefully try and lose early contact with the field, you better be damn sure that the psychotic pace actually materializes.

A good jockey doesn't need to predict the pace. A good jockey will position his horse based on how the pace unfolds. Of course a jockey will usually have a general game plan going into a race, but a good jockey will change the game plan as the race unfolds. Rosario didn't plan on being 18 lengths behind. He was probably expecting the half to go in :47 and he probably planned on being 5-6 lengths back. But once the race started and he could see there was a suicide pace, he dropped much further back, as any good jockey would do in that situation.