6/27: BEL (P4); PrM (P4); MTH-PHA-WO Stakes

[blackthroatedwind]

You do realize we have left a lot of turf races ON that most, if not all, tracks, would not have?

Taking races off the turf costs us a fortune and does a disservice to everyone from the horsemen, the owners, and the customers. We have struggled to do the best we possibly can under unbelievably difficult circumstances.

[the_fat_man]

This is what I realize and hopefully someone else will see it the same way.

I've been playing the horses and, thus, BEL/AQU/SAR, since the early '70's. I've never seen it this bad at BEL. Not only in terms of all the races coming off but in the quality of the races. Do you realize that on any given day CD, MTH, HOL, AP, WO, etc. have better quality turf races than NYRA? NYRA's basically recycling the same old tired horses -- claimers and NY BREDS.

Moreover, NYRA has the luxury of TWO, count them, TWO turf courses to work with. Is ruining the spring/summer BEL turf meet worth SAVING BOTH COURSES? Can't we come up with something a bit more creative?

Why is it that when I'm over at Prospect Park the grass there is never as bad as I'm led to believe the BEL courses are when it rains? Better drainage at the park?

I've seen tracks beat up their courses to shreds just to put on some turf races. There's a 6 week break when they're up at SAR; you can grow a lot of grass in 6 weeks.

Just run the ****in races. Get creative with the rails. Give people who handicap the night before a break. And let the 6 weeks fix whatever damage was done.

And this is just the view of someone who only plays BEL peripherally. I can only imagine what the horsemen must be thinking: they get a ton of hassling and money is taken out of their pockets on top of that.

[parsixfarms]

Originally Posted by the_fat_man

I've been playing the horses and, thus, BEL/AQU/SAR, since the early '70's. I've never seen it this bad at BEL. Not only in terms of all the races coming off but in the quality of the races. Do you realize that on any given day CD, MTH, HOL, AP, WO, etc. have better quality turf races than NYRA? NYRA's basically recycling the same old tired horses -- claimers and NY BREDS.

And this is just the view of someone who only plays BEL peripherally. I can only imagine what the horsemen must be thinking: they get a ton of hassling and money is taken out of their pockets on top of that.

Living up in Saratoga (where it's also been raining on and off for the better part of June), I can't comment on the weather from first hand experience, but from what I hear from our trainers, it just seems that the weather downstate has not been conducive to drying the turf courses. I'm sure a few sunny, 90 degree days will do that, if they ever come. Until it happens, we all have to do the best we can, and I speak as someone trying to get a horse on the turf (but I'm not looking to run him over a boggy course for his first start on turf). Actually, as BTW said above, there have been a few times where we were looking for a race to come off the turf, and it was surprisingly kept on given the relative softness of the course.

As for the quality of racing at this spring's Belmont meet, I think everyone realizes that it is less than what it was a few years ago, but to simply blame NYRA for it is silly. The deterioration of the racing product in NY is a symptom of a number of other factors (including state government's inability to get a slot operation up and running, the competition for horses from other states, and the proliferation of large stables that have taken many of their "B" team horses to venues like Monmouth, Delaware and the like [where they are allowance types instead of claimers in NY]). If you follow the condition book, the racing office is writing the same types of allowance races that they have for years; they simply don't fill, and that's a function of some of the factors discussed above. The types of races that you bemoan are typically "extras" when the book races don't go.

That's not to say that there aren't some "new" programs that the racing office has adopted that have not worked out. For example, the overnight stakes that they are constantly carding seem to be cannibalizing the allowance races. Look at the overnight stakes race that served as Friday's feature. It was a glorified allowance race, as most of those fillies were eligible for NW1X and NW2X allowance conditions. Now, they aren't available for the allowance races that the racing office is trying to fill, which becomes a vicious cycle. And it is even worse, as occurred on several occasions at Saratoga last year, when they ran overnight stakes with almost identical conditions to a graded stakes virtually on top of the graded race (the Jim Dandy, Test, and Lake Placid are three that come to mind immediately), taking horses from those races.

Another misstep, IMO, has been the change to drawing cards three racing days out. Sure, handicappers can get the PPs in their hands early, but when some cards are drawn five days out (for example, today they drew Thursday's card), they are even more at the mercy of the weather than ever. In the past, when cards were drawn 48 hours in advance, if the weather looked particularly ominous, they'd adjust the card (turning turf races to dirt races in advance), so that it would not be decimated with scratches. The current system, given the unpredictability of long-range weather forecasts, doesn't lend itself the sort of improvisation described above, and when bad weather strikes (as we have seen this month), the result is somewhat predictable.

[the_fat_man]

Originally Posted by parsixfarms

Living up in Saratoga (where it's also been raining on and off for the better part of June), I can't comment on the weather from first hand experience, but from what I hear from our trainers, it just seems that the weather downstate has not been conducive to drying the turf courses. I'm sure a few sunny, 90 degree days will do that, if they ever come. Until it happens, we all have to do the best we can, and I speak as someone trying to get a horse on the turf (but I'm not looking to run him over a boggy course for his first start on turf). Actually, as BTW said above, there have been a few times where we were looking for a race to come off the turf, and it was surprisingly kept on given the relative softness of the course.

Let me try to make this as simple as possible. I've been to my local park when the grass there has been flooded by too much rain. This is something that's evident. Not only is the grass wet but you can't even walk on it without your feet sinking into the mud. Walk through one of these areas and you need a month to clean off the mud from your sneakers.

I've been to the Prospect Park and some smaller parks in my area during this period. I've run over the grass; I've cycled over the grass. NO PROBLEMA. In fact, while there have certainly been a good number of day where portions of the paved areas in Prospect Park have been so wet you couldn't cycle over them, there's never been a day when I couldn't walk and run freely over the grass. Why are the BEL turf courses so saturated with water? Why won't they absorb and dry like normal grass does? Why is the BEL turf SOFT when MTH is FIRM? Something indigenous to the Elmont region?

This is all BS. It's ****in grass, they're horses and they've been running over wet grass and dirt throughout their history. NYRA just needs to let them run on it and stop making an issue out of the trivial.

At this rate anyone with turf horses in NY will just start shipping to MTH, DEL, PHA, and elsewhere, like Henning, McLaughlin, Tagg, Pletcher, Contessa, and others are already doing. Then it becomes an issue of why they really need to be in NY.

[blackthroatedwind]

Comparing the grass courses to Prospect Park is a big smile. Thanks, it's been a long day, I needed the laugh.

You can't be this crazy......can you?

[the_fat_man]

Originally Posted by blackthroatedwind

Comparing the grass courses to Prospect Park is a big smile. Thanks, it's been a long day, I needed the laugh.

You can't be this crazy......can you?

Really? Why does the grass at BEL take so much longer to dry than just about anywhere else in the world? It's not tropical there. Elmont isn't in the Amazon. The area is not a swamp.

But that's what NYRA would have us believe and I guess, you think, that everyone needs to just buy that BS.

[pmacdaddy]

The rain storm before they cancelled yesterday was intense. Reminded me of Ghostbusters. Kids were wading in puddles on the way out.

That isolated storm had to have set things back dramatically.

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by the_fat_man

Really? Why does the grass at BEL take so much longer to dry than just about anywhere else in the world? It's not tropical there. Elmont isn't in the Amazon. The area is not a swamp.

But that's what NYRA would have us believe and I guess, you think, that everyone needs to just buy that BS.

If you think NYRA likes taking off your crazy its killing them. NYRA is now being run by people who know they have to make money, you think they want 40% of the turf races off? Anyway I agree that they should TRY to be a bit less careful and run at least one on each course.I guess we just dont comprehend the situation well enough.. It really is in everyones best interest to leave them on so when they take off I guess it reallly is necessary???

[parsixfarms]

Originally Posted by the_fat_man

Why are the BEL turf courses so saturated with water? Why won't they absorb and dry like normal grass does? Why is the BEL turf SOFT when MTH is FIRM? Something indigenous to the Elmont region?

This is all BS. It's ****in grass, they're horses and they've been running over wet grass and dirt throughout their history. NYRA just needs to let them run on it and stop making an issue out of the trivial.

I'm not an agronomist and I haven't walked the Belmont turf courses. I don't believe it's any secret think that the turf courses at Belmont and Saratoga probably don't drain as well as NYRA would like and would be priorities for NYRA if it had funds for significant capital improvements for their tracks. Given its past financial difficulties, the problems with the turf courses can probably best be chalked up to the problems associated with deferred maintenance.

As for the issue as to why they aren't using the courses, it's in NYRA's financial interest to use the courses as much as possible when safe. Just compare the pick-4 handle this week ($494K) to last week's ($250K), when the races came off and NYRA had to pay over $100K on the pic-4 guarantee. I don't understand why you can't seem to grasp that these are long meets and constant use of the courses puts a strain on them. A few years ago at Saratoga (2006), they beat the sh** out of the course, and by the end of the meet, there were so many holes on the courses that they weren't safe (and they had to cancel turf races even though the weather was dry). If these were short meets or they had a single course with multiple paths, like Gulfstream or Colonial, they might not have to take as many races off the turf. But they don't, and we have to accept it, for now.

[chucklestheclown]

Blackthroatedwind, you need to fix this ASAP. It is a disgrace.

[Gander]

They moved Separatist up because he tried moving through an opening that wasnt there. Western Connection did come slightly over but was clearly in front of Separatist when he did and that happens all the time in horse racing, especially in turf racing. Look at the move Dame Ellen was making on Friday when she got the path she was going to take blocked. Would that have been grounds for a DQ had the horse that been in her way (I think it was La Rocca) finished in front of her? If they are going to move up every horse who tries to go through an opening thats not there and DQ a horse that moves slightly over, you better not even think of celebrating a win until the race becomes official.