BBC: Study favors Racehorse Nurture over Nature

[miraja2]

Originally Posted by sumitas

An eternal ponderance in horse racing. How good is this young horse ? Personally, I recall a profound post by Round Pond, I believe. He's from Florida and he firmly believes turning a horse out as a weanling is decidedley in the best interest of the horse and his potential as a racer. I personally subscribe to that. My weanling is stabled and pastured to develop as a young horse should until he is a yearling. I am proud to afford him the opportunity to develop stress free in the rolling hills and expansive pastures of upstate NY.

Pastures of polytrack I presume?

[Cannon Shell]

This study is a joke. To think that someone actually wasted money on this rubbish is scary. So if Pletcher took his horses and changed stables with a guy at River Downs he would be 90% as sucessful because of the care given and his jockeys.

[Riot]

I read what the study said a little differently - simply that there is no direct correlation between cost of horse and performance. Which isn't earth-shattering news I agree with the "waste of money" part.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

I read what the study said a little differently - simply that there is no direct correlation between cost of horse and performance. Which isn't earth-shattering news I agree with the "waste of money" part.

There most certainly is

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

There most certainly is

I'm thinking cost in more of a Seattle Dancer-Green Monkey vs the other high end progeny kind of way. The "excessive" money, which the study didn't throw out in their calculations.

All they did was compare stud fees to progeny winnings. They found those horses with the highest stud fee didn't necessarily have the progeny with the most earnings. That's not a surprise!

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

I'm thinking cost in more of a Seattle Dancer-Green Monkey vs the other high end progeny kind of way. The "excessive" money, which the study didn't throw out in their calculations.

All they did was compare stud fees to progeny winnings. They found those horses with the highest stud fee didn't necessarily have the progeny with the most earnings. That's not a surprise!

That is also not true. There are so many factors that they did not consider. It is a bunch of junk.

[Cannon Shell]

The study used 4000 horses starting in 1922. What 4000 out of the hundreds of thousands bred in the UK since 1922 did they use?