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#1
12-10-2009, 02:18 PM
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NT 
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#4
12-10-2009, 05:11 PM
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 He broke a 22+ year old record held by Spectacular Bid for fastest Ragozin figure ever run in his first Cigar Mile win. People thought of him as a sprinter/miler ... but look at the three ten furlong races on his form. Beyers of 116, 116, and 115. A win in the Hollywood Gold Cup trouncing Harlan's Holiday. A near miss 2nd to a two time Big Cap winner in a race where he carried 5lbs more. Pleasantly Perfect was 4th in that race - and would win the BC Classic at the same track and distance later in the year. The other 10f race being a 4th by 2.5 lengths in the Breeders Cup Classic - a race where he hooked Medaglia D' Oro the whole way... and both absolutely ran their eyes out. Not showing on that cut ... is Congaree's 3rd place finish in the Kentucky Derby. IMO, it was clearly the decade's best losing effort by any horse in the Kentucky Derby. That race was absolutley loaded with unbelievable quality speed horses.. and Congaree was the only thing close to that pace who survived. He toyed with Monarchos in his prior start in the Wood .. but he might have been more impressive than Monarchos in defeat in the Derby than he was in easy victory over him in the Wood. Not to knock Invasor ... but he was not a fast horse - only one time did he ever run a figure faster than 113. He beat laughable competition for the most part until the Classic. I think just about every respectable trip handicapper I know thinks Bernardini ran clearly the better race in the BC Classic .. and Bernardini is only rated 4th on the 3yo list.
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#6
12-10-2009, 06:43 PM
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People often forget that Congaree's Wood win was both his stakes debut and just his 4th lifetime start. The 2001 Wood Memorial was also THE ONLY two-turn dirt race on the entire card at AQU that day. That basically made it a nightmare race for figures makers. It's bad enough to only have one race to work with .. it's worse when that one race consists of a fairly small field of developing 3-year-olds. It makes something very easy to do into a total guessing game. In Congaree's prior start, he won an N1X alw race at SA going just 1/5th slower than the mighty Point Given went on the same card and distance. *Congaree wins the Wood by 2.75 lengths and is given a 108 Beyer. His Beyer jumps to a 109 in the Kentucky Derby when he's the lone survivor of a vicious pace and runs a mind bogglingly good race. * Monarchos runs 2nd beaten 2.75 lengths in the Wood and gets a 103 Beyer. In his prior start to the Wood .. he won the Florida Derby by 4.5 lengths overcoming a huge 6 wide turn move at inside friendly GP and gets a 105 Beyer despite the trip. Next out, he easily wins the KY Derby and gets a 116 Beyer after a dream pace setup. * Richly Blendid runs 3rd beaten 10 lengths in the Wood and gets a 92 Beyer. In his previous start he won a Grade 3 stake with a 101 Beyer. In his next start after the Wood he won a Grade 3 with a 97 Beyer. * It's So Simple runs 4th beaten 14 lengths and gets a 85. In his two prior starts to the Wood, he ran a 87 and 95. In his two starts after the Wood, he runs a 91 and 103. * Voodoo runs 5th beaten 15 lengths and gets a 83. In his prior start he ran a 91 - in his first start after the Wood he cut-back to 6fs and ran a 108 Beyer. * Paging ran 6th and last beaten more than 40 lengths and got a 36 Beyer. He ran a 88 in his prior start when 3rd in the Tampa Derby. He ran a 73 and 85 in his next two after the Wood. Basically....to make a long story short... the '01 Wood figure was a VERY bad guess by a figure maker who was put in a very tricky situation. The 108 was absolutely laughable in hindsight ... it should obviously be 5 to 8 points higher. I would assume the figure maker got so conservative because Congaree was a very lightly raced horse that's stretching out to 9fs and trying stakes company for the first time. It takes real guts to slap a 115 next to a 3yo stakes debuter when you have a very shaky variant.
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#7
12-10-2009, 07:17 PM
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Congaree wasn't good enough to overcome the 125/1 I got him for in the Derby future book right after he broke his maiden.
Awesome horse though. His derby was one of the most impressive losing performances I remember ever seeing. I think Macho Uno was a much better horse than most people realize too. He seemed to have some mental issues, but I seem to remember that his trainer was insanely cold for about 2-3 years and finally got fired for not being able to win anything with a lot of nice stock.
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#8
12-10-2009, 11:38 PM
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__________________
please use generalizations and non-truths when arguing your side, thank you
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#9
12-11-2009, 01:31 AM
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Yeah, I was expecting a bit more from Congaree as a sire. Usually horses with his running style and quality are great sire candidates.
Much like his own sire!!
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